Race of Scorpions - Dorothy Dunnett [292]
And then, ahead, were the walls of the Citadel, with its drawbridge down, and the portcullis updrawn to give entry. In its doorway, awaiting them, was a figure in rich, damaged velvets which must be Napoleone Lomellini. Within the court of the castle no doubt attended the garrison, and the Genoese lords, and their former hostages.
One of whom was Nicholas. For several weeks, Tobias Beventini had found it impossible to speak of the apprentice he had chosen to follow, to dissect, to guide, in a medical way, towards the real, adult world. Long ago, he now realised, Nicholas had slipped from his grasp. Alone of all the men who now surrounded him, Tobie carried the knowledge that the son of Katelina van Borselen belonged to Nicholas. He knew what had already befallen every kinsman with whom Nicholas had come in contact. He now knew, too, what had happened, through the contrivings of that tortuous, ingenious mind, to the last exiled Emperor of the dynasty of Byzantium, and all his grown sons. He knew that Katelina van Borselen was in this city, along with the sister’s son of Simon, her husband, while alone in Nicosia was Primaflora, the lovely woman Nicholas had taken in marriage after Marian, the simple widow who had founded his fortune.
Once, in the wake of the St Hilarion assault, Tobie had said to John, ‘Would you follow vander Poele? After this?’
And the engineer had raised his sandy eyebrows and said, ‘After what? You were in Trebizond with him. He hasn’t altered, that I can see, since he came away a rich man.’ Little that John le Grant said was ever reassuring, no matter how right he might be. It didn’t strike Tobie that John, too, had had no wish to talk about Nicholas.
The Great Court of the Citadel of Famagusta was one hundred and sixty feet long, and built to accommodate the grandest of ceremonials. A third of it was occupied by the surrendering forces. Placed to the rear of the Lusignan retinue, the company of Nicholas barely heard the clipped and formal exchanges demanded by protocol, or the clink of the keys as they were handed over, or the flourish of trumpets that heralded the raising of the Lusignan banner on every wall. Behind Napoleone Lomellini and his noblemen; behind the Pallavicino, the Doria, the families of Gentile, Verdure, Archerio, de Pastino and the ranked faces, filled with hate, of the soldiers, there stood the men hitherto guarded as hostages. The Arab Abul Ismail, erect and gaunt and impassive in turban and robes. And beside him, a strong, familiar frame unfamiliarly reduced, on which hung the soiled and ill-fitting clothes of a labourer. But the colourless face of Nicholas vander Poele with its rarefied structure had nothing in common with the dimpled joker of Bruges. His hair, untended, curled thick as a dog’s at his neck under a shapeless wool cap, and his mind was turned patently inwards; far from seeking, or even thinking of the men from whom he had been parted for six weeks.
Towards the end, he lifted his eyes, and looked directly at Tobie and his companions. The next moment he had turned and, by the King’s command, had re-entered the Citadel. His gaze had not been blank: he had seen them. But there was in it neither greeting nor welcome. Astorre said, ‘He’s under orders. Plenty to do. The King’ll want him. I’ve to get the prisoners ready for Nicosia. Why don’t you go into the Citadel? Or the Palace. They’re making it habitable.’
A voice said, ‘Senhores.’ Before them stood the bloodless figure of the boy they had last seen, blotched with indigo, in the dyeyard at Nicosia. Diniz Vasquez said, ‘The lord Niccolò has been commanded