To Lie with Lions - Dorothy Dunnett [362]
‘I suppose so. St Vincent,’ he said. ‘I’d begun to notice I’d gone rather far. I did try to surrender the game. Now I have. Could you consider Scotland as something apart? Something I had to do for myself? Against Jordan de Ribérac and his family, not because of you?’
‘Was it?’ she said. ‘Or wasn’t it both? Wasn’t it your trial piece, your masterpiece which had to be perfect, no matter what? And mightn’t you do it again, just as blindly, somewhere else?’
‘It was beautiful,’ Nicholas said. ‘Wheels are beautiful. I probably should. But it was against the others, against the St Pols, to begin with. You didn’t harm us as they did.’
‘Us?’ she said. She tried in vain to study his face in the gloom, thinking of something that the vicomte had said. That trollop, his mother.
Nicholas said, ‘I grew to hate the St Pols, not you. And you changed: you said so. Gelis, what did you want? When we were playing the game, what did you want for your reward?’
‘What was your wish?’ she asked. She felt weighed down with grief, like someone speaking alone at a graveside.
‘Mine?’ he said. ‘But you know it. To spend my life with one person: with you. To respect you and have your respect; to trust you and deserve the same trust. And by night, to lie at your side, so that I may give her my love, my dear love, ki mon cuer et mon cors a.’
Who hath my heart and my body.
He said, ‘And yours?’
She lifted her wet face from her hands. She said, ‘The same, of course. But you can’t do it. You can’t do it, Nicholas. I thought we were matched, but we’re not. Show me how I can trust you, show me how I can respect you after this.’
She stopped. She said, ‘No one is innocent. I betrayed you as well. But not on this scale. I cannot live with you. I couldn’t live with you now.’
The bond was broken. The bond they had each, she believed, thought to be inviolate, no matter what happened. Inviolate even in death, as he had proposed in the wilderness. She had understood his sudden despair. It was as nothing compared with what he had brought on them now. What he had brought on himself.
There was a long space. He said, ‘Will you take Jodi?’
She replied with another question. ‘What will you do? Nicholas, they won’t follow you now. None of them.’
‘Julius might,’ Nicholas said. She could see him slowly thinking aloud. ‘And Astorre. Not John. Not Tobie, after Volterra. Not Gregorio. Not Diniz. Not … Father Moriz. Not you. Not you. Not you.’
‘Not me,’ she said. ‘But we can share Jodi between us.’
‘Do you mean it?’ he said. Once, he had disclaimed any interest in a child reared by his wife. It had been part of the game. Then, he had been sure that Gelis would never leave him. As she had been sure.
After a moment he added, ‘Clémence saved us all. Clémence and Tobie.’
‘You should thank them,’ she said. ‘Will you stay here? Or not?’
He said, ‘I had better go. It should be known that the marriage has ended. You will have a better chance on your own.’
‘But you will tell me where you are going?’ she said.
‘Of course, when I know it. In any case, I shall see you tomorrow. And we have to arrange about Jodi.’ He stopped, and then said, ‘Did you burn the certificate?’
She said, ‘Watch. I am doing it now. Nicholas, Jodi will never change into someone like Henry. That was Katelina’s doing, not yours.’
‘Poor Katelina,’ he said.
Once, she would have been consumed with resentment. Now she watched the vellum blacken and burn, and then rose and unlocked the door, and