To Lie with Lions (79 page)

They listened in silence as, collecting his strength, he told them again his objectives, and exhorted them once more to lend him their help. In the end, seeing him weary, they excused themselves and with his blessing, departed. Outside the door, Nicholas found himself called back. Shrugging at Julius, he turned and re-entered, closing the door.

The sun, finding a chink in the shutter, fell across the high bed and lit the long, bearded face of the thinker named John who had taken the name of an Egyptian, the patron saint of his native Trebizond. The man patted the seat by his bed. He said, ‘Julius will question you narrowly, but I wished a little time with you myself. You are patient with him.’

‘Not always,’ Nicholas said.

‘He owes you more than he knows. He has found a gentle companion, I believe.’

‘She was in Rome. He hopes to marry her,’ Nicholas said. ‘It worries him that he cannot bring her a distinguished past.’

‘It worried him in Bologna,’ the Cardinal said. ‘But a good man will succeed, whether he can claim a father or not, and there is no shame to a woman in marrying him. Then he heads his own family,
and is as a tree, sheltering those of his blood whom he loves.’ He paused. He said, ‘I speak of you, Nicholas.’

His eyes were clear. It was painful to hold them. Nicholas said, ‘I wish it were true.’

‘Then you must make up for your mistakes in the future,’ said the man in the bed. ‘Now I have no more to say that is personal. I wish to speak to you of Caffa, and of Poland, and of Fichet and what you must do with his printing. And then – Do you see that flask over there?’

Nicholas rose. ‘Yes, my lord.’

‘Ah, not yet. It is Candian wine. When I have given you all my thoughts, then I wish you to pour it, and to sit by me and to talk of something quite different. Do you remember your Greek?’

‘Yes,’ said Nicholas.

‘Yes. You have listened to me, and to George and to Ficino. You have heard us speak of your namesake of Cusa. I have never heard you talk of the Dialogues.’

He ceased speaking and waited. Nicholas said, ‘Christianity and Plato? I have talked of them, but in Arabic’

The Cardinal said, ‘I was told of your friend. It was not the communion of two minds that killed him. I am dying. My chosen comfort is discourse. Indulge me.’

Outside, Julius said, ‘What happened? Poor old fellow. Did he want to talk of his great days, and got rambling?’

‘Professors of rhetoric rarely ramble,’ Nicholas said. ‘Don’t be jealous, or I’ll give you his lecture on Aristotle. He’s moving downriver soon to Ancenis. The captain says I have to wait to be summoned by Louis. He says they won’t let you stay.’

‘Why not?’ said Julius, incensed.

‘Because I’m on his payroll and you’re not. I can’t help it,’ said Nicholas. ‘They didn’t mind you seeing Bessarion, but now you have to return and do some serious besieging. If I were you, I’d go back to Bruges. Teach the women to swim in the river.’

Julius opened his mouth.

Nicholas said, ‘You came for his blessing, and you have it. I am glad, too, that you came. But now the risks have to be mine.’

He felt numb: a man divided in two, of which one half was routinely socialising, and the other was set among stars. He lay awake all that night, for it would never happen again. There was no one else left.

In the third week of August, Jordan de St Pol, vicomte de Ribérac,
arrived for the second time in the Loire valley and was directed to await Louis his master in the upright little castle of Les Ponts-de-Cé, once a favourite retreat of King René. He arrived in mellow temper, despite the heat of the road from La Rochelle and the complicated appraisals made necessary by the untimely demise of the King’s brother, the Duke of Guienne.

He knew why he had been sent for. He might not be the horseman that once he had been, but his servants were agile and efficient. The King had told him to get the child, and he had him. The boy was awaiting him now in the prisons of Les Ponts-de-Cé. By his orders the child had not been told where he was, or who had him. He had been no trouble, they said, on the journey from Beauvais. He had even tried to be helpful. It had amused them.

Jordan de Ribérac was tired. There was no hurry: the King was still at Ancenis. The vicomte retired to his chamber and slept. Then, upon rising, he refreshed himself with a change of clothes and a modest repast with some wine. Next, he commanded the governor to show him the way to the cells.

The room they unlocked had a window, lately fitted with bars, and was better provided than most, for the place was a residence more than a keep. A figure rose from a bench.

His first impression in the half-light was that the child was exceedingly fair, which was of course not necessarily impossible. The next was that it was of unusual height – indeed of
3
height which
was
quite impossible. The third, when it spoke, was one of disbelief. The child – the boy – the prisoner he had caused to be kidnapped gave a cry, a loud cry, of
‘Grandfather!’
Then, before he had recovered from that, the boy proceeded to howl. ‘I told them! They wouldn’t listen! Oh, Grandfather!’ The brat’s cheeks were filthy with tears.

He hated tears. He despised them. He saw, with disbelief and with fury, what he had to contend with. He said, ‘Henry.’

The boy began to rush forward.

Henry. Henry his grandson. Henry, who was no use to anyone. Henry, who couldn’t be used to influence bankers or armies but yet was uselessly here, a source of danger. A source of ridicule.

The vicomte de Ribérac stood in the cold little room, massive, unyielding, a bastion of disappointment and anger. The boy stopped.

The vicomte said, ‘What have you done? How dare you! How dare you interfere with my plans! Get out of my sight!’

Chapter 37

T
HEY WERE SCYTHING
the wheat as Nicholas made the gentle day’s ride from Saumur north-west to Les Ponts-de-Cé, parallel with the blue drift of the Loire. The wains full of sheaves rumbled beside him and, but for his escort, he would have dismounted in some deep golden field and shared his bread and meat with the straw-hatted harvesters, and heard all their gossip. But the King of France traversed this country, pursuing the concerns of his armies, and strangers rode under guard.

It was within a few days of September, and Nicholas was glad to move. Days ago, the Cardinal had received his appointment and departed, borne on the river. He would not return. Julius had also left, to go back to Bruges, and perhaps even to Cologne: Nicholas wondered whether he would find the Gräfin waiting, or whether she would have slipped off, in her cool, competent way, to oversee some other business. He had watched Julius and his Countess together; observed the grace with which she received her admirer’s ceaseless attentions. But her eyes did not caress as his did, and if their fingers touched, her breath did not quicken. You could see why he feared a rebuff.

Yet she was sensual. From long experience, Nicholas was sure of it. She had had one husband, and perhaps many lovers. They said the child was her own. It was most likely, Nicholas thought, that she was teasing Julius into losing his head. Then they would marry, and she would hold the ascendancy. He did not see how he could interfere in any way that would do good.

He observed, towards the end of his journey, that the fleur-de-lys flew from the steep blue roofs of René’s elegant home, and that Louis had therefore arrived. There was no hurry, however. Had the Burgundians triumphed in Picardy, he would have been sent for long before now. Louis had kept him waiting because there were no secrets that mattered. Or no Burgundian secrets.

In René’s exquisite painted chamber of audience, the bees flew back and forth through the windows and were snapped at by the dogs. The room was crowded. Nicholas, waiting aside, saw men he recognised, Gaston du Lyon among them. Louis was moving about with a jingle of spurs, joining first one group then another. When he approached Nicholas at length, he was drawing behind him another who was not French at all: Philippe de Commynes, godson of Philip of Burgundy, and – until recently – the present Duke’s favourite counsellor.

‘See!’ said King Louis. ‘See, mon brave! What do we call you? The Scots have made you a baron now, have they not? See, my lord of Fleury, what other fish have leaped into our pool from the Burgundian sea! Since M. de Commynes has joined us, we know all our poor cousin’s secrets: ah, what trouble they are making for themselves in the Pas de Calais! Roving hither and thither in such anger, while all the time our captains ride ahead of them, laughing! There is nothing you can tell us that we do not already know, save only what you have done for us in Scotland. So come. Let us step aside. M. de Commynes will forgive us. Tell us – how sad it seems – why after all, our dear nephew of Scotland has found it impossible to send us an army, even though you persuaded us – you emptied our pockets – on the pretext that he would?’

They were out of earshot. At a sign, all the others drew back. Louis sat, leaving Nicholas standing.

Nicholas said, ‘Monseigneur knows that the Scottish Parliament forbade it.’

‘As you knew they would,’ Louis remarked.

‘As I was afraid that they might, so long as the King remained childless. I had private word, monseigneur, just before I left Beauvais. The Queen has hopes of a child.’

It was a gamble. The word had been no more than a whisper, and might be contradicted. But for sure, Louis would not have heard it yet.

He had not. His eyes, black as ferrets, examined him. ‘Are you sure?’

‘It is early,’ said Nicholas. ‘But it means an army may come. Also marriage alliances. It is to be hoped that the King will take the best advice about that.’

‘Yours?’ said Louis. ‘Why were you given your barony?’

‘I have made myself useful,’ Nicholas said. ‘My lord “your royal nephew was pleased to thank me for the wealth I brought him from Iceland.’

‘We heard,’ Louis said. ‘Wealth which makes it unnecessary for him to sue us for a pension.’

‘Wealth which persuaded him to invest in a ship,’ Nicholas said. ‘He has bought from me the great vessel
The Lion
, which will eventually bring you his army. He has nothing left. If monseigneur wishes to bind him with a pension, then I can promise the opportunity is about to arise.’

‘So!’ said Louis. ‘How subtle we are, serving three rulers and lining our purses. But we think perhaps that now, like Paris, you must approach your final decision. You cannot surely deceive your poor Duke for very much longer. And what has the Duke to offer compared with ourselves? You have seen our young friend de Commynes, who has just acquired land, wealth and the promise of an heiress to marry. The finest officers of our late brother of Guienne have chosen to join us, and not for a pittance. And Brittany! Why do you think we are here and not with our army in Brittany? Because the lord of Lescun, the ablest man at the side of our nephew and cousin the Duke, has just joined us, for a pension of six thousand francs, half of Guienne, two seneschalships, the command of a castle in Bordeaux and two in Bayonne, twenty-four thousand crowns in ready money, and – if we remember it all – our order of St Michael, with a comté.

‘You see,’ said Louis, ‘what we are willing to offer to those who serve us, and in the cause, naturally, of peace? The war in Brittany, for all practical purposes, has ceased.’

‘Monseigneur! I am amazed!’ Nicholas said.

‘Indeed. So the long-awaited English will certainly not arrive, and our unfortunate cousin of Burgundy may as well load his flux-ridden army into carts and carry them back home to Artois. The war is over,’ said Louis. ‘There is no more work for your company to do, and you are paid – poorly paid – by a self-willed man with no more wits in his head than a goose. Bring your army and join us.’

‘In what capacity?’ Nicholas said.

‘Ah,’ said the King. There was a table, with a small stool beyond it. He waved Nicholas to the seat and made a sign over the room. A servant, surrounded by dogs, made his way to the table and placed on it a dish of raw meat which the King fingered with his gloved hand, before selecting a piece and throwing it down. The dogs, ears swinging, vied for it, barking. Another servant brought Nicholas wine. The table was spattered with blood.

The King said, ‘What did the vicomte de Ribérac promise Burgundy, in exchange for the return of his grandson from Beauvais?’

‘What did he tell you?’ Nicholas said.

‘What you might expect. That he gave orders to kidnap your child, and his men seized the wrong boy.’

‘My son is in Antwerp,’ Nicholas said. ‘The vicomte’s grandson
was with the Burgundian army, under threat of arraignment for attempted murder. Certainly, he would have an imperative need to extract him.’

‘And the price?’ Louis said.

‘Perhaps M. de Commynes can tell you,’ Nicholas said. ‘The bargain was not made with me. Or perhaps it is enough to say that the vicomte has sent his son back to Scotland after keeping him for almost four years in exile. Perhaps the vicomte himself means to follow. It could harm monseigneur’s prospects in that kingdom.’

‘He plans to go there. He has told us,’ said Louis.

‘Monseigneur could forbid it,’ said Nicholas. ‘And ask him to bring back Simon his son.’

‘Or we might let him go, and send you to counter him,’ Louis said. ‘We have spoken of the vicomte’s position at Court, and we know you are willing to fill it. You have seen the rewards we can offer, which would include your own vicomte of Fleury. We have said that we should welcome your army. All this will happen next year, when you openly leave your Burgundian master. But this winter, we wish you to serve us in Scotland. If our suspicions are confirmed, de Ribérac’s position in France will be yours.’

‘And the future of the vicomte de Ribérac?’ said Nicholas.

‘There are precedents. You yourself mentioned Jacques de Coeur,’ said the King.

The audience ended soon after. They did not speak of Bessarion, but Nicholas already knew that the Cardinal’s mission was over. In the long term, it had failed. In the short term, paradoxically, it had succeeded. Brittany was ceasing to fight because her most powerful counsellor had been bought. Burgundy, unsupported, badly led, was soon, surely, to fall into truce. But that was just this year. When spring came again, all the forces would realign and reassemble. When the spring fleets set out for the East, Burgundy, Brittany, and France would not be represented.