Pawn in Frankincense - Dorothy Dunnett [202]
‘It struck me,’ agreed Archie, ‘that it would be an easy way to get the wean into the town.’
They went, none the less, down to the harbour; and on the way Archie heard Jerott’s account, edited, of how he had traced the Peppercorn here to Chios; and in return heard Archie’s story, un-expurgated, of how he had called at every port used by the English until, by elimination, he had landed at Chios. ‘You’ll not have heard from Mr Crawford?’ he ventured. ‘If he got the other child and the Somerville lassie?’
Francis. It was Francis’s money he had been using just now, out on the rocks, to smooth the path of their interrogation. It had been Lymond’s money which had paid for the confirmation they had just received: that a child of two years had indeed left on one of the sponge-boats, some time previously, bound for Stamboul. Because Marthe had shown no concern for the child he, Jerott, had come determined to find it.
If he still wished to find it, he must go to Constantinople, with Marthe; with Pierre Gilles and his bloody Herpestes. And worst, he had to come face to face with Francis, whose past actions he could not condone … whom he had promised never to leave … about whom he knew something which, he suspected, for his very life he must appear not to know.…
He had told Archie nothing of that; and only the barest account of Marthe’s and Gilles’s presence. ‘I’ve heard nothing,’ he said. ‘He may even have the girl and the child and be on his way home.’ But it was a faint hope. Lymond would never have left without sending word of it.
‘No,’ said Archie. With Jerott he had walked out on the low mole, scanning the small boats tied up in the harbour and the big galleons anchored outside in the channel, their lamps beginning to glow in the sinking evening light. On the other arm of the bay, the Genoese lantern, freshly lit, burned red against a sky washed with pale apple green. A flock of cranes, a black wedge against the pale light, flew across the sky and was gone on the long wintering journey south. ‘It’s getting late,’ Jerott said.
‘It’s late.’ Under the turban, the broken-nosed face was passive and lined. ‘Pray God it’s not too late.’
Jerott stopped.
‘He’s in Constantinople,’ said Archie. ‘That I’ve heard. He couldn’t catch up with the girl or the wean before they both got there, and he hasna got them out yet. They’ve made him Ambassador.’
Jerott was startled out of his thoughts. ‘But d’Aramon …?’
‘M. d’Aramon’s going back to France, and a loon called Jean Chesnau is going as chargé d’affaires. Mr Crawford’s made accredited Ambassador, which means he’s got the power of France behind any demands he may make.…’
Jerott let out a long breath. ‘Then surely they’ll give him both Philippa Somerville and the boy that she followed. The other child we only have to locate. He isn’t a child of Devshirmé, poor brat.’ He sobered. ‘Unless a report of Gabriel’s death somehow got through and was acted on.’
There was a short silence. A longboat, pulling strongly, moved out into the harbour, its wake thin as a paint-line behind it. A cloud of fireflies, like sparks from newly lit wood, fussed through the darkening air and was gone. An aroma of cooking, borne from a galleasse which had just put up her awnings, floated, seductively, over the water. ‘They say …’ said Archie. ‘They say in Candía that Gabriel isna dead.’
‘I know,’ said Jerott. ‘What have you heard?’
‘They say he was nursed back to health in Zuara,’ said Archie in his flattest Scots voice. ‘And they say that Rustem, the Grand Vizier now with the army, has sent a new deputy north. He’s been in Stamboul this week or two back. By the name of Jubrael Pasha.’
Oh, my God. Francis …’ said Jerott.
‘If it’s true … it’s too late,’ said Archie. ‘It’ll all be over by now.’
After nearly a month at Topkapi, Philippa was elected to more than Paphian honours: she was appointed to make music for Roxelana herself.
Thus were justified all the crowns Kate and Gideon had spent on her study of lyre and of spinet. It was the only field, so far, in which the Pearl