To Lie with Lions - Dorothy Dunnett [164]
‘Robin would have come anyway,’ Kathi said.
‘Indeed? His father would be relieved, nevertheless, to know you are here,’ the priest suggested.
‘I suppose so,’ said Kathi. ‘He likes M. de Fleury as well.’
In Edinburgh, Archie escaped from his father and strode with his news to the house in the High Street. Gelis received him, but didn’t ask Mistress Clémence to leave. She had bound her hair up again. Archie smiled at the nurse and young Jordan, but spoke to Gelis at once.
‘I’ve just heard where they are. Has Govaerts told you?’
‘They?’ she said.
‘Robin and Nicholas.’ The child, who was playing with wool, looked up at his mother. So did the nurse.
Gelis said, ‘Govaerts told me this morning. They have gone to Ultima Thule, that desert that lies in the ocean.’
‘He told me he was fishing for herring.’
‘He told me the same. Place thy trust in cod,’ Gelis said, ‘rather than in aleci rubei, or red herrings. What else have you heard?’
‘That the Vatachino have a ship there as well,’ Archie said. ‘Sersanders, Adorne’s nephew is on it. And his sister Katelijne.’
‘What?’ said Gelis. Of course, she liked Kathi too.
‘She joined her brother at Ayr and sailed north.’
‘Why?’ She spoke as if he might know. He could only guess.
‘On an impulse, it seems. The ladies at Dean didn’t know until later.’
‘But why?’ said Gelis again.
‘I don’t know,’ Archie said at last. ‘Upset over her uncle and aunt. Worried about her brother and Nicholas. Maybe even she wanted to go. You know Kathi. A one-person tornado. Thank God Robin is there.’
The nurse was looking at him. He added, ‘He’s a helpful boy.’
Unexpectedly the nurse spoke. ‘It is spring. Young people embark on adventures. They are in capable hands.’
‘You are right,’ Archie said. He knelt and took some of the wool. ‘Your papa has gone to the top of the world. What will he bring you?’
A slow dismay spread across the boy’s face. The nurse picked him up and sat down. ‘He will bring his two ears,’ she said. ‘And some ice. He will bring some ice from Iceland to keep fresh that long, long difficult poem, so that when papa asks, there it will be, all the verses like new. And papa will be so proud.’
Soon after that, Archie left. He had come to soothe and be soothed, but remained troubled. Nicholas had deceived Gelis; he had deceived Archie himself, and taken Robin his son into danger. But you couldn’t hold a boy – or a girl – from adventuring. And the nurse had been right. It was spring. The boughs in his orchard were sturdy with thickening twigs, and the sun was warm through the glass in his windows. The sea was blue in the spring, and there was a harvest in it for everyone.
The sea was blue, the colour of cobalt. The sky and the sea were both blue, and both vacant. The sun illumined the sails, and the bright knitted hats on the heads of Katelijne and Robin in the mast-basket of the Banco di Niccolò’s Svipa. ‘The mainland of Iceland,’ Kathi said, ‘is a fifth bigger than Ireland, three-quarters empty, and you could put the entire populace twice into Venice.’
‘Including the trolls,’ Robin said.
‘Including the trolls. The Danish Governor lives in the south-west. The Danish Bishop lives a day’s ride from that to the east. The Burning Mountain is further east about the same distance.’
‘The Mouth of Hell,’ Robin said.
‘The Mouth of Hell. They call it Hekla. It opens once a year and swallows the damned. Henne is painting it. There are other hot mountains as well. You can tell them by the white clouds above them.’
‘Unless they’re exploding.’
‘Unless they’re exploding. Then you tell them by the black smoke and fire.’
‘And the boiling hot fountains,’ said Robin. ‘You can tell those by the steam. What do you think we’ll see first?’
‘I see it,’ said Kathi. Her voice faded, and then gained a resolute strength. ‘M. de Fleury, black smoke!’
‘The children are frightening one another,’ said Father Moriz. He turned an inquisitive eye upon Nicholas.
‘You underestimate them,’ Nicholas said. The call from the masthead had reached him. He tilted his head and made a soothing