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Authors: Allan Mallinson
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Christmas?’
‘Sir!’
‘And did anything cause that sickness that you know of?’
‘He’d had a bang on the ’ead from something, but I can’t remember what.’
‘Had he indeed! And this one, number …’ Hervey stooped to find the regimental number on the off-fore hoof (the Sixth had lately adopted this practice instead of the approved method of cutting the number into the coat). ‘J77 – did he have any knocks about the head?’
‘He ’ad a thorn in ’is eye a week ago, sir.’
Hervey made a thoughtful
umm
sound. ‘Fetch a candle, Clamp!’
‘What are you thinking, Mr Hervey?’ asked the serjeant-major.
‘I’m thinking that I should like to see the eye for myself. Would you hold up his head for me?’
‘His eye will be way back in its socket by the time you prise it open.’
‘That’s why I’m not going to force it. Hold the candle up close, Clamp!’ He placed his hand carefully on the gelding’s brow and gently extended his thumb so that it rested on the margin of the upper lid.
‘What exactly are you doing, then?’
‘There’s a muscle just above the eyelid, the retractor muscle,’ he replied. ‘If you press gently but firmly on it, it ceases to act with any strength and the lid can be lifted quite easily.’
Hervey pressed for almost a minute and then drew up the lid slowly, using his other hand to pull down the lower lid. The gelding stood quite calm and still.
‘Well, I’ll be damned!’ muttered the serjeant-major.
‘An old trooper taught me that: Daniel Coates – he was with the Sixteenth in America. He taught me to ride, use a sword and a pistol, and everything about handling a troop – and all before I was twelve! I should think there is very little that Daniel Coates does not know,’ said Hervey absently.
‘Do you see anything?’ the serjeant-major pressed, even more intrigued.
‘Take a look at the pupil for yourself, Sarn’t-Major. What do
you
see?’
‘The middle’s very blue.’
‘What else?’
‘Nothing that I can tell, sir. It’s very watery of course.’
‘The pupil – is it diminished?’
‘No, I would not say it was.’
‘Just so, Sarn’t-Major!’ And with that Hervey let the eye close. ‘We must summon the veterinary officer.’
‘I’m afraid he’s been bedded down, sir – fever again.’
‘The poor devil’s riddled with it. He ought to give up. Well, Sarn’t-Major, this horse is not to be shot. He needs some damp muslin over his eyes and then turning out in a day or so. He has Common Ophthalmia, not Specific. The symptoms are all but identical, except that with moon blindness the pupil is invariably diminished. Clamp, what is the other chestnut’s number?’
‘J78, sir. Him and 77 was bought as a pair in England.’
‘Umm,’ went Hervey again. ‘Order feeding-off, then, Sarn’t-Major.’
And now at last he could go and see his own chargers, stabled in a tithe barn on clean straw, the first they had seen in months. Inevitably they were chewing it.
‘It’s all right, sir,’ chirped Johnson, ‘it’s wheat straw.’
Hervey’s little mare whickered in recognition while continuing to chew her bed, but she looked badly run up.
‘Is there no hay anywhere?’ he asked, pulling her ears.
‘Not yet, sir, nothing decent; quartermasters are still out progging.’
Jessye was by common consent the handiest charger in the Sixth, although when Hervey had first joined for duty she had been derided as a covert-hack, fit only to take a blade to a meet but not to follow hounds. Barely an inch over fifteen hands, yet she had the sturdiness and intelligence of her dam, a Welsh cob which for twenty years had carried his father round his parish, and the speed and endurance of her sire, a thoroughbred whose bloodlines went directly back to the Godolphin Arab. She had struggled out of the womb on Hervey’s fourteenth birthday, the day he left the vicarage for Shrewsbury School, a birthday present of such apt timing that his
‘Sir!’
‘And did anything cause that sickness that you know of?’
‘He’d had a bang on the ’ead from something, but I can’t remember what.’
‘Had he indeed! And this one, number …’ Hervey stooped to find the regimental number on the off-fore hoof (the Sixth had lately adopted this practice instead of the approved method of cutting the number into the coat). ‘J77 – did he have any knocks about the head?’
‘He ’ad a thorn in ’is eye a week ago, sir.’
Hervey made a thoughtful
umm
sound. ‘Fetch a candle, Clamp!’
‘What are you thinking, Mr Hervey?’ asked the serjeant-major.
‘I’m thinking that I should like to see the eye for myself. Would you hold up his head for me?’
‘His eye will be way back in its socket by the time you prise it open.’
‘That’s why I’m not going to force it. Hold the candle up close, Clamp!’ He placed his hand carefully on the gelding’s brow and gently extended his thumb so that it rested on the margin of the upper lid.
‘What exactly are you doing, then?’
‘There’s a muscle just above the eyelid, the retractor muscle,’ he replied. ‘If you press gently but firmly on it, it ceases to act with any strength and the lid can be lifted quite easily.’
Hervey pressed for almost a minute and then drew up the lid slowly, using his other hand to pull down the lower lid. The gelding stood quite calm and still.
‘Well, I’ll be damned!’ muttered the serjeant-major.
‘An old trooper taught me that: Daniel Coates – he was with the Sixteenth in America. He taught me to ride, use a sword and a pistol, and everything about handling a troop – and all before I was twelve! I should think there is very little that Daniel Coates does not know,’ said Hervey absently.
‘Do you see anything?’ the serjeant-major pressed, even more intrigued.
‘Take a look at the pupil for yourself, Sarn’t-Major. What do
you
see?’
‘The middle’s very blue.’
‘What else?’
‘Nothing that I can tell, sir. It’s very watery of course.’
‘The pupil – is it diminished?’
‘No, I would not say it was.’
‘Just so, Sarn’t-Major!’ And with that Hervey let the eye close. ‘We must summon the veterinary officer.’
‘I’m afraid he’s been bedded down, sir – fever again.’
‘The poor devil’s riddled with it. He ought to give up. Well, Sarn’t-Major, this horse is not to be shot. He needs some damp muslin over his eyes and then turning out in a day or so. He has Common Ophthalmia, not Specific. The symptoms are all but identical, except that with moon blindness the pupil is invariably diminished. Clamp, what is the other chestnut’s number?’
‘J78, sir. Him and 77 was bought as a pair in England.’
‘Umm,’ went Hervey again. ‘Order feeding-off, then, Sarn’t-Major.’
And now at last he could go and see his own chargers, stabled in a tithe barn on clean straw, the first they had seen in months. Inevitably they were chewing it.
‘It’s all right, sir,’ chirped Johnson, ‘it’s wheat straw.’
Hervey’s little mare whickered in recognition while continuing to chew her bed, but she looked badly run up.
‘Is there no hay anywhere?’ he asked, pulling her ears.
‘Not yet, sir, nothing decent; quartermasters are still out progging.’
Jessye was by common consent the handiest charger in the Sixth, although when Hervey had first joined for duty she had been derided as a covert-hack, fit only to take a blade to a meet but not to follow hounds. Barely an inch over fifteen hands, yet she had the sturdiness and intelligence of her dam, a Welsh cob which for twenty years had carried his father round his parish, and the speed and endurance of her sire, a thoroughbred whose bloodlines went directly back to the Godolphin Arab. She had struggled out of the womb on Hervey’s fourteenth birthday, the day he left the vicarage for Shrewsbury School, a birthday present of such apt timing that his
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