Checkmate - Dorothy Dunnett [252]
So, too, with the papers. Someone had them. Someone was no doubt holding them, as he had promised, with instructions to publish what they contained if he came to harm. She had no means now of finding out where they were. She had no means now of stopping him, except by paying. And if he chose to favour the Lennoxes, no means of stopping him at all.
The music ceased, and the rattle of French voices started again, and a voice in her ear said, ‘What a fine piece, Mistress Philippa! Emeralds, are they not?’
It was Elder, Lady Lennox’s secretary, in rallying mood. ‘And are you not proposing to spend any of the last hours of your marriage at your brave husband’s side? Tell me, is that your husband’s brother?’
Across the room, square, quiet and brown in his rich clothing, stood Richard Crawford.
‘Yes, it is the Earl of Culter,’ Philippa said. She had no desire to introduce him.
‘And I believe his lady mother is in Paris, although I have not had the pleasure of meeting her. So regal, I am told. So well thought of at court. I regret,’ said Lady Lennox’s secretary, ‘that I have taken so long to make the acquaintance of this eminent family. I can only claim to know your husband’s great-uncle, a gentleman called Mr Bailey.’
‘I met him once,’ Philippa said. And said it steadily, for the seraglio teaches how to conceal all feeling when you are being tormented. Even when you are being tormented for a private satisfaction that does not know that it has been seen and identified.
‘A remarkable gentleman,’ said John Elder jovially. ‘How he would enjoy meeting your husband’s mother once more! Now tell me: who will have your favours when this little marriage of yours comes to an end …?’
He had said all he intended to say, and he moved away a little afterwards. It was only a short time after that, as she was bringing sugared plums to present to the Dauphin, that Adam Blacklock put his hand on her arm. ‘Philippa? Do you know where Archie is?’
‘Why?’ she said sharply. The noise was overwhelming.
‘For Francis. He had to go out. I can’t leave the room. I don’t know whether he knows what room Archie is waiting in.’
‘There he is,’ Philippa said.
Beyond the tapestries and the bright painted frescoes a slight, dour figure appeared in a doorway, loomed over by uneasy ushers; made a signal of appeasement, and left.
‘He’s got him,’ Adam said. And looking down at her, frowning, ‘You haven’t spoken to Lymond tonight?’
‘No. I wished the music would stop,’ Philippa said. She had found him as soon as she entered the room: one of the smiling, conversing group round the King, and she knew he had been conscious of her. But after that first, headlong glance they had not looked at or approached one another again.
Adam said, ‘Then you don’t know that Catherine d’Albon has withdrawn from the marriage?’
Her gaze sprang open on his. ‘How could she? Her parents?’
‘She seems to have defied them. Or at least to have persuaded them that it is in their own interests not to squabble in public. She has agreed not to announce it until after Monday, in case they stop your annulment. Philippa, it’s very bad news.’
‘I know,’ Philippa said. No ties; no duty; no relief. Three filaments gone in the life-thread, fragile as the thread of the silk-moth, which has no organs by which it can nourish itself, but instead is born, and loves once, and then dies.
Adam said gently, ‘Then, will you leave him to us? Leave court on Monday, as soon as you sign the annulment. I have had so many letters from Kate. She wants you back badly.’
‘You’ve been writing?’ Philippa said.
‘When you stopped. She didn’t deserve the silence,’ Adam said. ‘And Kuzúm is forgetting you. Don’t leave him.’
She did not realize that she was weeping until she saw the tears on the sugar plums, grey on the white powder, and that Adam had moved, so that his shoulders shielded her from her companions. The new ciphers shimmered, dazzling over them: M for Mary and a Greek Phi for her bridegroom François.
‘This marriage frightens me,’ she