Текст книги "Lord John and the Hand of Devils"

Автор книги: Diana Gabaldon

Соавторы: Diana Gabaldon,Diana Gabaldon
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“I believe this will be your summons now,” Grey said, nodding toward the functionary. “Good luck!”

The rammer hurriedly straightened his hat, already moving across the square.

“Thank’ee, sir!” he called. “The same to you!”

Grey lingered for a moment after the rammer’s departure, looking into the walkway beyond the square. It was growing late in the afternoon, and the light was beginning to darken, but the space beyond was perfectly visible—and perfectly empty.

Grey found himself profoundly uneasy, and seized of a sudden urge to be gone. The artilleryman’s ghost—if that’s what it was—had not disturbed him in the slightest. What troubled him was the glimpse he had had of the other artilleryman, the young soldier standing in the walkway, watching.

He had told Oswald that he had had no opportunity of studying Philip Lister’s face, and that was true enough. He had,however, seen it, in the instant before the cannonball struck. And he suffered now from a most unsettling conviction that he had just seen it again.

Drawing his cloak more closely round him, he crossed the square and went to find Tom Byrd, feeling a certain coldness near his heart.

Tom Byrd was waiting patiently for him in Bell Street, sheltering from the rain in a doorway.

“All right, me lord?” he inquired, putting on his broad-brimmed hat.

“Yes, fine.”

Byrd narrowed his eyes at Grey, who reflected—not for the first time—that Byrd’s round and essentially guileless young face did not in any way prevent his exhibiting the sort of penetrating suspicion more suitable to an officer in charge of a court-martial—or to a nanny—than to a valet.

“Fine,” Grey repeated, more firmly. “Mere formalities. As I said.”

“As you said,” Byrd echoed, with a trifle more skepticism than was entirely becoming. “Covering their arses, I expect.”

“Certainly that,” Grey agreed dryly. “Let us find a little food, Tom. And we must find a bed, as well. Do you know anywhere suitable?”

“To be sure, me lord.” Tom squinted in consideration, and after a moment’s consultation with the detailed map of London he carried in his head, pointed off toward the east.

“The Lark’s Nest; decent house round the corner,” he suggested. “Do a nice oyster pie, and the beer’s good. Dunno about the beds.”

Grey nodded.

“We’ll chance the fleas for the sake of the beer.”

He gestured to Tom to lead the way, and pulled down his hat against the steady drizzle. He washungry—ravenous, in fact—having eaten neither breakfast nor dinner, his appetite suppressed by thought of the coming interview.

He had been pushing that interview to the back of his mind, in hopes of distancing the Commission’s remarks sufficiently to deal rationally with them later. Now relieved of other distraction, though, there was no escape, and the Commission’s questions replayed themselves uncomfortably in his mind as he splashed through darkening puddles after Tom.

He was still angered by Marchmont’s insinuations regarding his own possible culpability in the explosion—but not so angered as not to try to examine them honestly.

The baffling taradiddle regarding Edgar he dismissed, seeing no way to make sense of it, save to suppose that Marchmont had intended to goad him and thus perhaps to drive him into unwary admission of fault.

Couldthe explosion have been in any way his fault? He felt a natural resistance to the suggestion, strong as the involuntary jerk of a knee. But he could not dismiss Marchmont’s insinuations—or deal with them, if they could not be dismissed—if he was not clear in his own mind about the matter.

Be the devil’s advocate,he told himself, hearing his father’s voice in memory. Assume that itwas your fault—in what way might it have happened?

Only two possibilities that he could see. The most likely, as Marchmont had implied, was that the gun crew might, in the excitement of the moment, have double-loaded the cannon, not pausing for the first round to be touched off. When the linstock was put to the touchhole, both rounds would have exploded together, thus blowing the cannon apart.

The second possibility was that a faulty round might have been loaded, and properly touched off, but failed to explode. It should by rights have then been cleared from the barrel before a fresh load was inserted—but it was far from uncommon for this step to be overlooked in the heat of battle. If the aim did not require to be adjusted, the process of loading and firing developed an inexorable, mindless rhythm after a time; nothing existed save the next motion in the complex process of serving the gun.

It would be simple; no one would notice that the charge had not gone off, and a fresh load would simply be tamped in on top of the faulty one. Stimulated by the explosion of the second, fresh charge, the faulty one might then explode, as well. He’d seen that happen once, himself, though in that instance, the cannon had merely been damaged, not destroyed.

Neither instance was rare, he knew. It was therefore the responsibility of the officer commanding the gun to see that every member of the crew performed each step of his duty, to discover such errors in process and correct them before they became irrevocable. Had he done that?

For the hundredth time since he heard of the Commission of Inquiry, he reviewed his memories of the battle of Crefeld, looking for any indication of an omission, any half-voiced protest by some member of the gun crew…but they had been completely demoralized by the sudden death of their lieutenant, in no frame of mind to concentrate. They might so easily have made an error.

But the Commission had called the rammer. Had they already interviewed the other surviving members of the gun crew, he wondered suddenly? If so…but if some member of the gun crew had testified to double-loading, Grey would have been facing more than insinuations.

“Here we are, me lord!” Tom called over his shoulder, turning in to a sturdy, half-timbered house.

They had arrived at the Lark’s Nest, and the smell of food and beer drew him momentarily from his broodings. Even oyster pie, sausage rolls, and good beer, though, could not keep recollection at bay. Once summoned, Crefeld remained with him, the smell of black powder, slaughtered pigs, and rain-soaked fields overpowering the scents of tobacco smoke and fresh-baked bread.

He had so many impressions of the day, the battle, many of them sharp as crystal—but able, like broken bits of crystal shaken in a dish, to fall suddenly into new and baffling patterns.

What, exactly, had he done? He recalled some things clearly—seizing the sword from Lister’s fallen body, beating the crew back to the gun—but later? He could not be sure.

Neither could he be sure of the Commission’s motives. What in bloody hellhad Marchmont meant by dragging Edgar in? Twelvetrees’s hostility was more understandable; there was bad blood between the Royal Artillery Regiment and his brother Hal, a feud of long standing, that had not been improved by last month’s—Christ, was it only a month past? It seemed years—revelations.

And Oswald…he had seemed sympathetic by contrast with Marchmont and Twelvetrees, but Grey knew better than to trust such spurious sympathy. Oswald was an elected politician, hence by definition untrustworthy. At least until Grey knew more about who owned him.

“You aregoing to eat that, me lord, aren’t you?” He looked up to find Tom Byrd focusing a stern look upon the neglected sausage roll in his hand.

And beyond Tom Byrd, at a table in the corner, sat a uniformed artilleryman, talking with two friends over pint-pots of the excellent beer. The man looked familiar, though he knew he did not know him. Another member of Tom Pilchard’s crew?

“I haven’t an appetite,” he said abruptly, laying down the roll. “I believe I’ll chance the fleas.”

The next morning, he and Tom returned to London by the post coach, arriving at his rooms—officers’ quarters at the regimental barracks—by mid-afternoon. He sent a note of apology to his mother, looked at a pile of unopened mail, decided that it could continue in that state indefinitely, picked two or three random lice from his body, bathed, shaved, and then, dressed in a fresh suit of clothes, set out on foot for the Beefsteak Club in Curzon Street.

He hadn’t set foot in the Beefsteak in months. In part, it was a simple disinclination for society; he had needed time apart to heal, before facing the companionship and curiosity—no matter how kindly meant—of his fellows.

The greater reason, though, was one which he scarcely admitted to himself. He had wished the Beefsteak to remain what it had always been for him—a place of peace and refuge. He could withstand the buffeting of circumstance, comforted by the thought that there was somewhere to which he could retire, if the pressures of the world became too much to bear.

If he did not go to the Beefsteak, his sense of it would be unchanged; his refuge was safe. But to go was to risk discovering that it was not, and he stepped across the threshold with a racing heart.

For an instant, he suffered the delusion that the dark red medallions of the Turkey runner in the entrance hall were blotches of blood, that some unsuspected catastrophe had befallen the place, and that he would enter the library to find bodies strewn in careless butchery.

He closed his eyes, and put out a hand to the doorjamb to steady himself. Breathed deep, and smelt the incense of tobacco and brandy, aged leather and the musk of men, spiced with the scents of fresh linen, lavender, and bergamot.

“My lord?” It was the chief steward’s voice. He opened his eyes to find the man squinting at him in consternation, the library behind him its usual soft brown self, glowing like paradise in the late-afternoon light that filtered through the lace curtains of the tall windows and suffused the rising wisps of pipe smoke from the smoking room.

“Will you take a glass of brandywine, my lord?” the steward asked, stepping back to open the way to his favorite chair, a wing-backed object upholstered in a dark-green damask, sagging in the seat and much worn about the arms.

“If you please, Mr. Bodley,” he said, and peace filled his soul.

He returned to the Beefsteak again the next day, and spent a pleasant hour sipping good brandy in the Hermits’ Corner—a trio of chairs set apart, facing the windows, backs turned to the room, for the use of those who had no appetite for company. One of the other chairs was occupied by a man he knew slightly, named Wilbraham; they nodded to each other as Grey sat down, and then studiously ignored each other’s presence.

Behind them came the soothing murmur of masculine conversation, punctuated by laughter and suffused with the odors of linen, sweat, cologne, and brandy, spiced with a hint of tobacco from the smoking room down the hall. Fiber by fiber, Grey felt his clenched muscles relax.

As he had known it must, though, his tranquillity came to an abrupt end with the descent of a large, meaty hand on his shoulder. He turned to look into Harry Quarry’s grinning face, smiled despite himself, and rose, leaving Wilbraham in solitary contemplation of Curzon Street.

“You look like death warmed over,” Quarry said without preamble, after a briefly searching look at him. This annoyed Grey, as Tom Byrd had taken considerable pains with his appearance, and he had thought he looked quite well, inspecting himself in the glass before setting out.

“You’re looking well, too, Harry,” he replied equably, finding no quick riposte. In fact, he did. War agreed with Quarry, lending a fine edge to a body and a character otherwise somewhat inclined to sloth, gluttony, cigars, and other appetites of the flesh.

“Melton said you’d had a bad time since Germany.” Quarry ushered him to the dining room and into a chair with an annoying solicitude, all but tucking a napkin under Grey’s chin.

“Did he,” Grey replied shortly. How much had Hal told Quarry—and how much had he heard on his own? Rumor spread faster in the army than it did among the London salons.

Luckily, Quarry seemed disinclined to inquire after the particulars—which probably meant he’d already heard them, Grey concluded grimly.

Quarry looked him over and shook his head. “Too thin by half! Have to feed you up, I suppose.” This assessment was followed by Quarry’s ordering—without consulting him—thick soup, game pie, fried trout with grapes, lamb with a quince preserve and roast potatoes, and a broccoli sallet with radishes and vinegar, the whole to be followed by a jelly trifle.

“I can’t eat a quarter of that, Harry,” Grey protested. “I’ll burst.”

Quarry ignored this, waving a hand to urge the waiter to ladle more soup into Grey’s bowl.

“You need sustenance,” he said, “from what I hear.”

Grey looked askance at him over his half-raised spoon.

“What you hear? What doyou hear, may I ask?”

Quarry’s craggily handsome face adopted the look that he normally wore when intending to be discreet, the fine white scar across his cheek pulling down the eye on that side in a knowing leer.

“Heard they knocked you about a bit at the Arsenal day before yesterday.”

Grey put down the spoon and stared at him.

“Who told you that?”

“Chap named Simpson.”

Grey racked his brain for anyone named Simpson whom he had met in the course of his visit to the Arsenal, but drew a complete blank.

“Who the hell is Simpson?” To show his general unconcern over the matter, he took an unwary gulp of soup, and burnt his tongue.

“Don’t recall his actual title—under-under-sub-secretary to the assistant something-or-other, I suppose. He said he picked you up off the floor—physically. Didn’t know royal commissions resorted to cudgeling their witnesses.” Harry raised an interrogative brow.

“Oh, him.” Grey touched his singed tongue gingerly to the roof of his mouth. “He did not pick me up; I rose quite without assistance, having caught my foot in the carpeting. Mr. Simpson happened merely to be present.”

Quarry looked at him thoughtfully, nodded, and inhaled a vast quantity of soup.

“Might easily happen to anyone,” he said mildly. “Ratty old thing, that carpet, full of holes. Know it well.”

Recognizing this for the cue it was, Grey sighed and picked up his spoon again.

“You know it well. Right, Harry. Why are you haunting the Arsenal, and what is it you want to know?”

“Haunting,” Quarry repeated thoughtfully, signaling the waiter to remove his soup plate. “Interesting choice of words, that. Our Mr. Simpson said he rather thought you’d met the ghost.”

That rattled him more than he wished to show. He waved away the soup, affecting indifference.

“So the Arsenal has its own ghost, has it? Would that be an artilleryman, wearing an ancient uniform?”

“Oh, you didsee him, then.” Harry’s eyes sharpened with interest. “The artilleryman, was it? Some see him as a Roman centurion—there’s a Roman cemetery under the Arsenal, did you know?”

“No. How do you know whether it’s a ghost with a taste for fancy dress, or two ghosts—or whether it’s a ghost at all?”

“Never seen him myself. I’m not the sort who sees phantoms,” Quarry said, with a sort of smugness that Grey found irritating.

“And I am, I suppose?” Not waiting for an answer, he picked up a bread roll. “Did you set this Simpson to watch me, Harry?”

“Someone should be watching you,” Quarry said. “Have you any notion what kind of trouble you’re in?”

“No, but I suppose you’re going to tell me. Is it mutiny to walk out on the questions of a royal commission? Am I to be shot at dawn tomorrow?”

He was not sure whether to be grateful for Harry’s concern, or annoyed at his solicitude. The one thing he did know was that he required someone to discuss the matter with, though, and so he kept his tone light.

“Too simple.” Quarry’s face twitched, and he waved the steward with the wine bottle over to refill their glasses. “Twelvetrees wants Melton’s balls, but failing that, he’ll have yours. His assumption being, I suppose, that it would discredit Melton to have his younger brother accused of negligence and forced—at the least—to resign his commission amidst a sea of talk.”

“They can accuse all they like,” Grey said hotly. “They can’t prove a damn thing.” Or he hoped they couldn’t. What in God’s name might the rammer have told them? Or the other man from Tom Pilchard’s crew?

Quarry raised a thick brow.

“I doubt they’d have to,” he said bluntly, “if they can raise enough doubt about your actions, and get enough talk started. Surely you know that.”

Grey felt blood starting to throb in his temples, and concentrated on keeping his hands steady as he buttered a bite of bread.

“What I know,” he said levelly, “is that they cannot force me to resign my commission, let alone prosecute me for negligence or malfeasance, without evidence. And I am assuming that they have none, because if they did, the ubiquitous Mr. Simpson would have told you of it.” He raised a brow at Quarry. “Am I right?”

Quarry’s mouth twitched.

“It isn’t only Twelvetrees, mind,” he said, lifting a monitory finger. “I suppose you didn’t know that the gentleman presently sitting in the Tower, accused of treason as the result of your recent industry, is Marchmont’s cousin?”

Grey choked on the bite of roll he had taken.

“I’ll take that as a ‘no,’ shall I?” Quarry sat back, allowing the waiter to serve his lamb, while Mr. Bodley imperturbably struck Grey between the shoulder blades, dislodging the roll, before continuing to pour the wine.

“Is this entire commission engineered for the purpose of discrediting me, then?” Grey asked, as soon as he had got his breath back.

“’Strewth, no. It wasn’t only your bloody gun that’s blown up. Eight more of ’em, within the last ten months.”

Grey’s jaw dropped with astonishment, and he belatedly recalled the shattered remnants laid out for autopsy behind the proving grounds. Certainly more broken guns lay on those tables than the mortal remains of Tom Pilchard.

“This, naturally, is not something the Ordnance Office wants talked about. Might put the wind up the Germans—to say nothing of the Dutch—who are paying through the nose for cannon from the Royal Foundry, under the impression that these are the best armament available anywhere.

“Not that this is entirely a bad thing,” he added, shoveling a judicious quantity of quince preserve over his lamb. “It’s what’s keeping them from trying harder than they are to have you drawn and quartered. You might have blown up one cannon, but you can’t have done nine.”

“I did not blow it up!”

Harry blinked, surprised, and Grey felt his cheeks flush. He looked down into his plate and saw that the fork in his hand was shaking, ever so slightly. He laid it carefully down, and taking his wineglass in both hands, drank deep.

“I know that,” Quarry said, quietly.

Grey nodded, not trusting himself to speak. But do I know it?he thought.

Quarry coughed, delicately separating a forkful of succulent meat from its gristle.

“The word ‘sabotage’ is being breathed—though the Ordnance Office is doing its level best to stifle any such breathing. Yet another reason to make a scapegoat of you, you see: make enough noise about Tom Pilchard, and perhaps the grubs of Fleet Street will be so busy baying at your heels, they won’t hear about the other ruptured guns.”

“Sabotage,” Grey repeated blankly. “How can you—Oh, Jesus. It’s bloody Edgar, isn’t it? They honestly suspect Edgar DeVane of—of—Christ, what on earth do they think he’s done?”

“It hasn’t got so far as thinking,” Harry assured him drily. “And I’ve no idea whether they actually suspect your half brother of anything personally. Might only have been dragging him in in order to rattle you and make you do something injudicious—like walk out of the inquiry.”

He chewed, closing his eyes in momentary bliss.

“By God, that’s good. Anyway,” he went on, swallowing and opening his eyes. “I’ve had nothing to do with artillery, myself. But I suppose it wouldbe possible to blow up a cannon with a bomb of some sort, disguised as a canister of ordinary shot?”

“I suppose so.” Grey picked up his fork, then laid it down again and clenched his hands together in his lap.

“Well. Have you any useful suggestions to make, Harry?”

“I think you should eat your trout while it’s still hot.” Quarry prodded his own fish approvingly in illustration. “Beyond that…” He eyed Grey, chewing.

“There is a certain opinion in the regiment, to the effect that perhaps you should be seconded to the Sixty-fifth, or possibly the Seventy-eighth. Temporarily, of course; let things blow over and quiet down.”

The Sixty-fifth was presently stationed in the West Indies, Grey knew; the Seventy-eighth was a Highland regiment somewhere in the American colonies—the Northwest Territory, perhaps, or some other outlandish place.

“Thus allowing Twelvetrees and Marchmont to claim that I’ve fled to avoid prosecution, thus lending credence to their preposterous insinuations. I think not.”

Harry nodded, matter-of-fact.

“Of course. Which leaves us with my original suggestion.”

Grey raised an eyebrow at him.

“Eat your trout,” Quarry said. “And the devil with your hands. Mine would shake, too, in your position.”

Hal was, of course, with the part of the regiment presently in winter quarters in Prussia. Harry had wanted to send word to him, but Grey declined.

“There is little Hal can do, and his presence would merely inflame feelings further,” he pointed out. “Let me see what I can do alone; time enough to advise him if anything drastic should happen.”

“And what doyou propose to do?” Quarry asked, giving him a narrow look.

“Go down to Sussex and see Edgar DeVane,” Grey replied. “He ought at least to know that his name is being put forward as a suspected saboteur. And if there should be anything whatever to the matter…”

“Well, that will at least get you out of Town and out of sight for a bit,” Quarry agreed dubiously. “Can’t hurt. And you could be back within two or three days, should anything—you will pardon my choice of words, I trust—blow up.”

Grey’s departure for Sussex was delayed, however, by receipt of a note in the morning post.

“What is it, me lord?” Tom, attracted by Grey’s muttered blasphemies, stuck his head out of the pantry, where he had been cleaning boots.

“A Mr. Lister, from Sussex, is in Town. He wishes to call upon me, should I find that convenient.”

Tom shrugged. “You might have found it convenient to be already gone, me lord,” he suggested.

“I would, but I can’t. He’s the father of Lieutenant Lister, the officer who was killed at Crefeld. He’s heard that I have his son’s sword, and while he’s much too polite to say he wants it back, that is his obvious desire.”

Grey reached for ink and paper with a sigh.

“I’ll tell him to come this afternoon. We’ll leave tomorrow.”

Mr. Lister had a slight stammer, made worse by emotion, and a small, pale face, overwhelmed by a very new and full-bottomed wig, from whose depths he peeped out like a wary field mouse.

“Lord John G-Grey? I intrude intolerably, sir, but I—Colonel Quarry said…that is, I do hope I am not…”

“Not in the slightest,” Grey said firmly. “And it is I who must beg pardon of you, sir. You should not have put yourself to the trouble of coming; I should have been most pleased to wait upon you.” Lord John bowed him to a chair, flicking a glance at Tom, who promptly vanished in search of refreshment.

“Oh, no, n-not at all, my lord. I—it is most gracious in you to receive me so s-suddenly. I know I am…” He waved a small, neat hand in a gesture that encompassed social doubt, self-effacement, and abject apology—and conveyed such a sense of helplessness that Grey felt himself obliged to take Mr. Lister’s arm and lead him physically to a seat.

“I must apologize, sir,” he said, having seen his guest settled. “I ought to have made an effort to inquire for Lieutenant Lister’s family long before this.”

A faint approximation of a smile touched Mr. Lister’s face.

“That is kind in you to say, sir. But there is no reason, really, why you should. Philip”—his lips twitched at speaking his dead son’s name—“Philip was not of your regiment, nor in any way under your command.”

“He was a fellow officer,” Grey assured him. “And thus has claim to both my duty and respect—as does his family.” Having been drenched to the skin in Philip Lister’s blood seemed an even more immediate claim upon his interest, but he thought he would not mention the fact.

“Oh.” Mr. Lister drew a deep breath, and seemed a little easier. “I—Thank you.”

“Will you take something, sir? A little wine, perhaps?” Tom had appeared, manfully lugging an enormous tray equipped with a rattling array of bottles, decanters, glasses, and an immense seed cake. Where had he got that? Grey wondered.

“Oh! No, I thank you, my lord. I d-do not take spirits. We are Methodist, you understand.”

“Of course,” Grey said. “We’ll have tea, Tom, if you please.”

Tom gave Mr. Lister a disapproving look, but decanted the cake onto the table, hoisted the tray, and rattled off into the recesses of the apartment.

There was an awkward pause, which a little port or Madeira would have covered admirably. Not for the first time, Grey wondered at a religion which rejected so many of the things that made life tolerable. Perhaps it sprang from an intent to make heaven seem that much more desirable by contrast to a life from which pleasure had been largely removed.

But he must admit that his own attitudes toward Methodists perhaps lacked justice, having been badly colored by—He choked off that line of thought before it could reach its natural conclusion, and picking up the knife Tom had brought, waved it inquiringly in the direction of the seed cake.

Mr. Lister accepted the offer with alacrity, but obviously more in order to have something to do than from appetite, for he merely poked at his allotted portion, breaking off small bits and mashing them randomly with his fork.

Grey did his best to conduct a conversation, making courteous inquiries regarding Mr. Lister’s wife and other family, but it was hard going, with the shade of Philip Lister perched like a vulture over the seed cake on the table between them.

At last, Grey put down his cup and glanced at Tom, hovering discreetly near the door.

“Tom, do you have Lieutenant Lister’s sword convenient?”

“Oh, yes, me lord,” Tom assured him, with an air of relief. Mr. Lister was getting on his nerves, too. “Cleaned and polished, kept quite proper!”

It was. Grey doubted that the sword had ever achieved such a blinding state of propriety while in the care of its original owner.

Grey felt an unexpected pang as he took the sheathed sword from Tom and presented it to Mr. Lister. He had no thought of keeping it, of course, and in fact had barely thought of it in the days since his return to England. Seeing it, though, and holding it, brought back in a sudden rush the events surrounding the battle at Crefeld.

The fog of misery and terror he had felt on that day enveloped him again, miasmalike—and then, cutting through all that, the weight of the sword in his hand, the same as the feeling in him when he had seized it from Lister’s body. In that moment, he had thrown all emotion and any sense of self-preservation to the wind, and flung himself howling on the deserting gun crew, shouting and beating them with the flat of the sword, forcing them back to their duty by the power of his will.

He had not realized it until much later, but that moment of abnegation had had the paradoxical effect of making him whole, as though the heat of battle had melted all the shattered bits of mind and heart and forged him anew—into something hard and adamant, incapable of being hurt.

Then, of course, Tom Pilchard had blown up.

His hand had grown damp on the leather of the scabbard, and it took an actual effort of will to relinquish it.

Mr. Lister looked at the sword for some time, holding it upon the palms of his hands as though it might be some holy relic. Finally, very gently, he set it upon his knees, and coughed.

“I th-thank you, Lord John,” he said. His face worked for a moment, formulating words with such effort as to suggest that each one must be individually molded of clay.

“I—that is, my wife. His m-mother. I d-do not wish to…cause offense. Certainly. Or—or discomfort. B-but it would be perhaps some s-solace, were she to know what…what…” He stopped abruptly, eyes closed. He sat thus for some moments, absolutely still, seeming not even to breathe, and Grey exchanged an uneasy look with Tom, not sure whether his guest was merely overcome with emotion, or suffering a fit of some kind.

At last, Mr. Lister drew breath, though he did not open his eyes.

“Did he speak?” he asked hoarsely. “Did you talk…talk to him? His last—his last w-words…” Tears had begun to course down Mr. Lister’s pale face.

Methodist be damned, Grey thought. Prayer doubtless had its place, but when you were right up against it, there was no substitute for alcohol.

“Brandy, please, Tom,” he said, but it was there already, Tom nearly spilling the glass in his haste.

“Mr. Lister. Please, sir.” He leaned forward, tried to take Lister’s hands in his, but they were clenched into fists.

He remembered the lieutenant’s last words, vividly. Likewise, Philip Lister’s expression of openmouthed astonishment as the cannonball had struck the ground, hit a stone, and soared up into the air—an instant later decapitating the lieutenant and rendering his last words ironically prophetic.

“Fuck me!” the lieutenant had said, in wonderment.

Mr. Lister was so much overcome with emotion that he made little protest at the brandy, and while he coughed and spluttered, Grey managed to pour sufficient into him as to induce a semblance of calm at last.

He had had it in mind, seeing his guest’s distress, to compose some suitably noble speech in lieu of Philip Lister’s actual exit line, but found that he could not bring himself to do this.

“I saw your son for the first time only moments before his death,” he said, as gently as he could. “There was no time for talk. But I can assure you, sir, that he died instantly—and he died bravely, as a soldier of the king. You—and your wife, of course—may be justly proud of him.”