Pawn in Frankincense - Dorothy Dunnett [17]
In a moment, Jerott knew very well, Lymond was going to lose his temper. Mortally relieved to be himself out of the firing-line, Jerott was looking forward to watching him do it. ‘About bastardy, perhaps?’ added the Dame de Doubtance placidly.
In all the dark room, there was no sound. Then Lymond drew breath. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Nor about anything else. We must not tire you.… Jerott?’ He had turned, without haste, on his heel.
Jerott stayed where he was. ‘What about bastardy?’ he said.
The dewlapped, colourless face smiled at him. ‘Ah, Mr Blyth. You are not afraid of ridicule, it appears. What a pity that Oonagh O’Dwyer should have been Francis’s mistress and not yours.’
To Jerott, everything suddenly became exquisitely clear, including Lymond’s motive for privacy. ‘You cast horoscopes,’ said Jerott Blyth quickly to the withered face in the gloom. ‘Can you tell us the child’s?’
‘If you can repress for a moment your spinster-like longing to meddle in my affairs,’ said Lymond cuttingly, from the door, ‘I am waiting to go.’
Ignoring this: ‘I might, if I were paid in a little courtesy,’ said the Dame de Doubtance to Jerott. ‘There is no hurry, Mr Blyth. Francis will not leave while you are still here.… What is the child’s name?’
‘He doesn’t know,’ said Lymond, answering for him. ‘He knows nothing. He is one of nature’s matrons, oozing arch curiosity. You can tell he’s a wood-nymph by the cow’s tail under those long, snowy robes. He wants to ask about Oonagh’s baby, so tell him. For God’s sake, tell him. Then he and the bloody girl can find and burp it together. If it’s alive.’
‘Oh, it’s alive,’ said the Dame de Doubtance quite calmly. ‘Vows made on Gabriel’s altar are not lightly regarded. Son and father will meet.’
Afterwards Jerott was not certain if the word ‘where?’ was spoken aloud. He knew only that it sprang to his lips, and that, silenced suddenly, Lymond framed it as well. Within the golden hair, the grey eyebrows rose. ‘How quiet we are,’ the Dame de Doubtance said. ‘It would not be good for you, I think, to be certain where. The woman, of course, is in Algiers.’
‘Oonagh?’ Slowly, Lymond had re-entered the room. A shadow in the dark, he passed Jerott and reaching the Dame de Doubtance’s old, slippered feet, dropped quietly to one knee, all caprice gone from his face. ‘Shall we meet?’
The ancient, powerful face looked down. ‘You will see her.’ A yellow nail, strongly curved, followed the line of his cheekbone. ‘You were a pretty boy; but ungovernable. You are right not to trust me.… You will see her. But your father’s two sons will never meet in this life again,’ said the Dame de Doubtance, looking at Lymond, the candle-flame in her round, predator’s eyes.
And under them, Jerott saw the fluid posture of the other man stiffen; and his stretched gaze in turn hold the woman’s, stare for raw stare, until the Dame de Doubtance laughed shortly and said, ‘Ah, Khaireddin. Of course. That was the child’s name,’ as if she had just been informed.
Your father’s two sons will never meet in this life again. Jerott, listening, scowled. Lymond had only one brother—Richard, third Baron Culter, at Midculter in Scotland. Richard, the well-loved and reliable family man who held the family title and administered the family estates and who shared his home with his widowed dowager mother. Lymond said, smoothly, to that grotesque and brooding face hung above him: ‘Promise me that Richard will be safe.’
And the Dame de Doubtance, glibly, repeated his words: ‘Richard will be safe;’ while Jerott, at last, was brought to regretting the childish sentiment which had inspired him stay and to force this queer confrontation to an inhuman issue.
‘Put the next question,’ the Dame de Doubtance said lightly, but Lymond said, still quietly, ‘I have no more questions to ask. You wished to make Jerott your witness?’
‘How quick you are,’ she said, mockery in the thin voice. ‘You don’t ask the date of your death? I can tell you.’
It was suddenly too much. The old bitch, thought