Four

'HOW'S MY COLLAR?' GEORGE ASKED AUBREY AS THEY stood on the doorstep.

'Perfect.'

'The tie?'

'Elegantly and firmly knotted.'

'My hair?'

'On top of your head, as it should be. Now, do you want me to produce a full-length mirror?'

The walk from Stonelea School to Maidstone, the Fitzwilliams' city residence, hadn't taken long. On such a pleasant summer's evening, many people were abroad. Courting couples were strolling arm in arm, oblivious of the passing parade. Families were walking with more purpose, mostly led by parents whose faces seemed to suggest that they knew the walk was a sound idea but that they'd rather be at home with a good book.

Maidstone was the house where Aubrey had grown up, and where generations of Fitzwilliams had grown up. It was one in a long, curving row of elegant three-storey townhouses facing a small park in Fielding Cross. The park was dominated by an ancient willow tree which shaded a tiny pond. Aubrey had spent many hours there, sailing wooden yachts and studying tadpoles.

The entire neighbourhood was clean, quiet and reeked of money.

Wealth was in the discreet, but expensive, brass doorknockers. It was in the uniformed domestic staff who appeared at doors whenever they opened. It was in the curtains, the clothes of the passers-by, the prize-winning dogs being walked by anxious-looking kennel lads. It was in the smoothly gliding prams pushed by pretty young nannies.

When growing up, Aubrey had taken some time to realise that the whole city wasn't like this. Small things, like the shabbiness of the visiting knife grinder and wondering where he came from, had aroused Aubrey's curiosity and sent him out of Fielding Cross and into the sprawling streets of the city.

He'd discovered the vast Newbourne railway yards and the blunt engineers and navvies who worked there. He'd found the Narrows, Newpike and Royland Rise, each with their thriving communities so different from the gentility of Fielding Cross, and visited Little Pickling, Crozier, and even the Mire, despite its reputation.

The city was a grubby, brawling conglomeration, and Aubrey loved it, but Fielding Cross remained home.

The entrance of the Fitzwilliam residence was grand. A sandstone portico that would have done justice to a minor pagan god sheltered the door from the elements. The door itself was painted a glossy, dark blue. A bell pull on the wall didn't draw attention to itself, but was there for those who were brought up well enough to know what to look for.

Aubrey took a deep breath, bracing himself. It was always tense, returning home. Sometimes it was like entering a battleground and he knew he had to have his wits about him.

He reached out and rang the bell.

'Ah! Master Aubrey! Master George!'

The butler who answered the doorbell was tall, silver-haired and ruddy-cheeked. The fact that Aubrey had always thought he looked like a weary basset hound didn't detract from the affection Aubrey felt for him. 'Harris. Good to see you. Is he in?'

'Not yet, young sir. Something has come up in Parliament. The PM's called an early election.'

Aubrey whistled. 'An early election? Something must be afoot. When?'

'He's called it for just after the King's birthday.'

'Very clever. No doubt he hopes the goodwill from the King's Birthday procession will spill over to the election.' He shook his head. 'What about Mother? She's not at the museum, is she?'

'No, sir. She's bathing. She said she stank of formaldehyde and needed a good long soak before dousing herself with Padparadsha.' Harris said this with an impassive face, as if he were reporting on the weather. He did not have a high opinion of Lady Fitzwilliam's choice of perfume.

'Good. Good. George and I will be in the library.'

Harris looked as if he were about to say something, but simply nodded. He shut the door behind them before disappearing into the cloakroom. Aubrey stared at Harris's receding form, wondering what it was that he had been about to say.

When they entered the library, Aubrey found out what the butler's discretion had prevented him from mentioning.

Aubrey's grandmother was in the library.

Duchess Maria was sitting in a huge armchair, facing the door. The room smelled of old leather, cigar smoke and woollen carpet that's absorbed too much port and too many secrets.

Duchess Maria was over eighty years old, but her face was smooth and unlined. She was tiny, almost lost in the leather immensity of the chair. Her silver hair was arranged under a black snood and she wore black lace gloves on her long, thin hands. Her eyes were bright and attentive. Aubrey knew, from past experience, that those eyes didn't miss anything.

She didn't look surprised to see them, something Aubrey attributed to her legendary network of informers and spies. An image of Duchess Maria as a spider at the centre of a web stretching across the country and much of the world came to him and he shuddered.

He bowed and kissed her hand. She smelled of violets. 'Aubrey. You're too thin.'

She turned to George. George had learned enough to kiss the hand held out to him. 'George Doyle. It has been six months since I've seen you. You have grown.'

In someone else it would have been a cliché. In Duchess Maria it was a careful observation. 'Yes ma'am. Five inches in the last year.'

'Well done.' She turned her attention back to Aubrey. 'You didn't complete the training course today.'

'No, I didn't,' Aubrey said. Then he waited.

'I see. And you know that this will make it difficult for you to become an officer in the cadets?'

'Yes.' Aubrey kept his answers brief and, he hoped, not open to misinterpretation.

'You know that every Fitzwilliam male in the last two centuries has been a cadet officer at Stonelea School?'

'Yes.'

'So what do you have to say for yourself?'

Aubrey looked mildly at his grandmother, knowing that anger was not a useful reaction where Duchess Maria was concerned. 'I'm allowed one more attempt. I'll make sure I complete the course.'

Duchess Maria nodded. 'I see.' She turned back to George. Aubrey thought the smoothness of the action was like a swivel-mounted machine gun. 'Are you keeping up your cornet practice, George?'

It was an hour before they escaped.

'I feel as if I've just been over the Hummocks myself,' George said as he closed the library door behind them.

'You see why I don't much mind living at the school?' Aubrey said. 'Let's go to the billiards room.'

Aubrey enjoyed a contest. He always felt that he could make up for any lack of skill with a good grasp of tactics, strategy, and the weaknesses of his opponent. He had been playing against George in all manner of games since they were four years old, and despite George's easy co-ordination and strength, he usually managed to beat him.

Aubrey was ahead by a few frames when Harris found them. 'Dinner, sirs.'

Aubrey racked his cue. 'Lucky for you, George, that this table has just been relaid. I was just starting to get the feel of it.'

George shrugged into his jacket. 'I'm sure. A few more decades and I would have been begging for mercy.'

Aubrey laughed. 'Harris, are my parents seated?'

'They are, Master Aubrey.'

Aubrey sighed and his head drooped for an instant. Then he gathered himself. 'Tally-ho, then!'

Gaslights shed yellow softness on the dark, polished wood that was the dining room. Wood panels, wooden floor, immense wooden sideboards and mirrors with heavy wooden frames filled the room, leaving space for the large oval table in the centre. Aubrey had eaten a thousand meals in this room and had always wondered how many trees had gone into the making of the Fitzwilliam dining room. A small forest or two, he was sure.

Duchess Maria was motionless, while seated at either end of the table were his parents.

He looked at his mother, Lady Fitzwilliam. Masses of dark blonde hair were flung over her shoulders, eyes the colour of summer sky at midday, a face that the greatest portraitists would fight to paint . . . Only her sun-tanned skin prevented her from being universally acclaimed the foremost beauty in the land in an age when white skin was the hallmark of those who didn't have to work in the sun and who – therefore – came from the leisured classes.

Aubrey glanced at George. George's face was red and he wasn't looking at Lady Fitzwilliam. Anywhere else in the room, but not Lady Fitzwilliam. Aubrey knew that George had always been totally devoted to his mother, and that she was the only female who unsettled him. Agog, enraptured, in love, George was all of these things. Aubrey was sure his mother knew it, and she tolerated it with warmth, never embarrassing George or revealing she knew of his infatuation.

A discreet throat-clearing drew Aubrey's attention to the head of the table.

Sir Darius Fitzwilliam was tall and slim. His centre-parted hair was beginning to grey, dramatically standing against the original blackness. Aubrey had often heard his father described as dashing but he'd always thought that if he grew a beard he'd look like a pirate, such was the glint in his eye.

'Father,' he said. He kissed Lady Fitzwilliam on the cheek. 'Mother.'

'Aubrey,' she said. 'Are you well?'

'Of course he is, Rose,' snapped Duchess Maria. 'Can't you see?'

'I'm not sure.' She put her hands on Aubrey's arms and turned him this way and that, allowing the light to fall on his face. 'You look pale.'

'He always looks pale, Rose,' Duchess Maria said. A touch of acid lay on her response like frost on a well-kept lawn.

'George, Aubrey, why don't you sit down?' Sir Darius said, amused. 'They could be at this for hours.'

Aubrey admired his father's voice. He could understand why the man had been able to inspire loyalty in his troops, leading them into – and out of – certain death. He also knew why the government flinched every time Sir Darius stood up in parliament.

'Thank you, sir,' George mumbled, taking his seat.

'Your parents are well, George?' Sir Darius asked.

'Mother's healthy as ever, sir. Dad's leg has been playing up, but he doesn't complain.'

'He wouldn't,' Sir Darius said. 'He never did complain.'

George's father had been Sir Darius's sergeant-major, saving his life in the Battle of Carshee – but losing his leg at the same time. Sir Darius had never forgotten, making sure that William Doyle received the best hospital treatment. After the war, Sir Darius had kept up the friendship and their sons had grown up together, Aubrey spending much time at the Doyles' farm. Aubrey knew that his father had sponsored and paid for George to attend Stonelea School, but only after much arguing with George's father. This was only one small part of Sir Darius's ongoing gratitude, but Aubrey also knew that such things were not spoken of. Loyalty, duty, honour were fundamental values, as important and as unnoticed as breathing. Debts were repaid, friendships maintained.

'You too, Aubrey. Don't let the ladies keep you.'

Aubrey nodded and took a chair. The instant he had, servants brought soup.

Lady Fitzwilliam wouldn't be diverted. 'I hope this has convinced you that the army isn't for you, Aubrey.' Her gaze was direct, not allowing him to escape.

'Of course he hasn't,' flared Duchess Maria. 'Every Fitzwilliam goes into the army.'

'And many's the Fitzwilliam who regretted it,' Sir Darius murmured. 'If they had the chance to. As the Scholar Tan said: "Warriors are often chosen, sometimes made, but seldom remembered."' Every eye at the table was on him. He lifted his head. 'My, this soup is good.'

Aubrey looked down. He realised it was pumpkin and that he'd eaten half the bowl. He hadn't tasted it, which was fortunate as he hated pumpkin soup.

Lady Fitzwilliam picked up her spoon and attacked the bowl much as she took to her specimens at the museum. 'George,' she said, 'you were there, weren't you? Tell us what happened.'

George froze in the middle of buttering a roll. 'Tell you what happened?' he repeated.

'I don't think so,' said Sir Darius. He wiped his lips with a napkin and glanced at Aubrey, then George. 'Hardly fair to expect a brother-in-arms to report on another. Loyalty, you know. Camaraderie, the spirit of the regiment, that sort of thing.'

Neither Lady Fitzwilliam nor Duchess Maria looked happy at that. 'Ridiculous,' Lady Fitzwilliam said and attacked her soup again.

'Splendid soup,' George said into the silence. 'Much better than anything we get at Stonelea. Potato and leek, isn't it?'

'It's pumpkin, George,' murmured Aubrey.

'Ah.'

'School food is meant to be bad,' Sir Darius said, the corners of his mouth twitching upwards. 'It means you'll be grateful for the comforts of home.'

So the rest of the evening went. Nothing more was discussed of Aubrey's failure, nor of his future. Lady Fitzwilliam and Duchess Maria were polite as they asked after school affairs, George's musical studies and his family. Sir Darius regaled them with gossip from parliament. Aubrey noted how George looked shocked at some of this, and he chaffed him. George tried to explain that he wasn't accustomed to knowing so much about the great figures of the day, but they would have none of that.

'Sweet, innocent George,' Lady Fitzwilliam said, smiling and touching him on the arm. 'May we always have plenty of sweet, innocent Georges.'

Much to Aubrey's amusement, George blushed mightily and tried to hide it under his napkin.

It was when an immense coconut, strawberry and cream pudding had been placed in front of them that Duchess Maria directed a fierce gaze at Sir Darius. 'Now. How are you going to win this election, Darius? You've been out of power for too long. Look how the Royalists are ruining the country!'

Sir Darius looked pained. 'Mother, I don't want to discuss this at the moment.'

Aubrey wanted him to. He wanted to know how his father was going to combat the Prime Minister's sublime scheduling of the election. The traditional King's Birthday procession, with the King and the PM in the great golden open carriage, would be winding its way from the Palace, over the Old Bridge and the other six great bridges and through the heart of the city. It was one of the few public roles that the King had insisted on maintaining and that the Crown Prince had been unable to distract him from by adding another exotic beast to the burgeoning royal menagerie. The parade was vastly popular, hundreds of thousands of people lining the route and cheering. What a start to the Royalists' campaign, as long as the King didn't do anything bizarre.

What were the Progressives going to do?

'I wasn't happy when you renounced your title,' Duchess Maria went on. 'But if you're going to keep up this ridiculous pastime of being in the Lower House, then at least you should be at the forefront again.'

Aubrey leaned forward, not wanting to miss a word. Since Sir Darius had lost the position of Prime Minister and been expelled from the Royalist Party, he'd been doing his best to consolidate the Progressive Party, the new party he had founded. The difficulty was that the Progressives were a disparate lot, with many different needs, desires and motivations. Making sure that they were all pulling in the one direction was a gargantuan task.

'We face a difficult election,' Sir Darius said.

'If the Royalists win,' Duchess Maria said, 'you'll be condemned to the Opposition benches for years. I couldn't imagine anything worse.'

'What about the war we're about to have with Holmland? Surely that would be worse,' Aubrey put in, before he realised it. Did I actually say that aloud? he thought and he chased a strawberry around his bowl.

All faces turned to him. Duchess Maria looked shocked, as if a dog had spoken up. A smile hovered on Lady Fitzwilliam's mouth and she covered it with one hand.

Sir Darius put an elbow on the table and rested his chin on a fist. 'War?'

'It may not be inevitable, but it is more than likely. This is why we should be preparing.' Aubrey stared at the strawberry on his spoon for a moment then looked at his father. 'Isn't that what you said in your letter to The Argus?'

'And faced a good deal of heat in the party room for it. Some of us aren't sure what we think about Holmland.'

'Surely they can see what's happening on the continent?'

'Some of them don't even see the trouble that rabble-rousers like the Army of New Albion and the Reformists are stirring up. I'm not saying that they don't have some genuine grievances about the state of the country, but their methods . . .' He made a face and picked up his spoon. 'Good strawberries?'

'I won't know until I taste them,' Aubrey said.

Duchess Maria made a noise of disgust. She dabbed at her mouth and rose from the table. 'If you'll excuse me.'

After she had gone, Sir Darius shook his head. 'That woman can gently close a door louder than a thousand cannon.'

'She's anxious, Darius,' Lady Fitzwilliam said. 'She's seen so much before.'

'Upper House politics?' Sir Darius snorted. 'Any place where entry is based on your owning a title becomes party games for the rich and idle. The Lower House is where government happens, where decisions are made. The Upper House members just glance at the bills and approve them, those who are awake. I don't know how Father put up with the Upper House.' Sir Darius looked at his son. 'And what do you think, Aubrey? What's the best way to win this election?'

This was a typical Sir Darius challenge. Aubrey knew that he expected a reasoned answer. Wit was acceptable, but it had to have a backbone of rigour. 'Well, sir,' he began, 'it's a short campaign, and I'm not sure the party is totally united.'

'True, true. Much to my chagrin.'

Aubrey chose his words carefully. 'And the situation with Holmland makes things awkward, wouldn't you say?'

Sir Darius sat back. 'Holmland is arming itself and growing stronger every day. I don't trust it, even though its Elektor is our King's cousin. I see ambition overriding any family loyalty. Strength, not words, is what the Holmlanders understand.'

'Darius,' Lady Fitzwilliam said, 'you're making speeches again.'

He grinned and suddenly looked years younger. 'I need the practice.'

Later, as Aubrey and George walked back to school, George said, 'Your father knows how to inspire people. If he led, I'd follow him.'

Aubrey didn't say anything for some time. Eventually, as they neared the school gates, he turned to George. 'His men always said that,' he said softly. 'Even the ones he later led to their deaths.'