Niccolo Rising - Dorothy Dunnett [174]
She rose from her chair. The moment she moved, he rolled and stood also, not so near, and not smiling. She said, “Can we have it plainly? This company needs a man at its head, and I have asked you to take that place by marrying me. This you think you can do?” She wondered if she looked as exhausted as she felt. He didn’t look tired; only quieter than usual. He didn’t come any nearer. He smelt of horse, and leather and sweat, but she didn’t wrinkle her nose.
He said, “I did think it through. It is the best solution. Best for me, too. Or I think so just now. There are things which may be escaping us both because it’s late, and we’ve been talking so long. Do you think we should say no more tonight? And then tomorrow, as early as you wish, perhaps you would send for me?” His eyes, again, were scanning her face. He added, “This is not ingratitude. I realise what you are offering. I want you to think about it again.”
She said, “I understand. I agree. Take as much time as you want. Leave it, if you like, until you are ready to go.”
He answered at once. “No. Tomorrow, early.”
She said, “I’ll send for you tomorrow.”
His face, which had been tense, relaxed suddenly. He smiled straight at her, reassuringly. He hesitated just a little, and then said, “Then I wish you a good night, my mistress. Not a sad or a difficult one. Whatever comes of it, nothing shall harm you if I can prevent it.”
My mistress, he had elected to call her, avoiding both the informal and formal. He always knew the right thing to do. Or nearly always.
“Good night,” she said. And he smiled and, turning, left the room. She wondered, looking at the shut door, what else he could have said, what other gesture he could possibly have made; and realised that there was none.
A night on both sides, to consider it. And tomorrow, an insistently early decision, to save them both prolonged embarrassment. Or – who could blame him? – for entirely practical reasons. If he were now to proceed with this frightening bargain with Venice, he had sensitive information to gather and many calculations to make before he left for Italy. Together with everything else that needed handling. Including Felix.
Marian de Charetty sank back in her chair. She rested her swathed and wired head on its cushion and her sleeves on its arms and found, forlornly, that her heart was beating like a bass drum. She had forced it on him. But he would never regret it. Never. Never.
Chapter 26
THE FIRST OF THE shock waves was sustained by Meester Gregorio of Asti, who had known his new employer the widow de Charetty for only a week. He didn’t know the workman Nicholas at all, except for a passing encounter at the yard pump which had shown the youth to be unreliable. He had also understood that the young man was called Claes.
Summoned very early the following morning, almost as soon as he had tied the strings of his black cap and slipped on his robe, Meester Gregorio opened the office door to find his employer seated, a little flushed, behind her desk. The scales were still on the table, and the ledgers, and the inkstand and pens. Also the rate card, displaying its columns of bright tufted wool. At the end of the desk sat the youth of the pump, wearing the ordinary blue Charetty livery. His head was bent, and, surprisingly, he was running a pen down columns of figures, or names, on the topmost of a large sheaf of papers resting on one of his knees.
He looked up and smiled, conveying the smile also to the demoiselle de Charetty, who was wearing, for a small, round, not unattractive woman, an expression quite formidable. The demoiselle de Charetty, clearing her throat, said, “Meester Gregorio. Thank you for coming. This is not in fact a matter of business, although I should like to say, for the company, that I’m glad you have joined us, and hope you