To Lie with Lions - Dorothy Dunnett [95]
She was in her parlour when Pasque came running to take her out to the street, where folk were gathering to look at the glare to the west, steadily brightening. Govaerts, roused and running to join her, explained. ‘It’s the Castle balefire, my lady. It spreads the word that there’s trouble. The news can run from coast to coast before a courier has foot in the stirrup, and all Scotland can be under arms in two hours.’
‘What kind of trouble?’ said Gelis. ‘M. de Fleury is there, and our son.’
‘Armed ships in the estuary,’ Govaerts said. ‘Or word from the south that an army is crossing the Border. Or a mistake.’
‘You think it is a mistake,’ Gelis said. He was composed enough now, but running towards her, Govaerts had been hissing under his breath. ‘Zot! Zot! Zot!’
‘It would be strange if it wasn’t,’ Govaerts said. ‘This office has better advance information than even the King.’ He cleared his throat. ‘They will put the fire out. That will cancel it.’
‘If they are sober enough,’ Gelis said. No one answered. After a few minutes, the light from the west became unsteady. After ten minutes it had gone. A sour, lingering smoke drifted downhill, and Gelis went in. Half an hour later, her son Jordan returned, asleep in the arms of his nurse. With him came her two servants and a filthy creature with her skirts round her knees, whom Gelis recognised, with misgiving, as Katelijne Sersanders. Then she saw the litter.
The girl said, ‘It’s all right. That is, Robin’s had his arm broken: M. de Fleury again, but it all worked out for the best. Is his father about?’ Her face was smeared with dirt and there were great circles under her eyes.
‘What happened?’ said Gelis. She sent someone for Archie and brought the small cavalcade into the house. Mistress Clémence, on a nod, took the sleeping child upstairs.
‘Nothing,’ said the Baron Cortachy’s niece. ‘That is, they took Jodi to Willie’s house, and by the time it was all over, they’d forgotten about him, and M. de Fleury told us to bring him back quickly.’ She stopped and then said, ‘The King was annoyed you didn’t go, but M. de Fleury explained. It turned into a sort of race, and I’m afraid we all got rather dirty. I’ve got to go back to Margaret.’
‘Wait,’ said Gelis. ‘I was invited?’
The expression in the fevered eyes altered. ‘Oh dear,’ said Katelijne Sersanders. ‘He didn’t tell you.’ She considered. ‘There would be a reason.’
‘There usually is,’ Gelis said. ‘No doubt he will tell me himself. Unless he is staying permanently at the Castle?’
The girl looked at her. ‘I shouldn’t think so,’ she said. ‘Aren’t you moving into the High Street tomorrow? That is, we shall all go back to Haddington in the morning, and the house is yours after that.’ She paused. ‘He didn’t tell you that either.’
Gelis said, ‘No. It doesn’t matter. I knew he had a house inside Edinburgh.’
‘Leased to the Prioress. He asked her to move. She wasn’t too pleased, but she has taken another. Look,’ said Kathi. ‘He may have decided to refurbish it. He could have planned to tell you everything yesterday, but the King didn’t let him come home. He can be very single-minded. I should find it most annoying, in your place.’ She suddenly smiled. ‘I’d better go.’
Gelis looked after her. For three years, it seemed, the pretty house Nicholas had bought for his wife had been occupied by the Prioress of Haddington and her household. Now, suddenly, the Prioress had been asked to leave, and his wife was expected to live there. Once, the possibility had been mentioned, but he had said nothing since. She settled, for perhaps the last time, to listen for Nicholas coming home. But not, this night, in her own room.
The town was asleep when, finally, Nicholas de Fleury made his way down Castle Hill, down the High Street, through the Netherbow Gate (for a price) and towards the staircase