The Ringed Castle - Dorothy Dunnett [211]
‘There is not a soul but over it is a keeper,’ Lymond said. ‘Welcome, brother.’
You cannot embrace a seated man whose long sleek hands, broken with callouses, remain strictly clasped round his knees, and whose two open eyes are discs of smooth blue enamel. Richard stood where he was and said simply, ‘Thank God you’re back. And safe.’ And then, moved beyond pride, dropped on one knee.
Lymond’s face warned him off. The repudiation, though he did not move, was as stark as if he had jumped to his feet, coldly incredulous. Shocked, Richard said abruptly, ‘Are you ill?’
With care, Lymond changed his position. It was not a retreat, but the space between them undoubtedly widened. It made it possible for Richard to move in his turn, and finding a stock of grey rock, to sit on it, with a stone from the beach to employ him. He had picked it up before he found it was fractured; an eggshell guillotined by its fellows, to show a quartz yolk of glistening olive.
‘I must apologize,’ Lymond said. ‘One is afflicted with a certain enjambment of silence. Before our miscarriage at sea, we were accustomed to living like cormorants.’
‘Is that why you are here?’ Richard said.
‘That is why I am here. The nest is rather full, with a great deal of bill-snapping. It is a little like Ramadan. At the appearance of the first star nothing but gluttony, drunkenness and lust. Brechin will be rotten with pox.’
‘I was at Dunnottar. Did you know?’ Richard said.
‘No. I had, perhaps, a premonition,’ Lymond said. ‘The wonderful celerity of hasting nature. And here you are.’
He was, of course, very tired still and looked it; the voyage, wreck apart, would overtax any man’s endurance. But that didn’t account for quite everything. Richard said bluntly, ‘I thought I should be welcome.’
‘I have fallen out of the habit of talking to brothers,’ Lymond said. ‘Is the Earl Marischal sending a courier to Edinburgh?’
‘Yes. And a party north, some time today. They will see the two men you mention on their way south to London, and arrange to conduct the Ambassador by easy stages to Edinburgh. The Queen Dowager will wish to see him. In any case, there will be some legal formalities to do with the wreck and the cargo. Is there a guard on her?’
‘On the Edward? Of a sort,’ Lymond said. ‘Most of it has probably gone. And pace the Muscovy Company, it would be a benign gesture not to pursue it too heartily. The fishermen gave up a good deal of their time on the night of the wreck at my instance, looking for Chancellor.’
He had heard the name before. ‘The new English pilot. A pity that,’ Richard said.
Lymond’s fair brows shot up, in a way suddenly and sharply familiar. ‘He died in tender years, but ripe in grace. And conducted to heaven these his sailors, being drawn to enjoy these celestial waters which God hath granted to the faithful. At least we don’t have to bury them.’
The edge, suddenly, was back, with all the hurtfulness he remembered so well. Richard said, ‘I hear you killed Graham Malett.’
Lymond opened his lips before he spoke. ‘Eventually,’ he said.
‘And saved one of the two boys he had taken. Don’t you want to know how your son is?’ said Richard.
‘Since Moscow is in the same planet as Philippa, I know how my son is,’ Lymond said. ‘At least, she sent me a letter. If he were dead, I imagine she would have mentioned it in the first sentence.’
Richard stared at his brother. ‘Philippa’s mother has him, at Flaw Valleys. They’re at Midculter on a visit, just now. He is all that any man would want his son to be. My God, Francis, you gave a year of your life towards finding him. He has the exact Crawford colouring.’
‘Egg mimicry,’ said Lymond. ‘How many more of yours have you hatched?’ He had loosened his hands and was delving his long, ruined fingers through the sand of the beach, scattered with immaculate shells and small sharp stones of all colours. Lower down, nearer the sea, lay the shining thick satin scarves