Race of Scorpions - Dorothy Dunnett [251]
This train of thought led to another. He finished his story and said, ‘I can’t stay long. I’d better go down to Episkopi. Then I’ll come back and we’ll talk. When this ship has sailed, can you come to Famagusta? Will it run well enough in your absence?’
‘How long an absence?’ said Loppe. ‘Perhaps the siege is over. Perhaps the magazine has blown up already.’
‘But that’s why I want you there,’ Nicholas said. ‘Not for the siege; but what’s going to happen after it.’
For the rest of the time, they spoke only of business. At Episkopi, he found one of the Martini brothers down by the warehouses. He had met him before, since his second coming from Rhodes, and on both occasions the Venetian was civil, if not effusive. Nicholas supposed honour was partially satisfied. The Martini had helped free the Flemish lady from Zacco. And Nicholas, as was now known, had prevented the acquisition by Madeira of the best vine and cane cuttings in Europe. That of course had not been his prime reason for going to Rhodes. Indeed, he had no proof, until he reached Rhodes that Katelina had taken cuttings with her. But no one but himself happened to know it.
The Order, when he came across its several agents down by the waterside, was civil for no doubt the same reasons. Zacco, as King of all Cyprus, would have the Venetian fleet on his side. So the Knights would have orders to smile on him; forgetting any small item such as the kidnapping of their ship and their cargo. Nicholas, in the course of these encounters, failed to meet John of Kinloch whose regard for him, he rather feared, would be unaltered.
His last visit was to fulfil an invitation from Marco Corner to take supper with him at his house. It had happened on the last occasion as well, for Venice was delighted with Niccolò vander Poele, who had destroyed the plants and was freeing Cyprus, God be good, of the Genoese. Even his marriage to Primaflora in some way had charmed them although, of course, there had been no opportunity for her to visit either Episkopi or Kouklia.
This time, Loredano was there, the perfect Venetian; but not the perfect Venetian princesses. It was a relief; although again, naturally, the subject of Katelina van Borselen arose, and he had to explain, again, that he had seen her last in good health leaving Rhodes. ‘A charming guest,’ returned Marco Corner, lifting his bulk from a settle and signing a servant to light the small brazier. ‘Although her captivity chafed her and her disappearance, as the lord King has found cause to remind me, has deprived him of her considerable ransom. Nevertheless, one would not have wished her to be miserable. The countryside troubled her. Fiorenza observed it. She had a great fear of insects.’
‘The lady Fiorenza is sensitive to the feelings of others,’ Nicholas said. ‘I trust she and her sisters are well?’
‘Of course. Of course,’ said Marco Corner. ‘You will see them in Venice. Surely, when the King is in possession, you will allow yourself a small trip to Venice? It would be wise, in any case, to supervise this vile matter of refineries. You are suffering too? I am told they have touched pawning as well. The Order and Carlotta have cause to know it. You will have to look to your Bank.’
‘My Bank,’ Nicholas said, ‘is as well protected as I am.’
Slithering north in the rain the next day, he thought he ought to be commended for speaking the truth, for what it was worth, which was little.
He returned to find the Cross of St George still flapping from the walls of Famagusta and nothing obviously changed except the weather, which would, of course, put out the slow-matches and the fire-missiles and make it increasingly unlikely that the tower of Famagusta was going to prove combustible. On his way to his tent, he fell in with a captain who told him gloomily that three men had individually