The Unicorn Hunt - Dorothy Dunnett [181]
She returned the old lady’s call, but talked of nothing of consequence except perhaps the grape harvest.
She rode to Porto Pisano to make the acquaintance of the Provveditore, and view the galleys – the Santa Reparata, the San Antonio, the big Ferrandina, the two Burgundian ships – preparing for the autumn departure. If there was to be an autumn departure. The ships for Flanders were safe. But the Levant? With the Turks the way they were? One could only prepare, and then hope. Thus the Provveditore.
She listened thoughtfully and rode back, beset by mosquitoes. The Burgundian galleys (leased to Tommaso Portinari of Bruges) would sail for Sluys in October, carrying alum. The schedule for the Ferrandina had not yet been announced. But space on the Santa Reparata was still reserved for the Banco di Niccolò, which had made handsome accommodation for its patron, his servants and their goods, about to travel to Egypt.
He was still coming. Confidence renewed, she was able to identify the messenger from Porto Pisano who reported every few days to Messer Bertuccio; just as she knew that Messer Bertuccio would receive reports from the roads to the north the moment that Nicholas came south of Milan.
Nicholas failed to come south of Milan.
September waned. The Arno brimmed because of the rain, and the sea consuls reduced river shipping and had palisades erected as usual. Piero de’ Medici returned from the country, and seeing him, men talked in whispers. Messer Bertuccio called and enquired if in any way he could be of service. She saw, to her annoyance, that he was actually hoping for news. She began to realise that she had depended too much on his competence.
October arrived, and brought to Florence two visitors. One was Tommaso Portinari, come to renegotiate his company contract and be allotted a wife. The first was a stranger, whose name, announced by her house-steward, was vaguely familiar.
Nicholai Giorgio de’ Acciajuoli was a tall man, grey-bearded and lean and past middle years, with all the hallmarks of his family: the grace, the cultured Florentine accent flavoured with Greek, the large, dark, cynical eye. It was only when he disposed himself, sitting, that she saw that his stick had a purpose: one of his limbs was man-made.
Smiling, he noticed her glance. ‘My young friend Nicholas has not regaled you with the tale of our earliest meeting? He shattered my timber leg and was beaten for it. I am glad to see he has found himself a charming wife to curb his excesses. But I forget. Now he is a great man, and full of discretion. And has fathered a fine son, if I am not mistaken?’
‘I am sure you are very seldom mistaken,’ Gelis said. It was a response, not to the words, but to some challenge she had not yet quite fathomed. She added, softening it, ‘But yes, we have a son. A satisfaction which I hope, with your name, that you share.’
‘What a kind heart,’ he said. ‘But alas. Pierfrancesco, my cousin’s husband, will tell you. A worthless brother or two – Bartolomeo Zorzi, what have I not done for him? – is all that I may legitimately claim, although, like your husband, I have not wasted my youth. Since you are a van Borselen and accustomed to affairs of the world, I may say without offence, I hope, that few brides can have taken a young man so exquisitely trained.’
A curious remark. He smiled. She said, ‘I trust you are going to call us well matched. Or I should suspect that you think me inhospitable. May I offer some wine?’
‘My dear madonna!’ he said. ‘In the domestic arena, the ladies of Flanders are peerless. No, I thank you. I have not come to partake of wine, and it is another form of hospitality to which I was referring. I wished to talk of the sensual arts … not in general, merely with reference to your husband’s experience.’
‘Florence,’ said Gelis, ‘never ceases to amaze and delight me. It is not a topic I have heard proposed in public before. It is not, I am afraid, one which I intend to debate now.