Niccolo Rising - Dorothy Dunnett [40]
“And now you know, of course, after one angry encounter. And as a result, there is damage to be redressed. My client is offended. Felix’s patrimony will suffer. All because of this accident.”
Claes said, “My lord Simon is going home after the galleys. I’ll keep out of his way. I suppose he will now keep out of mine. Demoiselle, I have some news about alum.”
She said, “You certainly will keep out of his way. I won’t have a feud while you’re under my roof. You don’t have the means to survive one. God knows you have the means to start one. Your trouble is the same as Felix’s. You need work.”
He smiled. His palms, as he lifted them to her, were thickened with callouses.
“What sort of a fool do you take me for?” she said. “I know that. In the eight years you have lived with this family your arms and legs at least have earned your keep. The pity is that none of the rest of you, it seems, is even born yet. What is to become of you?”
He shook his head, smiling the brimming, affectionate smile he turned on all the world. “The Duke will hang me, perhaps?”
“No,” said Marian de Charetty coldly. “The King of Scotland perhaps. The King of France almost certainly. If Meester Julius leaves, you might do worse than go with him.”
“Will he leave?” said Claes. He looked surprised.
“He might,” said Marian de Charetty. “When he finds I will not take him into partnership. But with what he now owes, it will take him a little time to save what will make him independent. By that time, Felix will be grown.”
“And I, perhaps, will be hanged by the King of Scots,” said Claes. “So where will you go for an honest notary to help you guide jonkheere Felix?”
He spoke as if thinking aloud. She allowed Claes to speak freely quite often. Now, before she could think of an answer, he had suggested one. “There is Meester Oudenin. His daughter is the right age.”
She felt her colour rise, and she inhaled abruptly. It left in her throat the faint smells of ink and parchment and leather, and sweat, and sawdust. Sawdust?
She said, “I think that will do. The beating you certainly deserve would do nothing but lose me even more of your labour. I shall tell you in time what other punishment I have devised. Meanwhile you will return to work, no matter what the town says. I shall take care of the Scots gentleman.”
The footsteps she had heard became clearer, and Astorre’s familiar fist banged on the door.
Claes smiled, and she fought not to smile in return. Another bang came to the door, and Astorre’s voice saying, “Demoiselle!”
Claes said, “I wrote it down. About the alum. It’s Phocoean, and the Venetians were hoping to keep it all quiet. The Guild would be interested.” He withdrew a creased scrap of paper from his pouch and laid it on her table; then glancing up with another smile, slid one of her other papers across it. Then, receiving wordless permission, he crossed and opened the door for Astorre, before himself bowing out.
The door shut. She did not look down at the paper. The soldier, as she expected, was carrying a heavy box under either arm. He crossed the room with his bow-legged tramp and set them heavily down beside her money chest. It was why she had to bring a strong bodyguard every year, carrying extra groats to pay for what she bought from the Flanders galleys.
Astorre straightened, his breathing hardly disturbed. Twenty years of hard fighting showed in the puckered scar over one eye and the scarlet frill which was all the surgeons had left of an ear, but he was as fit as a twenty-year-old, with not a thread of grey yet in his beard. He said, “So you’ve told him?”
“No, I haven’t,” said Marian de Charetty.
“He’d make off? I wouldn’t have thought it,” said the captain.
“No. He’s grown a lot in a year,” said the widow his employer.
“Too much?” said Astorre, and laughed, hawking. He spat in the