Scales of Gold - Dorothy Dunnett [239]
It was a pity he had not been to Ethiopia (the younger ladies were thankful he hadn’t tried) but it had been found to be too far away. He felt guilty, knowing that Nicholas and Godscalc were attempting that very journey, but he had been told not to mention it. In any case, no one seemed concerned. He had been to the end of the world. He was a hero.
He was invited to the Princenhof, where the Duke wanted to see him and commend his service with his sons Antony and young Baudouin in Ceuta, and enquire closely about his experiences in Guinea. He met Ernoul de Lalaing again. He had a private audience, somewhat fraught, with the Duchess Isabella, sister to the late Prince Henry of Portugal, who consequently knew as much as he did about trade, and whose secretary was his uncle. Briefed beforehand by Gregorio, he said, he hoped, no more than he should.
Others were anxious to hear of his experiences. He was invited to all the clubs: the White Bear gave him a feast; and Anselm Adorne arranged a gathering of friends at the Hôtel Jerusalem from which the Lomellini alone begged to excuse themselves. Louis de Bruges, seigneur de Gruuthuse, entertained him, and so did the Hanse merchants and the English, led by their Master and Governor William.
Diniz Vasquez was not an innocent: he knew very well that every man in Bruges – in all trading Europe – would be affected in one way or another by what Nicholas had done. He was being invited for his own sake, but also because he was young, and might let fall something that Gregorio wouldn’t.
The serious work in Bruges was being done by Gregorio who, during the two weeks of his stay, was invited out even more than was Diniz, but who chose very carefully where he went. The Duke, the Duke’s controller, the Scots at the Metteneye hostel, Adorne himself, and the Spanish merchants all received his attention, and he spent perhaps longest of all with Tommaso Portinari. Sometimes he took Diniz with him.
Always, Gregorio spent some time each day with Diniz, explaining what he was doing. In some ways, it was the most exciting part of the homecoming: those sessions with Gregorio and Jannekin Bonkle, the friend of Nicholas who, appointed by Gregorio, ran the Bruges bureau of the Banco di Niccolò.
Gregorio lived on the office premises, as did Bonkle, and sometimes Diniz made a bed for himself beside them so that, whatever the argument was, he could stay and engage in it. The bureau was hardly palatial: two rooms leased from the Charetty mansion and warehouse in Spangnaerts Street which Gregorio ought to know well, having worked there for Marian de Charetty.
Venetian merchants called there, from the families of the Corner or the Bembo. Sometimes Cristoffels, the Charetty manager, would slip in of an evening and join them, and once or twice the older Charetty girl came with him, and took a cup of wine, and asked questions.
One of the first things Diniz had had to do, along with Gregorio, was to have a formal supper with the Charetty girls, and answer their queries about Nicholas. It was what you would expect, since Nicholas had been husband to their late mother – although from what Diniz had heard, neither girl had approved of the marriage.
It astonished Diniz, all the same, to find that their very pertinent questions were directed to the intentions of Nicholas vis-à-vis trade, rather than to the adventures he wished to relate to them. Tilde, the elder, put him through an inquisition as thorough as the one he had faced at the White Bear, and made one or two points he found hard to parry.
Emerging, he found himself unexpectedly sorry for Tilde and Catherine. They were astute enough, for young girls, but the business wasn’t what it should be for its size. He hoped, if the gold came, and if Nicholas was giving them any, that he would devote some thought to the Charetty company. Cristoffels was excellent, as a notary. But