Words of Command (Hervey 12) (Matthew Hervey)

by Allan Mallinson

  And having given his opinion so decidedly, and the princess replying that she could only hope he was right, ‘for otherwise it will be to remove the wisest of counsels from the Concert of Europe’, he passed to a summary of what he’d learned at that morning’s council. ‘There have been inscriptions on the walls in the lesser streets for some weeks – “Down with Van Maanen … Death to the Dutch” – but these have now begun to appear in streets closer to the Place Royale, and leaflets were found last night.’

  He handed her one: Le 23 Août, Feu d’Artifice; le 24 Août, Anniversaire du Roi; le 25 Août, Révolution!

  The princess seemed unmoved. ‘And what do the authorities make of this?’

  ‘There was some dismay this morning, and I think for the first time. Kuyff, the policeman, was particularly concerned, and thought it best to cancel the fireworks and the illumination for the king’s birthday. Baron van der Fosse agreed, but the decision will be taken only on the twenty-second, after the king has arrived, and on account of unfavourable weather.’

  The princess raised her eyebrows. ‘And do we take it that it is not because of the superior divinings of weather available to the authorities that they are able to say it shall be wet four days hence? This present rain has the nature of a passing shower.’

  ‘I should have said ostensibly on account of the weather.’

  ‘Ostensibly?’

  ‘Angeblich.’

  ‘Ach, so.’

  ‘It does seem a risky venture, ma’am. In three days’ time it may very well be dry, in which case …’

  ‘Quite. But the king is still to come.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘Well, if he is to see the exhibition, which he must, the authorities will not wish to close that, and nor the theatres. I hope not, for I have taken a box at the Opera on the twenty-fifth.’

  ‘Nothing was said about closing the theatres, ma’am.’

  ‘Good. And you are invited, Colonel, and four of your officers, for I have taken an adjacent box, and afterwards shall give a supper party.’

  The opera: Hervey tried hard to sound appreciative (he’d been to too many to be diverted by the prospect). ‘I thank you, ma’am. Might I enquire which is the opera?’

  She bowed, suggesting his enquiry was very proper. ‘Masaniello.’

  Hervey frowned a little. ‘It is not one with which I am acquainted.’

  ‘Masaniello, ou la Muette de Portici.’

  He shook his head.

  ‘No, nor I, for it is new … by Monsieur Auber. And Nourrit is to sing.’

  Hervey had heard of neither Auber nor Nourrit, but thought it ungracious to admit it (and he had no wish to appear der Philister). ‘Ah.’

  ‘I say it is new; it was new but two years ago, though it has not been performed since. But it is thought most highly of.’

  ‘Then I look forward to hearing it, ma’am. Do you know what is its subject? Who is Masaniello, and this stumme Italienerin?’

  ‘Ah, of that I do know – and you too, I would think. Tommaso Aniello led a rebellion against the Spanish in Naples, two centuries ago. La muette is his sister. She has been ill used by the son of the Spanish viceroy, though I am uncertain if this is true, or whether a … Verfeinerung? – ’

  ‘Refinement … elaboration.’

  ‘Ja – an elaboration of the librettist’s.’

  Hervey had never supposed that what he saw on stage – especially if sung – bore much relation to reality; it was, after all, for the entertainment of the paying public. ‘I fancy a play in Brussels about a revolt against a foreign occupier would see a full house?’

  ‘Indeed so,’ said the princess, solemnly. ‘And because it has been proscribed in the Netherlands since it was first performed in Paris – and is only lately allowed.’

  ‘Better, perhaps, that people have the opportunity to weep into their handkerchiefs than paint on walls. But, la muette – if she is dumb – she can hardly have much to sing, can she?’

  The princess frowned. ‘You do not make fun of me, do you, Colonel?’

  Hervey smiled. ‘No, ma’am, I do not! The enquiry is most genuine, if perhaps – I admit it – lacking in understanding of these things.’

  ‘Du bist ein schlicht Dragoner?’ she teased.

  Schlicht – simple; what a cover for sins …

  ‘I simply do my duty – yes, ma’am.’

  The princess smiled, as if to say she’d had her satisfaction.

  ‘Well, Colonel, I may tell you that the part of the muette is taken by a dancer, who will be Mademoiselle Noblet of the Ballet de l’Opéra de Paris.’

  Hervey confessed himself in awe of her knowledge, and doubly enlivened by the prospect, for he’d never before seen a dancer of the Ballet de l’Opéra – indeed, of any ballet.

  She smiled again. ‘I am pleased therefore to be an agent of Aufklärung, Colonel.’

  Hervey nodded, for it was a clever pun: a Saxon dragoon would say Aufklärung to describe his efforts to find the enemy, and a Heidelberg philosopher for ‘Enlightenment’. What a colonel-in-chief the regiment had got themselves: the look to turn any head, and then to engage the cleverest of them.

  They talked of the arrangements for the king’s visit, and where she would ride in the procession, and other matters of business, so that it was a full hour later that he took his leave, saying he would call at the same time tomorrow after Baron van der Fosse’s next council. He wished perhaps that she’d asked him to stay and lunch, for he’d come to enjoy their safe and easy intimacy, and he’d not yet had occasion to speak of his sister and new brother-in-law. Except that her colonelcy was not made for his enjoyment. He must remind himself, he knew full well, that the princess was freundlich, nicht freundin … friendly, not a friend.

  Amsel showed him out, now muttering about ‘der alte Feind’ (the old enemy).

  The rest of the day he spent with Malet, for papers had arrived from Hounslow and there were matters needing prompt attention. A headline in the Dublin press on proceedings against Tyrwhitt in the Court of Common Pleas was first to command his attention: A man might have a wife in each of the three kingdoms although polygamy be not permitted. It was the sort of clever remark to be expected of an Irish journalist, he supposed, as were the ironic references to ‘the 6th Light Dragoons, a regiment which flatters itself as one in which good breeding is the first requisite of an officer’. The report was altogether unedifying.

  ‘I regret having to show it you first, Colonel.’

  ‘It makes no matter, I suppose, first or last – except perhaps you’ll leave me with a bon mouche?’

  ‘There are some letters of appreciation, yes.’ Malet picked up one of the sealed papers he’d placed on one side. ‘But these are marked for your personal attention.’

  ‘Open them if you would; I’ve no objection.’

  The first bore the stamp of the regimental agents. Malet broke the seal and read.

  ‘’Pon my word, we’re delivered, Colonel. Tyrwhitt’s made application for the half-pay … It seems he applied in May.’

  Hervey said nothing for the moment. A letter from Tyrwhitt personally would have been the customary courtesy.

  ‘Greenwood says it’ll be gazetted on 15 September.’

  Hervey nodded. ‘Then we’re excessively fortunate.’

  Indeed he was, for much that Mordaunt held the reins with increasing sureness, the tribulations of its captain could not but have their corrosive effect on the pride (and therefore discipline) of his troop. Now he would be able to let Mordaunt take proper command; if, that is, the lieutenant had the means to ‘pay the difference’ – buy the captaincy; and he wondered if he might make an exceptional case to the Horse Guards, that in effect Mordaunt succeeded to command ‘in the field’, as if ‘by death’. And yet Malet was by seniority entitled to the purchase …

  Malet opened the next letter.

  ‘From the Board of Ordnance … begging to inform you that the half-yearly returns were found satisfactory.�
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  ‘Mm …’

  Then Hervey recollected himself – ‘Tyrwhitt’s captaincy: you are Mordaunt’s senior – I trust you’d be content to pay the difference?’

  ‘On the same terms as F Troop, Colonel – titular?’

  ‘No, I could hardly ask that. To take proper command.’ It would be disagreeable in the extreme to lose an adjutant who understood his mind so well, but …

  Malet looked thoughtful. ‘Colonel, I’m greatly obliged to you. May I have a day or so to think on it?’

  Hervey was happily surprised by the hesitation, though he didn’t suppose further reflection would lead Malet to turn down the offer. He most certainly had the means.

  ‘You may have as much time as you will.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Perhaps, though, we should make it our intention meanwhile to determine who’s to be sar’nt-major. I fear the time has come.’

  ‘I await your instructions, Colonel.’

  ‘Mm … I must ask Mr Rennie for his decided opinion. I only hesitate to do so in case I must contradict him.’

  Malet smiled.

  ‘And you’ve had no reports whatever of there being any falling off in Collins’s standing these past months – no increase in indiscipline and the like?’

  ‘None whatsoever, Colonel.’

  ‘No, he appears to me only to have risen in stature. What a most curious business was Kennett’s retreat.’

  ‘Curious indeed, Colonel.’

  ‘Weeks he’d had to ponder on his judgement, yet without showing the faintest glimmer of doubt – remorse – that Collins might have been acting in good faith, and therefore to ruin an NCO of his seniority and service over something that could not with certainty be established … contrary to natural justice.’

  ‘Certainly no argument of mine could convince him.’

  ‘And then, just as you are in the very act of framing the charges, and Collins under notice for arraignment, he writes from London saying he felt no longer that he could offer evidence – as if he were no longer able to attend a ball or some such.’

  ‘Quite. Though I understand he’d felt indisposed for some days.’

  Hervey was reassured that Kat’s stratagem – in truth his stratagem, subtly adapted – was evidently not common knowledge. ‘And then – how Fortune bestows her favours on the unworthy – he’s appointed to General Gifford’s staff.’

  And the devil of it, he was certain, having now seen the actual papers, was that Kennett must have written withdrawing his accusations before Gifford could make the offer – before Kat’s artifice could have had its effect. Before, indeed, she might even have been able to speak with Gifford. What, therefore, had induced Kennett to change his mind (he was sure it was not conscience)? But it was perilous on several accounts to make enquiry – especially merely to satisfy curiosity. And the Lord rooted them out of their land in anger, and in wrath, and in great indignation, and cast them into another land: had the subalterns themselves rooted out Kennett?

  There were times – even if in public he always maintained the opposite – that it were better the lieutenant-colonel did not know certain things: The secret things belong unto the Lord our God. For to know – and to know therefore that others knew – meant that action must be taken.

  Meanwhile he had an infinitely more important choice to make – Collins or Armstrong (and perhaps even a new adjutant). But more immediately was the king’s visit – and those handbills: Le 23 Août, Feu d’Artifice; le 24 Août, Anniversaire du Roi; le 25 Août, Révolution!

  In the event the visit of the king passed off quietly – even well. Not only were there no affronts to his dignity, let alone any violent disturbance, William – ‘Wilhelm’, ‘Willem’, ‘Guillaume’, or however the varied citizens of Brussels wished to call him – accompanied by both sons, was cheered on his progress to the exhibition. It was the greatest pity, said Baron van der Fosse, when the council met on the twenty-third, that the king had allowed himself to take fright of shadows, cancel the fireworks and illuminations, and hurry back to The Hague to mark his birthday there and not in Brussels. A longer stay in the capital of the southern provinces could only have strengthened the ties with those of the north.

  And yet shadows there undoubtedly were. In fact in the days that followed they multiplied – the slogans on the walls, the handbills, the intemperate articles in the press, the public meetings, the jeering of officials and troops … At the meeting on the twenty-fifth the baron said he couldn’t reconcile it with the spirit he’d observed during the royal progress, and urged further precaution. General Bylandt said that he’d issued orders for his men not to show themselves in public places for the time being, and General Wauthier that he’d withdrawn the guards at the various palaces and state offices to within their walls. General Aberson informed them that he’d doubled the strength of the gendarmerie patrols, and Mynheer Kuyff that his spies were giving him troubling but contradictory reports: there were labourers come into Brussels from the country in want of work, and these were receiving doles to keep them in the city to add numbers to the demonstrations being planned for the opportune moment. Why the king’s visit had passed so quietly he was uncertain, but there was no doubting the disaffection. ‘I put it down to last year’s harvest being all but exhausted, and this year’s promising even worse.’ The baron asked what was to be done about the opera that evening: would it be an occasion for speeches and declarations? To which Mynheer Kuyff replied that he had men in the audience who would give the names of any who took such liberties, and they would be arrested the following morning. General Aberson said that his gendarmes would be present as usual, and that he saw no more reason to close the theatre than there had been to cancel the fireworks and illuminations, ‘Otherwise we shall for ever be at the mercy of la foule.’

  Hervey told them that he and four of his officers were to attend the opera with the Princess Augusta, at which General Aberson became uneasy. She had not asked for any special measures to be taken regarding her safety, he said. Hervey explained that it was of the nature of a private visit, and as there was no guard upon her villa – nor on that of any other foreign dignitary that he was aware of – she had probably not seen it necessary to ask the authorities for such measures. She would, in any case, have the services of five officers of her own regiment.

  ‘Do you intend going in uniform, armed, Colonel?’ asked Aberson.

  ‘I dislike going about in uniform unarmed, General,’ replied Hervey, in as conciliatory a manner as he could. ‘A sword to an officer is as his hat or gloves, as you yourself will own.’

  ‘It has the merit of being recognizable, I suppose,’ agreed Aberson.

  But the baron looked troubled. ‘It would be unedifying if she were recognized and subject to insult. Can you not persuade her to stay her attendance, Colonel?’

  Hervey raised his eyebrows, as if to say that some things were beyond his powers – or his better judgement. ‘Yours would be a more persuasive voice, sir.’

  But the governor of Brabant evidently thought not. ‘I … I think that on balance it is better to make no interference with Her Highness’s plans.’

  The meeting closed with an air of distinct uneasiness. The threat to the peace was construed from a perceived atmosphere rather than any solid evidence of intent. The precautionary measures therefore seemed feeble. Hervey decided he would put his own barracks on alert that night, and double the picket. As for the opera, it sounded as though things might be lively, and enjoyable for once therefore. Except that there was the dignity of his colonel-in-chief to take account of.

  Le Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie was a building in the classical style, raised but a dozen years in the middle of a newly made square where once the royal mint had stood, whence its name. It had been Bonaparte’s idea to build something altogether grander than he’d found, but there had been other calls on the public purse, and it was not until the union with the northern provinces that work began.

  He
rvey, his three troop leaders and the adjutant, with Serjeant Acton, stood on the steps of the Monnaie’s vast portico admiring its eight soaring Ionic columns, the very expression of permanence. The sun had set and the lamps in the square made a pretty picture. All about them, the buzz of opera-goers promised that here, this evening, would be a performance of distinction, the steady procession of carriages bringing more and yet more of the qualité of Brussels to this most ‘French’ of the city’s institutions.

  ‘There is evidently no other place to be this night,’ said Hervey, finding that even putting his back against a column gave no refuge from the jostling. Before the first performance of Messiah, in Dublin, the posters had begged ‘Gentlemen are particularly requested not to wear swords’ and that ladies should appear ‘without Hoops, as it will greatly increase the Charity by making room for more company.’ Hoops, he knew, were not quite la mode – not, at least, those of Herr Handel’s day – but he trusted the princess would not choose them this evening. He’d certainly not considered leaving behind his sword, despite the doubts.

  A little while later, the arrival timed fashionably, for the performance was not long due to start, her carriage hove into the square. There were no outriders, but two footmen in evening livery stood between the springs.

  Hervey and his party, still with some difficulty even as the curtain bells began ringing, moved to the foot of the steps to welcome her.

  An appreciative knot of onlookers applauded as she alighted. Her cloak – cream silk, edged in pink – was very full, and her hair was gathered up in a Grecian plume. She gave her hand to each of the officers (and the countess, dressed not dissimilarly but without plume, likewise), and then with effortless grace the footmen began leading the party to the boxes, the press of people parting like the sea before Moses.

  There was champagne waiting, and they toasted the King’s health.

  In a few minutes they were called to attention by applause for the conductor, and boisterous cheering in the pit, and took their seats expectantly. When the overture began, with its dramatic flourish, the cheering erupted again, only subsiding with the ‘Neapolitan’ tune that followed – but resuming with each return of the dramatic theme and its elaboration, so that when the overture came to an end after the better part of ten minutes the greater part of the audience was in a frenzy of cheering, stamping and singing – though with what words Hervey couldn’t fully discern. And it had to be reprised to satisfy the relentless calls of ‘Une autre!’