The Assistant Provost-Marshal acknowledged the order with a salute.
“Your man knew we’d have bloodhounds after him,” said the Governor. “He waded along the river. But he has to come out sooner or later, and we’ll pick up the scent again there.”
Barbara guided her horse to the side of the carriage, and raised her veil to speak to him.
“Good morning, dear,” she said.
“Good morning,” said Hornblower.
It was hard to say more, when the events of the last hour or two, and all their implications, were allowed for. And Barbara was hardly flushed with the heat and the exercise. She looked drawn and tired; her smile was positively wan. It occurred to Hornblower that she was participating in this hunt as unwillingly as he was. And it seemed likely that she had allowed the move from Admiralty House to Government House this morning to trouble her; womanlike she would not have been able to allow the Navy to execute the task without her supervision even though the Navy had made similar moves by the hundred thousand. She had tried to order it all and was weary in consequence.
“Come and sit in the carriage, dear,” he said. “Gerard will take your horse.”
“Mr Gerard is wearing silk stockings the same as you are, dear,” replied Barbara, smiling through her weariness, “and I have too much respect for his dignity to set him on a side saddle in any case.”
“My groom will lead your horse, Lady Hornblower,” interposed the Governor. “This hunt looks as if it’s going to turn out badly.”
Hornblower scrambled down from the carriage to help Barbara from the side-saddle and up into the carriage. Gerard and Spendlove, who had followed him out, followed them back after a moment’s hesitation and sat with their backs to the horses.
“We should have heard something from the bloodhounds by now,” said the Governor. The four bloodhounds had now cast up and down both banks for a considerable distance. “Can he have climbed a tree?”
A man could be more resourceful than any fox, Hornblower knew. But it was an unexpected aspect of Hudnutt’s character.
“Not a trace of scent, Your Excellency,” said the Assistant Provost-Marshal trotting up. “Nothing at all.”
“Oh, well then, we’ll go home again. A poor day’s sport after all. We’ll precede you, Lady Hornblower, with your permission.”
“We’ll see you at the house, dear Lady Hornblower,” echoed Lady Hooper.
The carriage turned again and followed the horsemen down the lane.
“You’ve had a busy morning, I fear, my dear,” said Hornblower; with his staff sitting across the carriage from them he had to retain a certain formality of tone.
“Not busy at all,” answered Barbara, turning her head to meet his glance. “A very pleasant morning, thank you, dear. And you – your ceremonial went off without a hitch, I hope?”
“Well enough, thank you. Ransome -” he changed what he was going to say abruptly. What he would say about Ransome to Barbara’s private ear was not the same as what he would say in the hearing of his staff.
The carriage trotted on, and conversation proceeded only fitfully in the heat. It was long before they swung through the gates of Government House, with Hornblower acknowledging the salute of the sentry, and drew up at the door. Aides-de-camp and butlers and maids awaited them; but Barbara had already dealt with the move, and in the vast, cavernous bedroom and dressing room allotted to principal guests Hornblower’s things were already disposed along with hers.
“At last alone,” smiled Barbara. “Now we can look forward to Smallbridge.”
Indeed that was so; this was the beginning of one of those periods of transition which Hornblower knew so well, as did every sailor, the strange days, or weeks, between one life and the next. He had ceased to be a Commander-in-Chief; now he had to endure existence until he would at least be master in his own house. The urgent need at the moment was for a bath; his shirt was sticking to his ribs under his heavy uniform coat. Perhaps never again, never in all his life, would he take a bath under a wash-deck pump somewhere out with the trade winds blowing upon him. On the other hand, he would not, at least while he was in Jamaica, have to wear a uniform again.