Gemini - Dorothy Dunnett [327]
The demoiselle Kathi was sitting beside Master Wodman’s bed, wiping his face. She said, ‘You went with him too, and helped him to get out. That was pretty useful as well. I’m glad it was worth it.’
She was smiling, but not with her eyes. Master Wodman wasn’t smiling: he was looking up at Jordan’s mother with lines like bricks on his brow. Jordan’s mother said, ‘But there was a price to pay, Andro? You were wounded, and Nicholas hasn’t come north?’
‘He had something to do,’ Master Wodman said. Then he suddenly shifted, and swore, and took Jordan’s mother by the wrist so hard that she slipped from the bed quietly and knelt, her wrist still in his hand, looking down at him. She had beautiful hair.
Master Wodman said, ‘You’ll hear when Adorne comes. He wants to tell Kilmirren himself. Simon and the young lad—Simon and Henry are dead.’
Jordan frowned. His cousin Henry had gone to war with his father, as Jordan would have done, had his father been here. His cousin Henry’s campaigns had always seemed rather grim, but he had never been wounded. His cousin Henry had bullied him once, but not now. Henry had belonged to the Royal Guard. He jousted. He sailed. Jordan said, ‘Forgive me sir, but are you sure?’ His mother looked at him.
So did Master Wodman. He released his mother’s hand just as suddenly, and then gazed at her, and at the demoiselle, taking his time. Then he said, ‘Forgive me. It’s true, but that was no way to tell you. What happened was … There was a skirmish. Simon and the boy had come down to the Tweed to—to—’
‘To scout,’ Jordan’s mother said. Her voice was quiet, the way it was when she was slowly tracing something wrong in the counting-house.
‘To scout,’ Master Wodman said. ‘They had followed some rumour … They happened upon us just as we were escaping. The English shot Henry.’
‘And wounded you,’ the demoiselle said. The cloth in her grip was oozing water.
‘And me. The river was flooding. The boy fell from the bank. His father drowned trying to save him.’
‘Simon drowned?’ It was his mother.
‘Nicholas found them together. They were dead. He nearly lost his own life, swimming after. Simon did lose his life. He was brave.’
‘And Nicholas?’ his mother said. Transfixed with horror, Jordan hardly noticed what a long gap there had been.
‘At the Abbey in Kelso. He left us to take the two coffins there. We don’t know what he will do. Adorne said he must decide for himself.’
‘He would be distressed,’ Jordan’s mother said. It was an odd, unmanly thing to impute to his father. His father wouldn’t be upset over Simon, who had made such a fool of himself in that fight with the puddings. Jordan was distressed over Henry, but Henry was his cousin. Had been his cousin. And now he was suddenly dead, like Raffo, and Captain Astorre.
As it happened, Master Wodman didn’t answer. The demoiselle, maybe thinking as Jordan did, abruptly said, ‘Never mind. We mustn’t tire you. Gelis, I think Robin ought to hear about this. Do you think Jordan might go and tell him? He and Robin understand one another very well. Jordan? Would you?’
Leaving, he tried not to show his relief. He blew his nose, crossing the road, and prepared what he was going to say. He thought again of the pudding fight, and unexpectedly remembered Simon’s big sword, the one he had never been permitted to use. Now it was really his. He felt pleased, then ashamed.
He spent some time with Robin, and answered the door when Master Julius called to speak to the demoiselle. Jordan explained she was with Master Wodman and why, and asked him in, but he was in a hurry. Jordan watched him go, and returned to what he had been doing. Julius knew the St Pols. Jordan liked Julius. If his father was really upset, perhaps Julius could help him.
ACROSS THE ROAD, Andro Wodman was sleeping. He had talked erratically for some time, relating the truth that he had kept from the boy, but would not withhold from Nicholas’s wife, and Adorne’s niece. Simon had gone to kill Nicholas. A malicious rumour had sent