You would think, therefore, de Fleury would be busy. Instead, he was intruding, deliberately intruding, where he was unwelcome. Sersanders said evenly, ‘The scarf? It’s Katelijne’s.’
‘Well, at least she didn’t give you a ball. The Medici would have hanged her. I suppose I should wish you good luck.’
‘Against Simon?’ said Sersanders briefly. ‘You’ll have to wait. That comes last, before the King takes on the winner and wins.’
‘You’ve done this before. No, I was wishing you enduring good health and fortitude. You could smack Crackbene for me, if you get the chance.’
‘I wonder why?’ Sersanders rejoined in the same tone. He was momentarily amused, amid his resentment.
‘You ought to know. Your sister’s in the same holy retreat,’ de Fleury said. The rebuke in his voice was a mockery. ‘And the King’s little sister, who didn’t really want to give her kerchief to your uncle, did she? Such a cold country: even the late Pope sired a son here; anything for comfort. Oh, listen. They’re going to start. Did I wish you good luck?’
The trumpets blew and the drums began. The waiting was over, and one Burgundian contestant was colder than ever. And angry.
‘Thank you,’ said Sersanders bitterly.
‘It comes with the service,’ said de Fleury, standing off from the doorway. He was already looking elsewhere. It had been an idle impulse, it was clear; arisen from God knew what wish for diversion. He went off and, rather surprisingly, joined a dark-haired young woman in green. Sersanders watched him, and then walked carefully outside to where his page stood by his stirrup.
Will Roger said, ‘Now, my darlings. And if you get the A right, I’ll kiss each one of you twice after supper.’
He liked training choirs. He liked it best, to tell the truth, when the voices came to him natural as they were born, welling out of big healthy bodies whose owners spent their days in the fresh air of the fields or the shore, and not bent double sewing in palaces. He had very little time for palaces. It was probably why he got on with young James so well. Everyone should remember his manners, but there was no need to crawl.
The well-born bitch with the simper was going to lose the beat again. Will Roger caught her eye, smiling, and rocked his head up and down. While a performance was in progress, there was nothing he wouldn’t do to keep them singing and happy. Strip and turn somersaults. Fuck them there on the stage, as they sang. He heard, with disbelief, that all the voices, ending, were coming together, at the right tempo, with the right tone, in the right notes, and they were articulating precisely as he had taught them.
Tears welled into his eyes. He loved them so much he could die for them.
Nicholas ran up the steps of the stand and found a place beside his rich landlord Berecrofts just as the parade of contestants began. Will of Berecrofts, who had sharp enough sight for his years, noticed that de Fleury’s bonny young friend had moved off, in her turn, to the women’s enclosure. He knew who she was. So did most people there. He said, ‘As I was saying, I’m holding the price, but I’m no daft enough to wait on ye for aye. What did Hamilton think?’
The parade of contestants had begun, led by the King, with his two brothers riding behind under the banner of Scotland. Against a prodigious blaring and a loyal roar which seemed to contain some genuine affection, Nicholas shouted a reply. ‘I have to see him again. I’ll tell you by noon tomorrow.’
Berecrofts said, ‘I’ll sell if you don’t come. Dod, it’s purgatory on earth, all thon hooting and crying. I’d melt down the lot and mak’ jugs o’ them. Davie Lindsay’s no lookin’ sae weel.’ The first ranks of knights were riding in, two by two. Among them, white cross on black robes, were the Knights Hospitaller of St John, led by their Preceptor. ‘And Will Knollys is showing a belly. He’ll be fair put to it to harry a Turk if they call him to Rhodes. Seton’s got his auld harness out: he’ll hae tae get the rest back from pawn for the wedding. And are those your men-at-arms?’
‘There’s to be a mock fight,’ de Fleury said.
‘I ken, I ken. And Master Julius, weel set up as usual. And the banner of Burgundy. Now that’s what I call a feast for the een. Well horsed, well set up, well armed, the hale retinue. A fine-looking man, Master Anselm Adorne, and naebody’s fool in the council-chamber. He’s got a niece as mad as a peerie.’
‘She’s sitting down there, with the choir.’
‘Oh glory be, so she is, and them about to break into yowls any minute. And here’s the childer.’
There were twelve ponies in all, groomed and glistening with their riders straight-backed and white-faced within their miniature armour. They wore their fathers’ colours, and a page behind each carried a pennant. Nicholas de Fleury’s eyes had followed them in. He said, ‘Robin rides well.’
‘Aye, aye,’ said Berecrofts. He viewed his grandson, but didn’t put his thoughts into words. A good lad. A kind-hearted, well-mannered wee fellow. Unlike some. He said, ‘Will ye look at yon arrogant little bastard? He’ll drive his horse mad.’
‘He can ride,’ Nicholas said.
‘And wants us to know it. Silver armour on a child of that age! I suppose his father’ll be wearing the same. Two cockerels needing their necks wrung.’
De Fleury, watching the procession, didn’t trouble to answer, thereby confirming an opinion William of Berecrofts had already formed. Nothing that happened in Bruges went unnoticed in Edinburgh, and the ill-will between vander Poele – now de Fleury – and the heir to Kilmirren was notorious.
And now they said the quarrel was over. Berecrofts supposed it might be. Wealth could heal many sores, including the canker of ignoble parentage. And for sure, since coming to Scotland, de Fleury had shown no hint of spite against Simon de St Pol or his father, even if he’d hardly bestirred himself to seek them. Instead he’d turned his hand to his own diverse concerns with unchancy efficiency and an edge of downright impatience which sometimes roused Berecrofts’s own temper. Nicholas de Fleury. Not a bairn you would trust at your back.
He pulled his thoughts away. The children had passed, and the landed gentry were advancing again. And foremost among them rode the child Henry’s father.
A sigh passed through the crowd.
Berecrofts gazed. Berecrofts stared. Berecrofts said, ‘Christ God, St Pol of Kilmirren … What farmyard could afford a cockerel such as that!’
Julius turned, hearing the same long hiss of surprise, and so did Archie Berecrofts the Younger, riding down the lists at his side. Comfortable about his own appearance and future performance, Julius was always willing to study the efforts of other people who were less travelled, and had no shares in the Banco di Niccolò.
At first his view was obscured by the file of plumes tossing behind him. Then he saw, entering the lists behind them all, the mounted figure which had drawn the audible tribute. Archie, who like his father had nothing wrong with his sight, said, ‘Christ God. Simon de St Pol of Kilmirren. Would you credit it?’
‘No,’ said Julius absently. They turned a corner and began to ride back up the long side of the lists, and he got a really good look.
The surcoat was Simon’s own, that was obvious. But it couldn’t hide what was beneath it. Unlike the King or his brother the Duke; unlike the handsomely clad and gallantly accoutred high nobles of Scotland, the heir to the lord of Kilmirren rode into the lists of Edinburgh that December day attired like an emperor. Attired in a carapace of a soft, flowing, powerful metal, engraved, damascened, embossed in silver and gold, with inserts of turquoise, of enamel, of mother of pearl such as had never been seen in the West; with cloth of gold edging and overlaying it and exquisite pinions of the rarest of birds falling from the jewelled spire of its helmet.
The glorious face within the helmet was both haughty and flushed, and the blue long-lashed gaze was directed ahead. Whatever fortune he had brought back from Africa, Simon de St Pol could not have found or paid for these arms. His purse stretched to silver, of the kind the brat Henry was wearing. Archie knew i
t, and all those folk in the stands. And behind them (Julius turned) the boy Henry’s hectic cheeks and bright, wary eyes told that he, also, was torn between doubts and bright pride. Young Berecrofts said, ‘What’s the man thinking of? Look at King Jamie.’
There was no need to look, but Julius did. He said, ‘I heard St Pol’d got two new suits.’
‘Silver. He did. Showy enough, but they’d thole it. Not this.’
‘What happened?’ said Julius. Simon passed on the opposite side, his arms and shoulders encrusted with light. Beyond him was the stand, with Nicholas seated beside Archie’s father. Archie’s father was talking and so was everyone else. Nicholas was watching the field and saying nothing at all so far as Julius could see.
‘What happened? Wha kens? The new armour got lost, and I expect he either had to borrow some or withdraw from the tournament. He asked me, but I didna have spares. He should have withdrawn.’
Julius supposed that he should. On the other hand, Simon was vain. He had tried to find something plainer, but perhaps had not tried very hard. Archie said, ‘But where in the name of the wee man did that armour come from?’
Julius had nothing against Archie or even his cantankerous father but, after all, they were provincials. He said, ‘Trebizond. It’s one of the ceremonial suits of the last Emperor, David.’ He didn’t mention that, pawned, it had helped save the Bank a few years before. He did add casually, ‘It belongs to Nicholas.’
‘De Fleury lent it to him?’
‘He must have done. I don’t suppose,’ said Julius virtuously, ‘that he wants much made of it. At least it lets Simon take part.’ He couldn’t imagine why Nicholas had done such a thing, any more than he could work out why Nicholas wasn’t fighting.
Except that, of course, Simon was one of the best jousters of his day. Simon was the man whom Scotland sent as her representative to all the elaborate tourneys in France and in Flanders. And although he had no great business head, it was true, he was always first in the field with a troop when the King’s peace was threatened, which compensated for a lot of poor management. He was a King’s champion, and decorative, and no coward, for tournaments were not designed as a rule to be harmless. The tilting-field was a training for war.
And so, if you considered the matter, it seemed that the long contention between Simon and Nicholas had actually ceased. By avoiding combat, Nicholas had already ceded superiority in the field. Now, in the loan of this armour, he had made a public gesture of friendship. It was not, of course, true tilting-armour: no one was ever expected to raise a lance or a sword against the late David Comnenos when he rode forth thus on parade. But the ornamentation, suicidal in battle, would not matter today, when every weapon was blunt and all the combat was for pleasure, à plaisance.
Archie said, ‘I think they’re both daft. Mind you, the suit’s safe on St Pol. Very few here can touch him, and even if you thought you could dent it you wouldn’t.’
‘Even for the honour of Burgundy?’ Julius said. ‘I think you’ll find Anselm Adorne has other views.’ He felt suddenly extraordinarily cheerful. He said, ‘You must agree, having Nicholas about does make things brisk.’
‘So I’ve noticed,’ said Archie of Berecrofts quite thoughtfully. He was looking at the King’s sisters who, like the King, appeared less than enraptured by Simon de St Pol of Kilmirren. It reminded Julius of a further pleasure in store. The lady Mary, whose favourite attendant had been Gelis van Borselen, had asked that Gelis van Borselen’s new husband should be presented to her after the tournament. The face of Nicholas, receiving the summons, had been the picture of flattered delight. Julius, seldom deceived, felt quite excited.
By the time the lists opened, everyone within earshot of Julius knew the origin of Kilmirren’s borrowed armour, if not the circumstances of its borrowing. Anselm Adorne heard the story from Sersanders his nephew, just before they rode into the field. In fact he delayed his entry a little, because of it. He had known Nicholas for a long time, nearly as long as Julius. And Nicholas never did or said anything without a reason.
The tournament was well arranged, for a local affair, calling for no more than a token attendance from those knights and gentles within reach of Edinburgh. There were two men from England, and one from the island of Orkney. The preliminary bouts, on horse and later on foot, were hard fought, with snapped lances in the muddy turf and nose-blood seeping down bevelled swords, and swollen flesh squeezed, red and blue, between bone and armour.
The King’s own guard took part, but their ardour couldn’t match the hard professionalism of the Knights of St John, behind which could be discerned a hint of contempt. Adorne himself was opposed to the Preceptor himself, stout Will Knollys, and tried to spin out the fight until Knollys could give in with honour. One of Maarten’s brothers was destined for the Order; all the Adorne family supported their hospice in Bruges; Father John of Kinloch used to live there. But one did not wish to draw too much attention to that.
He drew to the side and watched, while his page fetched him a fresh lance and a drink. The men Nicholas had brought with him from Bruges had done well. He recognised none of them. The old Charetty company, to be sure, was away fighting for Duke Charles. He liked the ruddy, forthright look of young Archie, the boy Robin’s father, who was well matched against Sersanders his nephew.
Adorne reflected, as he watched, on the shrewdness which had brought the Berecrofts family from their ancestral home in the west to the profitable estate they occupied on the edge of the Forth, and now the even more profitable sites they held in the Canongate and in Leith upon which, for a price, men like Nicholas were allowed to build houses. Some men made their fortunes in towns and then chose to establish themselves and their families in baronial mansions. He himself had investments outside Bruges, but he was, to the soul, a man of that town. A man of the town and the Duke’s, and God forfend he should ever have to divide the two loyalties. He watched his nephew, his thoughts for the moment elsewhere.
Berecrofts was struck from his horse. The combat on foot was quite long: they were both short men, he and Sersanders, of equal reach and equable tempers. As Adorne expected, Sersanders won. He smiled, riding heated back to the tent.
The display continued. Dusk came early in December: already the shadow of the Rock was crawling over the tilting-ground although the sun glowed yellow beyond, and the wind was only beginning to bite. Adorne moved. It was not wise to allow himself to become cold because he would be the last, of course, unless his fellow envoy forgot protocol and won too many fights. Sometimes, using his weight, Jehan Metteneye could unseat him. He had seen few others who could, skilled though some of them were. Anselm Adorne flung his cloak temporarily over his shoulders.
He won his remaining courses, knocking out a grinning Jehan in the first. He had to work hardest against Lindsay and Liddell, who was young. He could see, watching the youth Albany, who had had the teaching of him.
The Mêlée he took no part in. It was during that – forty men striking, grunting, squelching in the mud under a greying sky – that the lad Bonkle, at his side, said, ‘Have you heard the news, Ser Anselm?’
Anselm Adorne had known John Bonkle’s double family, Scots and Flemish, since the days of Robert Bonkle, that wily old merchant burgess of Edinburgh. Sanders Bonkle, Robert’s son, was a burgess of both Bruges and Edinburgh. Edward, the boy’s natural father, had been well known to the Scots queen from Guelders, who had made him both famous and rich as Provost of the church and hospice she founded in Edinburgh. The lad himself, though a bastard, had been sent to a Scots university and learned his business at the side of his uncle in Middleberg and Bruges.
Adorne had been pleased, although he had not said so, when Jannekin Bonkle had been offered commissions by vander Poele … by Nicholas de Fleury, and finally agreed to represent him in Scotland. He knew, from Sanders his uncle, how he fared, and quite a lot of what he was doing. Now Anselm Adorne said, ‘What news?’
‘From the borders of Burgundy. The to
wn of Liège has risen for France against the rule of the Duke, and has been attacked by the Duke’s army and gutted, the buildings burned. Hundreds are killed, or drowned in the Meuse, or dead of cold in the forests.’
Adorne was silent. Charles, Duke of Burgundy, was his master: his father had served the same family. He said, ‘I am sorry. Duke Charles has a heavy hand when he is angry.’ A cry rang out from the stand. The news was spreading. Liège was a rich trading town, a town like his own. Everyone had friends there.
‘So has the King of France,’ Jannekin said. ‘They say he secretly incited the rebellion, but when it happened, he was in the Duke’s power. He agreed to the destruction of Liège and his men also took part. Your niece is comforting her maid.’
‘De Fleury sent you to tell me?’ said Adorne. It came to him that the men who obeyed the Duke’s orders at Liège must have included the army leased him by Nicholas. Astorre was there, and Thomas, and perhaps even Tobias, their doctor. He added, ‘He must be concerned for his company. And for what it had to do.’
‘Nicholas de Fleury?’ Bonkle said. He paused. ‘He thought you should know.’
‘Yes. Thank you,’ said Anselm Adorne; and rode into the lists for the final bout. And immediately, as he had expected, the wave of comment lessened, for the slaughter at Liège had taken place far to the south, across the Narrow Sea, four weeks ago, and the culminating match in this contest – barring the token victory of the King, barring the last charming pageant of the children – was between himself and Simon de St Pol of Kilmirren.
He wondered, admiring the grace of man and mount pacing towards him, whether Simon had come to regret the magnificent loan he had accepted, or whether it meant more to him that he should be here, a single glittering figure drawing four thousand pairs of eyes in the dwindling light, the Scottish champion. He thought the latter.
The Unicorn Hunt: The Fifth Book of the House of Niccolo Page 11