The Emperor (51 page)

Edward was talking about the arrangements he had made
for the funeral, but feeling at last that he had less than the
whole of his brother's attention he stopped and frowned and
said, 'Have you been in the club all day? I suppose you are
bosky.'

‘
On the contrary, I am horribly sober,' James said sadly.
'Have you arranged the vigil for tonight?'

‘
I thought Edward should take the first four hours,' Mary
Ann said quickly, ‘so that he can have an unbroken night's
sleep. He works so hard during the day, he needs his rest.’

James met her eyes with a faint and cynical smile. 'Then
since I, as you plainly imply, madam, do nothing during the
day, I should take the middle watch.’

Mary Ann flushed. 'I implied nothing of the sort.'

‘
I thought I could do the middle watch,' Harry said,
noticing nothing of the exchange. 'I'm used to sleeping in
four-hour periods, so I could sleep before and after with no
ill-effects.'

‘
Then I am to take the morning watch,' James said. 'Very
well, I had better retire early, and make sure of my sleep.
You seem very comfortable here – I should be no addition. I
bid you all goodnight.’

He was at the foot of the stairs when he heard the
drawing-room door open and shut again, and turned to find
his wife coming towards him. He waited for her courteously,
but with that same forbidding smile which made her feel
clumsy and stupid. 'Well, ma'am?’

She took a moment to assemble the words. 'James, I wish
– I wish you will let me take vigil with you.’

He raised his eyebrows. 'I always thought my mother behaved towards you with nothing warmer than neglect.
Surely she was nothing to you?’

But
you
are! she cried inwardly. If she could have spoken
it, would it have made a difference? She didn't know; and
she said, a little stiffly, 'I imagine you will not forbid me, at
least.’

He bowed. 'I shall be glad of your company,' he said
courteously.

‘
I'll leave orders for one of the housemaids to wake you,'
she offered shyly.

‘
Thank you,' he said. A little, just a little, warmth sprang
up in the hall, and they both waited to see what there might
be to say. James tried to share his earlier amusement with
her. 'Jacob thinks you mean to promote him to Oxhey's
position. He opened the door to me with an entirely new
flourish.’

But she took it amiss, and blushed with vexation. 'Oxhey was unable to perform his duties today, and someone had to
take them over. I do think him too old, and that he should
retire, but I shall do nothing you dislike, I assure you.'

‘
Now you are mistress of the house, the decisions are
yours. You must do as you please about these matters,'
James said. The words were courteous, even generous, but
Mary Ann could not help feeling she was being baited. She made no reply, and after a moment James bowed again, and
went upstairs to his solitary couch.

*

Jemima had made a great many friends and even more
acquaintances in the course of a long life, too many to fit
into the chapel at Morland Place. It was decided, therefore,
to have the funeral service at St Edward's church, and the
interment afterwards at the chapel for the family and
servants only. The children from St Edward's School were
to sit in the gallery, and were to sing an anthem during the
service, and carry torches in the procession back to the
house.

All the family came, except for Mary and her husband,
who would not yet even have heard of Jemima's death.
Charles and Roberta opened Shawes to accommodate
themselves, Horatio and Lady Barbara, Horatio's two sisters
and their husbands, and the Ballincreas from Northumber
land. Lucy and Chetwyn, of course, stayed at Morland
Place. The local inns were full of Akroyd and Pratt cousins
not seen for years, and old friends and racing acquaintances
from all over the country. The Ansteys, the Fussells, the
Shawes, in fact the whole of York society, would be crowd
ing into St Edward's, and even King George sent a message
of sympathy, to remind the family that Jemima had been a
great lady, and the wife of an important special emissary of
the Crown.

Looking around him during the service, James saw that
almost the only person missing was Molise. Even as
Jemima's neice she ought to have been there, but she had
been more than that. Guilt seared him, knowing that it was
through his fault that she had not been able to be with them;
and then loneliness and longing for her drowned out even
the guilt. He moved restlessly with frustration and misery,
and his wife beside him, handsome in black, which suited
her, felt the movement and glanced at him in sympathy.
Harslett, the vicar of St Edward's, was speaking the eulogy, and James tried to listen, to escape his unwelcome thoughts
and the even more unwelcome notice of his wife.

‘
She was a great lady, born of a great age and a great
tradition,' the nasal, fluting voice declaimed. 'In Shake
speare's words, we shall not see her like again.’

And, oh, it was true, James thought, and the enormous
ness of their loss engulfed him. He thought of those of them who were left, and saw that there was no-one of her stature.
They were all such little people, selfish and nervous,
grubbing after their own concerns, without the greatness,
the long vision, the - yes, old-fashioned word though it was
- the
piety
to be truly Master or Mistress of Morland Place.
The world had changed, he thought sadly. She was the last
of her generation. Perhaps there would be no more people
like her, and the age of greatness was gone for ever.

The torchlit procession wound its way slowly back to
Morland Place, the torches blowing sideways like flags, red
and smokey in the breeze, villagers and tenants and
labourers joining it as it passed their gates until it had
swollen to a river of humanity. At the house Father Thomas
was waiting to receive the coffin into the jewelled cave of
the chapel, and though only the family and household were
to follow it, the procession did not disperse. The torches
made a ring of fire around the house, and the mourners stood like a besieging army, but a strangely silent one,
pressed together for companionship, and waiting, for what
they did not know.

In the chapel Father Thomas's reedy old voice wavered and failed, and kneeling with his brothers and sister, with
the weeping servants all around him, James too wept at last:
not for his mother, gone to live in eternal light, but for those
of them left behind in darkness.

The coffin was lowered into the crypt, and at a signal
from Father Thomas to one of the boys, the bell began to
toll. Outside the crowd heard it, and a long sigh ran through
them like a fluttering breeze. One of the torch bearers
stepped forward and plunged his torch into the moat,
dowsing it with a hiss, and one by one the others followed
suit. The flames plunged into the black water like falling
stars, leaving darkness behind; and when they were all gone,
the mourners turned away in silence and went home.

*

Edward's letter to Mary went out with the despatches to the squadron blockading Brest, but by the time it arrived there,
the
Africa
had left for other waters.

The news was that the French government, frustrated in
its desire to conquer England, had turned its attentions elsewhere. In March 1798 the Directory had begun to assemble
an
Armee d'Orient
in the south of France, giving the
command to Buonaparte, who had done so well in Italy.
The Admiralty believed that this force was to be aimed at
the King of Naples, and would attack either Sicily, Sardinia,
or Malta, and Admiral Lord St Vincent had quickly to
gather a squadron together to send into the Mediterranean
to destroy it.

Command was given to Nelson, who, recovering from
the loss of his arm, had recently hoisted his flag as Rear-
Admiral in the
Vanguard,
74, and amongst the ships
detached from other duties to form the squadron was the
Africa.

‘
It's a compliment,' Mary said when her husband told her the news, 'and a reward, for all those years of faithful block
ade duty.'

‘
I think you may be right. Jervis may well want to put me
in the way of a little prize-money,' Haworth said.

‘
And he may well wish to send his most able officers on
this assignment,' Mary added with an amused smile. 'So, my
love, what is there to make you frown? I don't suppose there's a captain within sixty miles of us who wouldn't
change places with you.'

‘
You know very well,' Haworth said, 'that I'm worrying
about you.'

‘
Then don't,' Mary said. 'I am perfectly all right — indeed,
I've never felt better or stronger. Don't I look well?’

She turned her glowing face to him, and he could not but smile. She carried her second child easily, and claimed that
it was because she was with him that in this pregnancy she
had known no single day of sickness or discomfort.

‘
You know it's a healthy life on board ship. Think of all the things I might have contracted if I had been on shore —
smallpox, typhoid, measles — '

‘
That's all very well, my darling,' Haworth said, inter
rupting the list, 'but you know I want to see you sent safely
back to England in good time for your confinement. Now
we are sailing to Toulon, and who knows where we will go
from there? At any rate, it is likely to be further from
England, and if the talk is right, that this Buonaparte has
designs on India — '

‘
You have so often told me that the seas are England's,' Mary said, taking his arm comfortingly, 'and wherever the squadron is, there will be ships coming and going. And we
may well be back with the Brest blockade, or even back in
port, in a few weeks' time,' she added hastily, to forestall his
protest.

He kissed the end of her nose, and smiled. 'I know what's
going on in your mind — you hope to persuade me to let you
have the baby on board; but let me assure you, my darling,
that there is nothing you can say to change my mind. At the
first opportunity, I shall send you home to England.’

Mary merely smiled. She had her own ideas about that;
but one thing she had learned during a lifetime of getting
her own way was that there was no sense in fighting before
the battle.

The squadron reached the Gulf of Lions on May the
seventeenth, and found the French invasion fleet still in Toulon harbour. Scout ships venturing close in reported
three hundred transports at anchor there — a probable army
of thirty thousand — and sixteen or seventeen warships. The
orders were to attack and destroy the fleet at all costs, but a
severe gale blew up in the night and drove the English
squadron off station, and by the time they had managed to
beat back, the French had taken their chance and sailed.

What would be their first objective was a matter for
guesswork, and the Mediterranean was a large place and full
of vulnerable islands. It was not until a month later that
definite news was heard of the French, and then it was
unhelpful. The fleet, under Vice-Admiral Brueys, had sailed
to Malta, where Buonaparte had taken and garrisoned
Valletta with four thousand soldiers, and they had sailed
again on the nineteenth of June.

‘
All captains' was signalled from the flagship, and
Haworth with the others hurried on board the
Vanguard,
where the situation was discussed. Was Buonaparte on his way to conquer Sicily, or to take Egypt and thence India?
Should the squadron sail to Malta, Sicily, or Alexandria? Mary was on the quarterdeck of the
Africa
along with the
Anchovy and as many other officers as could make them
selves inconspicuous when Captain Haworth came back on
board, to learn the news.