Queen's Play - Dorothy Dunnett [246]
Before he dived like the murdered Hugh of Lincoln, he yelled. O’LiamRoe heard the call, but Hughie understood it. He squealed once, good-humouredly, because as he knew it, this was moderately good sport; and rolling flat over sank, taking O’LiamRoe with him, just as the four boats blew up—squibs, fusillades, gunpowder and all.
Take ye and bear this Collar, with the image of the most glorious Martyr St. George, Patron of this Order, about your neck, by the help whereof you may the better pass through both the prosperity and adversity of this world …’
The Collar shone round Henri’s shoulders, the twenty-six Garters with their white and red roses and the Great George blazing below. Northampton, faultless to the end, had congratulated the Stranger in the name of Edward and all the Knights Companion, and had delivered the black velvet cap, diamonds winking at the base of the plume, and the Book of the Statutes in its red velvet cover … ‘non temporariae modo militae gloriam, sed et perennis victoriae palmam denique recipere valeas. Amen.’
Amen. The trumpets had piped faintingly out, everyone had bowed, and there was the guarded ruffling of a gathering, stiff, thirsty, and overclad, which had a Solemn Mass to get through before food.
Sensibly, no one began to orate. Henri, smiling, summoned both Northampton and Garter to his side and addressed them courteously; in a moment, Mason and Pickering also went. Behind, someone had opened the doors. There was an attentive rustling among the Archers, among the servants and the gentlemen with axes. The Constable, with an eye on the sun, guessed that they had kept well up to time. He caught Stewart of Aubigny’s eye, returning from the same survey, and knew a moment’s unease, allied to a kind of defiant unconcern. Let the Gods, Popish, Classical or Reformed, take care of it. Warwick was no fool; Warwick had included Lennox and his royal wife in this Embassy just in case of accidents, and would slough them as fast as the de Guise woman had put down that fellow, should the occasion arise.
And France in his view should do the same. There was nothing in Ireland for France: let England pour her own money down that open drain. And let England think France her ally.… What could the Emperor do against both?
The King was talking a little too long. Pasque-Dieu, that fellow d’Aubigny looked green. Something was afoot, then. Montmorency, observing with small eyes, caught the Duke de Guise’s limpid gaze and sustained it warily, for a long moment.
With a sweet and tintinnabulant crash, every window in the room cracked and blew in. The great boom which had followed the crash split into a chain of detonations, ranting like brother cannon breaching a town. Round the crackling centre of sound rose its echo, a great, sonorous wall of air which seemed to seep in through the shattered glass and fill all the stuffed room.
As puppets, every plumed head jerked round. Alone, among every pinched and startled countenance, the handsome face of Lord d’Aubigny looked at ease.
The Constable, absorbing the sense of the room in one glance, noted it and sighed. The clamour broke; it sounded like a boxful of geese. Deep in the heart of it, he heard the King’s voice.
Not unpleasurably, Anne de Montmorency heaved another sigh.
The noyade was over. Queen Mary of Scotland, presumably, was dead. His wife had dressed her dolls. A pretty child, last of her race, born within days of her royal father’s death. The Constable was fond of children; he had seven daughters although, of course, now all grown up.
Thinking hard, he moved forward and took his King by the arm. ‘Some accident, Sire, which should not be allowed to discommode our friends. With your permission, I shall send