Game of Kings - Dorothy Dunnett [16]
“Of course,” said the Master, digesting this remarkable statement. “Then let us be adult at all costs. Do you have a mistress? A wife? No? All, all in vain, this flors de biauté? A little quietness, if you please. We are all ready to help, you see. What else … Do you use broadsword or rapier? A hackbut?”
Smoothly spinning, the inexorable questions resumed, faster and faster. “What do you know about gunpowder? Not very much, is it? How old are you? Year of birth? If you must invent, stay awake afterwards.… What are you like with the longbow? There’s Mat’s quiver: hit that tree. Passable. Now the thorn. Good. Now,” said Lymond, “kill the man by the cooking-pot.”
Exhausted, deflated and angry, the boy directed one haughty grimace at the Master, hauled on the bowstring and sent the shot of a lifetime buzzing for the mark.
A great cheer, part shocked, part sardonic, arose. There was a blur of movement. Mat disappeared, and a swarm of curious bodies shut off the view of the target. Redhead knew, if he had never shot straight before, that he had put an arrow through blood and bone this time. He stood still.
A gentle voice rebuked him.
“Careful, careful! my slave of sin. These are Sordidi Dei. How nice,” said Lymond, “to have simple emotions. No trouble with principles; no independence of thought; no resistance to suggestion; no nonsense about adult behaviour when it comes to one’s own amour propre.”
The skin around the boy’s mouth was taut. “I’m not immune to trickery. And the Sordid Gods in this case are yours, I think; not mine.”
“Ah, no: not mine; I am godless,” said Lymond. “Not for me to solve the enigma.
“When a hatter
Will go smatter
In philosophy
Or a pedlar
Wax a medlar
In theology …
“There is the waste of purpose. Whereas I always have a purpose—you were wiser than you knew, and less successful than you feared. Oyster Charlie has been giving me a little trouble. But if his wits are moribund, his hearing is sensational—a matter of compensation, I suppose. Well, Mat?”
Turkey Mat shook himself free of the crowd, grinning. “Just a shower of blisters,” he said. “He dodged behind the pot and got a spray of chicken bree for his pains. He’s laying low now, is Oyster. He kens as well as you what that was for.”
“Excellent. The warning cock and the Devil’s bath,” said Lymond, amused. “Symbolism is coming cheap today.”
“You mean I didn’t kill him?”
“No. Thus even your remorse of conscience is rooted in hallucination. Oyster is not dead; merely lightly boiled in the shell. I hope you will both perceive the point of the experiment.”
Lymond surveyed the grinning audience with an air of gentle discovery. “Is there no work to be done? Or perhaps it’s a holiday?”
In a moment, the spectators had vanished. Left facing the three men, the boy stood straight and with some natural dignity, although silent. Indeed, there seemed little to say. The Master evidently thought the same. He smiled warmly. “A pleasant entertainment. Thank you. Have you thought of doing it for money? No? You should. It would go down very well on fair days in Hawick.… Take the young gentleman’s boots off, Mat, and loose him on the hills somewhere. Preferably not within ten miles of me.”
The young gentleman turned scarlet. Of course. Having made the bear dance, turn it to the dogs. And to that, youth and hurt pride had only one answer. “You’re welcome to try,” said Redhead, and lunged.
Lymond got hold of the upraised arm halfway to his face. He shifted his grip, twisted, and holding the limb on the edge of agony, smiled.
“Softly, softly! Remember your superior upbringing, and your Caxton. How gentlemen shall be known from Churls. Don’t be a Churl, Marigold. Full of sloth in his wars, full of boast in his manhood, full of cowardice to his enemy, full of lechery to his body, full of drinking and drunkenness. Revoking his own challenge; slaying his prisoner with his own hands; riding from his sovereign’s banner in the field; telling his sovereign false tales …”
“You have it pat.” The boy, suddenly