Gemini (116 page)

‘There are clothes ready laid out,’ she said, when he hesitated. He and Adorne had been robbed of everything, Tobie had told her. Everything he wore had been borrowed.

He wore a ring on his right hand. She had never seen it before.

His eyes followed hers, and for a moment she thought he would cover it. Then he lifted his hand, and let her see it. He said, ‘Adorne left it with the Prioress Euphemia. He had willed it to her half-brother thirteen years ago, when Bishop Kennedy was still alive. Seaulme asked the Prioress, yesterday, if she would mind if he left it to me.’

‘He hadn’t told you?’

‘No,’ Nicholas said. ‘He probably hoped I was going to die first.’ It wasn’t even black humour; it was just a necessary denial of feeling.

The stone was a sapphire. In size and colour and brilliance, it surpassed anything Gelis had ever seen. It was meant, as he said, for a Bishop’s ring. It came as a bequest from a man of deep convictions to another who, on the surface, had few. But Adorne had been a wise man.

She said, ‘You had best make a start.’

He said, ‘All right,’ and stood up. He hadn’t touched her. He knew, better than Jordan, what was too sweet.

Later, he went to Robin, and knelt, and talked. Then he went to the King.

H
E THOUGHT AT
first it was going to be like six years ago, when he came back in wild February weather from Flanders, and was so circumspectly reintroduced to the monarch by the three men who had since become part of his life. This time, there had been no wild escapade on the way. Oysters had come to mean something else. Henry was dead. Andro Wodman was in self-exile, serving a sick and evil old man in Kilmirren House, which Nicholas had no intention of visiting.

It was closer to six years ago than he expected, for men had reappeared: men like the former Archbishop Will Scheves, whom he had not seen at Court through the autumn. Andrew, the King’s half-uncle and
prospective Archbishop, was missing, but Davie Lindsay was there, and Leitch, and Master Secretary Whitelaw, whose spectacles Nicholas had cleaned, with difficulty, just that morning. But, of course, no Johndie Mar, and no Albany, now in Dunbar. No Princess Meg at Court now, since Crichton her lover had joined Albany. And no Lady Mary today, with her newly regranted Boyd lands, and her Boyd son equally caught on the side that was suddenly wrong: caught in Dunbar Castle with Albany.

The King said, ‘We are displeased.’

‘My lord, I am sorry,’ said Nicholas.

The King said, ‘We are reprimanding you. We should be reprimanding our Baron Cortachy, but for the tragic events of last night. They would not have occurred, had you followed our orders. We gave you no leave to mediate with our brother. You heard his threats. You saw his conduct. You heard of his traitorous dealings with England. Does it do us honour, after insults such as these, to be thought to be sending to
treat with
the villain?’

One followed the moves of the game. Nicholas said, ‘My lord King, we were concerned for your highness’s safety. We believed the Prince spoke in anger, and would repent. But until we were sure, we wished to give him no cause to harm you.’

‘And you think he cannot harm us now?’ said the King.

‘My lord, he has put himself so far in the wrong that he dare not. I think that my lord of Cortachy’s death has strengthened your grace’s throne.’

‘That is what they tell me,’ said the King. ‘I wait to be reassured. It is also true, I am told, that you shared his danger?’

‘I came to no harm,’ Nicholas said. ‘But I fear I have lost the Duke of Albany’s trust. I cannot expect to serve the King’s grace as usefully as I have in the past.’

The King said, ‘What are you saying? You are leaving? Before the funeral Mass of your countryman? That we cannot permit.’

‘No, my lord. Nor would I wish it. I shall be there,’ Nicholas said.

The King was staring down the long nose. ‘You have some plea, some complaint? The murderers will be brought to court. The criminals will be justified. My lords assure me of that.’

‘I am glad,’ Nicholas said. ‘No, I have no complaint, sire. Events have moved rather quickly, that is all. I should like a little time to consider my future.’

He was aware that it sounded like a well-worn stratagem for advancement. He was too tired to care. The Lords Three knew, at least, that he had simply spoken the truth.

The King said, ‘We are told that the robbers purloined the chains of our Order. Is that so?’

Nicholas said, ‘Yes, my lord.’ He wondered if he were about to be asked to replace his. He wished he could go.

The King said, ‘We shall have a replacement made. Two. My lord of Cortachy shall not go to his tomb without our recognition. Does that please you?’

He said something, and made all the standard gestures, and went. Nowie Sinclair walked a few steps with him outside. ‘Are you as ill as you look?’

‘No. I’m tired,’ Nicholas said. ‘Was there something?’

‘I rather think not,’ Nowie said. ‘Perhaps in a day or two, when you feel better. I share your grief over that splendid man, Cortachy. And the small maid, of course. And the quarrel, as I understand it, within your own family. But such things occur to us all. We are foolish to take them too seriously.’

Nicholas stopped. He said, ‘I am sure that, whatever it is, I can deal with it now, as well as I shall in a day or two. So?’

They were on the slopes leading down from David’s Tower. The old lodge of the King’s Guard was not far away. It was cold. Nowie said. ‘Very well. Was Will Knollys with the troop that came to your rescue in North Berwick? Or any of his bailies and their men?’

‘No,’ said Nicholas. He should have remembered that Nowie never wasted anyone’s time, especially his own. He found it hard to be interested.

‘He was supposed to be,’ said Nowie Sinclair. ‘Huntly wouldn’t like that. Nor would a few other people. You couldn’t say, of course, that the Order of St John was supporting England: all that was long ago. But it is getting greedy. Over-demanding about rents and tithes. Extortionate, even. People are talking about taking the law into their own hands, and recovering what they’ve paid over the odds.’

‘He would get it back,’ Nicholas said.

‘Maybe,’ Nowie said. ‘But it would cost him time and trouble. Especially if it weren’t just money.’ He produced the slow smile that people compared to a squeezed loaf of bread. He said, ‘Of course, you shouldn’t take part. It’s people like the Johnstones of Linlithgow, and friends of the Prestons and the Cochranes and the Russells who have the grievances. Heriot of Longniddry, and Gullane of Newbattle. Even one or two clients of Adorne’s nephew.’

Nicholas looked at him. ‘When?’

The squeezed slice widened. ‘Oh, about the time of the funeral might be appropriate. Don’t you think? The Lord Preceptor has quite an amount of property close to Linlithgow.’ He patted Nicholas on the arm with his manicured fingernails. ‘I’ll tell you afterwards. It might help you to make up your mind.’

‘About what?’ Nicholas said. As often happened after seeing Nowie, he felt slightly better. Slightly.

‘But, of course, the weather is depressing,’ Nowie said, as if he were producing an answer. ‘You must take absolutely everything into account.’

O
N THE DAY
of his funeral, the
endeclocken
tolled for Anselm Adorne, Baron Cortachy, in the church of St Michael’s, Linlithgow, as they would, a month hence, in his own church of the Jerusalemkerk, Bruges. As he had asked long ago, his body was wrapped in fifty-two ells of fine linen, to be gifted eventually to the poor; and among his bequests was one of a fine painted window for the monastery of the Charterhouse in St Johnstoun of Perth, that had held the heart of the first royal James, and had once assisted Maarten, his son. His other sons, the canons of Lille, the absent recipients of the prebends of Aberdeen, were not there; but his friends were, and the great and powerful friends of Phemie, the companion with whom he might have ended his days.

The King rode in procession from Edinburgh, and brought with him Mary his sister, the noble and mighty Princess who had once sheltered in Adorne’s great mansion of the Hôtel Jerusalem, and had borne her first children there. Her son James was not present, nor was her brother Alexander of Albany; but the lady Margaret attended, withdrawn and silent as she had been for that other ceremony, for the burial of Margaret of Berecrofts, whose mother had once been her handmaiden. The sovereign lady the Queen had also come from Stirling for both, and had brought James, her son.

The church, hung with cloths, pinned with the arms of Adorne and his family, was a place of splendour. The robes of Will Scheves and his Bishops glittered and blazed, as did the gowns and jewels of the King and his nobles. On the catafalque lay a new Collar of the Unicorn Order, one of a pair made in a single workshop by two rival goldsmiths, sleeping by turn. There were only two living Knights of the Unicorn present, of whom one was the King. The King was replicated again, in solemn profile, on the reverse of the glowing altar-piece behind the Archbishop, loaned from the Holy Trinity church to link Scotland with Flanders, and to honour Hugo vander Goes and the man who commissioned it, and the man who had advised its commissioning: Adorne, friend of artists, who, long ago, had recommended van Eyck to the Duchess Isabella, and had pursued Memling’s painting to Danzig.

The anonymous painted prince at this altar, piously kneeling, was not nine-year-old James, stiffly standing between the Queen and Abbot Henry. Nor would anyone ever admit, now, that it might be Albany, possible heir to the throne. Adorne’s death had brought what the lords
had foreseen, a landslide of revulsion. The vacillators would never join Albany now. Burgundy and dying France would hold back. England, whatever promises it made, was also facing an empty throne, and a fight for the succession which would leave no time or inclination for new northern empires. Albany would never become Lieutenant-General, and would be expected to impeach his friends, and sever all his treasonable bonds. And like a common criminal bound by a Constable, he would not be allowed within three leagues of his King.

It was over. And the King was alone.

Dirige Domine gressus meus …
The antiphone, the work of a dead man, was glorious. Anselm Adorne’s daughter Efemie did not hear it, but trotted out at the end, hand in hand with her cousin Saunders, while her other cousin Katelinje steered her softly from behind.

As she passed, the lady of Berecrofts glanced up at Gelis, who returned the look as if from the wastes of the sea. Nicholas neither spoke nor glanced round, and no one would have recognised the look on his face.

R
ETURNED WITH
K
ATELINJE
Sersanders and her family to Edinburgh, Dr Andreas saw them all settled and then, obeying orders, crossed the Canongate to the Floory Land to find Gelis. ‘Where is he?’

‘Nicholas?’ she said. She looked wind-wrung, as she had in the church. She said, ‘Can you help him?’

‘Help him?’
repeated Dr Andreas with comfortable contempt. ‘God bless and preserve him, all that man needs is a porridge stick up the arse. Women! What did you think you were looking at, but a finished example of unfettered cowardice?’

She looked startled. She had not observed, as he had, that they were no longer alone.
‘Confiteor,’
said Nicholas from the far end of the room. ‘You had better come with me, via the kitchen.’ But instead of a porridge stick, all they picked up in the kitchen was a lavish provision of wine, which they took back to a quiet room and drank.

The conversation that then ensued was quite different, naturally, from the consoling pap envisaged by laymen. It began, certainly, with the loss of Adorne, of the child Margaret, and of the man Julius, but moved beyond these matters of transient importance. Dr Andreas did not, of course, belittle the dead, or suggest that one should not experience grief. He had spoken for Adorne’s life in Bruges, and stood beside him in the chapel in Roslin; he recalled the aftermath of Nancy as well or better than Nicholas de Fleury; had been affected as had de Fleury by the hangings at Lauder; had understood some of the tragedy of the River Till. Now he was simply placing these matters in context. Perspective. De Fleury appreciated perspective.

At first, de Fleury had been reluctant to turn to the future. He did not want to think of his own. Andreas put him right about that.

‘Not your own. We spoke of this before. You stopped your divining because of it.’

‘You want me to resume?’ de Fleury had said. There was an edge to his voice.

‘No, I do not. I told you that I felt it was dangerous. Now I am sure that it is.’

‘You want me to live a long, happy life,’ the other man said.

Andreas looked at him. He said, ‘You may die tomorrow, and it would affect nothing now. Oh, the kingdom would suffer: I give you that. You would be mourned. Your family would be desolate.’

‘I should like to think so. But if my death doesn’t matter, why not divine?’ Then, at last, he used his intelligence, and answered himself. ‘Because it affects someone else? You thought it might?’ And then: ‘
You know who?
You have found out where the illusions come from?’

‘Come
from?’ Andreas said. ‘You have had more?’

He was disconcerted. ‘I’m not sure. There was something, with Julius. As if I were being forbidden to fight him.’

Andreas watched him. Then he said, ‘It was someone else’s resistance. Someone else’s dilemma. You took what was the right decision, for you. But it is better if you receive nothing more. I think, in the end, you won’t regret it. You may even meet him one day.’

It was a mistake. Nicholas de Fleury cried out. ‘Then he is in this life? Where?’

It was necessary to quell that at once. ‘No. Never. You will never meet him in life. Later, perhaps. That is why I suggest you protect your life, so far as you can. You have a long time to wait. So has he.’

But when de Fleury said,
‘But who is he?’
the astrologer did not give a direct answer. ‘Ask me what he is,’ Andreas said. ‘Some of that, I can tell you.’