Gemini - Dorothy Dunnett [139]
Within the same bracket of celebration arrived the news that the King of England’s brother had been arraigned for treason, poison, sorcery and generally antisocial behaviour, and had been discovered drowned in his bath. Or (according to the current cheap plebeian joke) boiled in a butt of good malmsey, instead of the ale-vat or kettle of your ordinary villain. Whatever, the Duke of Clarence regretted, for sure, that he could no longer observe his obligation to marry the young lady Margaret of Scotland.
The ecstatic young lady Margaret, with her brother Sandy, their friends, and the inventive help of Davie Simpson, Procurator for the Papal Collector, set off to terrorise Castle Hill, the Lawnmarket, the High Street, and Leith Wynd on horseback, blowing horns and preceded by a full pack of hounds which chewed up everything in sight, barely stopping at children. They were halted at the foot of the Wynd by twenty armed men and Bishop Spens, who was building a chapel there, and was also, as yet unreported, arranging with the other responsible lords to contract the ripening Meg, fast, to Earl Rivers, the English King’s brother-in-law.
With the Bishop was Nicholas de Fleury, who happened to be passing, and Will Roger the musician, who had just come from a rehearsal at Trinity College, preceded by the College’s aforesaid tithe-collecting armed team. The hounds, misled by some ill-judged commands from the Procurator, were inclined at first to be rough, but then the fleshers’ porters arrived, with a dripping sack paid for by Nicholas, and the dogs barely moved after that, even when clubbed. When Nicholas peaceably suggested they should all go on to Greenside for some sport, Meg and Sandy acceded at once, although he found himself left behind, detained by some demand of the Bishop’s. By the time he got to Greenside, the others had gone back to the Castle, and he couldn’t get at them.
Nicholas himself stayed at the Castle for a bit, until things had quietened, and ended up, as he often did, in Will Roger’s quarters. He picked up a guitar. Roger said, ‘I suppose that might have been worse. I never thought I’d say this, but I wish Camulio would come back.’
‘What’s he doing?’ Nicholas said, sucking his hand. The string had snapped. He wished he led the kind of gentleman’s life that would allow him ten reposeful perfect nails that didn’t get scuffed and split and broken on sword-handles and rigging and lathes. He cancelled the thought as pathetic.
Roger said, ‘Camulio? According to Bonkle, he’s being sent from one court to another; the statutory Genoese, inviting the Emperor and the Tyrol and Naples to fight for the Pope against the Regent of Milan. Before that, he was in prison for months, accused of stirring up Genoese exiles. For all I know, Davie Simpson helped put him there. In the end, the Holy Father hauled Camulio out, Fishers’ Ring round the gills, and promptly retained him to work for the See. Clipped and ringed Camulio; free Davie.’
Nicholas fixed the string and sat back. Adorne, kinsman of the Adorno, had never tried to conceal or to justify Genoa’s fight to shake off Milan. After a half-baked revolt, which had caused the then Governor to lock himself into the Castelletto, Milan had got Prosper Adorno out of prison, unringed, and sent him to Genoa as the new Vicar. Prosper, delighted, had promptly begun plotting with Naples. He had offered amnesty to all recent miscreants, raised six thousand ducats by common endeavour, and paid the army that brought him to leave. Now he was waiting for money and galleys from Naples. Shocked Milan; free, queasy Genoa.
Will Roger said, ‘Shall I tell you what else Bonkle said?’
Edward Bonkle was Provost of Trinity College, and owed his career to Thomas Spens. Edward Bonkle had just come back from Flanders,