Niccolo Rising - Dorothy Dunnett [23]
“Are they still alive?” said Katelina.
“Come Katelina,” said her father. “That is hardly courteous. These ladies cleave to their lords, as they should, and willingly follow the mode of life which duty lays on them. Whether it is warm or cold, or hilly or flat does not signify.”
“Or whether their husbands are warm or cold, or hilly or flat?” said Katelina. “It must signify, or the convents would all be empty.”
The chaplain pursed his lips, looking at no one. Her father said, “Demoiselle, you have not learned delicacy, it would seem, in your travels abroad. This is not talk for the board. My lord Simon will excuse you.”
She rose slowly. So did my lord Simon, and took her knuckled hand to lead her out from her chair. He said, “If, monseigneur, you would excuse your guest Simon also. There is a fine sunset in the garden which would cool us both, if one of your servants would attend us.”
There was a pause, then her father nodded, and signalled with his eyes to one of the younger serving-men, whose eyes were glistening with interest above the badge on his pourpoint. She thought of refusing to go, for she was in a rebellious mood. She had been a long time away from paternal authority, and her last suitor was still overclear in her mind. She walked out of the room and across the tiled passages still in two minds, and annoyed because he still held her hand, and because a pleasant scent of some sort came from his clothes, and his hair was a shade she had once prayed to the Virgin Mary to bestow upon her.
When the servant opened the door to the garden she moved her trapped hand half out of his, and was alarmed to find it detained. But he kept it only long enough to raise it to his lips, and then gave it back to her keeping again, and followed her docilely into the garden. The servant dropped out of sight but not, she supposed, beyond hearing. She said, “Why are you in Flanders?”
He had stopped walking. Back at the house, the shutters were rimmed with yellow lamplight except for the open, aromatic window of the kitchen, where a cat sat on the sill. In front of her the little trees, moving, masked the lamps in other houses being lit, one after the other as the evening light waned. The sky was full of pale marzipan colours, and so was the water in the fountain basin, and the glimmer that came from the well. Something pricked her through the gathered voile over her collarbones, and again at her temple. She said, “Gnats. We shall have to go back indoors.”
The bench was beside them. He said, “I was going to answer your question. Am I not worth a gnat?”
“No,” she said. “Tell me another time. Or drive them away. There are some leaves. Smoke would do it. Ederic?”
By God, not out of earshot. Her father’s servant appeared. “Fetch a brand from the kitchen,” said Katelina. “And throw it on those leaves. You were saying?”
Simon watched the servant disappear tranquilly enough, and led her to the bench, where he took off his jacket and spread it for her. “I was saying that, like everyone on the good Bishop’s fine ship St Salvator, I was in Bruges to sell part of the cargo, to invest the proceeds, to buy and to lay orders and, most of all, to enjoy the arrival of the Flanders galleys. You could have asked me all that on board.”
The trees were darker. A strengthening light, advancing, told that Ederic was coming back. “I wonder why I didn’t?” she said. She sat down.
He said, “Because you were afraid I might give you another answer. There is a time for everything.”
“And this is the time?” she said. Ederic, stooping, was introducing the brand to the pile of damp leaves. The leaves hissed, and a little smoke showed, and a trace of movement from the first moths. Simon made to sit down. “If you stand,” said Katelina, “you could tend the flame while Ederic takes the brand back to the kitchen. It is not the time to burn down my father’s house anyway.”
Blue smoke rose from the fire. Ederic looked at his mistress and left. Or at least,