The Unicorn Hunt - Dorothy Dunnett [342]
In praising the Order for its generosity, the sire de Cortachy referred to recent Ottoman threats against Rhodes and urged the Order – speaking of course in his own voice, and not that of the Pontiff or Burgundy – not to abandon its historic distrust of the Republic of Venice.
It was then the thirteenth of November. Two days after the Baron’s departure, the Council of the Order met and resolved to inform James, King of Cyprus, that the Order would not oppose any pact he wished to make with the Sultan of Cairo, and with the Grand Karaman and the seigneur of Candelore, the Muslim neighbours of Uzum Hasan. Subject to the outcome of the forthcoming meeting in Venice, certain funds were being held by the Order against the arming of such putative allies.
Anselm Adorne sailed towards Brindisi, with the intention of making his way, via Naples and Rome, back to Bruges.
Katelijne Sersanders became seventeen years old to outward appearances, and inwardly approximately three times that age. She gave up attempting to rewrite Jan’s Royal Book in any language.
The agents of the Vatachino communicated with one another: Martin in Syria to David de Salmeton in Cairo; David de Salmeton to Egidius; Egidius to the address which was only that of a company of couriers. It was agreed to stand back and leave the developing situation to Anselm Adorne.
Nicholas passed the first day of his new decade in Rome, among those delegates who had answered the call of Pope Paul and Cardinal Bessarion for an anti-Turk pact among the Italian princes. Seven days later the meeting took place, and such assurances were received that the Pontiff ordered salvoes of joy to be fired wherever Christians were gathered.
Discussing it later with his Rome agent, along with Lorenzo Strozzi and a pleasantly drunk Cardinal’s Secretary, Nicolas said, ‘Will it stick?’
‘Our bit will,’ said Lorenzo, speaking for Naples. ‘We need all the help we can get. But Milan won’t sign in the end. And I don’t know about Florence. You know the Medici: they don’t want to lose trade.’
‘It won’t stick anyway,’ said the Secretary. ‘Not when all the Western powers turn their backs, having something worse to worry about. You don’t know what I know.’
‘Let me guess,’ Nicholas said. ‘The Lancastrian King is back on the throne of England.’
‘That’s old,’ said Lorenzo. ‘The King of France helped put him there.’
‘Ah,’ said the Secretary.
They looked at him.
He said, ‘But you don’t know on what conditions. The King of France wants England’s help in his wars. And England has promised it. And so France has declared war on Burgundy.’
There fell the silence of genuine shock. Then Nicholas cleared his throat. ‘So what happened to Edward of York?’
‘My lord?’ said his agent. ‘That I can tell you. He fled to Holland. And was given shelter by the governor of Holland, the, lord Louis de Gruuthuse of Bruges.’
‘What!’ said Nicholas. He put his hand over his cup. He said, ‘The Duke of Burgundy’s lieutenant-general is sheltering the deposed English King?’ His hand was trembling with suppressed laughter.
His agent said, ‘Yes, my lord. In a private capacity, as you would guess. The Duke is not officially aware that the King is within his domain.’
‘While the Hôtel Jerusalem, in the same town, is harbouring Thomas Boyd and his royal wife from Scotland, early and fervent supporters of the Lancastrian King. How very difficult,’ Nicholas said, ‘for the poor wife and relatives of the peripatetic Baron Cortachy and his heir.’
Lorenzo gave a chuckle, then sobered. With marriage, he had become a shade portly. ‘It’s funny, but look. There’ll be no money coming now from the West. If the Turks are going to be stopped, we have to do it between us.’
‘That’s all right,’ Nicholas said. ‘I’m doing nothing on Tuesday.’
He stayed until Twelfth Night was well over, amassing facts