Gemini - Dorothy Dunnett [193]
Sandy liked France, for he liked being spoiled. Sandy would never understand the other kinds of fascination it held for the man Nicholas now was, or for the man that Jordan de St Pol, once vicomte de Ribérac, had been. Sandy would never consider that it might be a sacrifice to go, as duty called, to confirm that Diniz was all right in Bruges, and verify that Camulio was remembering his Genoese friends.
Then Nicholas thought of Damparis, and forgot everything else.
Marian de Charetty had died there. Now, beyond doubt, he knew why. A small, proud lady, no longer young, she had intended, he guessed, to bear this baby in private; away from curious eyes. If she lost the child, if she died, he was not to be told what had happened.
He had been very young. They had lived as man and wife for less than a year. It hurt that she had not given him the opportunity to care for her, to prove his maturity. He had felt like that before, long ago, with someone else. Yet to grieve for that reason was selfish. What mattered, what merited anguish, was the sacrifice made for his sake: the silent decision; the ultimate expression of love. She would not have wished the marriage undone. She would not have wanted him present. In a strange way, she herself had died fulfilled. It was he who was left unconsoled, alone on the brink.
It had happened before.
IN SCOTLAND, IT seemed natural that Nicholas did not at once return. He was softening up Sandy. Once Sandy saw that the King of France could do nothing for him, Nicholas would bring him back.
Now that Sandy was absent, it was less necessary to keep apart from Adorne, and Gelis saw him most days that summer, on matters of trade, or in aiding the Council in their management of the King. She grew to know the administrators well, as Nicholas had done; especially Avandale, her courtly escort to Dunglass, and that active man, John Stewart of Darnley, his kinsman. The siege of Dunbar Castle had dragged on for many weeks after Sandy had left, until, accepting at last that no French army would come to relieve them, the garrison had withdrawn by sea, and the King’s troops had entered the castle. In due course, the absent rebels were summoned, but unsurprisingly failed to appear. Then sentence of forfeiture of life, lands and goods was proclaimed against John Ellem of Butterdene, captain of Dunbar, and his twenty companions. It was as Nicholas had predicted. The men who had remained faithful to Albany bore the brunt of the King’s wrath.
Sir John Colquhoun’s death had shocked every sea-going merchant in Scotland, as well as Avandale himself, who had left the siege for his funeral. The King had also been there, and the men of the west who had been Colquhoun’s neighbours, as well as Will Crichton and his Livingstone wife. And Will’s relative, Colquhoun’s powerful widow, Elizabeth Dunbar, Phemie’s cousin (O Dowglass, O Dowglass, Tender and Trewe!), glaring at her even more powerful son, the litigious Humphrey. The division of spoils, it was already apparent, was going to keep the law lords busy for a long time, as the business consortia defended their rights. Tam Cochrane, for one, had put a lot of money into these shared timber and salmon ventures. Working up north, he was making more than he was spending.
Tam had managed to persuade young Mar to go with him up to Kildrummy, once he had set the cannon in place for Dunbar. It was a question, as ever, of fortification: to keep the King’s castles in order against the sporadic rebellions in the north. Reports that came south indicated that the stay was not likely to be a long one: Johndie had already fallen out with every sheriff, bailie, baron and lord in the neighbourhood, as well as all the local representatives of the Order of St John, and was liable to start a war by himself if not returned soon. While he was away, Gelis tried to make headway with the Princess Mary, whose husband was sinking, and who would soon be her own mistress, which meant open to every influence. It