Scales of Gold (16 page)

Because the journey upriver to Seville was slow, the
Ciaretti
lay in Sanlúcar to unload and load, denying her passengers a glimpse of the effete and gorgeous kingdom of Castile, whose court preferred Saracen customs. Sanlúcar, like all seaports, was full of taverns and warehouses and whores, as well as the grander houses and persons of the officials and merchants. Its jetties were covered with fish scales.

This time, Father Godscalc insisted on landing with Nicholas and Gregorio. They went on shore together, escorted as always, but found a strange absence of the usual officials, and the doors on
which they knocked remained shut against them, as well as the afternoon heat. Further into the town, the narrow streets were filled with people who should have been working, and a sprinkling of well-dressed men and women in silks, most of them riding. There was an air of festivity.

‘It isn’t a Saint’s Day,’ said Gregorio, returning to report. ‘It’s the Genoese consul’s daughter’s wedding, and they’re treating the town: plenty to drink and everyone invited, but no business today.’ He looked about him. ‘Where’s Nicholas?’

Father Godscalc looked about too, and then clapped a hand to his face. Behind it, Gregorio felt, was a large, stifled curse. Eventually he removed it and said, ‘Where he meant to be, I should guess. At the prison. Without a bodyguard. I swore I wouldn’t let him do this.’

‘You couldn’t help it,’ Gregorio said. ‘Not with these crowds. What do you want to do?’

‘Find the prison,’ the priest said. ‘I’ll take two of the men. Stay here with the others. If I don’t join you, come looking.’

But for his anxiety, Gregorio would have enjoyed standing where he was, at the edge of the marketplace, with children clinging to his legs and their parents slapping him on the back, or offering him a gulp of wine from a flask, or a sugared pastry out of a napkin. His escort, though watchful, didn’t fuss. He carried no money. He wasn’t the primary target.

Girls tried to slip their arms in his, and burly men attempted to explain what was going to happen in a form of Spanish thicker than the kind he was used to in Bruges. He was going to witness mock fighting, it seemed; some on foot, some on horseback and some between animals of various kinds. Oxen were going to play some sort of part. Gregorio, who had missed all the exotica of Cyprus and Trebizond, wished that Nicholas were less of a handful, and hadn’t managed to ruin a really promising afternoon. By insisting on hounding Crackbene, Nicholas had put himself in jeopardy, and the rest of them to some trouble. He really deserved all he got.

At the same time, Godscalc had been away for ten minutes, and that was ten minutes too long. Grimly, Gregorio collected his men, asked the way to the prison and, followed by curious stares, set off towards it.

Halfway there, he caught sight of Godscalc pushing his way towards him. Beside him were the two men-at-arms and an unknown gentleman in a red velvet hat and a doublet with elaborate gold buttons. Godscalc said, ‘Ah, there you are. Let me introduce you. This officer is from the Genoese casa, and brings an invitation for you and me to watch the entertainment from the balcony of his house. The running of the bulls.’

‘The …?’ Gregorio said. ‘What about …?’

‘That,’ the priest said, ‘has all been taken care of. There is absolutely nothing to worry about. Do you have your rosary, now?’

‘No,’ said Gregorio blankly.

‘Ah, well,’ said the priest. ‘I have a good bit of credit, and I hope He remembers it.’ And, returning to his place by the Genoese, he resumed striding forward. Gregorio and the bodyguard followed.

The Genoese house had a gallery round two of its sides from which the marketplace was in full view, as well as the streets leading to it. The Genoese casa was full of men called Centurione, or Lomellini or Giustiniani or Spinola, all of whom had cousins working in Bruges who knew the Charetty company. Nobody mentioned the House of Niccolò, and Father Godscalc frowned whenever Gregorio opened his mouth. It meant either that Nicholas was safe, or that his situation, whatever it was, was past mending.

So, in a distracted fashion, the lawyer found himself following the entertainment below: the grand procession, the dances, the acrobats, the races, the mock battles between mounted teams in different colours, using light shields and spears. The crowds behind the barriers cheered, and the flags fluttered against the blue sky, and serving-girls brought in bread and olives and grapes and filled his cup with Andalusian wine. The shadows grew longer, and the air became milk-warm and pleasant. He began to laugh at two mummers on horseback.

He realised he had seen them before, on opposing sides in the battles, one in red and one in yellow with casques made of buckram and satin. Now they had feathers as well, and light lances of which they never let go, but which they used to threaten and prick at each other as they jumped in and out of the saddle, and knelt, and ran, and achieved fearsome misses and occasional spectacular hits.

The horses were jennets, trained for dancing round the young bulls to enable the picador to plant his
garrocha
. They had seen some of that already, but these two had not taken part. Now, you would say they were playing double roles: each the beast and the picador also. And the young bull in yellow was Nicholas.

As the idea entered his head, Gregorio realised it was preposterous: suggested by some similarity of height, a width of shoulder, a type of inventiveness. Then he saw the expression on the priest’s face beside him; and turned back to the arena ín horror. It
was
Nicholas.

Of the two, he had the better seat on the horse. Or that was not exactly true: what he possessed was a bodily control of his mount which he must have learned in the East; a trick from Persia,
Turkey, Byzantium, where men played games on light horses like this. It left his arms free for whatever he chose. And what he chose was pure comedy at the expense of his opponent.

There could be no doubt, now, who his fellow mummer in scarlet must be. One couldn’t imagine how the prison governor could have been persuaded to let him out to be mocked at, or how he could have brought himself to agree. But the other man, there was no doubt, was Michael Crackbene.

They had been told, presumably, to entertain, and this they did. But Nicholas, wielding his spear, was also wielding his anger, and knew very well how to make a strike hurt. And Crackbene, though more at home on the sea than in the saddle, was none the less an athletic man, with the blood of Vikings in him, and determination, and anger. Vaulting, running, whirling his spear, he fended Nicholas off, and sometimes managed a strike, upon which Nicholas flung his arms open and bellowed. When hit, Crackbene also, clowning, lamented. The spectators cackled and cheered, while Gregorio saw the spots of blood on the yellow, and the spots of black on the red, and knew it wasn’t all mime. Then the thunder of hooves drowned the laughter.

A running of oxen. The burly man had tried to explain, in the bright afternoon when the sun was high and hot. Now it was low and yellow, and the arena was half in black shadow, and the drumming of hooves came from behind the Genoese casa and then from the paved street beside it, from which boys and men, running in comical terror, debouched screaming into the marketplace. After them poured a torrent of animals.

Oxen was the word they had used: an innocuous word to do with watermeadows and ploughs and slow, lethargic beasts which had no connection – no possible link – with a herd of gleaming, terrified, frothing young bulls being forced through the streets of Sanlúcar and finding themselves now in an open space, surrounded by crowds and occupied by two vulnerable men on two vulnerable horses.

It seemed to Gregorio that Nicholas shouted something to his opponent. Certainly, ramming his spear into its slot, he galloped across, and, seizing the other man’s reins, attempted to race with him from the arena. He was halfway there when the beasts were upon them, muzzles dripping, horns ducking and goring. Crackbene’s horse staggered and fell. The herd crowded about it. Exclaiming, the crowds beyond the barriers parted.

Crackbene stood for a moment, bleeding and buffeted, and then, twisting about, slammed his hands on a bull’s neck and vaulted. He landed, thighs spread, on its rump, and reaching forward, seized a horn in each fist. The bull bucked and threw up its
hooves. Nicholas, moving behind, pulled out his spear and, controlling his plunging, white-eyed horse, pierced the bull again and again on the rump. The bull, bellowing, forced its way to the fence and burst through. The jennet followed. Its sides scored and bleeding, the second horse reached the vacated barrier and jumped.

The herd was attempting to follow when, almost too late, a band of Sanlúcar worthies blocked their way, riding up with their whips and their lances. The stamping, dust-covered animals faltered, backed and began to seek another way out. Towards the sea, over the heads of the crowds, the stampeding bull and the jennet had merged into the distance. Gregorio, on his feet, found the priest on his feet also beside him. The Genoese in the red cap said, ‘They will both be killed,’ and crossed himself soberly.

Somewhere in the pronouncement was a thread of satisfaction. Gregorio realised that, whatever bargain had been struck, the Genoese had always hoped that both would be killed. He said, ‘If God is good, no.’

‘God is good,’ said the priest distinctly. Walking back to the barrier was the jennet, its gait stumbling and slow and blood on its muzzle. On its back was the mummer in yellow. The Genoese said, ‘Ah. We have, it seems, to mourn the death of our prisoner. A sprightly man, but short of temper in drink. It was to be expected, and there will be no recriminations. The entertainment was all.’

‘Of course,’ the priest said. ‘We are privileged, who have taken part in it. And now, if you will permit, it seems that Signor Niccolò might well appreciate our company back to the ship. We shall see you tomorrow, no doubt?’

‘No doubt,’ said the Genoese. ‘I have seldom laughed so much. Your young master is a natural jester. Give him a hump and bells, and he would be immortal.’

They returned to the ship without crossing the market, their men-at-arms with them, and Nicholas in their midst, silent and stripped of his finery. Even so, half the men they met in the street recognised him, and wanted to hail him and laugh. He returned their sallies, showing his dimples, and explaining his gashes as love-bites. At the jetty he stopped.

The smaller ship’s boat was there, with its oarsmen and Loppe. Loppe said, ‘Yes. It’s all right.’

‘What a pity,’ Nicholas said. And when Godscalc made to say something, turned on him a look of stark fury that made the priest stop. On board, he walked to his cabin and turned at the entrance. The blood, running together, made strange damascened shapes on his doublet. He said, ‘You had better come in.’ And they followed him, Loppe drawing the curtain behind.

Inside, Michael Crackbene rose to his feet in his red mummer’s costume, blotched also with blood. Without the casque, his broad, blond face showed pale and repressed; his chest heaved. He opened his lips.

‘If you speak,’ Nicholas said, ‘I shall probably kill you. Our next call is Portugal. You will disembark there, and I hope never to see you again. In the meanwhile, Loppe will show you where to lie so that none of us will be required to set eyes on you. Get out.’

‘I will speak,’ the sailing-master said. ‘Even if you kill me. I meant you no harm. I fulfilled my contract. I was free. All men operate so. One day Piccinino fights for Milan, the next day against him. It is all by contract.’

‘And Diniz?’ Nicholas said. ‘Get out of my sight.’

‘You saved my life,’ Crackbene said. His voice was puzzled. But when Nicholas looked at him, he turned and left, followed by Loppe. A moment later Gregorio, too, left.

The galley rocked. The heavy curtain, blocking the light, reduced the great cabin to dimness. It smelt of damp wood, and salt, and the metal of the weapons hung on the wall, and the faint odours of cooking, and humanity, and fresh blood. The priest said, ‘Now? Or shall we come back when the lamps are lit?’

‘Oh, now,’ Nicholas said. ‘Sit down. Our next call is Lagos, and we ought to have matters straight before then. He thought I was going to forgive him.’

‘Surely not,’ the priest said, and then fell silent as Nicholas looked at him.

Nicholas said, ‘You’ve wanted to know my state of mind ever since I came back from Cyprus, so let me make you really happy and tell you. I’m sorry, of course, about the deaths of Katelina and Tristão Vasquez, but they’re over. Simon can do what he likes about Katelina’s child; I’m not going to hunt down a baby; it’s up to Simon to rear him. I’m angry that Jordan took away Tristão’s son, but Diniz is eighteen or more. If he wants to get away from his grandfather, he can presumably do it himself.’

‘Can he?’ said Godscalc. ‘Leaving his mother and her business to fend for themselves? From this moment on, you will be directly competing with St Pol & Vasquez on their own ground. What, in this storm of decision-making, are you going to do about that?’

‘What do you think?’ Nicholas said. ‘Withdraw from the contest and let the Bank fail? You know very well I’ve always kept my hands off Simon and his father, but their business has nothing sacred about it. And if the competition ranges Diniz against me, everyone ought to be pleased.’

It was too dark now to see his face. Godscalc said, ‘He may
range against you and starve. Nicholas, they are blood of your blood, even though they repudiate you. You must take the first step. You must meet Simon at Lagos and make him see that there is no need to pursue this vendetta. If you were to combine your two businesses, there would be no one stronger to fight the Vatachino. Won’t you do that? I should come, if you wanted me. Simon would listen.’

In the darkness, Nicholas gave a soft laugh. ‘What do you wager? I don’t mind trying, provided I’m wearing my cuirass. But if they won’t be convinced, I’m not going to coy them for ever, or spare them the less gentlemanly aspects of common trade.’

‘Oh, I shouldn’t place any wagers on what might happen,’ said Father Godscalc. ‘Simon de St Pol is nearly your equal in stubbornness. But at least you would have tried, and I should be relieved of the black thought I have that you are truly the nameless child Simon thinks you are, and your mother a harlot.’