The five that remained suddenly woke. They began again to close, with the same wary walk, half crouching, gesturing with their spears. Armstrong knew he had one more shot before they would rush him, and then there would be four, and Wainwright would have one of them, and he, the non-commissioned officer in charge of Somervile's escort, would have the other three – one with the pistol at his belt, the other two (if they pressed home the attack) with the edge of the sword.
He fired. Another Xhosa fell. He laid down his carbine to draw his sabre, transferring it to his left hand, then took the pistol from his waist belt with his right and cocked the hammer.
At a dozen yards Wainwright's carbine fired. The biggest of the four Xhosa clutched at his chest, stumbled, then fell.
Armstrong levelled his pistol at the middle Xhosa – twice the distance he wanted, but he needed time to transfer the sabre to his right hand. He pulled the trigger, the hammer fell. There was no spark. Nothing.
The Xhosa checked, but seeing there was no more to fear from the pistol, came on, crouching lower, animal-intent.
Armstrong switched pistol for sabre, coolly weighing the blade as he took stock of the new challenge: three Xhosa, three spears – odds he would not have faced willingly.
They edged towards him.
He could see their eyes – murderous as the tiger's. He stayed on one knee.
They checked again.
He sprang – left, well left, to the flank of the right-hand Xhosa, cutting savagely, backhand, tearing open his shoulder. He leapt thence at the furthest before he could turn, slicing deep through the back of his neck. The remaining Xhosa spun round and feinted with his shield. But Armstrong knew the ruse. He dropped to one knee and drove his sabre under the shield into the gut with savage force. Two more points finished off the other two, leaving Armstrong on his feet, heart pounding, surveying the bloody outcome of twenty years' drill and gymnasium.
Somervile could not speak, such was his admiration: Armstrong Agonistes.
II
REGIMENTAL MOURNING St Mary Moorfields, London, 4 July 1828
Sweet, white smoke billowed from the silver thurible as the celebrant censed the altar, the deacon and sub-deacon holding aside his black cope to permit of freer movement, they, too, black-vested, the altar frontal black, also. The incense rose like the chantry orisons of another age, refracting the morning light which, though there was no east window, fell on the sanctuary steps in front of the guidon-draped coffin in a warm, sunny pool that seemed to waitwelcome the soul of the faithful departed. There were no wreaths of flowers, these being (except in the exequies for a child) 'alien to the mind of the Church'. But six candles, of unbleached wax, burned bright and hopeful about the coffin.
The smoke drifted from the sanctuary to the nave, into the nostrils of men who would as a rule have reeled at the prospect of ritual – a foreign practice, a thing of those countries which for centuries had contrived to subvert the demi-paradise. But this morning they stood respectful. Hervey, indeed, breathed the scented smoke deep, as if to pay even fuller regard.
The choir sang the introit, plainsong, as the Sixth had often heard through long years in the Peninsula: Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine. Et lux perpetua luceat eis. Some of the officers joined in the final prayer, if sotto voce, and two or three of the dragoons made the sign of the cross: Requiem aeternam.
The stream of supplication continued: Deus, cui proprium est misereri semper et parcere . . . the celebrant's words at once recognizable, yet of another world. What he – what all the Sixth – did, though, was real enough. They were gathered to commend to the Almighty the soul (indeed, to pray for the soul's release, as the regular worshippers of the Moorfields chapel would have it) of one of the goodliest servants of the regiment, whose death and its terrible consequences he, Hervey, could scarcely yet credit: te supplices exoramus pro anima famulae tuae Catharinae . . . 'We humbly entreat Thee for the soul of Thy handmaiden . . .'
Tears filled his eyes – the incense smoke, perhaps; but, more likely, for the pity of it, and for those consequences.
Major and Acting Lieutenant-Colonel Matthew Hervey had intended only the briefest of calls on the cavalry barracks at Hounslow. While his new wife drove on to London to see her aunt (or, more particularly, to see that her aunt's arrangements for the musical entertainment at which she, Kezia, would sing and play – a benefit concert, but a London début nonetheless – were properly in hand) it was his purpose to speak with the commanding officer of the 6th Light Dragoons on the orders for the recall of the detached troop at the Cape Colony, to which he himself would be returning from his leave of absence in September.
The honeymoon had begun ten days before, in Brighton. Although for Hervey the place held unhappy memories, these were of a dozen years ago and more, and the time had come to lay them to rest. Besides, he knew Brighton and the country thereabout; and his bride had no objection. The town had the merit, too, of some fine houses, with whose occupants Kezia was acquainted, and so there was opportunity for her to practise the pianoforte daily, which, as she had explained to her husband-to-be, she must do, for the entertainment in the Queen's Concert Rooms in Hanover Square was of the utmost importance (the prime minister himself was to attend).
The ten days had not been as they had wished, however; certainly not as Hervey had wished. The glass stood high throughout, and this occasioned Kezia a protracted headache, which her dutiful practice at the pianoforte only served to exacerbate, so that on several evenings she had to take leave of her husband before dinner; and even on those evenings when the headache was not so dispiriting, she had been obliged to retire early. The abandonment of their seaside sojourn was therefore not entirely unwelcome: Kezia would be able to put her mind at rest concerning the arrangements for her music, and for Hervey there was the prospect of an end to headaches.
He kissed his new wife on the cheek, bid her well for the afternoon, said that he would be with her in Hanover Square (where she had lodgings with her aunt) by nine, and got down from the chaise. He watched it pull away, turned to the arched entrance to the barracks, acknowledged the sentry's salute (one of Third Squadron's dragoons, and therefore recognizing his longabsent squadron leader despite his plain clothes), and set off. He walked briskly towards the regimental headquarters beyond the parade-square. He returned several more salutes from NCOs with whom he had long acquaintance, though he was curious as to their rather solemn demeanour in contrast with the customary cheer of that rank. By the time he reached the orderly room he would not have been surprised to hear that the King were dead; except that there was no sign of court mourning.
The adjutant stood as he entered. 'Good morning, Hervey,' he said, with a double measure of surprise.
Hervey smiled at him. 'I know, Malet – appearing at orderly room with but a quarter of the honeymoon spent! The weather at Brighton was inclement. And, you may believe me, I have not the slightest intention of remaining here but an hour.'
The adjutant's brow furrowed. 'You are not come, then, on account of the . . . news?'
'What news?'
Malet swallowed hard. 'Mrs Armstrong.'
Hervey was at once alarmed. 'What—'
'I'm afraid she died yesterday. I sent an express at once.'
Hervey shook his head. 'I did not receive it,' he said, quietly. He sat down. 'How . . . Of what did she die?'
'Poisoning of the blood, I understand. Or rather, I do not understand.
That is what the surgeon reported, having it from the man in Hounslow who attended her. She had had a fall. I do not know any more. It was a very sudden business.'
'The children?' asked Hervey, still shaking his head in disbelief.
'Mrs Lincoln has care of them.'
That at least was no cause for concern: the quartermaster's wife was as capable as might be. But Armstrong himself, his serjeantmajor, dutifully at his post in the Cape Colony . . .
'Lord Hol'ness is visiting with them now.'
'That is u
ncommonly civil of him,' replied Hervey, and with complete sincerity, for whatever were Lord Holderness's weaknesses as commanding officer, they were certainly not of humanity.
'Shall I bring coffee?'
Hervey nodded.
He had known Caithlin Armstrong since before Waterloo. He had known her family, Cork tenants, rack-rented – had stood up for them, indeed, against the magistrate when they faced eviction, setting himself against the military authorities thereby, saved only through the intervention of the young Duke of Devonshire, himself a considerable Cork landowner, at the behest of his, Hervey's, soon-to-be betrothed, Lady Henrietta Lindsay. Caithlin was a scholar of the hedge school. She had good Latin, and he had taught her some Greek. Her marriage to a bruising serjeant, his own serjeant, had come as a surprise to many, but Armstrong had offered her protection, and the rough-hewn decency of his own home and calling, and they had become the best of couples, the parents of . . . four – was it five? – fine children. Hervey had seen the look in Armstrong's eye whenever Caithlin was there – the deepest pride, the most complete adoration, which he supposed he himself had once known, but never could again. He wondered how in God's name he would be able to tell Armstrong of this, how he would be able to see that look of pride and adoration fade, and in its place despair.
Malet came back with a clerk and the orderly-room coffee pot, which was kept permanently hot by a nightlight. Hervey bid the clerk dismiss. The merest nod of the head was all that was necessary in the atmosphere of collective bereavement (Caithlin Armstrong had long run a regimental school, and classes for dragoons who wanted to read and write). He poured a cup for himself, taking neither sugar nor milk. He forced himself to put a hundred and one questions from his mind; in such circumstances it would be easy to become lost in the pity of it all. Two, nevertheless, pressed upon him.
'A fall, Malet: how could such a thing bring about death? Was she unwell?'
The adjutant shook his head. 'Not in the least. She had by all accounts taken a reading class the evening before.'
'Then . . .'
The adjutant sighed, but more with heavy heart than with any impatience at Hervey's incredulity. 'We have seen it ourselves, have we not? A man dead within the day, when all the surgeon does is tend a wound with bandages, while another survives the saw with scarce a fever?'
Hervey nodded, a reluctant acknowledgement of the mysterious ways of God, or of corruption.
There remained his immediate concern. 'What are the arrangements for the funeral? Who has charge of it?'
The adjutant tilted his head. 'The question has vexed me the best part of the morning. The priest from the mission is away for the summer. Serjeant Molloy is devilling about to find what is the form. I confess I know not. I wish there were a chaplain still. Or even that the parson were in his parish instead of. . . wherever it is he's gone.'
Hervey sighed, deeply. The death of a serjeant-major's wife was an unhappy event, but when the widower was half-way round the world, and his late wife's religion strange to all, it became a pitiable thing indeed. 'I think I had better look to the arrangements myself.'
'Are you quite sure?' asked Malet, doubtful but grateful. 'I believe there will be many of every rank who would wish to pay respects; there is a collection already got up in the canteens for the children. But your honeymoon—'
'I will arrange the funeral,' said Hervey decidedly, draining his cup, and rising.
The stamp of the orderly corporal's spurred boots on the wooden floor outside, and 'Good morning, Colonel' announced the return of Lord Holderness, who came into the adjutant's office rather than entering his own directly.
'Ah, Hervey: how glad I am to see you.' The relief was evident not merely in the words themselves. 'I confess I am at a loss to know how to proceed. Come.'
Lord Holderness led him into his office, that which Hervey himself had occupied, albeit in temporary command, for some months the year before. He indicated the leather tub-chair, and sat wearily in the one adjacent.
'I have told Malet that I personally will attend to the arrangements,' said Hervey, sitting perfectly upright.
Lord Holderness looked even more relieved. 'I'd consider it a great favour.'
Hervey shook his head. 'With respect, Colonel, Armstrong is my sar'nt-major, and I've known – I knew – Caithlin Armstrong a good many years.'
'Did you? You will know, therefore, perhaps, how we may inform her people?'
The colonel's solicitousness was heartening (he was, after all, an extract – a man come in from another regiment). But informing Caithlin's people could hardly be by express, reckoned Hervey, and he had no idea who was now in the garrison at Cork, and who therefore might have been able to help.
'I believe it best if we send a cornet, Colonel.'
This was extreme counsel, he knew. Four dragoons, and as many women, had died at Hounslow since January alone, and the practice was that an officer took the ill news, and the lieutenant-colonel's condoling letter, to the family. But to Caithlin's people, in Ireland, beyond the Pale . . .
Lord Holderness smiled, however, if sadly. 'I am glad you are of that opinion, for it is mine too.'
'And one other thing, Colonel,' said Hervey, shifting his feet resolutely. 'Mrs Armstrong should have a regimental funeral. I believe she deserves no less, and that it would be of some consolation to Armstrong. The others, too – the dragoons and NCOs – would want it, I'm sure.'
Lord Holderness nodded: the fifth such funeral in a year – the inescapable business of soldiery.
Hervey now cleared his throat. 'There is, of course, the question of her religion. You would have no objection to . . . to being present at such a service?' He had no idea how his commanding officer had voted in the House of Peers on the various measures for Catholic emancipation; he had certainly not disclosed his views in the mess.
Lord Holderness raised his head, and looked at him frankly. 'I believe a man, or a woman for that matter, has a right to be buried according to the practices of his religion, and that his passing should be mourned with all due respect. I shall instruct that the regiment parades for church on the day, whether a man be Protestant or Catholic.'
Hervey smiled appreciatively. 'Thank you, Colonel.'
Lord Holderness now relaxed visibly. 'Do you happen to know where that church might be?' he asked, nodding his thanks to an orderly who brought in his coffee.
Hervey shook his head. 'I confess I have not yet the slightest idea. I suppose we are not able to have such a service in the parish church here – with a Catholic priest, I mean, not the parson. I think I must seek advice in London. I'll make a beginning at once.'
'And then there is the business of Armstrong. What's to do? He shall have to come back, don't you think – the children, and all?'
Hervey inclined his head. 'He would not expect to, I think. He would not expect to leave his post just to take up with his children. They're in good hands, after all.'
'But even so . . .'
Hervey thought a little more, and then began nodding his head, slowly. In the normal course of events – in war, India, or wherever – these things were misfortunes to be taken, if not quite in one's stride, then with fortitude, in the place they came. For what other way was there? But not now; not when the nation was at peace, when its army was made up of true volunteers. The Sixth did not treat its dragoons heartlessly; it never had. 'Patrician command and the fellowship of the horse': that was the way of the Sixth, was it not?
He breathed deep. 'I should need to replace him, Colonel. It would not serve with Quilter standing in. He's a sound enough serjeant, but he could not manage a troop.' (He would have been content to have Wainwright do duty, but Wainwright was too junior.)
'Then I'll instruct the adjutant to issue the necessary orders.'
Hervey's mind was already decided, however. 'With respect, Colonel, I should like to take Collins.'
Lord Holderness nodded. 'I have no objection. But why Collins?'
'As a rule, Co
lonel, I would not try to favour those I knew best, but Collins, I judge, would serve admirably, and since there is every prospect of trouble with the native tribes before our term at the Cape is up, I should want to be certain of my man.'
'That is reasonable.'
Lord Holderness was indeed a commanding officer whose instincts were reasonable as well as admirable. Hervey did not suppose there was a man in the Sixth who could have complaint against him. Did it matter much that in the exhilaration of manoeuvres, two months ago, a cold immersion in the Thames had induced a fit of epilepsy? (He, Hervey, and the regimental serjeantmajor had arranged things with the utmost discretion, so that few others knew of it.) There would always be someone to gather up the reins, so to speak.Was it not more important that the regiment was content, well found – as undoubtedly it was?
He laid down his coffee cup, and rose. 'Thank you, Colonel. And now if you will permit me, I will make haste to London.'
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