The Passage to India

by Allan Mallinson

  An empty house was perhaps a wretched thing to return to after such an affair. ‘Take a seat, Annie, and some wine’, he’d wanted to say. It was reasonable enough to want a little company and an ear for what he’d seen and done – and thought, indeed, not all of which he could share with St Alban, even though they were meant to speak freely. But he’d not invited her to sit, let alone take wine with him. For one, it offended against all proper management of an establishment. That alone was enough. And yet in these peculiar circumstances it might not bring the collapse of social order. The truth, he knew, was that it courted graver sin. Annie was unread, unfinished, but she had the looks and simple refinement that was not associated as a rule with the class from which the nation’s soldiery was drawn. As so often before at this hour, there was nothing now he wished for but companionship – the companionship of the pillow, the willing embrace, a few hours’ consolation, and warmth on waking.

  The struggle was not to be underestimated. He might be able to put from his mind that her brother had gone for a soldier, and that any impropriety would therefore be a sin not only against God’s law but probably King’s Regulations too. And as for adultery, how might any reasonable man – how might God, indeed – suppose he had a wife in any sense but that understood by the law of the land?

  No; what kept him from improper companionship was simply that he did not wish to … spoil her. In that, of course, he made an assumption; so many girls in service were spoiled. With Annie, though, he felt sure. There were many things for which he would one day have to answer, but he would not add to that shameful list the spoiling of a simple and honest girl. And that resolution, indeed, was a powerful restorative to his self-respect.

  So that evening – the early hours indeed – as many a time before, she’d stood before him listening attentively, and asked him questions – good questions – until he no longer felt able to speak to her on these terms, and so thanked her handsomely for her consideration in waiting on him, and said that he would himself douse the fires and draw the bolts, and that she should now retire and sleep, and that he would not rise before nine, and trusted there would be hands to bring him plenty of hot water in the morning. And Annie in her turn had thanked him for his consideration in telling her all that had happened in Bristol, and that she hoped all would now be well – and that she would go and run the warming pan through his bed once more, for it had been several hours since she’d done so first.

  Then with her customary bob and looking him surely in the eye, she said with winning cheerfulness, ‘Good night, sir.’

  ‘Good night, Annie,’ he replied, fixing himself in his chair with the remains of the brandy until he felt able to extinguish the fires, draw the bolts and go to his warmed bed.

  He dressed next morning without the attention of Corporal Johnson. At first he’d thought to put on a plain coat, for he intended going to London in the afternoon to seek out Lord Hill, or if he were not at office, the Military Secretary, FitzRoy Somerset. Last night as he lay in bed, he’d had a premonition of confusion at the Horse Guards as letters arrived from the various ‘parties’. In his experience it required fine judgement in order not to appear anxious to account for one’s actions; but being forced to fight on ground not of one’s choosing by waiting to be asked to give account was equally perilous, however much it might appear to reflect confidence.

  In the end he’d put on undress. In the circumstances he thought it best to appear unequivocally ‘on business’ at the Horse Guards, and during the short drive to Hounslow had resolved on his course of action.

  St Alban was waiting for him at orderly room; Armstrong and the chief clerk too.

  ‘Would you have a fair copy made, please,’ he said, handing the adjutant the report he’d spent from six o’clock till eight writing. ‘I intend delivering it to the Horse Guards today, by hand.’

  The chief clerk took it for his best copyist to begin on at once. ‘What business is there?’ he then asked as he sat ready at his desk and nodded to the question of coffee.

  ‘Principally defaulters, Colonel,’ said St Alban, handing him a sheet of paper. ‘Rather a dispiriting number, I’m afraid. And too many sick as well.’

  Hervey studied the list while one of the ‘sable twins’, as the regiment affectionately knew them – Abdel or Hassan (he was never entirely certain which, even with the supposedly distinguishing feather in the turban) – poured coffee from a silver pot. He’d made few changes to the room that Lord Holderness had bequeathed him. The prints of Wolfe at Quebec and Clive at Plassey, in their deep, gilded frames, still commanded the walls. The fine damask curtains that Lady Holderness had had put up in place of the heavy green velvet still hung smartly. The two gilt armchairs and sofa, silk-covered in blue and gold stripes, had not shifted an inch in the twenty-two months that the room had been his. In the fine Adam fireplace, with its eagle victrix moulding, coals burned cheerily, as they had on the first morning of his occupancy. Indeed, the sole additions to the elegant taste of his predecessor – or more particularly, to that of his lady – were a silver inkstand, the present of the grateful ambassadress of the Emperor of All Russia for his mission in the Levant, and instead of the looking-glass over the fire-place, a likeness of the colonel-in-chief.

  By custom at first orderly room of the day, the adjutant and serjeant-major stood. The parade was merely to report the ‘states’ – the numbers at duty, the numbers sick or absent (with and without leave), and the incidents since watch-setting the night before. But usually it was at ten o’clock, and there was comparatively little to report. With several days out of barracks, however, there was rather more on the adjutant’s memorandum.

  ‘Please sit, gentlemen,’ he said, beckoning Abdel (or Hassan – he knew they switched feathers for mischief) to bring cups. ‘I’ll say nothing of the past days, save that I’m excessively obliged, as ever, for your service, and that I have commended you in my despatch to the Horse Guards.’

  ‘Colonel,’ said St Alban simply, and for both of them (Armstrong liked to remain formal whenever there were other eyes). Thanks were by no means rare, even if they were unnecessary, but, like an order, they required nothing more than acknowledgement.

  Abdel’s return with two cups saved any further awkwardness.

  Hervey looked at the list again. ‘Defaulters,’ he began, with a sigh; ‘It will not have escaped your attention that the list has been growing these past six months – not merely in number but in kind. Drink, quite evidently, is at the root of much of it … But Stokes – a bad business indeed. What is the supposition there?’

  ‘He was taken by the police in a street near by the crime, Colonel,’ said Armstrong, ‘at the back of the Banqueting House. The body wasn’t yet cold. Serjeant Bain, who was called to vouch for ’im, says there wasn’t a drop of drink on his breath.’

  ‘A common prostitute, was she, or did he know her?’

  ‘Bain says she wasn’t unknown to ’is troop, Colonel.’

  ‘Mm.’

  ‘I shall go an’ see ’im, Colonel, as soon as the guard’s changed at Windsor.’

  Hervey nodded. ‘Stokes is the feather-weight man, sandy hair, is he not?’

  ‘He is, Colonel. Not a bad dragoon as a rule.’

  ‘Well, we shall see what we shall see. And what is there to say about Corporal Owthwaite?’

  ‘I’m sorely disappointed with ’im, Colonel. I gave ’im fair warning last time. He’s the best rough-rider the RM has, but ’e just can’t turn away from a pretty face and ’e can’t see where these things lead – and on ’is pay.’

  ‘Well, he’s certainly going to have less of it in future. Pay, I mean.’

  ‘Yes, and ’e knows it, and ’e’s asking already if ’e can go to an Indian regiment.’

  ‘Owthwaite’s a rogue – don’t we know – but a man to take on a tiger hunt. I’d be sorry to lose him, but on such a charge I can see no other course than to reduce him to the ranks. No doubt he thinks he’d regain his stripes quick
er in another regiment – and India.’ (The place had a way of making vacancies.)

  ‘I think he’s constitutionally more suited to its ways than ’ere, Colonel.’

  Hervey agreed. Besides the extra pay and every pleasure a fraction the price, when a man had been through the breach at Bhurtpore, galloping between Windsor and Whitehall with a letter or two must be monstrous anticlimax. Little wonder he sought thrills at either end.

  ‘You’ll recollect how he fought that day at Bhurtpore, Sar’nt-Major.’

  They’d never forget Bhurtpore: Kezia’s husband dead before they even got out of the sap, Armstrong as good as when the mine caved in …

  ‘Well I do, Colonel. But that was then, and this is now. Bhurtpore’s no chit to stay out of gaol – with respect.’

  Hervey wasn’t quite sure for whom the respect was meant, but that was by the bye. It was good to be fortified in one’s resolve when it came to cruel necessity – and losing Owthwaite as corporal would be cruel indeed. There’d been some who’d thought that Armstrong didn’t possess the eye for discipline of a regimental serjeant-major – a doubt he himself had had to address. For Armstrong’s own conduct sheet was not without entries, and his ready recourse to summary justice was well known. It was one thing for a serjeant-major of a troop, but with the crown atop the four chevrons it was another matter entirely. But not once had he had a moment’s regret promoting him – and what relief that was, for he could never have borne the fall of the man who had been at his side since his cornet days (and been the last to see Henrietta alive – to die, almost, trying to save her).

  ‘And four dragoons in Hounslow, no less, confined overnight and bailed by the justices; three more in arrest in barracks for insubordination … Seven others variously for making away with necessaries, or drunkenness on duty, or sleeping on post …’

  The discipline of a regiment was the product of a good many variables, but the serjeant-major was its unvarying factor. Nevertheless, Armstrong knew his powers and influence were not unlimited. ‘An’ they’re not all bad’ns, Colonel, though Roache and Eubank could do with a good ’iding.’

  Or rather, something more emasculating, for he knew they’d had several barrack-room strappings.

  ‘I know it,’ Hervey conceded. Indeed it had been troubling him for some months. And they had not yet spoken of the sick list …

  St Alban thought to say something consolatory. ‘I have it from one of the Adjutant-General’s men that one in every five on the Home establishment is confined in a public gaol.’

  Hervey sighed, and drained his cup.

  Armstrong said what he supposed Hervey was thinking: ‘But the point is, Mr St Alban, sir, the Home establishment’s them, an’ we is us.’

  Abdel poured more coffee during the silence.

  Hervey put the memorandum to one side. ‘Very well, let’s be done with it. Orderly room tomorrow at ten, and then defaulters. I leave for the Horse Guards in a quarter of an hour – sooner, if the chief clerk’s finished scribbling.’

  VI

  Post Mortem

  The Horse Guards, later

  ‘LORD MELBOURNE HELD a conference this morning, and Lord Hill was called. There’s to be an inquiry – a military inquiry – assembled with all haste. He’s with the Secretary at War at present.’

  Lord John Howard, lieutenant-colonel of Grenadiers, had in various ranks served an age at the Horse Guards. A succession of commanders-in-chief, including the Duke of Wellington himself, thought him indispensable. He was also an old friend.

  ‘Who’s to be its chairman?’ asked Hervey.

  ‘Dalbiac.’

  He nodded. Major-General Sir Charles Dalbiac was Inspector General of Cavalry – a Peninsula hand, and India too. A better man it would have been hard to find. It was some relief.

  ‘Lord FitzRoy has been asked to nominate four members,’ added Howard.

  Hervey nodded again. It would not matter greatly who they were. With Dalbiac in charge he should have no fear of the outcome. Nevertheless he was anxious that his report was not overlooked at this time. ‘I should like Lord Hill to read it, nevertheless,’ he said, indicating the folio he’d just placed on Howard’s desk.

  ‘He will, I assure you.’

  Which meant that first Howard himself would read it – as Hervey had very well known – and make sure that others would too.

  ‘But the inquiry is most particular in its purpose,’ added Howard, encouragingly; ‘Lord Hill wishes that Colonel Brereton be afforded the fullest opportunity to meet and remove the unpleasant allegations set forth against him. It is only on account of those allegations, largely by the mayor, but also by sundry yeomanry officers, that the inquiry is called. Indeed, were there to have been no allegations there would, I believe, be no inquiry. Matters would proceed straight to law. You didn’t suppose it to be an inquiry into your conduct?’

  ‘Not expressly, no. But any inquiry would have to examine all that transpired. There are, besides, a considerable number of lives and limbs to account for.’

  ‘Quite so, but that is first a matter for the coroner, I imagine.’

  Hervey was content to imagine so too, though he was puzzled to imagine also how the Horse Guards thought that no inquiry would be necessary without the allegations of sundry officials and yeomen. But the Horse Guards had its ways … ‘I suppose it’s to be held in Bristol? There could be no more convenient place. When might it commence, for I suppose I shall be called to give evidence in addition to my deposition?’

  ‘The seventeenth, I think it is,’ replied Howard, looking into his order book. ‘Yes, the seventeenth. Tomorrow fourteen days.’

  ‘Mm.’

  ‘See here; go and take your ease at the United Service and I’ll send word as soon as Lord Hill is returned.’

  Hervey rose. ‘Capital idea. You’ll dine with me this evening, perhaps?’

  ‘I have to attend on his lordship at the French ambassador’s. Come dine at White’s with me tomorrow instead.’

  ‘I thank you, yes. Until later, then. And Howard, would you be so good as to let me know if Lord Hill receives any separate communication from Colonel Brereton?’

  ‘I shall.’

  He left by the little door in the archway and looked in at the Light Horse stables, where all was predictably faultless – which it might have been in any case, but was certainly going to be after Serjeant Wakefield had suddenly appeared – and then walked to the United Service Club across the parade ground of the Horse Guards. It was perhaps a slightly longer route than up Whitehall, but although he liked to see the equestrian statue of King Charles, the works in King William’s Square, a site of demolition yet, were unruly at the best of times. Besides, the Guards had their band beating quick time in the corner, by Downing Street – the Scots, he thought – and a company at drill, and it was ever a pleasure to step out to their music.

  At the United Service there was the usual welcome from the hall porter, and the customary reference to the news or the weather – ‘dreadful news from Bristol’ (to which he would add nothing but ‘Shocking, Dobbs’). In the smoking room it was the same: ‘They need to feel a bit of cold steel, I reckon, Colonel.’

  ‘No doubt, Prichard.’

  ‘There’s cannon on the way, I hears tell, sir.’

  ‘And quickly, I trust. Coffee, please, good and strong.’

  There were but a few others in the room, and none he knew, which he was glad of, for he’d no desire to discuss the news. Instead he would read what he could of it – or rather, read what was written of that which he knew already.

  The Times lay on the bulletins table. He took it up and settled in a tub by one of the windows, full west. It was news two days old – ‘From a Correspondent. BRISTOL, Monday, 4 o’clock p.m.’ – but it might tell him what to expect at the hands of ‘the fourth estate’, powerful and yet contrary as it was.

  He was, though, gratified that it spared no detail of the destruction, for otherwise how could anyone form an impres
sion of the urgent necessity under which the military acted:

  I concluded my dismal narrative to 11 o’clock last night, which, if I recollect right, was incorrect, in so far as the mob did not succeed further than breaking the windows at the White Lion and the Council House. They, up to that time, utterly destroyed by fire the three gaols, Bishop’s palace, bridge toll-houses, and Mansion-house. They had unmolested possession of the city all night.

  Indeed, it pleased him greatly: ‘unmolested possession’ – precisely the state he had found things early that Monday morning …

  After burning the Mansion-house they sacked the next house, then fired it, and so proceeded along that wing of Queen’s-square to the Custom-house; thence to the end of the same wing, including the houses in King-street abutting behind on the same; thence to every house in the west wing, so that the entire of two wings is destroyed, including the Custom-house and Excise-office. The whole, or nearly the whole, of the square belongs to the corporation; there cannot be less than 10,000L. worth of building destroyed altogether in the city; and perhaps other property to a greater extent. I was on the spot the whole night, and it was a truly awful sight, comparable to no other conceivable thing than the infernal regions. The yells of the miscreant incendiaries were dreadful. Most of the inhabitants fled in time, but the loss of life was very great among the deluded victims themselves, who, after drinking all the spirits they could find, were unable to escape the flames in time, and so soon fell in with the floors of the houses. I saw seven persons meet their just, though awful, retribution in this way, in the Custom-house alone. Besides the sacking which took place by the incendiaries, the property stolen by low women and boys was immense. There were no magistrates or constables; or military, seen in or near the scene the whole night; and this is so utterly inexplicable, that I will not attempt to surmise its cause, unless it be that they were panic-struck by this small mob, which, as actors, did not, after 10 o’clock, exceed 150 to 200!