Disorderly Knights - Dorothy Dunnett [26]
The Constable of France, broad, grey and matted with age and intrigue, smiled and lifted a great arm to the newcomer’s shoulder. ‘M. le Comte de Sevigny, is it not now?’ he said. ‘Let me introduce you to our friends. M. de Villegagnon you met in Scotland two years ago, he tells me, over a matter of a lady called—called …’
‘Hough Isa,’ said the Chevalier, smiling also, and gave Lymond his hand.
‘And M. Strozzi you met also—’
‘On the occasion of a wedding at Melrose. I remember, of course,’ said Lymond docilely, and got a sharp look from the Florentine black eyes.
‘But you have not yet encountered his brother Leone, General of the King’s Galleys in the Mediterranean. With M. de Villegagnon here, one of the great seamen of the world,’ said the Constable, throwing in some cursory tact.
‘I had the misfortune to be out of Scotland when Signor Leone paid us his memorable visit,’ said Lymond politely, and the second Strozzi brother, seal-like beside de Villegagnon’s ursine bulk, younger than the Chevalier by five years and than his brother by fifteen, bowed till the gold ring in his ear winked in the shafted sunlight and said, ‘I hear that you also, sir, have sailed in your time.’
With annoyance, the Constable saw that he was being left to retrieve this ill-timed reference to his guest’s informal past. Wishing, once more, that Leone Strozzi were not the Queen’s cousin, he said, ‘Some of the noblest captains on our seas have rowed for a year or two under the whip, Signor Strozzi.’
‘Such as Jean de la Valette,’ said de Villegagnon coldly, offering the name of one of Malta’s great captains.
‘Or Dragut,’ said Lymond cheerfully. ‘I met him once, I remember, off Nice. A most cordial encounter. We were in different boats but on the same side, of course … as the Grand Prior will appreciate,’ added the deprecating voice.
Francis of Lorraine, thus at last addressed, rose to his feet, scarlet to his soft hair line. At sixteen, the privilege of representing the Order of St John as Grand Prior of France was a prized and sensitive burden, as well as a lucrative one. Silent from youth and necessity, he returned the Scotsman’s bow until, straightening, he thought of something. ‘Whatever our allegiance to the King of France, Monsieur, our allegiance to God comes before it. I doubt if any member of my Order would call a murdering Turkish corsair cordial.’
‘But I,’ said Francis Crawford gently, ‘am not of your Order.’
And Piero Strozzi, a man of humour and of no ties with the Order of St John, concealed his amusement and sat in a mood of silent anticipation. For this artistic performer clearly understood every nuance of his invitation to dine with the Constable, and for the Constable, unused to ambush in the bogs of statesmanship, the auspices were bad.
So, as every man there realized, with the possible exception of young Lorraine, was his dilemma. For the de Guise family, whose eldest sister Mary was Queen Dowager of Scotland, was becoming also too powerful in France. And with the coming marriage of the child Mary of Scotland to the Dauphin of France, the de Guises would be supreme behind the joint thrones of Scotland and France.
To curb the Queen Dowager’s power in Scotland were only a few strong Scottish families, dissatisfied with their French pensions, or with leanings towards the new religion and England. But these were hardly enough to keep her in check, so happily were they squabbling among themselves. And if Mary of Guise returned to Scotland with a new leader, a man of talent and panache, who would help her keep Scotland and maybe take Ireland too for the King of France, the power of her family would be beyond any control.
Similarly, if the King of France, so indebted to Crawford of Lymond for his services to the child Mary, chose with the de Guise family to make of Lymond an ally and a popular idol, the power of the Constable and the French Queen, silent in the daily company of her husband’s