Disorderly Knights - Dorothy Dunnett [151]
‘It’s true! It was all round Boghall!’
Graham Malett was laughing aloud. ‘It is true. Joleta wrote about it. But you haven’t got the essential facts.’ He looked at Philippa and sobered suddenly. ‘This is a brilliant young man going to waste. I have failed with him; we have all failed. His career in France last winter is a sorry business, best forgotten. I had thought that Malta would change him … but he cannot do without women, he cannot do without wealth, he cannot do without admiration. He has come to Scotland for no better purpose than to raise a money-making army of mercenaries, just as he went to Malta for no better reason than that the Constable paid him to. I hoped that in Joleta’s company he would learn other values.’
‘On the whole,’ said Kate bluntly, ‘I feel that he would be far more likely to bend his brilliant mind to seducing Joleta.’
Gabriel’s wise, direct gaze moved from Kate to her daughter. ‘No man living could dishonour my sister. I believe in Joleta as I believe in the fount of my faith. But I would give her in marriage to this one man, if he asked it, provided that he brought as his marriage portion his new-made army, a holy instrument for Mother Church.’
‘You would let him marry Joleta, knowing him as you do?’ said Kate sharply; and ‘Poor Joleta!’ said Philippa in a carping voice, and was quiet under her mother’s glance.
Gabriel smiled. ‘Joleta exercises a curious transmutation of her own. If she promised herself to him, he would become her equal in honour; of that I am sure. But it seems unlikely that she will. She challenged him, I think, and he felt impelled to show how vastly indifferent he was, and she became thoroughly piqued in return.… They are not elderly, passionless statesmen, these two. They would not be worth troubling over if they were.’
Philippa’s eyes were suddenly shining. ‘How nice,’ she said genteelly, ‘if your sister and Mr Crawford were married. Love often begins with a show of hate, doesn’t it?’
‘Only common mortals like the Somervilles have good old rotten hates, dear,’ said her mother. ‘Sir Graham manages to love everybody and wouldn’t know what you’re talking about. Have a bun.’
‘He doesn’t love the Turks,’ said Philippa. ‘He kills them.’
‘That isn’t hate,’ said Kate Somerville. ‘That’s simply hoeing among one’s principles to keep them healthy and neat. I’m sure he would tell you he bears them no personal grudge; and they think they’re going to Paradise anyway, so it does everyone good.’
With some relief, Philippa saw that Gabriel was smiling. ‘You have a sharp tongue,’ he said. ‘I think at bottom you approve of Lymond more than of me. You may be quite right.’
Starting from the collarbone of her least unfashionable winter dress and ending at the back of her ears, Kate flushed. Then, with Philippa’s bright angry eyes fixed on her, she said, ‘I merely know him better, perhaps. There is nothing wrong with his standards. He merely has difficulty, as we all do, in living up to them, with somewhat hair-raising results.’
‘Whereas I succeed because my aim is more commonplace, and you find me smug,’ said Gabriel gently. ‘But we may only do our best as we are made. You will make life very unhappy for yourself and the child if you measure all your friends against this charming, undisciplined man.’
Kate’s brown eyes were wide open to preserve her from any suspicion of weakness. ‘My friends don’t mind,’ she said. ‘Have a bun.’
At which moment, to Philippa’s appalled relief, Margaret Erskine came in, smelling of chicken. She said, ‘Oh, I’m sorry my dear: you’re still busy,’ and then looked surprised and pleased. ‘Graham!’ He had of course, Philippa remembered, travelled from France with her, although he had left the Dowager’s party to come to London first. For the thousandth time, Philippa wondered how Jenny Fleming, the vivid mistress of Henri of France, could have produced this downy little person who, a war widow of nineteen, had found joy at last with the Master of Erskine. Then Graham Malett, towering above them, said, ‘Joleta