'Suit yourself,' said the young man cheerfully, and went to another door. The engine at the front, no doubt in sympathy with the Colonel, let out a huge huff of steam.

Only some time later when the engine was puffing them with a busy rattle towards the environs of Southampton, did Lord Henry venture to enquire: 'Who was that young man?'

And now poor Albion buried his face in his hands and through gritted teeth informed him: 'That, Sir, was my son-in-law.'

'Ah,' Lord Henry enquired no more. He had heard of Minimus Furzey.

It wasn't long before Albion saw their game. The Committee Room was crowded. Cumberbatch and his friends, the Forest landowners, everyone was there; and sitting behind the long table facing the room were ten men, law lords or peers of the realm, every one. He saw their game by the way they looked at him.

Colonel Albion had always felt rather proud of the fact that he was descended from two of the most ancient families in southern England. He wasn't arrogant about it but there was a satisfaction in knowing that no one, not the mightiest in the land, could ever tell him he wasn't a gentleman or that he didn't belong. He was also proud of the fact that, though he had purchased his captaincy, he had advanced to the rank of colonel entirely on his merits. His social place amongst the Forest gentry was as solid as a castle on a rock.

But the aristocrats who faced him now were of a different sort. Their families mightn't be as ancient, but they didn't care. Their estates were far larger; they belonged to that more rarefied club that governed the country. And to them - they were too polite to say so but he saw it in their eyes - he was just a florid-faced squire.

'Colonel Albion, you are a Commissioner, are you not, of the Deer Removal Act?'

'I am.' There were thirteen Commissioners whose job it was to oversee the working of the Deer Removal Act and, in particular, to approve any new inclosures. Three came from the Office of Woods, including Cumberbatch, then there were the four verderers, chosen by the county, though their power was only a shadow of what it had been in medieval times. The rest were the gentlemen or freeholders who held rights of commoning on the Forest. Albion, with extensive rights and numerous tenants, was a natural person to sit on the Commission.

'And why, Colonel, in your view, has there grown up such opposition to the Crown?'

Opposition? Of course there had been opposition: fences broken, young plantations set on fire. These were the ways the poorer Forest folk let you know their feelings and frankly he didn't blame them. Cumberbatch might like to characterize this as a rebellion against the monarch, but he wasn't going to let him get away with it.