The Spring of the Ram - Dorothy Dunnett [196]
She looked at him, two fine frowning lines between her blue eyes, but could not think, it was clear, how to counter that. She said, her voice almost angry, “He nearly died, trying to save him.”
“It was good of him to have the messenger sent,” Godscalc said. She stared at him speechlessly with her frowning, colourless face and he added, “Master Tobie is with us, demoiselle. We shan’t trouble my lord Doria any more than we need. But we must find and bury them.”
Now, thought Tobie, she will cry. As she should; as she needs to. He saw a short, jerky breath overtake her. Then she pulled down her chin and her mouth and said through a tight nose, “That is what you are paid to do. I am Genoese. I have my husband to think of. Captain! Do you want us to ride in the dark?” And brushing past, she set her horse into motion.
Beside him, as they dropped back, Tobie saw Godscalc’s lips move. It was not the girl, he knew, he was cursing. Tobie said, “What was it you called Doria? Frivolous?”
Godscalc turned and looked at him. His large face had returned to calm. He said, “What was it we said of Nicholas? Vengeful, deceitful. A man who secretly causes others to suffer. A man who secretly causes others to die.”
Tobie was silent. They had said all those things, and they were true. Was the spoiling of Catherine de Charetty better or worse than the ruin of Katelina van Borselen? Doria had killed. But Nicholas had killed more subtly, more often. He said, “They were the same man, I suppose. They were both Jason.”
“You could say so,” Godscalc said. “I have noticed that those with a quest are often those with something to escape from; and that applied to them both. Their quests, of course, were quite different. But we are going to see the survivor. We should keep an open mind.”
The dusk after all overtook them. They trotted ringingly into the gorge: a metalled cortège drawing the flashing sunlight after it. The sun, withdrawing stealthily from the beech and the ash, the chestnut and the elm, lingered a long time on the pine trees on the upper reaches of their deep, winding valley; but already the change was upon them. The torrent at the foot of the valley increased its voice, so that all other movement was soundless. The sharp outline of spear and breastplate vanished in the lightless profusion of leaves. The undergrowth sprang thick to their shoulders: fixed among it, the massed mouths and trumpets of flowers spoke with their scent, but when you turned showed only flat moth colours. From the leaf ceilings over their heads, festoons of cindery lichen caught their spears and brushed humming over their helmets. Far above that, the sky was an amphitheatre for wheeling birds whose cries could not be heard; and beneath their feet, red fungus yielded and liquified.
At a hamlet of small wooden houses, shuttered and silent, a hog’s back bridge took them over the river. Behind them, a dog, knowing nothing of brigands, barked hysterically and then was suddenly quiet. Ahead, eight hundred feet up the sheer cliff, was the monastery of Sumela. They sent an agile equerry of Astorre’s off to warn them, and lit the torches they had brought, and started the climb.
The toiling ascent, after the journey, was more than the house-women could manage. Their ponies were led, and two of the soldiers carried them. The demoiselle paid them no attention. It was only by edging close that Tobie saw the sharpness of her cheeks and the stains under her eyes, staring ahead. Although her face was quite blank, tears had begun to pass slowly down either cheek.
She needed to cry, but not like that. Tobie felt Godscalc’s hand on his arm, but shook it off with a frown. He was tired, and he had had enough of Godscalc’s forebodings. He rode firmly to Catherine’s side and putting an arm round her shoulders said, “My horse is fresh. Let me take you.”
Her push nearly sent him off the path. Her face, in the torchlight, was that of a princess assaulted. “Take your hands off!” said Catherine de Charetty. And as, aching, he stilled his shuddering