Company Of Spears

‘No doubt I should. So the import of what you are saying is that both Whig and Tory would have an interest in prosecutions against the Catholic Association? I am glad to avoid imputations of party in that case!’ He smiled wryly.

‘Do you have any Catholic friends?’

‘Not since poor Strickland died.’

‘That may be as well.’

‘Great heavens! Don’t say—’

‘I say nothing at all, Hervey. And recollect that it is of complete indifference to me whether a man prays in English or Latin, so long as whoever hears him understands.’

Hervey was never fond of debating religion with Somervile at the best of times, and this morning was far from the best. He leaned forward along his mare’s neck to avoid a low branch; it gave him the opportunity to return to the material subject. ‘And so how do you suppose my submission to the Horse Guards will be received?’

‘Pray you have a friend who keeps it in a drawer!’

Somervile gasped; his cob, chosen by the Cockerells’ groom, supposing kindly but in error that this man of affairs had need of a schoolmaster, was taking a deal of urging up the slope, so that its rider was already short of breath a mile from the house. ‘Great snakes, this screw!’ he spluttered again, finally touching with his whip.

The horse picked up its feet a little, but still it plodded, so that Hervey had to keep checking his own hunter so as not to pull ahead. As for the friend and the drawer, he rather supposed he had no hope there – if holding back the submission was the right course. ‘We may as well let them take it at a trot,’ he sighed, conceding to poor practice rather than continuing the discomposure.

‘If you haven’t a friend at the Horse Guards, then you’d better come to the Cape with me! Have you given it any consideration?’

Hervey thought there was no need to reveal quite how much. ‘I have,’ he said, and with something of a rueful smile. ‘But would I not need a friend at the Horse Guards in that case too? Or do you have plenipotentiary powers in that connection?’

Somervile did not see the tease. ‘Oh, I think such things are easily arranged.’

Hervey was far from sure, but since he had reached no firm conclusion – or rather, he could not do so until he knew the Horse Guards’ pleasure regarding the lieutenant-colonelcy – he was not inclined to argue. And so they continued their ride in a generality of conversation: the present state of legislative turmoil, the Corn Laws, the Greek war and the threats to the peace in His Majesty’s possessions overseas. It was, as Somervile pointed out, and as Hervey sensed only too well, a difficult time for the War Office: it had been one thing calculating the number of men required to see off Bonaparte – every last one who could be found a red coat – and quite another to determine the size of that repugnant thing, a standing army.

‘Soldiers in peace, Hervey,’ Somervile reminded him. ‘They are like chimneys in summer. You had better be done with it and come with me to the Cape!’

* * *

When they were back, and the ladies too, Hervey took a turn about the formal gardens with Emma. The talk was at first inconsequential, until at last Hervey stopped, and cleared his throat.

‘Emma, I believe I should tell you that I intend making Kezia Lankester an offer of marriage.’

Emma looked astonished. She tried hard to recover her countenance nevertheless. ‘Why Matthew, this is so very … sudden.’ She rallied a little. ‘If I say more by way of congratulations it would seem premature—’

‘And tempt fate?’

‘I do not believe in such a danger, as well you know. I meant … well, I had heard that there was an amour in Lisbon.’

Hervey became anxious at what exactly she had heard.

‘A Portuguese lady of noble birth, whom you had first met there some years ago?’

‘Ah.’ His relief was palpable: she did not mean Kat. He lowered his eyes, and cleared his throat again. ‘Isabella Delgado. She is engaged to another.’