To Lie with Lions - Dorothy Dunnett [62]
‘Her daughter?’ said Gregorio. Behind the question, Julius saw his wife Margot’s prompting.
‘Name of Bonne,’ Julius said. ‘Wenzel adopted her.’
‘But she’s the Countess’s daughter?’
‘I expect so,’ said Julius. ‘They have the same eyes and the same hair. I assume the child was the result of an earlier marriage, but of course she might be a daughter of sin. You must ask the Countess to tell you.’
Gregorio was grinning. ‘Touchy, aren’t you? I’m delighted. Really. We all thought you were going to die without ever coming across anyone worthy.’
‘She is just a client,’ Julius said. ‘Mary Mother, if I went to bed with everyone I did a deal with, I’d die of exhaustion. You’ve got marriage fever, that’s all. Go and find Tobie or John and drag them to the altar.’
‘There aren’t enough rich German widows to go round,’ Gregorio said, and ducked as Julius threw a plate at him. But as a matter of fact, Julius wasn’t angry at all, any more than he was disappointed that Nicholas was going to Scotland without him. Julius was quite content, ensconced in the splendours of Rome, and waiting for Christmas.
Chapter 8
LONG BEFORE HE left Calais, it was known in Scotland that Nicholas de Fleury was returning to take up his business, accompanied by two mining experts and a pedigree cannon from Innsbruck.
As seed quickens to rain, so from east coast to west, the Bank’s dormant fleurets awoke to the touch of their master. Indolent on the high seas, Nicholas lived, as once before, from wave to wave, for the moment. With him in a locked chest were the letters which still had to be delivered, this time by himself. The documents for King James, from the Duke and the Chancellor of Burgundy. And the personal note for King James from His Most Christian Majesty Louis of France, to be handed over at a time of discretion, for it, like the other, requested the sender’s dear kinsman of Scotland to receive the sieur de Fleury with favour, and to give credence to what he would ask. Thus Nicholas de Fleury, serving two masters.
For the two weeks of the voyage, Gelis van Borselen and her husband were together for the first continuous spell since their marriage. Together, that is, in the sense that they travelled aboard the same vessel.
After Hesdin, the journey to Calais had been made bearable by the logistics of travel. Nicholas had a convoy to lead, and his wife was injured and needed attention. Her maid had departed, refusing to sail off the top of the world with two nurses. Gelis travelled to the coast in the cart with the child, and slept with the child and Mistress Clémence and Pasque, who cared for Gelis too. Nicholas shared the quarters and table of his officers: Michael Crackbene, le Grant and Father Moriz.
All of these came to pay their respects, but the first two had little to say and did not return. Only the sturdy bow-legged pastor sometimes remained, passing the time with the child and his nurses whom he had already befriended in camp. She was aware that he was available if she wanted to talk. She had no wish to talk to a henchman of Nicholas. She had to build, and was still finding the bricks. She did not know, and would have been horrified to learn, that Mistress Clémence had asked Father Moriz to be her confessor.
The child had dropped readily into his old confiding relationship with her, which was exactly the same as the one he had with his nurses. Time spent with Mistress Clémence had confirmed what she could now deduce for herself: that in her absence Nicholas had been impeccable with the child, and consistently agreeable to the nurses. Mistress Clémence, true to her training, had offered no further comment on what had happened at Hesdin, and her manner to Gelis was precisely as it had been since the birth of the child.
In this at least, Nicholas had played fair: neither child nor nurses had been set against her. Only sometimes, in the knowledgeable eye and hoarse banter of Pasque (c’est un bachique!) did Gelis guess that something