The Unicorn Hunt - Dorothy Dunnett [217]
One day her husband, who shared his favours with so many others, would fail to come back, or would come back to her dying or crippled. She hunted: she knew what the risks were. Hazily, Nicholas wondered if the absences helped: if the times they were living apart were easier than the times like these, when she was aware of every folly and danger. He wondered if she would leave the Tyrol if Sigismond died; or stay, as her sister had stayed to become permanent Dowager Duchess of Brittany. He thought she would stay. She would be better in the Tyrol, he thought.
The darkness was back: the weight lay again on his temples. ‘You should have stuck to water,’ Father Moriz remarked.
‘There wasn’t any,’ Nicholas said.
Father Moriz had him under the arm, and was supporting John le Grant on his other side. For a gnome, he was strong. He said, ‘Nicholas, I can understand a few tongues, but not that one. Never mind. I can recognise an excuse in any language. Come along. You will need some wits about you, I think, in the morning.’
The Duke’s wits being in the same state as his own, it was afternoon the next day before the summons came: the illustrious and powerful prince lord Sigismond, Duke of Austria and Styria and Count of the Tyrol, requested the presence of Nicholas de Fleury, Knight of the Order of the Scottish Unicorn, resident of Venice and Burgundy.
‘Ouch,’ said John le Grant. ‘Neither of them the happiest of attributes just at the moment. Are we coming too?’
‘No. You both drank too much,’ Nicholas said. He didn’t want them with him. If he was right, the Duke didn’t either. In the event, he went to the Duke’s chamber alone.
Sigismond looked unchanged, except perhaps for a little extra fleshiness under the eyes. In the short time he had known him, Nicholas had seen him make some extraordinary recoveries. Sitting now in his chair of state with his brimmed beaver hat banded with pearls, his quilted coat shawled with fur, his rings, his chains, his belt, his pendant and brooches, this was Sigismond, Duke of the Tyrol, in his princely persona. Nicholas – who had gone to some pains as well – did the right thing and knelt, and was allowed to rise. There was no one else in the room except Antonio Cavalli.
The Duke said, ‘Your knee pains you?’
‘Yes, your grace,’ Nicholas said.
The Duke paused. ‘You deserved it. You could have killed me. You would not have lived very long after that.’
‘No, my lord,’ Nicholas said. ‘I regret it. Unfortunately, my alternative was immediate death.’
There was another pause. Cavalli looked down. The Duke said, ‘There is another matter.’
Nicholas bowed. He had not been asked to sit. Cavalli was sitting. He was wearing a neat doublet and a round cap and he was dark as the men from between Trent and Venice were dark. He had a relative in the German fondaco in Venice. Nicholas said, ‘Yes, my lord Duke?’
‘The bow,’ Sigismond said. ‘The steel bow.’
‘I was given it, your grace,’ Nicholas said. ‘To use it would have been suicide. I knew it was not by your will.’
Once, the Duke must have been a ravishing child. When he asked the future Pope, for example, to write him those love letters. Now the two lines deepened at the root of the tip-tilted nose and the pink arched lips drooped. ‘I have mentioned,’ said the Duke heavily, ‘the man who calls himself Martin, of the company called Vatachino?’
Spring came. Summer flowered. His headache disappeared. Nicholas said, ‘You mentioned, my lord, that you had decided to allot him the right to mine silver. It is not for me to censure a rival.’
‘In that case, you must be unique,’ said the Duke tartly. ‘Are you too high-minded, also, to present any case of your own? You appear to be a remarkably poor envoy.’
‘Certainly,’ Nicholas said, ‘I am a representative of my lord of Burgundy in so far as I bring his goodwill and letters. In the matters of alum and silver, I represent only myself and my Bank, and am as free as Herr Martin to bring wealth to the Tyrol from both.’ He paused respectfully. ‘The mountainside did not seem