He shivered; the fire was getting low. It was Christmas Day and there was no chaplain, no company whatsoever. He had never spent Christmas Day alone; he found it remarkably discouraging. Were there any but felons confined as he was? None, he felt sure, who wore the King’s uniform. And it was not entirely self-pity. He felt abhorrence at letting himself become a prisoner of the King’s enemies (was enemy not too strong a word for the men who kept him here?). He felt shame, indeed, and he dare not let his thoughts drift to home, to which in any case he had been stranger for so many Christmases.
How did Isabella Delgado spend this day? Warming by a great fire in Belem, in her father’s easy and loyal company; mass at the Jerónimos; a walk in the royal gardens; a drive, perhaps, to Cintra; and dinner in agreeable company? He would have been glad to be with her at any of those diversions. Glad, to be sure, simply to be with her. He shivered again. Lady Katherine Greville – did she spend a good Christmas in Madeira? Would that he could picture it! Would that he were there, too! Did she curse him, now? He had treated her less than gentlemanly, he knew it. But alarm had suddenly seized him in Lisbon, when he feared himself drawn in excessively deep, and it had been all too easy to send her that dismissive letter – what was it, three weeks ago? Now, he half prayed she was thinking it . . . ambiguous. Had she ever intended going to Madeira in the first place, as she told everyone? Or had his coolness driven her there? He would never know, most likely. And he had such need of her capability now.
But what was the purpose of turning over the past, or the question of dissembling, when he would in all likelihood face the discipline of the Horse Guards? He doubted any amount of purchase or patronage could restore a career thereafter. Would it come to that, to court martial? What else could it come to unless he escaped soon? He could wish himself in Belem now, or Madeira, but above all he wished he were in Wiltshire. That was where his true duty lay, was it not? Home – a cold church but a warm hearth. How many times had he heard the Christmas bells in Horningsham? His stomach twisted: only once since joining the Sixth. Yet that season was imprinted on him as if he had never left – perhaps even stronger, for the changes which must have come, year by year, had never troubled him, so that his memory was the sixteen-year-old’s, as perfect as may be. Except that there was now a dependent in that place, a daughter he was neglecting, even when he had his liberty. He could not say truly that he honoured his father and his mother, either, by his long absence. It was not so plain a commandment, perhaps, as the seventh, which he broke with astonishing ease; but break it he did. His condition, in all things, was not one in which he could take any pride.
He opened his Prayer Book with a heavy heart. It was at least something familiar; he would be transported for half an hour, perhaps even contentedly. He began with the day’s lessons, then turned to the appointed psalm, 119 – Beati immaculati: Teach me, O Lord, the way of thy statutes: and I shall keep it unto the end . . . O take not the word of thy truth utterly out of my mouth: for my hope is in thy judgements. So shall I always keep thy law: yea, for ever and ever. And I will walk at liberty . . .
He smiled ironically. He could walk in liberty at this moment. It was only his parole that he would render up. But that would not be keeping the law as it fitted the soldier. He had pledged somewhere, if only in his own hearing, to keep it to the end.
He read on, until the closing verses: It is good for me that I have been in trouble: that I may learn thy statutes. The law of thy mouth is dearer unto me: than thousands of gold and silver. He shook his head. How often was the psalmist apt!
To Hervey’s considerable surprise, and equal joy, the physician visited him a little before six o’clock. ‘I could not bear to think of you dining alone this day, Major Hervey,’ he had said, and with such warmth that Hervey was prompted to take his hand by return.
Indeed, after he had read the psalm, his cell had become a place of some cheer suddenly. His jailers had fetched more wood for the fire, and servants he had not seen before brought a bowl of candied fruit, and fine wine and cakes. And when the physician had said that he could not bear to think of Hervey dining alone, he had meant that he would dine with him. So Dr Sanchez and his ‘charge’ had feasted on roasted capon, beef and puddings, and Hervey had almost been able to forget his condition for an hour or two. They spoke freely, but of the past, which avoided cause for dispute or indiscretion, for Britain and Spain had been allies (in later years at least) in the long struggle against Bonaparte. The more they spoke, the more they found common ground.
‘Oporto was a very fine affair,’ said Hervey, taking a cigar. ‘I did not realize it at the time, but it spoke everything of the Duke of Wellington. He had a reputation for caution, but that is to misunderstand. He was – is, I suppose – a safe general, and there is much difference between the two. A general may have his reverses, but a commander-in-chief must never be beaten.’
‘To have the enthusiastic support of the people, in the way you had at Oporto, is greatly to be prized, Major Hervey. That was the undoing of the French in my country. You know, I hope, of the guerrilleros?’
Hervey blew the first of his cigar smoke towards the high ceiling. ‘I do, but I confess I regard a great deal of what they did with utter revulsion. I saw unimaginable things on the way to Corunna, the most shameful things, but the butchery which followed after Oporto was an outrage. The duke begged the people not to molest the French wounded, but it had little effect. It was nothing to what we saw later in Spain, however.’
The physician nodded thoughtfully. ‘But by Oporto, the Duke of Wellington had secured his reputation, it is true. A fine affair indeed, a brilliant affair, Marshal Soult ejected from Portugal to cower in Galicia a prey to the Spanish army. Such audacity on the duke’s part!’
Hervey did not immediately respond. There was no doubting the duke’s right to praise, yet Soult had not been destroyed; neither was he by the Spanish. True, he had had to abandon all his supply, just as Sir John Moore had, and many of his guns, but the fact was that Soult had escaped and would recover and be a thorn in the duke’s flesh for four more years. Months after Oporto there were rumours the duke had thrown away his chance by disdaining the advice of a Portuguese officer who knew by what route the French would escape.
Escape – the word again. What might his route of escape be? Was there some secret way, ancient but unmarked on any map, as Soult’s had been, by which he might slip from these quarters and out of the castle, through the lines and across the border? Who might be his guide? He had high hopes of Sanchez, but there was a difference between hope and desperation.