To Lie with Lions - Dorothy Dunnett [26]
A name. Not a place-name, the name of a person. The name ROBIN.
It was a relief. Nicholas stood. He collected the pendulum from the long palm of the other and, holding it for a moment, made it his own again before putting it away. Architects, glass-makers, doctors, the family Robin were known throughout Anjou and Provence. He thought of the lion Martin and smiled. It was a crooked smile, because the trampling was coming nearer. Not the feet of angels, but of six men at least, outside the window and door. He had been kept there very artfully. But then he had known what might happen. We cannot even protect our friends.
The door opened.
‘I am sorry,’ said the man opposite.
‘You had no choice, I am sure. It would have happened in any case,’ Nicholas said. The men who came in were armed. Their leader was a man he had seen before, at long intervals in strange places, in Bruges, in Louvain, in Scotland. He remembered his name, Andro Wodman. Until not so long ago, a member of the King of France’s Scottish Guard; now accompanied by soldiers, every one of whom wore the royal badge of France on his tunic.
Wodman walked in and glanced at the table. ‘We had finished,’ said the physician. ‘Do your duty. I shall tell the Duke of Anjou what has happened.’
Wodman turned. ‘M. de Fleury, my master begs you to forgive the hasty invitation, but I have to ask you to come with me at once.’
‘It is, indeed, remarkably short notice,’ Nicholas said. ‘My boxes, for example, are up at the castle.’
‘They are here,’ Wodman said. ‘My lord apologises, as I have said, for the inconvenience. There is, however, no possibility that he could be refused.’
‘Then I shall not try,’ Nicholas said. He turned. ‘So I must say goodbye, M. Pierre Robin.’ It amused him, a little, that the man had troubled to do no more to fill time than tap out his own name. And yet despite himself, watching the pendulum, Nicholas had been touched by a sadness he had not felt before.
His remark drew a sharp look, as he expected. Then the doctor gave a mild sigh. ‘Ah! My name is not Pierre Robin, M. de Fleury. You have confused me with King René’s physician.
‘We share the name Pierre, it is true; but I am not the Robin whose life, whose fate touched you today. My name is Pierre de Nostradamus.’
Chapter 3
THE RED AND white chequered fortress of Ham, powerful as a walled city, had for two hundred years commanded the village, the church and the River Somme whose moat surrounded it. Because of its strategic importance it had changed hands many times. At the moment it was defended by the Constable of France, and occupied by Louis XI, King of France and nephew and overlord of René of Anjou, who had no army with which to protect either Anjou or his guests.
Nicholas de Fleury was not brought to Ham in bonds, nor deprived of his senses, but he was under guard, and had been for the week of the journey from Angers. On the way, they stayed only at the King’s lodges. The Burgundian was allowed his own horses and his own servants, who were considerably better acquainted with fighting than they looked. Of his escort, only Wodman stayed at his side from the first, but answered no questions.
Nicholas waited. On the first night, eating alone with him in the chamber they shared, Nicholas set down his cup and said, ‘And now.’
Under previous monarchs, the Archers of the Royal Guard of France were handpicked for their looks, as well as for their skill and their courage. In array on the field, they resembled an army of Attic comeliness, with their plumes of red, white and green and their sleeveless three-coloured jackets covered with golden embroidery. Andro Wodman by contrast was an ugly man; short-necked and short-legged and burly under the plated jack which he removed with his helmet and cap. His hair was dark and thick as a bear’s, and the stubble darkened his jowls below a nose squashed in