Gemini - Dorothy Dunnett [72]
And much more than that: Shall we not have sport on your way to the block?
Wodman, experienced man that he was, had been surprised by the ambush at Bonnington, thinking it uncharacteristic of Simpson. Nicholas had affected to disagree but, of course, Wodman was right. David Simpson would try to protract the game—extend the separation from Gelis, for example, until his new-found marriage weakened and broke, or he was forced to bring her to Scotland. And if Nicholas left for Bruges, of course Simpson would follow.
He had already decided what to do. Dismissing the matter, he collected some papers, spoke to his manservant, who was also his clerk, and checked that Henry was already outside, receiving the saddled horses from the groom, who came from a farm at Lochwinnoch. The groom was speaking, and Henry, fondling his beautiful roan, was smiling at him. The hour-glass emptied. Nicholas turned from the window and swept down.
BEFORE BRINGING HENRY, Nicholas had several times recently visited the Cistercian Priory at Haddington; partly on business, for he wished to speak to Lisouris the carpenter and Conrad the physician, both of whom were often found here, and partly to make sure of the Prioress’s discretion. But no convent accustomed to training embryo princesses was likely to depart from discretion by discussing young women recently returned to their families. Phemie was spoken of vaguely but fondly by the kind nun of the Maitland family who had once helped teach the King’s little sister, and the various donations by other members of the family Dunbar were referred to with gratitude. Anything more personal was unthinkable.
The visit with Henry, when it took place, was of the kind Henry appreciated least: when, grimly carrying tablets, he followed his base-born uncle from field to workshop to desk, making notes of fells and fleeces and hides, honey and cloth in the piece. Paperwork bored him, and so did stock-rearing and inducing plants to grow in the ground. The pace at which artisans were trained to work also annoyed him: Henry had never known anyone who expected to cover so much in any one day—in any one ludicrously long day—as Claes the Bastard. Artisans also, it appeared, could operate on a meagre ration of sleep and no sex: after a furious row, in which the Bastard had entered Henry’s cubicle and flung out the girl who was (temporarily) resisting him, Henry had tried very hard—had paid—several unsavoury girls to lie in wait for his uncle, without success. The Bastard was probably impotent. The only thing Henry had enjoyed so far in his whole time as a student of management had been a bad-tempered afternoon in the field with Anselm Adorne’s nephew Saunders, who had run a battering course with him to test out a shield. In a place like Haddington, Henry couldn’t even enjoy being admired, when the only women were servants and nuns. It didn’t seem to stop dear Uncle Nicholas, who got smiles and even hugs everywhere he happened to go. It was obscene.
All the same, the young cadet of St Pol was the opposite of pleased to discover, halfway through the afternoon, that while he had been left counting stinking hides with the factor, Uncle Nicholas had temporarily vanished. Then Henry found out where he was and all his growing suspicions were confirmed.
• • •
THE STUD OF the Knights of St John lay not far from Haddington, in rich well-watered meadows where mares could graze, and the choice stallions brought over from Flanders could maintain the line of stout, biddable horses bred to serve a militant Order. In truth, they were more in demand by the great lords and the royal household of Scotland, not to mention the better-off