‘Quite the opposite, I believe.’

‘Then I shall speak no more of it.’

Hervey’s brow furrowed. ‘You were called to Dorothea Worsley’s this morning, I understand. She is well, I trust?’

‘She is very well. Her time nears – two months, I’d say; these things are difficult to be exact about – but the season has fatigued her.’

Hervey wondered if there was something more; but he put it from his mind. Milne, he found, was invariably frank – as frank as may be – and if he were anxious for Kezia’s condition he’d given him ample opportunity to say so …

Instead they saw out the coffee with general chat about the healthiness and otherwise of the garrison, though he began to regret indulging Milne in so vivid a description of the plague of boils visited on the Madras Artillery.

Hervey didn’t stay long at office. St Alban had returned soon after Milne left, saying there was no business to detain him. Hervey had been doubly content, for Sammy had told him that a tiger had come close to one of the villages near the Long Tank the night before. The ryots had chased it away, but were sure it would return as their goats had not long yeaned, and although they kept dogs and a watch, they feared they’d be unable to drive it off for good now that it had scent of the fold. There was nothing that he, Hervey, could likely do, but it would be a fine thing to get sight of the beast, if only at a distance. Georgiana, he was sure, would wish to; and St Alban was all eagerness, for leaving India – whenever that would be – without seeing a tiger would be too much to admit at a drawing room. He was certain that Fairbrother would say the same.

Kezia wasn’t tempted, however, when he proposed the idea on returning to Arcot House; she had to pay a call on Dorothea Worsley. Besides, she reminded him, she’d seen tiger in Bengal, ‘where they are of no little size’. (She’d thought it would be in vain to suggest he took care, for himself or Georgiana.) She was, though, pleased that Major Garratt would accompany them. Knowing that he’d not yet seen a tiger, but that it was his avowed intent to have a skin on the wall by the year’s end, Hervey had woken him playfully – ‘Dekh, dekh, samne – baagh!’ – and Garratt had sprung up, all anticipation. And when Hervey had explained, he’d been all activity. His plans for a grand baagh shikar in the Nilgiris were well advanced, and of tiger hunting he’d read everything he could lay his hands on, but a glimpse of the noble creature hereabout, this very evening, could only serve his object.

‘One thing I would say, though,’ warned Hervey, thinking it right not to let eagerness entirely overtake caution; ‘a thing that was told me when first I was here: you may take your chance with a leopard in thick country – as once I did at the Cape, and not by choice – but you have none with a tiger. The leopard when startled isn’t so intent on killing as on escaping, whereas tiger – man-eater or no – is so prodigiously strong, it makes no odds why he attacks, for he’ll crush you instantly.’