Pawn in Frankincense - Dorothy Dunnett [208]
On an annual income from the French Crown, supplemented from one’s own estates, one might live generously but not extravagantly as Ambassador at the Sublime Porte. M. d’Aramon et Luetz, whose own presentation years ago had cost him over three thousand pounds in entertainment and gifts, was silent as Onophrion’s preparations drew to a close; and he began to have an inkling of the amount of gold the Controller had been permitted to spend.
By custom, all those in the Ambassador’s party must be uniformly clothed. That meant livery for, say, twenty servants and two pages; robes, or short gowns over matching doublets and breeches for the dozen chief French citizens of the city who would accompany them, and court dress of the most elaborate kind for the Ambassador and M. d’Aramon, presenting him, together with lesser suits for the half-dozen Embassy officials with them. Cloaks, tunics, caps, shoes and jewels for forty or more.
Most of the garments, M. d’Aramon knew, had come on the Dauphiné. The last week had been spent fitting and enriching them. Submitting, courteously, to Master Zitwitz’s deft, measuring hands, the retiring Ambassador approved without comment the ice-blue velvet proposed for his doublet, and the massive blue and silver over-robe the Controller lifted like a child from its coffer and offered for his admiration. ‘Cloth of silver, Monseigneur, with an ogival frame of blue velvet and raised knots and leaves in pulled loopings of silver silk. There is a matching cap in blue velvet with aigrette feathers. All the household are in blue and white satin, and I have put the merchants, with His Excellency’s agreement, in black silk lined with scarlet. The shirts for yourself and His Excellency are of lace, edged with silk Florentine thread. I thought a pleated collar instead of a stiffened wing, as I gather the Turkish robes you will be required to wear may be collared and heavy. I should advise you to unclasp the over-robe and give it to me before assuming the Turkish attire.’
‘And what,’ said M. d’Aramon, with gentle amusement, ‘will His Excellency be wearing?’
‘The same as M. le Baron, if you will forgive the liberty,’ said His Excellency’s soft voice from the doorway. ‘Onophrion couldn’t face the problems of precedence and neither could I, so we had two lots made. I’m sorry about the useless blue velvet. It is supposed to indicate that you are prepared to wear it once and then throw it away. You could wear it afterwards, perhaps, at a large, vulgar banquet.’
‘I gather,’ said M. d’Aramon dryly, ‘it is necessary to impress.’
‘It is necessary,’ said Lymond briefly, ‘to beg.… I came to tell you, there was a blind and somewhat sickly descendant of Sohâib Rûmi downstairs requiring help to write a letter in French. Your secretary swore that both he and the boy with him were probably rogues, and they certainly couldn’t pay an asper, but I thought it might be politic to help them. If any harm comes of it, it’s not your secretary’s fault.’
‘My secretary is wrong. We are here to assist,’ said M. d’Aramon firmly. He had watched his successor in the past week, with the merchants who came to kiss his hands; the suppliants; the formal, inquisitive calls from his fellow Ambassadors of Venice, Ragusa, Epidaurus, Chios, Transylvania, Florence and Hungary. The French Embassy had a name for generosity. Its doors were open to travellers: its purse—even his, d’Aramon’s, private purse—had been ready to help the stranded visitor with clothes, money and horses: at his own expense also he had bought and freed not a few Christian slaves, whatever their country, from the hands of the Turks.
It was a tradition he would like to see followed. He hoped, not for the first time, for many reasons, that Crawford’s petition would be swiftly successful.
At dawn on Tuesday, a cool autumn day, the Mehterkhané, the Sultan’s musicians crossed the Golden Horn to the French Ambassador’s house, and with the low roll of drum and kettledrum below every unlatticed window, commanded