The Unicorn Hunt - Dorothy Dunnett [90]
Then Master Crackbene the sailor had elbowed past her, taking the other man with him.
After that, even though all the servants were up, there was so much to do that Robin had no time to feel tired: fires to bank up, water to heat, messengers to get on their way, food and drink to be brought from the kitchen. The Flemish doctor Andreas arrived; then the Bishop of St Andrews himself with the dead lady’s brother. And then, finally, the lawyer called Julius, bringing Robin’s friend Katelijne, looking like girls did when in bed with a pain. Robin yelled to bring his father but it was the lady Bel who hurried forward and took the girl in her arms. After that, it got quiet.
It was very quiet in the room where Lucia lay. The Bishop had gone. Dr Andreas, finishing his work, stood soberly by the lamp while Simon, entering, found his way to the bed and looked down at the face of his sister. It was void of expression. You couldn’t tell how she had died. The reticence was uncharacteristic. Whether you wanted to or not, you always knew Lucia’s feelings.
He bent and kissed her. He had never liked her. On the other hand, she had never been capable of making positive trouble. Unlike others. He looked up.
‘She drowned,’ said Dr Andreas. ‘The ice gave way, and it was too cold to struggle. There are no other marks.’
‘She was driven on to the ice,’ Simon said.
The doctor looked at him. ‘There is no proof of that,’ Andreas answered. After a moment, he bowed and left him alone.
Simon sat down, since he wanted to think and was finding it difficult. For the sake of appearances, he had borrowed a shirt and a doublet: underneath, the rest of his linen had stiffened and stuck to his skin. When the door opened on Nicholas de Fleury, he noticed that he, too, had changed, if only roughly. Out of respect, of course, for the dead. Simon said, ‘Come and see. You must be so disappointed.’
The other man, moving slowly, closed the door. Simon watched him. Beneath the open doublet, the lawn, he must be as bone-weary as Simon was, with a heaviness worse than the pain of the abrasions and burns they both carried. And if Simon himself was exhausted, then the river must have brought his late antagonist to the extremes of fatigue.
And indeed, when de Fleury spoke he let the weariness show, as if there were no point in dissembling. He said, ‘No. I am sorry.’ He moved, stopping short of the bed.
Simon said, ‘You thought it was me.’
‘For a while.’ His gaze brushed the bed. ‘We both killed her.’
‘We both …?’ It wasn’t worth vehemence. Simon said, ‘I lured you to the salt-pans?’
‘To Scotland. Why was she here?’
His voice remained low, and hardly intensified. Despite that someone outside had heard them. Before Simon could answer, the door opened again. And this time it was the interfering old woman. Lucia’s helpmeet, nursemaid, companion. The old woman Bel, in her thick gown, with cloth all over her head.
Simon said, ‘Excuse me. This is private.’
‘I’m sure it ought to be,’ said Bel of Cuthilgurdy, coming in. She shut the door and, walking forward, sat down at the foot of the bed, her face as ever shapeless, her eyes buttons, her body a sack full of homely, sensible vipers. She looked at Simon. ‘So answer him. Why was she here?’
Simon could guess, he thought, why Lucia was here. He was going to debate that very point with de Fleury. He didn’t want the old woman here. Neither, it appeared, did de Fleury, who turned. The skin of his face, like Simon’s own, was oddly frayed and raw with abrasions. It would be hard to deny what had happened between them. De Fleury said,