Race of Scorpions - Dorothy Dunnett [252]
In the most artistic way, Nicholas swore. The man grinned. ‘What have you to worry about? He sent a message for you. It’s in your tent.’
There proved, when he got there, to be two messages. The first, from the King, summoned him forthwith to Nicosia. The other, from Philip Pesaro, asked that no matter what time he arrived, he should ride on immediately to Sigouri.
The Château Franc at Sigouri was ten miles away. It was dusk, it was wet, and Nicholas had been riding all day. He sent for Astorre, and there appeared instead Thomas, who reported smartly that Captain Astorre had been called to Nicosia, and Master Tobie and Messer le Grant with him. He answered, when pressed, that he didn’t know why, but it was understood that the young fellow was mad, that is, Monseigneur the King was in one of his fits of impatience. The rumour was that they were to give up the siege and have their contracts revoked before Christmas.
Nicholas said, ‘Don’t believe it. All we need is a bit of good action. Wait till I get back from Sigouri.’
‘They say,’ said Thomas, ‘that you’re not coming back. That the King’ll keep you beside him at the Palace.’
‘And that’ll be nice and dry and warm for us both. I can see how the thinking is going. Well, tell them I’ll be back whether the King wants me or not. We said we’d take this damned city, and we’re going to.’
Thomas didn’t look immediately cheered, but might relay some of that, Nicholas thought, where it would help matters. He felt wet and cold and touched with foreboding. He sent for one man and Chennaa, swallowed some cold meat and wine and, wrapping himself in a dry cloak, went and mounted the camel, crooning love-talk as she rose to her feet and took up her soft, swaying gait. She was a racing-camel. Although booted and plastered with mud and out of temper with herself and with him, she deposited him at the drawbridge of Sigouri in just over an hour. Pesaro met him in the yard.
Philip Pesaro was a good fighting man in a post that controlled all north-east Cyprus from Famagusta to the end of the Karpass. He took Nicholas into his office, shut the door and spoke as soon as the servants had gone. ‘I’ve got a report from inside Famagusta. Their food is virtually finished. There are only two thousand still alive in the city, and the survivors are dying off daily. But Lomellini and his men will not give up. They will starve to the end, because they believe rescue is coming by sea.’ He paused and said, ‘The King is not here. He has offered honourable surrender, and his envoys have been killed or turned back. The responsibility for what is happening does not lie with us. But I must report it to you.’
‘Yes,’ said Nicholas. He pushed aside, untasted, the food Pesaro’s servant had given him. He said, ‘Of course, the King has not heard this latest news.’ He looked at the window and said, ‘I’ll go to Nicosia tonight.’
Pesaro said, ‘You might as well have your night’s rest. I know what the lord King will say. It is no concern of his if the city is stubborn, and suffers. And until after your Feast, he will do nothing.’
Nicholas stopped in the act of rising. He said, ‘What?’
‘The Feast of St Nicholas,’ said Philip Pesaro. ‘You had forgotten. He offered to hold it in Famagusta. Since you have failed to give him Famagusta, he proposes to celebrate it in his own capital. That is why you have to go.’ He paused, and said, ‘You won’t persuade him to do otherwise, Messer Niccolò. Don’t think that you can.’
‘No,’ said Nicholas. ‘I shall go, then. But there are some orders I should like carried out. I shall write them down and sign them. Then when this mad Feast is over, I’ll bring the King back.’
He wrote, and Pesaro watched. At the end, the