To Lie with Lions - Dorothy Dunnett [115]
Despite himself, Julius could not resist it. ‘Not unless miracles have happened. The best news we have received is that he has refrained from breaking her other arm. He is where he is, on the affairs of the company. After that, he is committed to Burgundy. He will come back to the Somme when the spring land campaigns open. He couldn’t sail for the East if he wanted to.’
‘Even for gold?’ the Florentine said. ‘Or perhaps he thinks he will divine all the gold he requires in little Scotland, as he thinks he has identified all the alum in the Tyrol? I have to tell you that the Vatachino think he has allowed personal matters to stifle his genius. The gold in Scotland is trifling. The sale of other alum will be prohibited so long as the papal mines have the monopoly.’
Julius admired his own beautiful hose. They were of knitted silk, with three pearls down each side. He said, ‘Run by the Medici.’
The Florentine tilted his head. He, too, was admiring the pearls. He said, ‘Operated by the Bank of the Medici. Also the newly opened magnificent mines in Volterra, a commune under the influence of Florence.’
‘Another source of rightful pride to Messer Lorenzo,’ Julius said. ‘One has only to hope that the rumours of unrest in Volterra are baseless. Also the tales of useless stockpiles of alum, over-produced and offered at too high a price. After all, the profits are to finance the Crusade you mentioned. The spring sailing to Persia. The peregrinations of Father Ludovico, the Patriarch of Antioch. The marriage of Zoe. I believe Messer Prosper de Camulio has been seen in the city. One might imagine that even the Genoese think that papal alum may not, sadly, achieve all that it might.’
There was a silence during which Julius, smiling, studied the toe of his slipper. Whatever one might think of him, sometimes Nicholas got it just right. Then the Florentine said, ‘I have a message for your Master Niccolò. The Medici have lost none of their power. And this is a different Pope, with different policies. You may have fewer friends now, and those you have, may be dispersed very soon. The Vatachino must watch out for themselves.’ He paused. ‘In this new world, it pays to be Greek.’
Nicholas had said that as well. Nicholas, in the closely written pages ciphered for Julius alone, had suggested paying particular attention to the quandary of Zoe, tender unmarried heiress to the brilliant lost throne of Byzantium. Failing her brothers, who were too young to lead armies, the husband of Zoe would have the right and the duty to drive the Turk from his Empire. Once, with the blessing of Cardinal Bessarion, it had seemed that Zacco of Cyprus would make Zoe his bride, and Cyprus an outpost of Byzantium. It had not suited Venice. Cyprus was to be a Venetian arsenal, a floating war-machine against the Grand Turk. Zacco, discontentedly rattling his chains, had instead married Catherine Corner, half Venetian, wholly the daughter of a princess of the lesser Greek Empire of Trebizond.
Catherine’s uncle was in Persia now, urging her great-uncle Uzum Hasan to lead his armies against the Sublime Porte. It would embarrass the Turk to have the White Sheep attack from the south. It would embarrass them more to be attacked at the same time from Moscow. As would occur, one might hope, if Zoe, daughter of Caesars, gave her hand to the Grand Duke of Muscovy. The widower Ivan the Third, the lord of White Russia; and the fated successor, perhaps, to Constantine Palaeologus, the last lord of Byzantium.
Julius said, ‘How right you are. Greece! Fount of all civilisation. Although, in my days serving Cardinal Bessarion, I never found him less than complimentary to us Latins. I take it that you are attending his ritual welcome to the Florentine embassy? If anything has gone amiss with your invitation, I should be happy to write you another. I have the Cardinal’s confidence.’
‘I should have expected no less,’ said Acciajuoli. ‘He reposes the same confidence in the Latin Patriarch, your much-travelled Father Ludovico. The Cardinal