I woke early and set to work. The sergeant soon came to me and, after the usual preamble, said, ‘Johnson is dead, sir.’
I rubbed my eyes and said, ‘Very good,’ and thought, Another man lost to the climate.
I dismissed the sergeant and then threw down my pen and went out of the tent, watching him drill the men and hearing the familiar commands: wheel, turn, march, counter march, advance, retire.
Their numbers were depleted, for there were the usual absences due to illness, caused by the heat or tainted food or disease, and to deaths. I thanked God I had acclimatized, and that I no longer felt the agonies produced by the exotic spices and rotten meat.
My eyes wandered to the bullocks walking past, carrying loaded panniers, and I wondered if we would have enough of them to pull the guns and ammunition wagons when we broke camp.
Carstairs joined me, evidently thinking the same thing, for he said, ‘Do you think we should buy a couple of elephants to pull the heavy guns?’
‘They are expensive,’ I said. ‘Can we afford them?’
‘The purchase price, yes, but the maintenance?’ He shook his head. ‘Perhaps not. At least with bullocks, they can graze off the land. It is a pity, though. A couple of elephants would make easy work of it.’ His eyes wandered to the men, who were forming a square. ‘They seem to be shaping up well.’
‘Not well enough. They are not ready for battle. Their formation is sloppy, and they do not react quickly enough to commands.’
‘They will improve.’
‘I hope so, or they, too, will soon be dead.’
He looked at me curiously, for I used not to be so grim, but I cannot rid myself of the thought that, if only Eliza had had more strength, we could be married now, she and I, and we could be happy.
Tuesday 21 September
Another letter from Catherine arrived this morning, already many months old, giving me news of my father’s funeral, and telling me of Eliza.
We are staying at Delaford with Harry and Eliza. Harry is worse than ever. I lectured him on the evils of drink but he took no notice of me. He was already drunk when we sat down to dinner and he could barely stand by the time Eliza and I withdrew. Eliza was pale and seemed unwell. Her spirits must have been sadly affected by my father’s death, for she spoke barely two words to me all evening, and I cannot think what else she has to make her unhappy.
I hope it is only the melancholy occasion and my sister’s presence that caused her low spirits, but I fear it is her marriage. If she still regrets it, what torment for her.
What torment for us both.
Friday 24 September
I am finding it impossible to control my thoughts. They are not here with me, but at home, with Eliza. Is she happy? Is she well? Is she thinking of me?
I turn a thousand possibilities over in my mind. If I had not left home, if I had returned sooner, if ... if ... if....
I must gain control of my thoughts soon or I fear for my sanity. My only solace is work, and I am determined to think of nothing else, for how else will I survive?
1781
Thursday 24 May
A letter from Catherine this morning, the first in two years, for not since my father’s death has she written to me. I opened it with nerveless fingers, wondering what news it would contain, and wondering if it would mention Eliza. For all my efforts to forget her, I cannot banish her from my mind, and when there is a lull in my duties, I find myself thinking of her.
I read Catherine’s news of her family with little interest, scanning the page until Eliza’s name caught my eye.
... and so Harry has divorced her.
Divorced? I sat back in my seat, rocked.
I steeled myself to read on.
It is not to be wondered at. Harry drank, it is true, and gambled, and had numerous mistresses, but Eliza should have borne it. I always knew that she was unsatisfactory. There was something ridiculously romantic about her, for which I blame you, James, for you encouraged her. It is true that Harry should not have invited his mistresses into their London home, but if Eliza had only been sensible and withdrawn to the estate, instead of going into a decline and then falling prey to the first man who showed her a little kindness, she would be a married woman still. I have no patience with her. She should have valued herself, and her good name, more. Of course, Harry was obliged to divorce her, and I would not be surprised if he marries again. He has run through Eliza’s fortune, and you know how Harry has always needed money. If he finds an heiress who will have him, I feel sure he will take another wife.
I put my head in my hands. All that hope and beauty coming to nothing. She was divorced, disgraced, cast off, and by my brother, a fiend who should never have been allowed to marry her. I felt ill, even worse than I had felt when hearing of her marriage. At least then I had been able to hope she would not be too unhappy. But now I could hope for nothing.
I read on, feeling worse and worse with every word, for she had been abandoned by her first seducer. Without an adequate allowance, for my brother had been mean and vengeful and had not given her an income that was either adequate to her fortune or sufficient for her comfortable maintenance, she had sunk still further, finding another protector and sinking yet again.
I folded the letter at last and willed myself to turn to stone, for if I remained a creature of flesh and blood, I feared the pain would kill me.
1782
Monday 9 December
How strange it feels to be in England again after almost four years away. I had forgotten how low the sky was, and how grey, and how it leached the colour from everything, leaving the world a dreary place.
As I stepped ashore, I fastened the buttons of my greatcoat and hunched my shoulders against the rain. My countrymen hurried past with their colourless faces, dreary and sad, and I felt a stab of homesickness for the Indies, for sunburnt skin and bright colours and the heat of the sun, but then I shook it away. It was not England that had called me home again, it was Eliza.
I thanked God that I was at last able to take some leave so that I could do what I had longed to do ever since I had learnt of her sorrows. Return to England and find her. Care for her. Comfort her. And, perhaps, make her happy.
Wednesday 11 December
I set out early this morning, walking to the inn where I would catch the stage for home.
Home! Delaford is no longer my home. It ceased to be my home the day I was cast out, the day my father irrevocably set Eliza and me on a path to misery.
The coach arrived, and amidst the general bustle, I climbed aboard. The gaiety of the other passengers could not touch me. I was lost in my memories, and in my distaste for what was to come, for having learnt that my sister no longer knew of Eliza’s whereabouts, I knew that, in order to find her, I had to see my brother.
Thursday 12 December
As the coach approached Delaford, to my surprise I was thrown back in time to the day I returned from Oxford as a young man, full of hope and optimism. I remembered it clearly, and not only remembered it, felt it, with the same sensations assailing me.
When the carriage came to the bend where, all those years ago, I had seen Eliza walking through the fields, and when I remembered my elation as I had leapt from the carriage and rolled down the hill to meet her; when I recalled the love that had coursed through me as I had picked her up and swung her round, then I was nearly unmanned.