The Ringed Castle - Dorothy Dunnett [104]
The others got through the same ceremony with the smoothness of painful rehearsal, with the exception of George Killingworth, who had to wait while the Tsar called the Metropolitan to admire the colour and size of his beard, upon which the Metropolitan observed reverently, ‘This is God’s gift,’ and blessed it. Clutching his goblet, Killingworth rejoined Chancellor in a hurry, his face red as a cockscomb above the flowing evidence of his Maker’s generosity. Shortly after that, the Tsar watched the last man return to his bench, and tapped with his possoch, and spoke: ‘You may depart.’ The supper had lasted five hours.
It was dark outside. Escorted by nobles and lit by wavering torches, Diccon Chancellor and his three colleagues made their way, with dazed concentration, down the steep flights of stairs from the Granovitaya Palace, and across the shaved wooden paths to where their horses were waiting. The Secretary, Viscovatu, had said farewell outside the palace, and had told them that they would shortly be summoned to discuss their business with a panel of boyars and merchants. Meanwhile, with the help of their Pristafs, they were free to enjoy the city of Moscow, and to join the Tsar and his subjects in the entertainments of the season.
For their own safety, the Chief Secretary had added, he must request them to entertain no one in their own premises, without the protection of at least two Muscovites present. Until they found their own property, the house was theirs free of charge for their lodging. They would have a fixed allowance of bread, meat, hay and straw, wood for the kitchen and stoves, and salt, oil, pepper and onions each day, together with three sorts of mead and two kinds of beer. Meanwhile, said the Secretary, the Tsar was pleased to desire them to drink his health at their own board this evening, and was sending a cart with three barrels of wine for that purpose.…
‘I can’t,’ said Ned Price.
‘You’ll have to,’ said George Killingworth hazily. ‘My God: if I can be tweaked for my Queen, you can spew for her.’
*
Francis Crawford of Lymond entered Moscow briskly just before midnight by the Elinschie gate, with a small company of men. A group of artisans, hurrying late with a lantern, bowed to the ground as the tasselled horses raced past and he lifted his whip in acknowledgement but did not pause until the Nikólskaya Tower of the Kremlin, nearest his house, where he dismounted and flung the reins to a groom. The captain of the barbican, hurrying forward, bowed and said, ‘My lord … the sovereign prince Ivan Vasilievich desires your presence in his apartments.’
The Supreme Commander did not ignore him, nor was he scathing about the appearance and general alertness of the guard, which these days, certainly, was impeccable. He merely said, ‘Advise his grace, if you will, that I am coming?’ and, after a word with his men, walked off on foot towards the private staircase beside St Saviour, his servants and torchbearer following. He had unbuckled from his waist and left behind both his sword and his dagger.
He was challenged six times before he reached the Tsar’s private chamber: by the hackbutters in the courtyard who waited there, matches lit and guns charged day and night; by the grooms who lay at every gate and door of the court; by the officers of the third chamber, where waited forty boyars’ sons through every night: by the officers of the second chamber, where Alexei Adashev slept with three others. He replied to each challenge correctly, his veiled eyes assessing and automatically delivering judgements. Six months ago, after a banquet, the stairs and passages of the palace, half lit and stinking, would have been strewn with the weeping bodies of drunkards, while far out in the mud the grooms waited shivering for their