• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 2175 0

in the middle, after four days’ hard riding from Danzig. Benecke did not say whether he owned the raft that he boarded, or the rye that he took from the granaries: he had a share very likely in both. The raft was one of the biggest; a marktschiff built like a box, with room for over a thousand bushels of grain and twenty men, including sailors and steersman and cook, and Paúel Benecke and a discarded banker. It possessed some primitive shelter, to which they could retire from the wind and the rain, and where Benecke continued, if allowed, with the interrogation that had been going on all through the winter. Sometimes Nicholas humoured him for a time. There was something he wanted from Benecke. He had lost some gold, and rather thought that Benecke had heard something about it.

It was never too hard, in any case, to answer Paúel’s questions. ‘Tell me again about Anselm Adorne,’ he was saying. ‘Do you still think you know why he’s here?’

Nicholas produced a long groan. ‘You know why he’s here. He has to wave a flag on behalf of the Medici: the Duke of Burgundy owes them a fortune. Bruges wants him to sort out its trade; and he’ll have a little mandate, I’m quite sure, from Scotland. And when he’s finished in Poland, all his masters would like him to keep the Pope happy without actually going on crusade. Hence the trip to comfort the Christians in Caffa, and the further trip to prod Persia into helping them, too. Anselm Adorne has a lot of friends in the Levant.’

‘Genoese friends,’ Benecke said. ‘Caffa is a Genoese colony. Do you trust him? He tried to usurp the Hanse trade in Iceland.’

‘He succeeded,’ Nicholas said. ‘He bribed the Danish officials. And someone in Danzig kindly helped him by delaying the ship they were building for me. And, as you know, I got a ship anyway. We all like it when you fall out among yourselves in the Hanse, because it adds so much to the business opportunities. What are you trying to get me to say?’

‘I’m trying to get you to tell me why you’re here. They say it’s because of a feud that went wrong.’

‘What a stupid idea,’ Nicholas said. ‘If it had gone wrong, I shouldn’t be here. And if it had been against Anselm Adorne, he’d be dead. You owe me some money.’

‘I bloody don’t!’ Benecke said.

‘You will, when you’ve taken this wager.’

‘You don’t have any money,’ Benecke said. He had never said it outright before. ‘What could you do if you don’t come with me?’

‘Start another feud,’ Nicholas said. He picked up the bowl that Benecke was eating from and threw it and its contents into the water. ‘What would I do if I did come with you? Piddle about the Baltic in convoy like a shopkeeper? The war’s over.’

Benecke breathed through his nose. Beneath the week-old black beard he was yellow. He said, ‘Learn who your friends are. You need money.’

‘Not all that much,’ Nicholas said. ‘What do you think I’d do if I did come into money? Buy a fine dwór in Cracow and sit in it? I didn’t go to Cairo or Scotland or Iceland because I needed money. Your trouble is that you’ve got access to a bloody great ship and nothing interesting to do with it.’

Benecke’s colour had returned. He said, ‘So what would you do if you had money?’

‘Tempt me,’ said Nicholas. ‘What could you devise that needs capital no one else would offer you?’

There was a pause. ‘I could go to Iceland again,’ Benecke said. ‘Paid protection as well as cod-fishing. Or I could move further south. You can do things without letters of marque. There are rich men always willing to pay.’ He stopped. His eyes, which were black, were glittering. He said, ‘I was right. You want fighting.’

‘Yes, but not on a diet of whale blubber. Why don’t you put together a programme? You’re the professional pirate. I don’t mind providing the brains.’

Benecke picked up Nicholas’s bowl and threw it outside. They were both on their feet in enjoyable anticipation when the raft hit a new eddy and tilted; someone roared, and the discussion came to a halt for the moment.

They arrived at the crowded jetties of Thorn, built like all the busiest ports on a bend of the river.