To Lie with Lions - Dorothy Dunnett [52]
‘You know more than I do by now,’ Gelis said.
‘I know, certainly, about the Gräfin von Hanseyck and her daughter, the rich, the beautiful and the widowed. Then tell me about something else. Who has married, apart from Margot and Gregorio? Or is that all? Even masculine gossips know of that.’
‘And do they know of the second Marian?’ Gelis said. She walked to the lectern and looked. To turn the pages, it was necessary to stand under the mark on the ceiling. She did so, maintaining a weary forbearance, and set her hand to the book. Nothing happened.
‘Of course. Marian de Charetty’s grandchild. Mine too, since I married Marian de Charetty. You have married a grandfather. The song in the book is what the soldiers made up when Warwick died and the Yorkist King won. Do you sing? Like a lark?’
She sighed. ‘Not as you do. Bien vienne. How could I forget? How could I forget your songs in the brothels of Cairo? I was flattered,’ said Gelis, ‘to hear you mourn me so eloquently.’
‘I was singing to you,’ he said. Mistress Clémence, behind, was standing in silence.
Gelis smiled. ‘Another failed jest. So what was supposed to disconcert me here, do you think?’ She indicated the lectern, and surprisingly he strolled up to look at it. He was chanting under his breath: she realised it was the soldiers’ song from the book.
‘Or a-t-il bien son temps perdu
Et son argent qui plus lui touche
Car Warwic est mort et vaincu;
Ha! Que Loys est fine mouche!
‘You should sing. What failed here? Soot from overhead, it is evident. And jets of water, of course, from the book. I must lodge a complaint. The schedule allowed for a fall of flour in the doorway, and a second cascade as you fled to the mirror. The catoptric flour of parrots and poesy. If nothing works, then I shall certainly send for some buckets. The second verse is worse:
‘Entre vous, Franchoix
Jettez pleures et larmes:
Warwic vostre choix
Est vaincu par armes.’
He crossed to the window, singing in a concentrated way. As she followed, he stopped. ‘And so, find something to tell me. Whose is the child not yet born?’
There was a face outside the window: a grotesque mask which hovered, mouthing and grinning. Below it was a box, and below that nothing but air. The box was too small for a man. She said, ‘What does it do?’
‘It answers questions,’ he said. ‘More quickly than you do.’
She peered at the mask. ‘The coming child? It is Anselm Adorne’s, born of his welcome home to his family in Bruges. His lady will be delivered in January.’
He did not answer. Looking up, she saw he was watching the mask. Gelis said, ‘What are you doing?’
‘Asking a question,’ he said. He opened the window and ducked. Eyes rolling, the mask emitted a brief spurt of water, and a portion of Mistress Clémence’s sleeve became soaked. She sprang back. Nicholas, straightening, addressed the face gravely. ‘Master, tell me the truth. Will the family Boyd go to England?’
There was a pause. ‘Bien sûr,’ said the box under the mask. Its voice, a little flustered, was adult. A dwarf.
‘It doesn’t know,’ Gelis said, out of breath. Nicholas stood frowning quite close beside her. His doublet was scentless and new, but there was a warmth in the sun from the window. He turned away and walked out of reach again.
‘Of course it doesn’t know,’ he said. ‘But I do, and so do the Boyds: they’re not stupid. They’ve made off with the hermit.’
‘The Boyds have? What hermit?’ she said. He marched to the door and she followed him, talking. ‘Why not ask the dwarf?’ she was saying. ‘He must be horribly cramped.’ Mistress Clémence was looking at her. Gelis stopped talking abruptly.
He didn’t seem to have noticed. He said, ‘There should be a room with a hermit. Now there’s only the Medea.’
‘The Medea?’ she said.
‘Called after Jason’s enchantress. Duke Philip named the room after her. Otherwise known as Violante. There are eight conduits under that doorway, and three outlets for flour. Go and stand there.’
None of them worked. She realised