Gemini (79 page)

The servant who opened Bel’s door had the speech of a local man rather than one you would associate with the St Pols of Kilmirren, and pointedly left Nicholas standing while he vanished inside with his name. But, almost immediately, the door opened again, and Bel herself stood on the threshold considering him, with her round, pugilistic face puckered about with glistening linen, and her short person as sturdy as when he first met her, companion to Lucia, Simon’s sister, in Portugal.

‘Aye,’ she said. ‘Thrawn as ever, I see. Well, ye’d better come in.’

He was never sure what greeting she would allow. Bel resolved it, once in her parlour, by opening her arms. She was the first to break away, gently, and find a seat for him.

‘Bloody Henry Arnot,’ he said.

‘You think so. He’s a wise wee soul. It’s getting near time to stop all this nonsense. I’m getting too old, and so’s Jordan.’

‘Which Jordan?’ he said.

‘The one that didn’t have you for a father,’ Bel said.

He got his breath back, and said, ‘I’m glad I didn’t meet
his
father, in that case.’

‘Are you? You don’t ever apply your brain to the St Pols, do you? If ye think Simon’s your father, then Jordan’s your grandfather, isn’t he?’

‘Moriz,’ said Nicholas. He had been stupid enough, recently, to put that into words to Father Moriz.

‘Aye. He’s Clémence’s confessor. Remember it. And if Master Julius wanted more evidence, he only has to compare Monseigneur Jordan and yourself, for I never saw two characters more alike.’

‘Thank you,’ said Nicholas. It was childish to care. It was childish to mind, as he did, whenever Bel talked like this about … about Monseigneur Jordan.

‘It’s no trouble. He gets an idea, and won’t leave it. For him, every
stitch in the cloth must be perfect. Give him an objective and he won’t notice who or what stands in his way till he’s finished.’

‘I’m like that?’ Nicholas said.

‘You were. You stayed a feckless apprentice until you were eighteen years old, because you knew that whatever challenge you chose, it would dominate your life, if you let it. Now maybe you’ve got your demon in hand, and if you have, you have Gelis and old man Jordan to thank for it. They both made you fight; and they both made you grow. Only Gelis did it for you, as well as herself; and Jordan did it for Simon.’ She broke off and looked at him quizzically. ‘Now you’re sorry you came and you want to go home.’

‘Not if you’re enjoying yourself,’ Nicholas said. ‘You got a parcel I sent?’

She looked at him with a half-grudging appreciation, in which there was a great deal of fondness. ‘I got it. The Duchess Eleanor’s book, discreetly rewrapped and redirected, with all the French names covered over, in case. I appreciated the thought but, Nicol, anyone who has the time and the patience and the curiosity can follow my history easily enough. Every Scottish Archer knows that in France, Asquin stands for Erskine, and Échaut for Shaw, and Moncourt for Moncur. And that if my husband was John Dunbarrow of Cuthilgurdy, in France they’d spell it Dunbereau. Every Scottish Archer knows; and so do the sisters and cousins of Eleanor of the Tyrol, because she and I went to Paris together when I was a widow, and she was twelve years old.’

‘But you didn’t go with her to the Tyrol, because you married again,’ Nicholas said. ‘You had John by your first marriage, and your daughter Claude by your second, in France. John didn’t marry, but Claude married a Scot with an estate on the Loire, and gave you your grandchildren.’

‘Grandchild,’ Bel said. ‘There is only one left; the one you saw. You didna go to Coulanges that time just to find out about Jodi’s nurse Clémence. You wanted to know how she connected with the Moncur family of Chouzy, in the same valley, and how the Moncur family connected with me. You probably found out as well. Clémence is wholly French, and related to another Moncur by a wife’s marriage. I knew she’d make a fine job of Jodi, until you and Gelis came to your senses. I didna ken you’d go bursting into Chouzy, or that Robin and Dr Tobie would see you there.’

‘You’ve forgotten. I didn’t go of my own volition to Chouzy; I was taken there,’ Nicholas said. ‘After having my bones smashed by the thugs of your esteemed friend my grandfather. I didn’t need to visit your daughter. I’d confirmed it all at La Guiche. I’d even guessed about Andreas’s mistress, with the palatial houses in Lyons and Blois. I don’t know why everyone fusses about my divining, and no one prevented that
pair from breeding. Do you suppose my grandfather was trying to kill me?’

‘No,’ said Bel. ‘If he’d meant you to be dead, you’d be dead. I jalouse he wanted you taught a lesson, or held up, or both, and someone exceeded their orders.’

‘And,’ Nicholas said, ‘does the same apply to Simon and Henry? I have just antagonised them both to the point where one or other will certainly try to commit murder, and Monseigneur will probably let them, perceiving my usefulness finished. I suppose I ought to go back to Flanders.’

He thought she would take him up on that, but she didn’t. The battle light left her face, and she exclaimed. ‘Ah, no, no, Nicol. Is that what all this is about? Henry? I’m mortally sorry. Simon should never have been sent for.’

‘He had to come back some time,’ Nicholas said. ‘And Henry had to deal with it some time. I just didn’t want other issues dragged in to confuse matters. Now, as you say, perhaps it doesn’t matter what people know.’

‘Because Henry’s opinion of you won’t alter now?’

Nicholas looked at her. He said, ‘Bel: what in God’s name do you think Henry’s opinion of me matters? Nothing matters to Henry but the approval of Simon’s father and Simon. There were other ways he might have earned that, but they’re gone. Now, if he can only obtain it by attacking me, then he will. Hence, I do see, an exposé of his family by you, or by me, or by Julius can’t make anything worse.’

‘It could unite them,’ she said. ‘It would unite them, of course, for all the worst reasons, but that’s maybe better than nothing. Or don’t you think so?’

He was silent. ‘I don’t know,’ he said.

‘No,’ said Bel. ‘Even you can’t quite think through that one. But loneliness, I have to tell you, is a terrible thing. A man alone will do from a whim what a tribe of villains would rarely do, even for profit. A tribe of adventurers will survive, but very few men can face fear and self-hatred on their own.’

She wasn’t talking of Henry; she was talking of the fat, solitary man who was his grandfather. Nicholas said, ‘I really don’t know, Bel. I want the same thing for them that you do, but I can’t do much more. I won’t have my family hurt.’

She smiled. She said, ‘They won’t be. I have seldom seen any family as secure as the one you have made, Nicholas. I have to pray that nothing dissolves it. But if you didn’t take risks, the boy wouldn’t worship you as he does.’

‘So that I am really here to impress Jodi,’ Nicholas said. ‘That is
what you are supposed to be doing: appealing to me to place my dashing services at the small Danish feet of the Queen?’

‘No. I knew you would do it,’ said Bel. ‘You didn’t come here for that. You came to find out how I can stomach a man who does what Jordan does, and love you as well.’ She stopped, presumably reading his face. She said, ‘Did I have to put that into words?’

‘It helps,’ he said. He cleared his throat. ‘I hoped you knew I felt the same. But I couldn’t pretend to want to be as close as you are to Simon or his father. Long ago, perhaps; but not now.’

‘Then I’ve not properly explained what I feel for them,’ Bel said. ‘It’s not what you’d call unalloyed love or respect. It’s more the same feeling, I jalouse, that you have. You’ve been harsh with them, as they have with you. In spite of everything, you still feel protective. They’re your family. I feel the same, in a different way. I can carry the burden. So can you. Just so’s ye ken, as we were saying, that you’re not on your own.’

Someone else had said that, when it mattered. The miracle was, he had long since realised, that he had never been alone; even in Poland. You tried to safeguard other people, and, all the time, the lifeline was working both ways.

M
ARGARET
,
QUEEN OF
Scots, received the younger Burgundian in her apartments at Stirling Castle, with the three men who constituted her private council about her.

She had first met Nicholas de Fleury when she was an inexperienced little child-bride of twelve, excluded from the family games of the King and his siblings, and suffering James’s untutored petting through the long evenings when the Court entertained itself, with the help of amusing, musical friends such as the Burgundian. De Fleury could speak in the Danish-German of her father and brothers: she could converse with him. He had been very correct, but also easy to talk to. Sandy had been smitten.

After that, the Burgundian had come back at intervals, but she herself had been less at Court; and during the present long stay, she had followed the policy they had all deemed to be best, and had seen little of M. de Fleury, except on formal occasions. By this time, as he would have noticed, she had grown from a pale, sharp-eyed waif to an active young woman with a mind of her own, and an acquired grasp of statecraft. It was necessary. The King her father could hardly have realised how much. It was one of her personal weapons, along with the stock of jewels and clothes which she obtained through her excellent revenues, and also from her husband, as she presented him with each son. To begin with, she had believed that all husbands behaved as hers did. Then she had discovered what else was different about James, and his brothers and sisters.

It might have frightened someone without her kind of Scandinavian determination. Only gradually had she come to realise that the truth was also known to the old men who surrounded James, and that they
were working, in ways she had not noticed, to make life tolerable for her. Then, as they saw how her nature developed, they helped her choose her own private council, surrounding herself with astute men—Shaw, Colville, McClery—who were agreeable to James, but also attached to her interests.

The King’s men had continued to be helpful. It was Dr Andreas who explained to the King how marital duty might damage a pregnancy, and who advised on the required interval of abstinence after every delivery. She was eternally grateful to Dr Andreas, and Dr Tobias, and Master Scheves, who was now an Archbishop. At the same time, too much frustration could send James into one of his painful passions, when he forgot himself. He was always contrite when it was over, and when, as was only right, she had pointed out to him what he had done. Her father—her poor father, who had just died—used to say she was a saint.

She stayed at Stirling most of the time, or Linlithgow. The boys, for their own security, were always in Stirling. All of them had received excellent fostering, and the care of a good married matron in the royal tradition—Mistress Preston, with Betha Sinclair and the wife of Dr Tobias to call upon for advice. As their mother, she herself saw her sons often enough when they were babies, but did not find them interesting, any more than she was personally devoted to important jewels and fine clothes. The production of heirs was one of the requirements of ruling. She took the oldest son in hand when he was five, and she was officially appointed his guardian. Now he was eight, he had his own household and teachers for everything: academic, religious and military. She took care to spend time with him regularly and check on his training.

He had proved brighter than she had feared, and the doctors agreed that the elder Prince, and perhaps even the second (also called James) might have escaped the blight of the Stewarts. The baby, even at eighteen months, gave less promise. The middle child, who was five, had recently been allotted the forfeited earldom of Ross, which effectively denied it to any adult and ambitious baron. Had she been the King, she would have presented the title to their oldest son, but it was not of great moment. That Prince was already Duke of Rothesay and further advantaged, although she said it herself, by his mother’s meticulous supervision. If the King did not always see it that way, it could not be helped. Education for kingship could not be left to chance.

Today, but for her mourning, the Queen would have dressed for the Burgundian in the steepled headdress and sumptuous gown which had just been returned from overseas, where her portrait was being painted for the Trinity altar-piece. It annoyed her that the Provost’s picture had been completed first. Of course, Bonkle had travelled to sit for the artist, whereas her own likeness and that of the King must depend upon drawings. Because their children were young, and God’s will for their family
was unknown, it had been decided to depict the King’s continuing dynasty in the form of a kneeling young man, with what might be termed Stewart attributes. It could represent any child who survived. If all of them died, it could, at a pinch, represent the next incumbent, her good-brother Sandy, who had certainly won through to his prime. If he hadn’t, she wouldn’t be giving this audience to Nicholas de Fleury.

The Burgundian was really enormously tall, although he knelt at once, and then slid into the seat that was proffered him. His eyes were steady and large, and he had the engaging habit of resting them for longer than most people did on the faces of those with whom he was speaking. She wondered if he did that with the French King, and in the countries of the East where, she had heard, it was a crime to meet the eyes of the lord. He had something Northern about him that was reassuring. She liked his shipmaster, Crackbene, for the same reason. It was good: it made transactions easier; it did not mean that they were your equal.

She said, ‘We are obliged to you for coming. You understand that we are about to discuss nothing that is not fully known to our serene lord, the King. We merely spare him the sorrow of referring to his beloved brother, Duke Alexander of Albany, in the context of recent changes in France.’