The Ringed Castle - Dorothy Dunnett [97]
There was a short silence. The man to whom, out of all likelihood, that lively, normal young creature had allowed herself to be tied stood in thought by his bedside, the light showing no tremor on his still, hard-moulded face. Then Lymond said, ‘You will see when you come to Moscow. It makes no difference to what I said there at table. I am staying in Russia. I want to know one thing only. Why does Margaret Lennox wish to force through a divorce?’
Margaret Lennox, noted the watching brain behind Chancellor’s clear, blue-black eyes. He said, ‘I mentioned a letter, purely because the Russians were present. Lady Lennox does not wish you to write releasing Mistress Philippa from her promise. She says that Holy Church will not grant a divorce on written evidence only. She says you must come to England.’
The lamp-lit face was merely attentively polite. ‘Or …?’
The threat to himself, Diccon Chancellor had long since decided, was the affair of Diccon Chancellor and no one else. He said, ‘Or Flaw Valleys would have to be guarded in the only way possible.’ He drew breath, but Lymond spoke first.
‘Kate?’ he said. ‘If I don’t return and Philippa can’t remarry, then Kate must marry to make Flaw Valleys safe? Is that it?’
Diccon Chancellor stared at the other, fair face which was smiling.
He said, ‘If Kate is Mistress Somerville’s mother, then that is the threat. She shall be made to wed a loyal English citizen, for the sake of herself and her family.’ And at something, a question, in Crawford’s face, he elaborated. ‘There is a boy, I believe: a lovechild who stays with her also?’
Lymond laughed. He laughed slowly and softly, turning away from the bed, and the sound of it, in the quiet night, made the hairs prick between Chancellor’s flesh and his clothes. Then turning suddenly he lifted the dipper, presented it smiling to Chancellor, and, when he had done, tipped it twice down his own throat.
‘A lady of classical impulses,’ said Lymond. ‘The weaklings may hold to the Rule of Zosima: without women, how should we sharpen our wits?’ He paused a moment, and said pleasantly, ‘The child is not Kate’s or Philippa’s, but mine. A threat of such nicety deserves to be appreciated.’
‘Why does the Countess of Lennox want you back?’ Chancellor said.
‘To play with,’ said Lymond.
‘Will you go?’ Chancellor said.
Lymond smiled. Like a painting in gesso the lamplight caught the moment of pleasure: lit the ridged brows and gold feathered hair, the tips of the thick, open lashes; the sapphires glowing like oil on his doublet.
‘Ask me in Moscow,’ he said.
Chapter 3
Four days later, through gentle country of yellowing birches and sunlit scarlet berries of rowan, they reached the joined wood walls and log bridges of Moscow, and passed between the izbas and churches to reach the inner city, ringed by its wall of rose brick, where Lymond conducted them to a modest, shingle-roofed house and introduced them to the two Pristafs, with their company of soldiers, who would be responsible for their lodging and food. Then he left them.
The following day, they received a summons from the Chief Secretary to bring to him all their official missives for translation, and did so, finding Master Ivan Mikhailov Viscovatu prepared to be most cordial, and being conducted on their return to a larger house in a different district where they waited in total seclusion for almost a week, playing cards and trying to engage the Pristafs in frivolous conversation. Seven days after their arrival, they were advised by Master Viscovatu that the Tsar felt a desire to accommodate them in still greater comfort, and, with a great deal of bowing and baring of teeth, were escorted to a still larger house, hung with red serge, which had beds in it. Here they received daily eight hens and a portion of mead, together with an allowance of five and sixpence in cash, and a man to clean house and serve. Two days after that, the letters were returned, and they were warned that they would be called to the Tsar’s presence in the