Checkmate - Dorothy Dunnett [271]
‘Then,’ said Lymond, ‘did she send any?’
The woman thought. Mary Fleming shut the door, her heart beating, on the distant noise outside and envied Mr Crawford his composure, waiting. Then Euphemia said, ‘There was the letter she sent the Hôtel de Guise, about her boxes.’
He said, ‘What was that?’
‘Just after we arrived. A letter to one of her grooms, telling him that someone would be calling with mules to take away the four boxes in her chamber, and to help him, as they were heavy.’
‘Boxes?’ Lymond said. ‘What kind of boxes?’ And turned as Mary, in spite of herself, drew a quick breath. ‘You know?’
‘I know the boxes she means,’ Mary said. ‘They were metal bound, with Nuremberg locks in iron. Philippa has had them with her now for two months. She said they contained books.’
‘But you didn’t believe her?’ Lymond said.
Her mouth for some reason dry, Mary Fleming faced the swift, un-aggressive inquisition. ‘They were full of money,’ she said. ‘You could hear the coins move when they were lifted.’
For a moment, Lymond’s eyes continued to dwell on her, then he turned back to the woman Euphemia. ‘And the gentleman who was to call for the boxes,’ he said. ‘Did she name him, or describe him in any way?’
That she remembered. ‘His name,’ Euphemia said, ‘was M. Janus, and she said he was an old gentleman, very heavy, with an English accent. She didn’t know,’ added Euphemia, suddenly frightened afresh by the atmosphere, ‘that I read the letter. They said I was to read everything.’
Janus. The two-faced God. The God of Gates, with a key in his hand.
‘I see,’ Lymond said. ‘Thank you. It was not your fault. I know where Mistress Philippa is, and I shall not even trouble Lord Culter, I believe, with the story. You will have her safely back before long. Mary, will you excuse me?’
But swiftly as he made out of the room, Mary Fleming pursued him. ‘Where is she? What do I say? What if someone asks for her?’ And then, as he turned, ‘You don’t know yet, do you?’
‘No,’ said Lymond. ‘But I shall find her. And if you are able, I would ask you not to let it be known, for as long as you can, that she is missing. Am I asking too much?’
‘No,’ said Mary Fleming. He was asking a great deal, but then, she would have given him a great deal, as once her mother wanted to do.
The last galliard had begun in the hall, and messieurs of the Town, pleased, well-drunken and wonderfully tolerant now on all matters to do with both collars and precedence were lost in wet-eyed pleasure at the splendour of it all, and in a mood to form loving friendships with every man in the room. Daniel Hislop, having exhausted his larynx, if not his stock of witticisms, had gone to earth among a huddle of somnolent advocates. Jerott, kept remarkably sober by his fellow captains, had found a lady who liked black hair and Lyon velvet, and was skirmishing with her. Adam, uneasy about many things, agreed, for the third time, to become the lifelong blood-brother of a hatmaker and then stepped sharply aside, causing a landslide of creased yellow satin as Lymond’s voice spoke abruptly behind him.
‘Adam? Is Osias on duty? Or anyone else?’
Adam’s heart went cold. ‘Not tonight,’ he said. ‘It was impossible, because of the …’
He was not allowed to finish. ‘On other days, has Philippa always been followed? I asked that this should be tightened.’
‘Always,’ Adam said. ‘Except for the one time you know about. Francis, what’s happened?’
‘And on that one occasion,’ said Lymond, as if he had not spoken, ‘how long was she away from the Hôtel de Guise? Is it known?’
‘An hour, Osias thought,’ Adam said. ‘She crossed the rue St Antoine from the de Guise house, going south. That’s all he could find out … Francis?’
‘She left the palace this evening,’ Lymond said. ‘So she wasn’t going, the other time, to one of the bridges. She didn’t leave by the Porte St Antoine, and she had hardly time to get a ferry over the river and back again. And that leaves the Petit Arsenal district.’
‘The Petit Arsenal?’ Adam said. ‘That’s where …’
‘What?’ said Lymond.
‘Danny