Lord John and the Hand of Devils Page 15

  Grimacing, he sought respite from the clock's ticking by striding up and down the corridor, returning the censorious looks of the row of portraits hung upon the wall as he passed them--early governors of the Arsenal.

  The portraits were mediocre in execution for the most part, save the one near the end, done by a more talented hand. Perhaps a Dutchman by his looks--a black-browed gentleman whose fiercely rubicund features radiated a jolly determination. Probably a good attitude for one whose profession was explosion.

  As though the Dutchman agreed with this sentiment, a tremendous boom rattled the casement at the end of the corridor and the floor heaved suddenly under Grey's feet.

  He flung himself flat, hat flying, and found himself hugging the shabby hall-runner, sweating and breathless.

  "My lord?" A voice from which any trace of astonishment or curiosity had been carefully removed spoke above him. "The gentlemen are ready."

  "Are they? In...deed." He rose, stilling the trembling of his limbs by main effort, and brushed the dust from his uniform with what nonchalance could be managed.

  "If you will follow me, my lord?" The functionary, a small, neatly wigged person of impeccable politeness and indeterminate aspect, bent to pick up Grey's hat, and handing it to him without comment, turned to lead him back down the corridor. Behind them, the clock ticked imperturbably on, the passage of time undisturbed by such ephemera as explosion or death.

  There were three of them, seated behind a long table, a weighty thing of carved dark wood. To one side, a clerk sat at a small desk, quill and paper at the ready to record his testimony. A single chair was placed, stark and solitary, in the space before the table.

  So it really was an inquisition, he thought. His brother Hal had warned him. His sense of unease grew stronger. The trouble with an inquisition was that it seldom went hungry to bed.

  The black-coated functionary accompanied him to the chair, hovering at his elbow as though afraid he might bolt, and left him there with a murmured "Major Grey" and a discreet bow in the direction of the Commission of Inquiry. They did not bother to introduce themselves. The tall, thin-faced fellow was vaguely familiar; a nobleman, he thought--knight, perhaps a minor baronet? Expensively tailored in gray superfine. The name escaped him, though perhaps it would come of itself in time.

  He did recognize the military member of the tribunal: Colonel Twelvetrees, of the Royal Artillery Regiment, wearing his dress uniform and an expression that spoke of habitual severity. From what Grey knew of his reputation, the expression was well earned. That could be dealt with, though; yes, sir, no, sir, three bags full, sir.

  The third was less forbidding in aspect, a middle-aged gentleman, plump and neat in purple, with a striped waistcoat and a small decoration; he went so far as to smile politely at Grey. Grey removed his hat and bowed to His Majesty's Royal Commission of Inquiry, but did not sit 'til he was bidden to do so.

  The colonel cleared his throat then and began without preamble.

  "You are summoned here, Major, to assist us in an inquiry into the explosion of a cannon whilst under your command during the battle at Crefeld in Prussia, on twenty-third June of this year. You will answer all questions put to you, in as much detail as may be required."

  "Yes, sir." He sat bolt upright, face impassive.

  A sort of rumble ran through the building, felt rather than heard, and the droplets on a small crystal chandelier tinkled gently overhead. The huge proving grounds of the Arsenal lay somewhere beyond the Tower Place house, he knew--how far away?

  The plump gentleman put a pair of spectacles on his nose and leaned forward expectantly.

  "Will you tell us, please, my lord, the circumstances in which you came to take charge of the gun and its crew?"

  Obediently, he told them, in the words he had prepared. Colorless, brief, exact. Allowing of no doubt. Had any of them ever set foot on a battlefield, he wondered? If they had, they would know how little resemblance his words held to the truth of that day--but it hardly mattered. He spoke for the record, and was therefore careful.

  They interrupted now and then, asking trivial questions about the position of the gun upon the field, the proximity of the French cavalry at the time, the weather--what in God's name might the weather have had to do with it? he wondered.

  The clerk scratched industriously away, recording it all.

  "You had had previous experience in fighting a gun of this type?" That was the roundish gentleman with the striped waistcoat and the discreet decoration. The baronet had called him Oswald, and suddenly he realized who the man must be--the Honorable Mortimer Oswald, Member of Parliament. He'd seen the name on posters and banners during the last election.

  "I had."

  Oswald cocked an eyebrow, plainly inviting him to elaborate, but he kept silent.

  Twelvetrees fixed him with a cold eye.

  "With which regiment, when, how long?"

  Blast.

  "I served informally with the Forty-sixth, sir--my brother's regiment--Lord Melton, that is--during the Jacobite campaign in Scotland under General Cope. Was detailed to a gun crew belonging to the Royal Artillery after taking up my commission, and trained there for six months before coming back to the Forty-sixth. More recently, I was seconded to a Hanoverian regiment in Germany, and saw service there with a Prussian artillery company."

  He saw no need to add that this service had consisted largely of eating sausages with the gun crew. And as for his so-called service with Cope...the less said about that, the better. He had, however, actually commanded the firing of cannon, which the members of the board very likely had not, Twelvetrees included.

  "Cope?" said the baronet, seeming to rouse a bit at the name. "Gentleman Johnny?" He laughed, and the colonel's hatchet face tightened.

  "Yes, sir." Oh, God. Please God, he hadn't heard the story.

  Apparently not; the man merely hummed a snatch of that mocking Scotch song, "Hey, Johnny Cope, are ye walkin' yet?" and broke off, looking amused.

  "Cope," he repeated, shaking his head. "You must have been very young at the time, Major?"

  "Sixteen, sir." He felt his blood rise and his cheeks flush. Nearly half a lifetime. Dear God, how long would he have to live, in order to escape the memory of Prestonpans, and goddamned Jamie Fraser?

  Twelvetrees was not amused, and cast a cold glance at the nobleman.

  "Had you commanded a gun in battle, prior to Crefeld?" Bloody-minded sod.

  "Yes, sir," Grey replied, keeping his voice calm. "At Falkirk." They'd put him in charge of a gun and allowed him to fire several shots at an abandoned church before retreating, for the sake of practice.

  Oswald emitted a hum of interest.

  "And what sort of gun did you command on that occasion, Major?"

  "A murderer, sir," he replied, naming a small and very old-fashioned cannon, left over from the last century.

  "Not quite so murderous as Tom Pilchard, though, eh, Major?"

  He must have looked as blank as he felt, for Oswald kindly elaborated.

  "The gun you served at Crefeld, Major. You did not know its name?"

  "No, sir," he said, and could not help adding, "we were not formally introduced, owing to the circumstances."

  He knew before he said it that it was a mistake, but nerves and irritation had got the best of him; the constant thumping from the proving ground beyond the house made the floor shake every few minutes, and sweat was running down his sides inside his shirt. The price of his momentary lapse was a blistering ten-minute lecture from Twelvetrees on respect for the army--in the person of himself, he gathered--and the dignity of His Majesty's commission. All the while Grey sat upright as a ramrod, saying, "Yes, sir," and "No, sir," with a countenance of perfect blankness, and Oswald wheezed with open amusement.

  The baronet waited through the colonel's tirade with ill-concealed impatience, stripping the barbs from his quill one by one, so that tiny feathers strewed the table and flew up in a cloud as he drummed his fingers.

>   From the corner of his eye, Grey saw the clerk lean back, looking faintly entertained. The man rubbed his ink-stained fingers, clearly grateful for the momentary break in the proceedings.

  When at last the colonel subsided--with a final ugly jab at his brother, his brother's regiment, and Grey's late father--the baronet cleared his throat with a menacing growl and sat forward to take his own turn.

  Grey was inclined to think that the growl was aimed as much at Twelvetrees as at himself---noblemen did not like to hear others of their ilk rubbished in public, regardless of circumstance. The lack of amity among the members of the commission had become increasingly apparent during the questioning, but that observation was of little value to him personally.

  The clerk, seeing the end of his brief vacation, picked up his quill again with an audible sigh.

  Marchmont--that was it! Lord Marchmont--he was a baronet--set about a brisk dissection of Grey's experience, background, education, and family, ending with a sudden pointed inquiry as to when Grey had last seen Edgar DeVane.

  "Edgar DeVane?" Grey repeated blankly.

  "Your brother, I believe?" Marchmont said, with elaborate patience.

  "Yes, sir," Grey said respectfully, thinking, What the devil...? Edgar? "I beg pardon, sir. Your question took me unexpectedly. I believe I last saw my half brother"--he leaned a little on the words--"near Christmas last." He remembered the occasion, certainly; Edgar's wife, Maude, had badgered her husband into bringing the family to London for a month, and Grey had accompanied her and her two daughters in their raids on the Regent and Bond Street shops, in the capacity of native bearer. He recalled thinking at the time that Edgar's affairs must be prospering markedly; either that, or he would return to Sussex bankrupt.

  He waited. Marchmont squinted at him, tapping the mangled quill on the papers in front of him.

  "Christmas," the baronet repeated. "Have you been in correspondence with DeVane since then?"

  "No," he replied promptly. While he assumed that Edgar was in fact literate, he'd never seen anything of a written nature purporting to emanate from his half brother. His mother kept up a dutiful correspondence with all four of her sons, but the Sussex half of that particular exchange was sustained entirely by the efforts of Maude.

  "Christmas," Marchmont repeated again, frowning. "And when had you last seen DeVane, prior to that?"

  "I do not recall, sir; my apologies."

  "Oh, now, I am afraid that won't do, my lord." Oswald was still looking genial, but light glittered from his spectacles. "We must insist upon an answer."

  A louder than usual boom from beyond the house made the clerk start in his seat and grab for his inkwell. Grey might easily have started likewise, were he not so taken aback by this sudden insistence upon his half brother's whereabouts and relations with himself. He could only conclude that the commission had lost its collective mind.

  Twelvetrees added his own bit to this impression, glowering at him under iron-gray brows.

  "We are waiting, Major."

  Ought he to choose some date at random? he wondered. Would they investigate to discover whether he told the truth?

  Knowing what sort of response it might provoke, he replied firmly, "I am sorry, sir. I see Edgar DeVane very infrequently; prior to last Christmas, I suppose that it might have been more than a year--two, perhaps--since I have spoken to him."

  "Or written?" Marchmont pounced.

  He didn't know that, either, but there was much less chance that anyone could prove him wrong.

  "I think that I may have written to him when--" His words were drowned out by the whistle of some large missile, very near at hand, followed by a tremendous crash. He kept himself in his chair only by seizing the seat of it with both hands, and gulped air to keep his voice from shaking. "--when I was seconded to the Graf von Namtzen's regiment. That--that would have been in--in--'57."

  "Can they not still that infernal racket?" Marchmont's nerves seemed also to have become frayed by the bombardment. He sat upright and slapped a hand on the table. "Mr. Simpson!"

  The black-coated functionary appeared in the doorway with an inquiring look.

  "Tell them to stop banging away out there, for God's sake," the baronet said peevishly.

  "I am afraid that the Ordnance Office is a power unto itself, my lord," Simpson said, shaking his head sadly at the thought of such intransigence.

  "Perhaps we might dismiss the major until a more congenial time--" Oswald began, but Twelvetrees snapped, "Nonsense!" at him, and turned his minatory gaze on Grey once more.

  The colonel said something, but was drowned out by a barrage of bangs and pops, as though the Ordnance fellows proposed to emphasize their independence. Grey's blood was roaring in his ears, his leather stock tight round his throat. He dug his fingers hard into the wood of the chair.

  "With all respect, sir," he said, as firmly as he might, disregarding whatever it was that Twelvetrees had asked. "I have little regular contact with my half brother. I cannot tell you more than I have."

  Marchmont uttered an audible "hmp!" of disbelief, and Twelvetrees glared as though he wished to order Grey strung up to a triangle and flogged on the spot. Oswald, though, peered closely at him over the tops of his spectacles, and in a sudden, blessed silence from the proving ground, changed the subject.

  "Were you intimately acquainted with Lieutenant Lister prior to the occasion at Crefeld, my lord?" he asked mildly.

  "I am not familiar with that name at all, sir." He could surmise who Lister was, of course, who he must have been.

  "You surprise me, Major," said Oswald, looking not at all surprised. "Philip Lister was a member of White's, as you are yourself. I should think you must have seen him there now and then, whether you knew his name or not?"

  Grey wasn't surprised that Oswald knew that he belonged to White's club; all of London had heard about his last visit there. He didn't haunt the place, though, preferring the Beefsteak.

  Rather than endeavor to detail his social habits, he merely replied, "That is possible. However, the lieutenant had been struck by a cannonball, sir, which unfortunately removed his head. I had no opportunity of examining his features in order to ascertain whether he might be an acquaintance."

  Marchmont glanced at him sharply.

  "Are you being impertinent, sir?"

  "Certainly not, sir." All three of them looked suddenly at him as one, like a phalanx of owls eyeing a mouse. A drop of sweat wormed its slow way down his back, itching.

  Twelvetrees coughed explosively and the illusion was broken. With bewildering suddenness, they resumed questioning him about the battle.

  "How long had you been fighting the gun when it exploded?" Marchmont asked, drumming his fingers on the table.

  "Roughly half an hour, sir." No idea, sir. Seemed all day, sir. Couldn't have been, though; the battle itself had taken no more than three or four hours. So he'd been told, later.

  He realized, with a faint sense of nightmare, that his hands were beginning to tremble, and as unobtrusively as possible, curled them into fists on his knees.

  They returned to the battle, making him go through it again, and once more, and then again: the number of men in the gun crew, their separate offices, how the gun was aimed--a pause, while he explained to a frowning Marchmont exactly what quoins were and that, no, the placement of these wooden wedges beneath the cannon's trunnions affected nothing more than the altitude of the barrel, and could not possibly have contributed to the explosion--what shot had they been using--grapeshot, for the most part--what was the fucking weather like, which member of the crew had been killed--the loader, he didn't know the man's name--and exactly who had put the linstock to the touchhole during that last, fateful firing?

  He clung to the colorless, rehearsed words of his testimony, a feeble shield against memory.

  A faint haze of smoke from the proving ground had seeped through the cracks of the windows and hung near the egg-and-dart molding of the ceiling, gray as the rain cloud
s outside.

  His left arm ached where it had been broken.

  Sweat ran over his ribs, slow as seeping blood.

  The ground shook under him, and he felt in his bones the invisible presence of Prussian dragon-riders.

  He wished to God they had not told him Lister's name.

  The thump and rumble of distant explosion had resumed. He began to try to identify the sounds as a means of distraction, wondering, An eight? Or a coehorn? at a series of regular, hollow thumps, or thinking with more confidence, Twenty-four pounder, when the chandelier rattled overhead.

  "It rained in the night," he repeated for the fourth time, "but it was not raining heavily during the battle, no, sir."

  "Your vision was not obscured, then?"

  Only by the sweat burning in his eyes and the billows of black powder smoke that drifted like thunderclouds over the field.

  "No, sir."

  "You were not distracted in mind?"

  He gripped his knees.

  "No, sir."

  "So you claim," Marchmont said, with distinct skepticism. "Do you not think it possible--or even likely, Major--that in the heat of battle, you might conceivably have ordered your crew to load a second charge before firing the first? I think such an eventuality would have provided an explosion of sufficient force as to rupture the cannon, would it not, Colonel?" He leaned a little forward, raising an interrogative brow at Twelvetrees, who looked more po-faced than usual, but nodded.

  A small smirk of satisfaction oiled Lord Marchmont's lips, as he looked back at Grey.

  "Major?"

  Grey felt a sharp jolt in the pit of his stomach. He'd come expecting official tedium, the meticulous dissection of accident required by those whose business such things were. He hadn't looked forward either to the endless questions or to the inescapable reliving of the events at Crefeld--but the last thing he'd expected was this.

  "Do I understand you aright, my lord?" he asked carefully. "Do you insinuate--do you dare to insinuate--that I...that my actions caused the explosion which--"

  "Oh, no, oh, no!" Oswald leapt in hurriedly, seeing Grey draw himself up. "I am quite sure his lordship insinuates nothing." But Grey was already on his feet.

  The clerk looked up, startled. There was a smut on his nose.