Pawn in Frankincense - Dorothy Dunnett [135]
Philippa had forgotten her. She turned round, the child in her arms, and saw the yellow face on the mattress had gone grey, and the thin hands were wrestling together. Bending, she put the child on its feet. ‘Run,’ she said. ‘And kiss your …’
‘Aunt,’ said the little boy; and laughed, and scampered across the floor to throw himself on the sick woman’s chest. Philippa saw her gasp; and then draw the round head tight to her breast. Over it, Evangelista Donati’s black eyes made their only appeal and Philippa read it. ‘You meant,’ she said slowly, ‘that in the harem, or going to it, no one dare touch me? And that once there, no one could touch Khaireddin either?’
Evangelista Donati said, her voice only a whisper, ‘It is a terrible thing to do for a man … or a child. It is a school which will never end; a company you may never discard. More than that I can promise you. The Sultan is old: you will not suffer. You may choose to die in the Seraglio, or be married to the best blood in the land, for only these are given wives from the harem. But once committed, you will never escape.’
‘You risked death,’ said Philippa. Her throat was dry.
‘I have met death, and I am thankful,’ said Madame Donati. ‘And if you, you are to care for the child, I am glad. Because to Graham it will be a mortification I would die more than once to inflict.’
And upon the sight of the sick woman’s eyes, wildly glittering, and the sleepy roll of the bright yellow head, and the knowledge that hatred for Gabriel, more even than love for the boy, was the fuel which had powered this sick will and forced Evangelista Donati to the point of decision, Philippa heard herself saying, ‘Then I shall go. I shall take care of Khaireddin after you. I shall enter Topkapi with him, and look after him until he is able to leave. But,’ said Philippa, and an odd tear, infuriatingly, made its way down one sun-hardened cheek, ‘I don’t know what Kate will say when she hears.’
14
Zuara
It was hot, that August; and the wind blew from the desert, southwest; so the fleet of the Knights Hospitallers of St John of Jerusalem under Leone Strozzi, Prior of Capua, took a week, under oars, to travel from Malta to the African coast between Djerba and Tripoli, where lay the rich little town of Zuara.
Leone Strozzi was impatient. It was so near, this great prize for which he had laboured all winter. Under his guidance, Malta was fortified. Using Sicilian peasants and knights for his workmen, he and his friends had built two forts to shield the Knights from the continued assaults from the Turks. Built and paid for by the melted gold plate sent to him, with the chains from their shoulders, by the Order’s Knights in Malta and overseas, they were the first commissioned since that domineering, avaricious old man de Homedes became Grand Master seventeen long years before.
But now Grand Master de Homedes was dying. Over eighty, warped and all-powerful still, there were signs that at last the strong heart was faltering, and the current of intrigue in that closed community of four hundred celibate Knights, vowed to poverty and chastity and obedience, was running faster and thicker as each day went by.
All that summer Leone Strozzi had worked at the fortifications, and had sailed the Mediterranean with his own two galleys, taking prize after prize. His had been the voice loudest in the Sacro Consigno; his had been the Langue with the best table, the finest entertainment, the liveliest talk. And he had only two rivals. Jean de la Valette, Grand Prior of St Gilles, was twenty years older than Leone Strozzi, and for all his brilliance and his dedication lacked the final, self-centred violence of purpose which could drive a Florentine forward. And for the other, Sir Graham Reid Malett, Leone had plans of his own.
All summer, Gabriel had been the one constant threat to Strozzi’s ambition. Gabriel the saintly,