Game of Kings - Dorothy Dunnett [173]
Scott was stunned. “It was you who—” but Lymond swept on. “If I could keep my mouth shut, surely you could take the trifling trouble to keep her out of the courtyard? You don’t care whom you sacrifice, do you, as long as you imagine it will damage me?”
“I didn’t deceive her!”
“Do you think I did her any harm!” exclaimed the Master. “But for your meddling she was perfectly secure!”
“I remember,” said Scott. “You don’t like red hair.”
The untamed face stared into his. “She was one of your four women, was she? Then it certainly seems that she lost security, reputation and peace of mind through one of us today. Who else?”
“The Countess of Lennox.”
“Lady Margaret was responsible for the fiasco at Heriot which nearly cost your father his life. Who else?”
“Your brother’s wife.”
“You know the truth of that as well as I do.”
“Do I?” said Scott. “I was stinking drunk on the floor of your room at the time, as I remember.”
“All right. I leave you to work out why, having seduced my sister-in-law and slaughtered my nephew, I should keep coy silence while you shuffle downstairs at three in the morning with that bantling-brained romantic done up in an oatsack?”
For one dumb moment, Scott sympathized with the man who disgorged a sponge into water and found his throat cut. He recovered. “Because you wanted rid of her, I expect. As with your young sister.”
“As with my young sister,” agreed Lymond. Like the sun in eclipse, the candle at his back rimmed his unregenerate head; he held himself lightly and easily, the poised Roc pitying the elephant. “I should have warned you. I can wrestle with one arm as well as with two.”
The light in Scott’s pale eyes was contemptuous. “It won’t be necessary. I know enough about you. I don’t want to know any more.”
Lymond said delicately, “What are you afraid of?”
“Me? Nothing!” exclaimed Scott. “If you want to fight, I’ll fight.”
“But not with ideas? You’re beating drums and brass kettles, Scott. Thick skin and prejudice won’t keep the dragons away.”
“I’m tired of a landscape with dragons,” said Scott violently.
“What, then? Retreat underground into hebetude: retreat under water like a swallow: retreat into a shell like a mollusc: retreat into the firmament like some erroneous dew.…”
“I don’t retreat.”
“You don’t progress much, either.”
“I scotch the dragons.”
“And how,” said Lymond precisely, “do you know a dragon when you see it?”
Despite every endeavour, Scott was trembling. He said, “Because I’m a human being, not a toy, a familiar, a piece of unconsecrated wax to malign your enemies with. I know you. I didn’t mean Turkey to die. I wouldn’t intentionally have hurt the girl, but it’s done, and if it had to be done again it would be worth it. You know all about the law of talion: you’ve hunted Harvey, poor devil, like a thing from beyond the grave. You’re a master—my God, don’t I know it—of the art of apposite punishment. I made damned sure you’d get a taste of both before you got out of my reach. You won’t get over the Border to kill Harvey now.”
“Teaching you to speechify is another thing I should have my throat cut for,” said Lymond. “My appointment is broken; I may be said vaguely to be aware of that. Your intentions were majestic. To teach me to sing re, my fa, sol, and when I fail, to bob me on the noll. Only the field is now littered with other bobbed and blameless nolls and I am left, as it happens, singing ut to Johannes, which should delight you indeed. Why are you here?”
There was a pause. Scott said nothing, and the blue eyes suddenly narrowed. “Is this, by any chance, a modest silence? Good God!” Lymond sat down. “Have you