The Ringed Castle - Dorothy Dunnett [187]
Before the Tsar wakened, his Voevoda Bolshoia had left Moscow.
The last man to see him was Alec Guthrie, waiting alone and unheralded at the Nikólskaya Gate as the brief cavalcade left the Kremlin: the sumpter horses and the servants; the compact group of armed men to protect them. He waited until Lymond came into view, and catching sight of him reined; then at a gesture approached and walked his horse with him. ‘We shall do what we can. I hope your business speeds well.’
Lymond said, ‘Alec.’
He was, Guthrie saw, staring frowning ahead. Guthrie said, ‘Yes?’
‘Güzel is on close terms with the Tsaritsa. Listen to what she tells you. It is most important that you do.’
‘About the Tsar?’ Guthrie said.
‘Without me, I cannot tell how he will move. Between us all, we have steadied him. But if it goes wrong, it will be such a holocaust as you have never imagined. If that happens, you must leave, and take the rest with you. Güzel will tell you how.’
Alec Guthrie, a man not easily disturbed, found it necessary to deepen his voice in order to steady it. ‘I cannot see such an extreme of danger developing in such a short time. But if it does, we shall see that Güzel comes safely to you.’
For the first time, his brows raised, Lymond glanced at him. ‘I rather fancy it will be the other way round. Wild bears become meek for St Thekla.’
The grey-bearded face remained grim. ‘You called me Alec just now,’ Guthrie said. ‘If I have dispensation to do the same, let me say it. Francis Crawford, I wish you away from this country; and if I had the hearing of a friend, and not that of the Voevoda Bolshoia, I would tell you never to come back.’
Abandoned by artifice, Lymond’s face exposed, for an instant, his astonishment. ‘Of course you may speak,’ he said. ‘At this moment … but why? I cannot see why?’
‘I know you cannot see why,’ said Alec Guthrie. ‘You saw it when you fought Graham Malett. You saw it in France and in Malta. You saw it clearest of all at home among your own people.’
Lymond said sharply, ‘That will do.’ After a moment, he said pleasantly, ‘Whatever motives of squalid self-interest you seem to be hinting at, there must be some credit accruing in heaven. You have served this Tsar, and so have I, for nearly two years through some pains and some peril.’
‘With your brain,’ Guthrie said.
Lymond glanced at him, with a touch of the familiar hauteur. ‘Who expected a crusade: Ludovic d’Harcourt? Intelligence is the only indispensable commodity in life or in warfare. If you think otherwise, go live in a hut with a poet. The rest of us will do our best to defend you.’
‘Man is not intellect only,’ Guthrie said. ‘Not until you reject all the claims of your body. Not until you have stamped out, little by little, all that is left of your soul.’
The emotive, squalling words, thin as a hare pipe, sank and were lost in the hearty, masculine noises: the chink of stirrup and buckle, the squeak of leather, and thunder of unshod, rapid hoof-beats around them. No one answered them. Lymond rode on as if he were alone, and did not trouble to speak any more.
Until the Neglinna Bridge, where the column slowed to clatter over the planks between the crowded wood houses and Guthrie, slowing in turn, reined aside and, waiting, prepared to be passed, ignored, by his commander. But the Voevoda reined suddenly also, and turned to him.
‘We part here. I value your good wishes. I value the consideration that brought you to meet me. For two years and more St Mary’s has been upheld by your staunchness, and so have I.’
He paused, and Guthrie, grimly watching, saw that he was choosing his words with some care. Lymond said, ‘On the other matter … the terms of reference by which I live are my own, and those who dislike them must leave, as Blacklock and d’Harcourt have done. I have said the intellect