Company Of Spears

If this magnificent landing – the sea, the beaches and the green beyond – minded Hervey of his first footing in Madras, he was soon persuaded of the difference. Madras had been all white villas the length of the shoreline (and a bustling shore at that), and a massive stone fortress, with the roofs of fine-looking buildings and the spire of St Mary’s church topping the walls, like a Hanse port. Here in Port Elizabeth there were few signs of comparable civilization. The place had been scarcely more than an empty beach not seven years before. On the heights above the Baakens River was not so much a fortress as a redoubt, wood- and earth-built in 1799 when the British had first taken the country from the Dutch. It was named Fort Frederick in honour of the then commander-in-chief, the late Duke of York, and close by were the Batavian barracks, to Hervey’s eye in no greater state of comfort than the day they had been rudely put up. He understood them to house two companies of the 55th (Westmoreland) Regiment – fretting to be on to India, their original destination, Fairbrother had told him. He could not blame them: in India there would be legions of little brown men who for a few annas would shave a private soldier of a morning, dhobi his linen, attend his uniform, black his boots and pipeclay his equipment. Here there were a few Hottentots who couldn’t be trusted with a sweeping brush. As for women, Hervey saw none to compare with that day when he came ashore in Madras.

On a promontory above the beach there was a stone pyramid. Hervey pointed as he and Fairbrother walked along the landing stage. ‘To a colonial pharo, no doubt!’

Fairbrother looked pained. ‘Do you not know?’

Hervey looked askance. ‘It is of some greater significance, evidently.’

‘Hervey, it is all you need to know of a man.’ Fairbrother said it almost wistfully.

Hervey had unconsciously reassumed his military mask on touching dry land, and bridled somewhat at his companion’s obliqueness. ‘Do stop riddling.’

Fairbrother was not in the least perturbed. He was not under military orders in any significant sense (he could walk away at will), and by now the two had struck up more than a professional friendship; indeed, they had forgone all rank. ‘Hervey, do you know what it is to grieve for a woman?’

Hervey spun round. At that moment he felt the most powerful urge to strike Edward Fairbrother, an urge he had rarely felt other than in close action. The impudent assumption! Henrietta was in truth a saddening memory now, not the agonizing daily presence of the first years, nor even the dull remittent ache of the India sojourn. Yet his grief had driven him from the army, had made him for many months a melancholy companion, had sapped at his confidence and his will, distorted his view of humanity and duty, and ultimately led him to question – in many cases without an answer – so much of what he had once held dear. He knew what it was to grieve for a woman.

‘I believe you have lived too long outside decent society else you would never have presumed.’ He spat the words icily, intending to wound as deep by return.

Fairbrother froze. Then he put both hands to Hervey’s shoulders.

Hervey did not recoil, although it was so alien a gesture.

‘My dear fellow.’ The voice was as warm with sympathy as Hervey’s had been cold with anger. ‘I believe I may indeed have lived for too long outside decent society. And in that case, for it was not principally of my own choosing, I beg you would forgive me. It was a most arrogant presumption, and I am sorry for it. I confess that I am altogether too disposed to it.’

Hervey’s face softened. ‘Then we have more in common than you suppose.’ He turned and continued along the broad wooden walk to the quayside. ‘Hadn’t you better tell me what is the pyramid?’

‘Have you heard of General Donkin?’

‘I saw much of his brigade at Talavera.’

‘He was briefly governor here at the Cape. He had been in India, and his wife – of but a very few years – died there, and he was returning with his young son when he received orders to assume the governorship to allow Lord Charles Somerset to return to England. It was he – not Somerset – who put the frontier on to a proper footing. There were settlers arriving from England, and there were many from my old corps too who were being promised grants of land. He surveyed the whole area. And that pyramid is a memorial to his wife.’

Hervey stopped again. He looked at the monument, then back at the brig, from which flat-bottomed boats were already warping her cargo to the landing stages, and then at his new friend. ‘Her name, I imagine, was Elizabeth?’

Fairbrother nodded.

Hervey found himself vowing he would one day do the same, before recalling himself to his senses. ‘I think we may delay our necessary calls and business here. It is a warm day, and I think I would have you know something. Let us find a quiet spot, and I will tell you of why I spoke so sharp.’