A Civil Contract (36 page)

The flicker of confidence flared high for a moment, and sank. There were too many foreigners in this new Army of Wellington’s, too many raw battalions. The recruit who had never been shot over might perform prodigies of valour, but it was only the seasoned soldier who could be trusted to maintain his ground in the face of determined attack. The Allied Army was not the Peninsular Army: it was a polyglot force, stiffened certainly by veteran Regiments, but its ranks swelled by such unknown quantities as the Dutch-Belgians, the Brunswickers (many of whom, Major Rowan wrote, were mere children), and Hanoverian Landwehr battalions.

In the small hours of the morning the realization came to Adam that he had acted like a madman; and until a restless, nightmare-ridden sleep overcame him he endured worse agonies than any he had suffered under the surgeons’ hands.

When Kinver drew back the blinds in his room, and he awoke, the more lurid of his imaginings seemed absurd; but he got up feeling more jaded than when he had retired to bed, and not much more hopeful.

He was never afterwards able to recall what he had done during that interminable day. When the newspapers appeared they contained the first accounts of actions fought on the 16th and the 17th June. Making every allowance for exaggerations and misapprehensions, they did not afford very reassuring reading. There was no official dispatch: a sure sign that the actions at Ligny and Quatre-Bras had been the prelude merely to the main battle, of which no news had yet reached London.

A nasty business, Quatre-Bras: that much was evident. Boney
had
taken the Duke by surprise: the miracle was that Ney did not seem to have pressed home his attack on a force he must have known to be numerically far inferior to his own. Forgetting his personal anxieties, Adam thought that they must have stood like heroes, the fellows who held the ground until Picton brought up the Reserve, midway through the afternoon. Dutch-Belgians, too: well, that was cheering, at all events! But Picton had been badly cut up, and there was no mention of any British cavalry. A scrambling, desperate fight it must have been, attended by big losses, but mercifully inconclusive. The cavalry skirmishes at Genappe on the 17th furnished exciting material for the journalists’ pens, but were relatively unimportant. The worst news was that the Prussians seemed to have been shockingly mauled, and flung back in disarray. There was even a rumour that Blücher had been killed; and where the Prussians were now, whether re-forming, or retreating, no one knew. It might be a serious business, Adam thought, if their officers failed to get them together again.

Trying to build up a picture of the situation from unreliable reports was not easy, but for a short time Adam felt more hopeful, taking comfort from the reflection that although the Reserve must be terribly weakened Wellington had been able to withdraw his troops in good order, and, apparently, without being much harassed by the enemy.

There was no more published news, but as the day dragged on more and more ominous rumours reached London, and were passed from mouth to mouth. The Allied Army had endured a crushing defeat; the remnants of it had fallen back in disorder on Brussels, and had been seen defiling out through the Antwerp gate; deserters from the battlefield had been encountered as far away as Ghent and Antwerp, telling of an unprecedented bombardment, overwhelming attacks by enormous forces of cavalry, hideous carnage.

Adam recognized the falsity of much that he heard, but it was impossible to maintain optimism under the cumulative weight of reported disaster. When not one scrap of reassuring news was received one could no longer laugh rumour to scorn: even if the stories were grossly exaggerated they must be founded on truth; and one was forced, at last, to confront, not the possibility of defeat, but the incredible certainty of it. The confidence which had burned like a flame in Adam all the previous day, sunk to embers during the night, and then flickered fitfully but with diminishing strength with his efforts to keep it alive, was not quite dead when he walked down the street to Brooks’s that evening. It still smouldered, but with such a tiny glow that he was barely conscious of it. He felt rather numb, as though he had been battered into insensibility. He tried to realize that the Army had been beaten, but the words conveyed nothing to his brain: they were as meaningless as gibberish. It was easier to realize that he had completed the work of bringing his house to ruin. In the throes of reaction, he had uttered aloud: ‘My God, what have I done?’ in horror at what then seemed an act of madness; but he had still been able to cherish the hope that his gamble would yet prove successful. The little spark of hope that lurked beneath despair and self-blame was no more based on reason than the disbelief that flashed into his brain when some fresh tale of ignoble rout was forced on him. He knew that when he had staked everything he possessed, even Fontley, he had not thought it a gamble, but he could not recapture the confidence that had then prompted him, or understand how he could have been so crassly, so wickedly stupid as to fly in the face of Mr Chawleigh’s advice, and of Wimmering’s entreaties.

The club was crowded, and, for once, very few of its members were in the card-room. Everyone was talking about the reports from Belgium, but there was no fresh news, not a hint that any word had been received at the Horse Guards from the Duke’s Headquarters. In the large room overlooking St James’s Street Lord Grey was proving to the apparent satisfaction of a numerous audience that Napoleon was established in Brussels at that moment. Napoleon had two hundred thousand men across the Sambre, which set the question beyond argument. Nobody attempted to argue; Sir Robert Wilson began to read aloud a letter which confirmed the rumour that what was left of the Army had evacuated Brussels, and was retreating to the coast.

An elderly stranger, standing beside Adam before one of the windows, said in an angry undervoice: ‘Gammon! Pernicious humdudgeon! I don’t believe a word of it, do you?’

‘No,’ Adam replied.

The babel of voices rose; peace terms were being discussed. The noise stopped suddenly as someone said sharply: ‘Listen!’

The sound of cheering could be heard in the distance. It drew nearer. Adam’s unknown companion thrust his head out of the window, peering up the street in the failing light. He said: ‘It’s a chaise, I think. Yes, but – here, sir, your eyes are younger than mine! What are those things sticking out of the windows?’

Adam had taken a quick, limping step to the window. He said in a queer voice: ‘Eagles!’

Pandemonium broke out; there was a rush to the windows; as the post-chaise passed staid gentlemen leaned out, waving and cheering; persons who had never been on more than nodding terms clapped one another on the back; and even the most rabid opponents of the war huzzaed with the best.

Adam stood leaning against the wall, so dizzy that he was obliged to shut his eyes. The room was spinning round; waves of alternate hot and cold swept over him; but he managed to remain on his feet, and to overcome his faintness.

Waiters were sent scurrying for champagne; corks began to pop; and someone called out a toast to Wellington. Everyone drank it; Adam saw that the proposer was one of the Duke’s bitterest critics, and grinned inwardly. The Duke had no critics tonight, only fervent supporters. Adam thought that the enthusiasm would not last for long; but he could not foresee that within three days several of those who were acclaiming Wellington as the country’s saviour would be saying that the battle was rather a defeat than a victory.

Adam did not remain for long in the club, but slipped away presently, and went back to Fenton’s. Kinver was waiting for him, a broad grin on his face. Adam smiled at him with an effort. ‘Did you see the chaise, Kinver?’

‘I should think I did, my lord! With the Eagles sticking out of the windows! Three of them!’

Adam sank wearily into the chair before the dressing-table, and put up a hand to drag the pin out of his neckcloth. Kinver said: ‘I hope you’ll sleep tonight, my lord.’

‘I think I could sleep the clock round,’ Adam said.

He was asleep almost before his head touched the pillow. Kinver thought he had never seen him look more exhausted.

He would have liked to have drawn the curtains round the bed, to guard him from the sunlight that would filter in a few hours through the window-blinds, but he dared not do it: his lordship, accustomed for years to camp-beds, declared himself unable to sleep if snugly curtained from draughts.

But although his room faced east he did sleep the clock round, deeply and dreamlessly, hardly stirring. When he woke at last, the room was full of golden light, subdued by the blinds that Kinver had drawn so closely across the windows. He yawned, and stretched luxuriously, not fully conscious, but aware of a sense of well-being. As he remembered the cause of this, his first thought was one of rejoicing in the victory. Then he realized, as he had scarcely been able to do before, that he was not ruined, but probably richer than he had ever been.

The door creaked; he saw Kinver peeping cautiously at him, and said lazily: ‘I’m awake. What’s the time?’

‘Just gone eleven, my lord,’ Kinver answered, pulling back the blinds.

‘Good God, have I slept as long as that? I must get up!’ He swung his feet to the floor, and stood up, slipping his arms into the sleeves of the dressing-gown Kinver was holding for him. ‘Tell ’em to send up breakfast directly, will you? I’m as hungry as a hawk! Have the newspapers come?’

‘Yes, my lord, they’re laid out for you in the parlour. It looks like Bonaparte’s been sent to grass all right and regular this time.’

He went off to order breakfast, and Adam walked into the adjoining parlour, and opened the
Gazette
, sitting down at the table to read the Waterloo Dispatch. He had just come to the end of it when his breakfast was brought in. He was looking grave, which made Kinver say, as the waiter withdrew: ‘He is beat, isn’t he, my lord?’

‘To flinders, I should suppose. But, my God! twelve hours of it! I’m afraid our losses must have been enormous.’ He laid the
Gazette
aside, and as he did so caught sight of the date on it. He stared at it incredulously, exclaiming: ‘Wednesday, 21st June? Oh, my God!’ He saw that Kinver was looking bewildered, and said: ‘The dinner-party for Miss Lydia’s engagement! Now I
am
in the basket! Why the devil didn’t you wake me hours ago?’

‘I’m sure I’m very sorry, my lord!’ Kinver said, much dismayed. ‘What with all the excitement – and you saying you’d like to sleep the clock round – it went clean out of my head!’

‘Out of mine too. Can it really be Wednesday? Surely –’ He passed a hand over his brow, trying to reckon the days. ‘Yes, I suppose it must be. Oh, lord!’

‘Do you eat your breakfast, my lord, and I’ll send to warn the boys that you’ll be needing the chaise in an hour’s time!’ suggested Kinver. ‘We’ll be at Fontley by nine, maybe earlier.’

Adam hesitated, and then shook his head. ‘No, it won’t do. I must see Wimmering before I leave town. Warn the boys to be ready to set forward, however – at about two, perhaps. I’m surprised Wimmering hasn’t been here to see me.’

‘Well, my lord, Mr Wimmering
did
call,’ disclosed Kinver guiltily. ‘But when I told him you was abed and asleep, he wouldn’t have you wakened, but said he would call again this afternoon.’

‘I see. I expect you meant it for the best, but I’m not going to sit kicking my heels here: I shall have to drive into the City.’ He then thought that it would be as well to see Drummond too, and smiled at his chagrined valet. ‘Never mind! I must have gone to Drummond’s in any event.’

His call at the bank lasted for longer than he had anticipated, for Mr Drummond considered the occasion worthy of his very special sherry. Civility compelled Adam to conceal his impatience to be gone; so that it was already two o’clock when he reached Wimmering’s place of business.

Wimmering had been on the point of setting out for Fenton’s, and exclaimed in disapproval: ‘My lord! You should not have put yourself to the inconvenience of coming to me! I left word with your man that I would call again!’

‘I know, but I’m in the devil of a hurry!’ Adam said. ‘There’s a dinner-party being held at Fontley tonight, in honour of my sister’s engagement, and I swore I’d return in time for it. I shan’t, of course, but I might arrive in time to bid the guests farewell, don’t you think? I shall be in black disgrace – and deserve to be!’

Mr Wimmering smiled primly. ‘I fancy, when the cause of your absence is known, you will be forgiven, my lord. And may I, before I enter upon any business, beg that
I
may be forgiven? Your lordship’s head is better than mine. I must confess that I regarded your far-sighted venture with deep foreboding. Indeed, I was so filled with apprehension all yesterday that I found myself unable to swallow as much as a morsel of toast. I blush to own it, but so it was!’

‘You need not!’ Adam said. ‘Don’t speak of yesterday! What
I
endured – ! Do you know, I even wondered if I ought not to be in Bedlam? I shall never do such a thing again: I haven’t enough bottom for speculation!’

When he presently left Wimmering he was just about to summon up a hack from a nearby stand when he remembered that there was a third call it behoved him to make. He hesitated for a moment, and then resigned himself, and proceeded on foot in the direction of Cornhill. It was going to make him devilishly late, but there was no help for it: the barest courtesy made it necessary for him to visit his father-in-law.

He found Mr Chawleigh alone, and entered his room unannounced, pausing a moment, his hand still grasping the door-knob, looking across at him in sudden concern. Mr Chawleigh was seated at his desk, but he did not seem to be at work. Something about his posture, the sag of his great shoulders, the settled gloom in his countenance made Adam fear that the loss he had suffered must be much larger than he had disclosed. He said in a tone of real concern: ‘Sir – !’

Mr Chawleigh’s expression did not change. He said heavily: ‘You haven’t gone home then, my lord.’

‘Not yet. I’m leaving today, however. It’s Lydia’s party, you know, but I wanted to see you before I left town.’

‘I know,’ Mr Chawleigh said. He got up, and stood leaning his knuckles on his desk. ‘You’ve no need to tell me,’ he said. ‘No need for you to blame me either, for you couldn’t blame me more than I blame myself. Eh, it’s taken all the pleasure out of knowing we’ve beaten Bonaparte! The first time I ever advised anyone against his advantage, and I have to do it to you! Well, I don’t know when I’ve been sorrier for anything, and that’s a fact!’

Adam put his hat and gloves down rather quickly on a chair, and limped forward. ‘My dear sir – !’ he said, a good deal moved. ‘No, no, I assure you – !’

‘Nay, don’t say it, lad!’ Mr Chawleigh interrupted. ‘It’s like you not to ride grub, but I’ve done mighty ill by you, and it don’t make a ha’p’orth of difference that I never meant it to turn out like it has! Now –’

‘Mr Chawleigh –’

‘Nay, you listen to what I’ve got to say, my lord!’ said Mr Chawleigh, coming round the corner of the desk, and laying a hand on Adam’s shoulder. ‘If it hadn’t been for me, you wouldn’t have thought of selling out, would you?’

‘No, but –’

‘– so it’s my blame, and it’s for me to make it good, which I will do, and there’s my hand on it! Now, we don’t want any argumentation, so –’

‘You know, sir, you are a great deal too kind to me,’ Adam interposed, his slender hand lost in that enormous paw. He smiled at his father-in-law. ‘But I didn’t come here to reproach you. I came to tell you that I’ve made my fortune!’

‘You’ve done
what
?’ ejaculated Mr Chawleigh, staring at him under suddenly knit brows.

‘Well, I daresay you won’t think it a fortune,’ said Adam, ‘but I assure you it seems one to me! I hope you’ll forgive me: I didn’t follow your advice!’

The grip on his shoulder tightened. ‘You didn’t sell?’ Mr Chawleigh demanded.

‘No, sir: I bought!’

‘You – Well, I’ll be damned!’ said Mr Chawleigh, apparently stunned. ‘With me and Wimmering telling you – Well, if ever I thought you had it in you – !’ A delighted smile spread over his countenance; he released Adam’s shoulder to pat him on the back. ‘Good lad, good lad!’ he said. ‘
Bought
– ! And what’s your profit?’

‘I don’t know yet, but Drummond thinks it will be somewhere in the region of twenty thousand, sir.’

‘Twenty – How did you come by the blunt to buy to that tune?’

‘I borrowed it from Drummond – on my own securities.’

‘Oh, you did, did you?’ said Mr Chawleigh. ‘And I suppose he didn’t get a notion that
I
was one of your securities?’

‘I told him,’ said Adam blandly, ‘that he was on no account to think that you were in any way concerned.’

Mr Chawleigh regarded him with a fulminating but not unadmiring eye. ‘If you wasn’t a lord,’ he said, ‘I’d call you a young rascal!’

Adam laughed. ‘Oh, no, would you? It was perfectly true! You were
not
concerned!’

‘Yes, it’s likely I’d let my daughter’s husband be rolled-up, ain’t it?’ retorted Mr Chawleigh, with asperity. ‘Well, well, to think you’d so much rumgumption! Twenty thousand pounds!’ He chuckled; but all at once his expression changed, and he directed one of his searching stares at Adam. ‘I take it you’ll be wanting to redeem the mortgages?’ he said belligerently.

There was a long pause. To redeem the mortgages, to make Fontley his own again, independent of Chawleigh-gold, and free from even the shadow of a threat of Chawleigh-interference, had been Adam’s only motive for plunging into a speculation which he now regarded as the craziest act of his life. Even when he had been most horrified at what he had risked the thought had persisted that the object was worth any risk. The gamble had succeeded; and now, as he gave back his father-in-law’s stare, he realized, in some bewilderment, that having the power to redeem the mortgages he had lost the desire to do it. Almost from the day of his marriage it had been his fixed goal: it should have been his first thought on waking that morning, but he had not thought of it until Mr Chawleigh himself recalled it to his mind. He had thought instead of drainage, and new cottages, and of the experimental farm he had now the means to run. His old obsession suddenly seemed foolish. Mr Chawleigh giving rein to the Juggernaut within him might infuriate him, but he was perfectly capable of handling Mr Chawleigh. And, to do Mr Chawleigh justice, he had never shown the least disposition to interfere in the affairs of Fontley. He had once, in the grip of passion, threatened to foreclose, but Adam had known, even in the heat of the moment, that there was no intention behind the threat, or any comprehension of the effect so brutal a display of power would have on one of finer sensibility than his own. His vulgarity made him sometimes extremely trying, but under it there was much that was admirable, and a softer heart than his fierce aspect would have led anyone to suppose. Looking at him now, Adam knew that he was scowling because he was afraid he was going to be hurt. Well, he shouldn’t be: certainly not by the son-in-law who owed him so much and of whom he was so unmistakably fond.

‘I’ll redeem them if you wish it, sir – of course!’ Adam said.

The scowl lifted a little. ‘Why should I wish it? I’d a notion you couldn’t bear to think I’d aught to do with that place of yours – nor wouldn’t rest easy in your bed till you’d paid me back every penny you’ve had of me!’

‘Good God, sir, I hope you don’t expect that of me?’ countered Adam. ‘I could never repay all I owe you!’

‘Don’t talk so silly!’ growled Mr Chawleigh. ‘You know I don’t!’

‘Yes, of course I do – and also that nothing pleases you more than to shower expensive luxuries on me,’ Adam said, affection as well as amusement in his eyes. ‘As for Fontley, if you mean that I won’t let you carpet the Grand Stairway, or fill the park with deer, you are perfectly right! But I give you warning that I have every intention of trying if I can’t persuade you to dip that little finger of yours into a project I have in mind. I’ve no time to go into that now, however. About the mortgages – I have a much better scheme than to waste my money on redeeming them from you: I should infinitely prefer it if you will settle them on Giles.’

The scowl had entirely vanished. ‘Now, that
is
a good scheme!’ exclaimed Mr Chawleigh, rubbing his hands together. ‘Ay, I’ll do that, bless him! I’ll have it drawn up legally, all shipshape and Bristol fashion, never fear!’ A thought occurred to him; he said: ‘If you was to do something handsome by the Government you could get yourself made an Earl, couldn’t you?’