Queen's Play - Dorothy Dunnett [95]
The Hôtel-Dieu in the Place Louis XII had an orchard behind. They crossed from tree to tree like Saurians and pelted each other with apples until, from shed to storehouse to attics, they took to the rooftops again. There, the youngest pair made a discovery, and two more, exhilarated with exercise and drink, knelt with them and cheered loudly and sardonically at a lit window whose light suddenly went out. In the shadow of a gable end Thady Boy landed softly and rose to his feet. Stumbling, Stewart was beside him. ‘Where now? D’Enghien’s ahead of us. And St. André.’
‘There’s not the least hurry in the world.’ The liquid cadences comforted. ‘Let you take breath a little. My life for you, in a little short while it will be either d’Enghien or St. André who’s ahead of us—but not both, a mhic; not both.’
Four o’clock on a weekday morning was no unusual time for the public roaster to begin his work. Red in the scented glare, with grease spattering his apron and sweat spreading in his neckcloth, he worked half-sleeping over the crackling spit, while a thin-shanked child in cotton shirt and bare feet cranked at the treadle. And inside his shop was the last clue but two.
For all the attention he paid, he might have been deaf to the noise outside his door as the crowds surged and swayed, moving with the dark figures, jumping and scrambling far over their heads. Heavy as it was, the wagering among the contestants was nothing compared to the money which had changed hands in the streets. Half the Scots Guard off duty, as Stewart well knew, were among the brawling, struggling mass down below.
Lying hidden in the shadows beside Thady Boy, Robin Stewart prayed only that he might reach the castle and the last clue before Laurens de Genstan. It was the happiest day of his life.
Jean de Bourbon, sieur d’Enghien, was the first to force open the steamy roof-light on the roaster’s house and drop cautiously through.
There was a shelf running high along the wall, from which in the daytime hung the sides of beef, the sheep and the poultry bought and waiting to be cooked; and below that, a table on which d’Enghien and his brother Condé could step without touching ground and thereby infringing the rules. D’Enghien, his curling hair plastered over his dirty face, silk doublet gaping and hose ripped and blotched black, green and white from lime and tar and moss-grown copings, was aware that St. André and St. Genstan were almost on him and in no mood for waiting.
As the roaster tipped a pool of hot fat over the meat, put the ladle carefully down, wiped his hands on the limp stuff of his apron and turned, the young man hopped from table to stool, from stool to dresser and from the dresser to the neighbourhood of the fireplace. Built into the stonework, ridged and scored by the honing of generations of knives, was the salt recess. In it was absolutely nothing but blocks and boulders of drying salt.
The roaster, porklike arms akimbo, his round beard a wet fuzz of grease, watched him without sympathy. ‘You seek some papers, monseigneur?’
Above, the roof-light rattled as St. André attained it.
‘Yes, you fool. They should be here. Where are they?’
The roaster turned his head and the boy, who had stopped cranking, mouth open, hurriedly began again. He turned back. ‘They were put in the fire. What a pity. An accident.’
‘An accident!’ Behind, there was a scuffle. The Prince of Condé, as tattered as his brother, was back on the shelf, gripping the roof entrance fast shut against the onslaught of the two men outside. Urgently d’Enghien harried the roaster. ‘Can you remember what it said? What was the clue?’
His red face blank, the man gazed up. ‘I have a bad memory.’
Feverishly, d’Enghien dug into his purse. Gold gleamed. ‘What was the single word, then? You must at least remember that?’
The roaster caught the coin, bit it, and allowed himself a brief smile. ‘The word