Race of Scorpions - Dorothy Dunnett [109]
‘And if he doesn’t?’ said Primaflora. ‘If I marry him, and he stays with Queen Carlotta?’
‘Then you would still be a rich widow,’ said Katelina. ‘Because I should make you one.’
Slowly, in her turn, Primaflora rose, her eyes on the other. She said, ‘What has he done to you?’
Katelina made a short, dismissive gesture. ‘There was something. It was done to injure my husband, not me. No one else knows of it, because it was designed by Nicholas to be savoured by Nicholas only. You think of Nicholas as an adventurer. He is a man who maims, I have told you, for sport.’
Primaflora listened. The Queen was right. The woman was dangerous; in some way obsessed. But now was not the moment to find out the root of it. She rested her manicured fingers on the other’s silk sleeve. ‘Leave it to me. But meantime, let him feel safe. Keep out of his way for your own sake. He must know you and Tristão Vasquez are his enemies. He is at liberty, and you say he is cruel. If that is so, then you must be in danger.’
‘Perhaps,’ said Katelina van Borselen. ‘It doesn’t make any difference. He is a traitor. I will prove it. And nothing will stop me.’
From the door, Primaflora stood and considered her. Then she took a decision, and spoke. ‘You are still unsure of me, so I will tell you. This Niccolò is a lover I like, but that means very little. I am the Queen’s lady, but I am also a courtesan. The Queen uses me to attract and hold knights to her cause. I was with such a man in Bologna when he was killed, and the Queen told me to attach myself to vander Poele if I could.’
Another pause. ‘Was it difficult?’ the Flemish girl said. Despite an obvious effort, the contempt showed.
‘No,’ said Primaflora. ‘He will go to bed with anybody. On the night they told him his wife was dead, he found consolation until dawn in the arms of a Greek married lady of means.’
‘He told you?’
‘I heard from one of his men. Is that your page, or my woman?’
Katelina answered the scratch on the door. ‘Your woman, madonna. Someone expects you.’
For once, her woman had chosen correctly. It was time to interrupt: the right moment to go, leaving that news behind her. The leave-taking on both sides was smooth. Followed by her chaperone, Primaflora moved to the stairs, and was almost pushed aside by the young St Pol page dashing past her. In the hall below, she could see a stir, and hear men’s voices upraised. Her woman said, ‘Not down the stairs, madonna. My lord is in one of the rooms in this very gallery.’
Primaflora stopped. She said, ‘Who is in one of the rooms?’
The woman stopped also, looking surprised. ‘My lord Niccolò, your betrothed. I gave him your message, and he is waiting for you. You are blessed. He is ardent, madonna.’
‘But he was not to meet me here until later! He is too early! The maniac!’ she said.
The room she had just left was behind her. As Primaflora spoke, she heard the page open its door. She heard the boy’s voice within, and that of Katelina, responding. The Flemish girl’s voice sounded nearer: she was on the verge of stepping out to the gallery. Primaflora, distracted, looked about her. An unwilling bride should not, on the face of it, be making assignations with her despised future husband. Another door began to open ahead of her. It led to the room her woman had indicated: she didn’t wait to see who would come out.
She had fled halfway down the stairs when a man’s hand took her comfortably under the arm and a man’s voice said, ‘My dear future bride! Are you running to me, or from me?’
She turned. It was, of course, Niccolò. The dimples were there, and the large eyes with their purses of mischief and the austere, contradictory nose with its drawn nostrils. Framing his face were two flaxen plaits with a veil on them, and his boots emerged from a long-waisted gown of white lawn. ‘Guinevere,’ he said. ‘I was just off to a joust with the Knights, but I’d rather have one with you. Why are you frowning?’ He looked round. ‘Something is happening?’
In the rest of the building,