Checkmate - Dorothy Dunnett [7]
Lymond hurled himself down. Someone screamed. Under Francis Crawford’s swung steel the man at the foot of the staircase perished. Still running, Lymond killed the next who opposed him, and a third rolled under his feet as a dozen more, racing, converged on him. He staggered as first one and then another crashed into him but the sword still stabbed and glittered and Strozzi, his brows drawn under the Piedmontese cap, saw a fourth stuck and collapse, choking. For a moment, it made the rest falter. Then they swarmed after, ducking, dodging, clutching at that damnable, that diabolical sword-arm.
On that, furious, Strozzi shouted an order and the fools drew off at last and deployed, cutting off the way to the gates, so that Lymond was forced back against the doorless wall with a half circle of men crouched before him, out of reach of that swift clotted sword-blade.
Piero Strozzi snapped his fingers and, with a fresh-lit torch in his hand, walked forward and joined the gasping group of his men.
Crawford of Lymond watched him come, his breathing fast, his knuckle bones white on the sword hilt. He said, ‘The Kyng of Fraunce spared none … But sent for hem everychone. What have you promised them?’
And Strozzi, holding the illuminating torch just out of reach, said calmly, ‘That the man who harms you will die. As you see, their swords are still in their scabbards. You have killed four. You may kill four more before they take your sword from you. But you cannot escape. Is Russia worth eight loyal men’s lives?’
‘Yes,’ said Francis Crawford. ‘You will have to watch me take them.’
‘Including mine?’ said Marshal Strozzi.
‘If you insist,’ said the other man pleasantly. He had recovered his breath. ‘My dear Piero, I abide and abide and better abide. How can I be made to take a command in your army? The bribe does not exist that would interest me.’
‘There is one, they say,’ said Piero Strozzi. ‘You had wealth in Russia, and power. You may have both in France. You may also have something they tell me Russia could not offer you.’
‘A loyal Florentine friend?’ Lymond suggested.
‘No, although you will thank me for this yet,’ said Strozzi with equanimity. ‘You cannot obtain an annulment, they say, for your marriage.’
Distantly from the inn came the sound of voices and hammering. In the darkness someone groaned, and the dying torches, spluttering, lit the long grotesque rows of the game bags, each with its occupant. A cock chuckled and another, savagely, gave tongue in answer. Lymond said, ‘I hear gossip too. I do not always repeat it.’
‘This gossip,’ said Strozzi, ‘says that there is nothing you will not pay to be freed of this contract. I am to tell you that unless you come back to France you will never secure this divorce. I am to tell you that it will be granted you when you have served the King of France for a year, freely and to the best of your powers in any theatre where he may need you. And, in case you may doubt what I say, I have the promise in writing, with the Cardinal Legate’s own signature.’
Lymond took the thrown packet and opened and read it, without relaxing his guard, in the light of the fresh burning cresset.
Strozzi watched him.
This time, there was no trick and Lymond would know it. The Pope, the friend of France, could withhold or grant this annulment as France requested. All that mattered now was whether gossip spoke truly. Whether, to obtain his divorce, Francis Crawford would conceivably, undertake the year’s service demanded.
He stood for a long time, considering. Then the point of his sword moved slowly downwards, and Strozzi knew, amazed, that he had surrendered.
‘I have one condition,’ said Francis Crawford. ‘Les Amis de Rabelais should not suffer. They had no idea who I was.’
Strozzi doubted it. But there was no need to quibble. ‘Am I a clod,’ he said, ‘deaf to the call of the Muses? They may return on St