Race of Scorpions - Dorothy Dunnett [90]
Nicholas, too, had been watching the jetty come nearer, and was scanning the crowds on its length. A band of Knights, naturally, to greet the ship and its officers, and receive the report of its master. The Brethren whose business was imports. The merchants looking out for their cargo. The dock workers, the cranemen, the lighter-men. The customs officers and the searchers and the harbourmaster and his officials. And beyond, by the walls, the stalls of the scribes and the moneychangers. The hawkers of bread and fruit and tavern accommodation. The friends and families of the crew, looking for presents and wages before it all got drunk. An emissary perhaps of Luis, King-Consort of Cyprus, come to inspect the illicit goods which had been spirited off under the noses of Zacco and the Venetians. An emissary of the Queen or the Order, come to see what else of Zacco’s might have arrived.
And presumably, somewhere, Simon de St Pol of Kilmirren, come to greet his wife’s brother and his half-Portuguese nephew Diniz. And, one fervently hoped, nowhere at all, Astorre or Thomas or Tobie, to share in the moment when Simon looked up and saw, grown to hated manhood, the child born to his wife who called himself Nicholas vander Poele.
Meanwhile, he had been asked a question. Nicholas said, ‘What is Simon like? Look for the most beautiful man you have ever seen except maybe for Zacco. He has your own colouring apart from his eyes, which are blue.’
He could feel her surprise. She said, ‘I imagined, from what I heard, that he envied you.’
He laughed. ‘Thank you. No, he doesn’t. He is older, though. About the same age as Tristão.’
‘The boy is dark,’ she said. ‘But yes. Also a pretty face, and a delectable body. It is a pity you kept us apart.’
He didn’t answer. The ship, her sails down, rowed smoothly in. The harbour was crowded with masts and banners. There were other banners as well on the wharf. Then he saw the one that he knew, and felt again the hurt, and the loss. Primaflora said, ‘Is it where you are looking? I see no Apollo.’
‘No,’ he said. Because now he saw that Simon wasn’t there, waiting in front of the liveried servants under the insignia of St Pol. Instead of Simon, there stood a brown-haired young woman of middle height in a cut-velvet cloak over a gown which looked equally sumptuous. Her face, full of character, had the potential of beauty marred, at the moment, by a harshness amounting almost to anger. But her grooming was perfect; her hair skilfully dressed under a two-horned headdress with a slight veil, which under no circumstances could be described as a hennin. Her chin was up, and her unplucked eyebrows were drawn, as she stared intently over the water.
He looked at her for a long time. It was a long time since he had seen her. Who is Katelina? This, my dear, is Katelina. The girl who asked an apprentice called Claes to initiate her into the rites of love – not once, but the length of two nights. The girl who conceived a son as a result and, marrying Simon, allowed Simon to think the coming infant was his. The girl who then discovered (unfortunately) that Nicholas was born to Simon’s first wife. And that, all his life, Nicholas had been reared to believe Simon his father. Simon hated Nicholas, as a symbol of what he thought was his first wife’s betrayal. Katelina van Borselen hated him with far, far more reason.
She stood on the wharf, the girl called Katelina, who had come to Rhodes, it would seem, instead of Simon, and who knew what Simon knew to his detriment, and would use it. Unconscious of anything else, Nicholas stood and gazed without seeing her, and remembered two long, sweet nights, from which had come an abomination. Nor did he see Primaflora, her eyes wide open, watching him.
The ship moved in to its destination. The servants of St Pol fidgeted in their livery. The girl Katelina waited while the ship berthed, disregarding the cold wind that tugged at her cloak. She remained,