As though Trevelyan’s presence had not been sufficient oppression, a shadow fell across Grey at this point, and he looked up to discover that the very tall German had come to join them, hawklike blond features set in a grimace of congeniality. Behind von Namtzen, Olivia rolled her eyes at Grey in a gesture of helplessness.

Not caring to be loomed over, Grey took a polite step back, but to no avail. The Hanoverian advanced enthusiastically and seized him in a fraternal embrace.

“We are allies!” von Namtzen announced dramatically to the room at large. “Between the lion of England and the stallion of Hanover, who can stand?” He released Grey, who, with some irritation, perceived that his mother appeared to be finding something amusing in the situation.

“So! Major Grey, I have had the honor this afternoon to be observing the practice of gunnery at Woolwich Arsenal, in company with your Colonel Quarry!”

“Indeed,” Grey murmured, noting that one of his waistcoat buttons appeared to be missing. Had he lost it during the contretemps at the gaol, he wondered, or at the hands of this plumed maniac?

“Such booms! I was deafened, quite deafened,” von Namtzen assured the assemblage, beaming. “I have heard also the guns of Russia, at St. Petersburg—pah! They are nothing; mere farts, by comparison.”

One of the ladies tittered behind her fan. This appeared to encourage von Namtzen, who embarked upon an exegesis of the military personality, giving his unbridled opinions on the virtues of the soldiery of various nations. While the Captain’s remarks were ostensibly addressed to Grey, and peppered by occasional interjections of “Do you not agree, Major?”, his voice was sufficiently resonant as to overpower all other conversation in his immediate vicinity, with the result that he was shortly surrounded by a company of attentive listeners. Grey, to his relief, was able to retreat inconspicuously.

This relief was short-lived, though; as he accepted a glass of wine from a proffered tray, he discovered that he was standing cheek by jowl again with Joseph Trevelyan, and now alone with the man, both Lady Mumford and Olivia having inconveniently decamped to the supper tables.

“The English?” von Namtzen was saying rhetorically, in answer to some question from Mrs. Haseltine. “Ask a Frenchman what he thinks of the English army, and he will tell you that the English soldier is clumsy, crude, and boorish.”

Grey met Trevelyan’s eye with an unexpected sympathy of feeling, the two men at once united in their unspoken opinion of the Hanoverian.

“One might ask an English soldier what he thinks of the French, too,” Trevelyan murmured in Grey’s ear. “But I doubt the answer would be suited to a drawing room.”

Taken by surprise, Grey laughed. This was a tactical error, as it drew von Namtzen’s attention to him once more.