Gemini - Dorothy Dunnett [276]
‘You think you know everything?’ Jordan said. ‘You’ll find it’s the other way round. One day, you’ll just come to me.’ He sat up and, retrieving his hand, leaned on it, smiling.
Nicholas said, ‘I think I have done, today.’
He was thinking about it when Jordan, bending suddenly, gave him a fierce, intent kiss on the cheek, releasing it slowly. Then he disengaged and jumped up, as if returned to himself, his face full of unexpected, raw happiness. He said. ‘Then come on, old man. Race you back to the house.’
They ran like demons. Nicholas won.
Chapter 35
In tyme of weir unto none erdly wicht
Patent suld be thar portis on the nycht.
THE TOWN OF Berwick-upon-Tweed was invested that autumn; its walls battered by guns and its harbour closed to supply ships. The siege lasted two months, and then was called off because of the cost and the weather. The citadel was of course untouched, and the townspeople had mostly remained, knowing that the attack couldn’t last long. The besieged had been slightly better fed than the besiegers. There had been two very bad harvests: it made you wonder sometimes what was happening to the weather these days. Julius took part in the skirmishing, and enjoyed himself so much that he stayed till November.
In Edinburgh, the King hanged Alec Brown, outlawed Peter his brother, and offered Leithie Preston a vast sum, which he refused, as a reward for bringing back the wine-ship from Orkney. Nicholas, freed after a murderous journey with two hostile girls and a nun, found Leith in an uproar, and John le Grant in a timber yard, smashing things. He took him back to the Leith house with Gelis. Father Moriz was there, waiting to hear the news about Bonne. Nicholas informed him, in two words. He had already told Gelis all she needed to know.
He listened to what everyone had to tell him, inside both his own house and several others, and including friends who accosted him outside taverns. Then he set off, with John and Moriz and Gelis, back to Edinburgh. Before he went, he had a brief exchange with his own chief skipper, Mick Crackbene. At the end of it, Nicholas had walked away and turned back.
‘You said your Ada couldn’t read?’
‘She can now. I taught her,’ Crackbene said.
Gelis had overheard. ‘What was all that about?’
‘Ask me later,’ Nicholas said. He wished he meant it. He wished she didn’t know that he didn’t mean it. At least she knew—he made sure that she knew—that after Eccles and Malloch, he found it a shattering relief to be back.
In Edinburgh, he saw Robin, left a message for Tobie, and was collected by Adorne for a swift session of the King’s inner council, without the knowledge of the King. It was held, for that reason, in the house of the Abbot of Cambuskenneth in Aikman’s Close, which led off the High Street just a little downhill from his own house.
They were all there when Nicholas entered with Adorne—eight men of good age, distributed about a low-ceilinged, wainscoted room in their autumn doublets and robes, and guaranteed a fast, incisive meeting with Abbot Henry in the chair, which he was, despite the presence of the highest officers of the kingdom. Years as part of the procuratorial team representing Scotland at Rome, years close to the royal Court at Stirling as Abbot of the wealthy monastery over the river had made Henry Arnot a highly visible statesman, known to churchmen and politicians alike. Small, quick, sharp-featured, round as a pomander, Arnot made chancellors tremble by the speed of his oral delivery, which Colin Argyll once calculated to exceed that of a hodful of hailshot dropped from the spire of Durham Cathedral. In languages other than Latin, it was even quicker. He knew Adorne and his oldest son well. His cousin was married to a Brown of Couston. He commissioned music from Whistle Willie. He was a confidant of the Queen.
M. de Fleury was invited to mention anything relevant to the kingdom’s condition, following his findings in the Borders and Leith. He did so.
The company was asked to consider short- and long-term projections and policies for the war