The Unicorn Hunt: The Fifth Book of the House of Niccolo

by Dorothy Dunnett

  ‘My parrot?’ said M. de Fleury.

  ‘I am told it arrived on the Ghost. Perhaps you were not aware. In any case, when my lady expressed a longing to buy it, Master Crackbene thought you would have no objection.’

  ‘I didn’t know. Does it talk?’ de Fleury said. The parrot looked at him evilly.

  ‘Not a word. My lady is planning to teach it.’

  ‘A welcome for my lord,’ said the Lady of Dean Castle, blushing. ‘M. de Fleury, we are receiving you with small ceremony. Will you forgive us? Once the mirror is hung …’

  ‘Holy Mother,’ said her uncle. ‘Never mind that. I need the nail and somewhere to rest –’

  ‘Here,’ said M. de Fleury. He put on his hat, lifted the book-cushion on top and, laying the lozen nail on top of that, walked to the ladder.

  ‘It isn’t tall enough,’ said the King’s uncle James. ‘Put a book on top. Turn over the handbasin there with the lugs. Mary, are those your red stockings? Now the nail. Now come here, and I’ll let down the mirror. What –?’

  The scream this time came from Dame Betha, invoking the Trinity in the vernacular. It had been preceded by a clang and a whipping of wing-feathers. The cage-door hung open. ‘The wee hoor’s flitted!’ exclaimed Dame Betha, still in the vernacular.

  All those present looked up except James of Auchterhouse, embracing the mirror, who was already higher than anyone, and Nicholas de Fleury, standing under the towering skewer of brochettes on his head with only his contorted mouth and chin to indicate his reaction.

  ‘Oh!’ said the lady Mary. ‘Oh! Oh! He’ll eat the hangings!’

  Phemie choked. Katelijne, who had been attempting to keep a grave face, burst into laughter. Dame Betha, pushing her hand into the cage, extracted a handful of cereal and tossed it over the floor. Katelijne said, ‘We need a net and two brooms and some gloves and three eggs. M. de Fleury? What do parrots like?’

  ‘Other parrots,’ he said. Under the weight of the mirror, the pyramid on his head had sunk heavily, bulging out and overlapping the brim of his hat: his voice sounded nasal. The King’s uncle, hammer in hand, was attempting to knock the lozen into the wall. The muffled voice added, ‘Sing to it. Where is it?’

  ‘On the bed-rail. We could sing it the laud. Phemie’s gone for the brooms. Oh, the windows. My lady Mary, do you want …’

  The lady Mary had no intention of losing her parrot. She ran to both shutters and closed them. Darkness fell. The noise of hammering abruptly stopped, with a surprised oath, and the muffled voice under the hat made a remark. It could be deciphered as a desire to know whether or not he was now wholly suffocated and actually dead.

  ‘No,’ said Katelijne, feeling her way to the tinderbox. She collided with Dame Betha doing the same and fell to her knees in a patch of gravelly parrot-food. The parrot, which had been consuming it, blundered croaking into her hair, started away, and could be heard hurtling about the room like wet washing. The door opened, admitting Phemie, daylight, and an assortment of servants with implements. On a shrieked order from the Countess of Arran the door was slammed shut and darkness fell again. Amid the hubbub of voices the demands of James of Auchterhouse on the ladder remained the most penetrating. The parrot couldn’t be heard, nor could Master Gregorio or M. de Fleury, who appeared to be voiceless. Katelijne lit a candle.

  The parrot flew up to the ceiling, batted frantically along its leaping shadows and, shooting downwards and sideways, attached itself with two horny claws to the bosom of the King’s uncle’s doublet. It then proceeded methodically to wrench the buttons off with its beak.

  At that point, Katelijne stopped looking in order to breathe. She could hear Phemie wheezing beside her, and even Master Gregorio, although he had picked up the broom she let drop and started forward with it. Someone threw the net, but not high enough; it came down and coped the cage and Dame Betha together. Looking up for a second, Katelijne saw the astonished, sensible face of the Earl of Orkney’s widowed daughter appearing in strips through the bars like cut cheese. Then the ladder started to rock.

  They rushed to steady it, but circumstances were against them. Beating at the flapping bird on his chest, Hearty James had dropped lozen and hammer and forgotten, for the moment, where he was. His slipping weight pulled at the ladder and dislodged the mirror which had been resting partly against it, and partly upon the Pisalike tower on its human foundation. The King’s uncle started to fall. The ladder slipped sideways. The mirror, heavily tilting, was saved by a series of scrambles by M. de Fleury who, scuffling below, managed to engage the help of the wall to support part of it.

  The ladder crashed. The King’s uncle fell, his doublet gaping, and was safely caught by many assiduous hands. M. de Fleury, teetering about, hands outspread, chin upraised, came slowly to a halt, the mirror resting perfectly balanced between the uncertain pile on his head and the wall. It could be seen that his mouth was open. Someone – Phemie? – started a round of applause. Katelijne’s ribs hurt.

  The parrot landed, with a thud, on the top of the mirror. The man below made a slight move, compensating. The parrot looked down. Then it sprang across and posed on the pyramid, its tail spread, its great oyster beak confronting the mirror. It pecked the glass, its eye lascivious, and pecked it again. ‘Hijita de mi alma,’ it said.

  The King’s uncle, and those who were helping him, paid no attention. ‘It spoke!’ said his niece. ‘What did it say?’

  Master Gregorio knew. His laughter fading, he opened his mouth. The Atlas under the hat spoke before him. ‘¿Salud, chiquito?’ said M. de Fleury, his voice astonishingly distinct.

  The parrot pecked the glass anxiously, a thread of white encircling each pupil. It exclaimed, its voice raucous: ‘My treasured ones! Kiss me, my angels! Come to me, my little mice!’

  Nicholas de Fleury moved without thinking. The pyramid tilted. The parrot, disturbed, slid muttering off. The mirror, inclining backwards, began to run down the wall at a speed which human flesh could not check and M. de Fleury did not try to. He stepped away, and the mirror – glass and white paste and backing – crashed to the floor. A stench of musk rose, causing the parrot to cough. While it was doing so, Dame Betha threw her handkerchief over it, and flung it into the cage. The door shut and latched. The parrot put a claw on its swing and shoved it petulantly. ‘¡Demonio!’ it remarked.

  ‘It swears!’ said the King’s sister.

  A handbasin, a book-cushion, a book, and a pair of red stockings arranged themselves in a pile at her feet, followed by the remains of a hat. The contrite face of Nicholas de Fleury confronted her. ‘I am afraid,’ he said, ‘that this is not the bird that you wanted. Let me buy it back. A full refund for the bird and the mirror.’

  Katelijne Sersanders prodded Master Gregorio in the back. ‘It’s not his fault. Tell him,’ she said. ‘He owes nothing. Tell him.’

  She had to prod him twice. Then Gregorio said, ‘No. If he wants the parrot, let him have it.’ He spoke with punctilio, although his face was still glossy with laughter.

  Katelijne said, ‘Why? Tell me?’

  ‘To make me happy,’ said M. de Fleury. ‘I always wanted a parrot. Do you need three eggs for anything?’

  She was diverted at once. ‘They were to juggle with. Can you juggle?’

  ‘For you, anything,’ said M. de Fleury. ‘Put them back in the shells and I’ll amaze you.’

  Chapter 20

  THE PERFORMANCE being over, there followed the business.

  James of Auchterhouse, paying in kind for his recent amusement, shared a flask with his good-humoured visitor and emerged from the encounter much sobered, his eyes dwelling in thought on the timid person of the Countess his niece.

  The talk at table with Betha and Phemie proved to be as instructive as it was entertaining, dealing in a forthright Sinclair way with the question of the little Queen’s dowry. Which, if it included the island of Orkney, was about to affect the Earl and all the Sinclairs his kinsmen. M. de Fleury knew the family Zeno who
se forebear Antonio had sailed to a land west of Greenland with their forebear, Earl Henry of Orkney. Eighty years ago, they might have found Cathay. It was agreed that if they had only managed to set up a trading-post, it would have brought the price of silk down a treat.

  The topic was raised of Sir Anselm Adorne and his daughter in England. The Countess talked about her legendary royal aunt in the Tyrol, friend and half-sister of Auchterhouse, and aunt to the King. The subject of families reminded the Countess of the happy news she had already received. She returned to it.

  ‘A fine boy, you say. And Gelis is well, but not yet in public for – for the reason you tell me.’

  ‘The bridal oil too close to the birth-tray. I beg your grace’s forgiveness for mentioning it. I have already had a severe reprimand from our priest.’

  The little Countess was not displeased. She said, her skin enlivened with interest, ‘And the name? We hoped you would call the boy James. Or Thomas, perhaps. It is a saintly name, Thomas.’

  ‘Or Nicholas?’ said Katelijne. ‘It is a saintly name, Nicholas.’ She had been piqued, Gregorio knew, because this was one question Nicholas always avoided.

  He couldn’t evade answering now. He didn’t try, but sat at table with his ringed hands before him and his dimples marshalled below the black velours cap now fitted over the hair his bodyservant was trained to cut flat. The unicorn horn had been worth three thousand florins. The diamond in his cap was worth two.

  He said, ‘Naming the boy was a difficult task, with duty and inclination leaning sometimes towards James, and sometimes towards Florence or Franck, to honour the house of van Borselen. In the end, we allowed Duke Charles to decide. He sent water from Jordan, and we baptised the child with it and after it. The boy’s name is Jordan de Fleury.’

  The gaze of the girl Katelijne would have made paper curl. She didn’t say anything. It was the Princess who spoke with surprise. ‘The name is unusual. Yet we know of the vicomte de Ribérac, who must have been baptised thus for the same reason. We shall set aside a gift for the boy and his mother. Tell his mother we wish to hear from her. Tell her that our own lord is already preparing to cross the sea to our side, and we hope she will share in our happiness.’

  ‘I shall tell her, your grace,’ said Nicholas gratefully.

  Presently, while the others played cards, Gregorio sat by the fire and chatted with Mistress Phemie Dunbar about small, pleasant matters to do with letters and music, and the friends they had in common elsewhere. Only at the end did she say, ‘One seldom meets a man as versatile as your M. de Fleury. You are close friends?’

  It was not a question he was ready to answer. He spoke, a little ashamed of his reticence. ‘He follows his bent. So far, I follow it too. How far, depends on Nicholas.’

  The undistinguished features looked thoughtful. ‘He does not welcome help or advice?’

  Gregorio paused. He said, ‘The answer, I’m afraid, is that he doesn’t. He has reached where he is with nothing behind him: no great institution, no tradition, no kinsmen. Such an achievement brings self-sufficiency.’

  ‘It brings isolation,’ said Mistress Phemie. ‘You know there is a convent of the Cistercian Order at Emmanuel?’

  They had passed it, on their way to Berecrofts. Mystified, Gregorio nodded.

  ‘There is a child there,’ Mistress Phemie said. ‘A love child, of Joneta Hamilton’s. Have you heard of Joneta Hamilton?’

  He had, from Julius. He had been able to guess, when his head cleared, exactly how Nicholas had been employed, that first night in Stirling. Gregorio said slowly, ‘Yes. But not of the child. Is it his?’

  To his surprise, pain crossed her face. ‘No!’ she said. She touched his hand. ‘No, of course not. It is far too old, and black-haired and of quite a different mould. No. But if he does not know of it, some troublemaker may take pleasure one day in telling him, should he continue to seek the girl’s company. No doubt you know men who would like to provoke him.’

  ‘You are asking me to break the news first?’ Gregorio said.

  Through his alarm, he realised she was smiling. She said, ‘I shouldn’t presume. I have told you only so that you can protect him a little, at need. I do not want to know what is wrong. But if you do, it may guide you.’

  He wondered how, hardly acquainted with Nicholas, she knew that something was wrong. He thought of the Nicholas of nearly a decade ago: the incorrigible apprentice; the young married man evincing the first gleams of brilliance; and, pervading it all, the aura of boundless goodwill. Then had come the double blow of the death of Umar and the betrayal of Gelis, after which self-sufficiency had changed – she was right – into ruthless detachment. Thinking of his long vigil that night of his wedding in Bruges, Gregorio was swept once again by the overwhelming pity he had felt for the man, emerging from his wife’s room to stand motionless at the window while the first light of dawn changed into brutal, dazzling day. ‘It’s Simon’s child, Nicholas!’ she had called. When he had told Margot of it, she had wept.

  Gregorio wondered how Margot did tonight, nursing another woman’s unwanted child; and whether her task was worse than his. But she had been right to go, as he had been right to come here, despite his increasing apprehension. He should have come the first time. Or perhaps he was wrong, and the uncomplicated, self-centred character of Julius had been what Nicholas had wanted and perhaps needed then. Julius would have heard, delighted, this tale of the Hamilton girl, and – carrying it crowing to Nicholas – would have enabled him to respond carelessly – genuinely perhaps – in the same vein. Whereas Gregorio could not imagine himself being able to mention it at all.

  The company retired. Gregorio, procrastinating, climbed the stairs some time after his bedfellow, and entered the room they were to share with reluctance. ‘¡Buenos días, caballero!’ remarked a sly voice at his shoulder. He whirled.

  The parrot. He had forgotten. He had forgotten the scene with the hat. He had forgotten Nicholas de Fleury, the comedian.

  He was there too, sitting crosslegged on a stool, wearing his ruined hat and a length of pink bed-curtain. He was nibbling a fig, and there were others in the palm of his hand. He and the parrot were staring at one another. The parrot, Gregorio was thankful to see, was in its cage.

  ‘Well hurry up, I need you,’ said Nicholas, still gazing at the cage.

  ‘I’ll get the ladder,’ said Gregorio with a surge of relief.

  ‘Don’t think you’re being funny: it may come to that. No. You’ve got a mirror. Hold it up to the cage and let it see itself.’

  ‘What with? It bites!’ Gregorio said. He pulled out the mirror and stood. ‘Where are my gloves?’

  ‘Never mind your execrable gloves,’ the other man said, his eyes fixed on the parrot. ‘You heard it. You understood what it was saying. It was talking Spanish. It was meant for me. It was talking in a style we both know, and using phrases we both remember. Go on. Whose?’

  Gregorio sat down, holding the mirror. ‘Ochoa de Marchena,’ he said faintly.

  ‘Ochoa de Marchena, Spanish shipmaster of the Ghost, which disappeared off the African coast with a cabin full of African parrots and hats, and a cargo containing three mule-loads of African gold belonging to us. Yes.’

  ‘His parrot?’ said Gregorio.

  ‘His voice,’ said Nicholas de Fleury. ‘So let us re-create the cabin. So let us hear what he has been sent to say.’

  The answer was nothing. The night wore on, the figs were shared, the parrot fell in love with its reflection and continued to utter endearments to its new friend but said nothing else except once, when it repeated Holy Virgin! in the voice of Nicholas, several minutes after mistaking his thumb for a fig.

  Gregorio said, ‘We were wrong.’

  The parrot’s friend took off toga and hat and removed an ostrich feather from behind his ear. He said, ‘It’s Ochoa’s vocabulary. It’s Valencian dialect.’

  ‘African parrots are grey,’ Gregorio said. ‘Grey and red.’

 
There was an unexpected silence. The other man said, ‘So they are.’

  Gregorio looked at him. He said, ‘I was wrong, wasn’t I? I thought you had some deep plans for Scotland. But you do really fancy laying hands on the gold. And that business about the Tyrol, and their power-hold on the highways to Italy, and their nuisance value to Burgundy and to the Germanies and to France … You are going back. You’re not staying in Scotland after all, are you?’

  ‘And that’s what they call logic in Padua?’ The padrone’s voice was different from the comedian’s. The padrone said, ‘I’m interested in the Bank, but I employ other people to polish its door-knob. If the situation in the Tyrol looks promising, if the Vatachino become a little too vivacious in Rome or the Levant, if the parrot comes up with a name and address – I have you, don’t I, to go back and deal with it?’

  Gregorio felt himself flush. He said, ‘What were you doing with the King’s uncle?’

  ‘I wish I could shock you. But we were discussing the Boyds.’

  Gregorio picked up the bed-hanging and threw it over the cage. The parrot swore. ‘How much did you tell him?’ he said. ‘Hearty James doesn’t care for the family, but his niece and Tom Boyd are married. He’ll warn her.’

  ‘He has,’ the other man said. He settled back into bed, clasping the feather. ‘She came to me later on for advice. If – for some undisclosed reason – she found herself having to pay a short trip to the Continent, would the van Borselen be prepared to receive her?’

  ‘And you said?’ Gregorio asked.

  ‘That Henry van Borselen was old; and Wolfaert’s new wife was a Bourbon; and my own wife was in delicate health. But …’

  The feather twirled.

  ‘But?’ said Gregorio.

  ‘But that I was sure that Anselm Adorne would be happy to have her. So what about Beltrees tomorrow? I have to leave early: I want to call at Lucia’s old house, and then Semple’s. You could come, or you could meet me at Beltrees. Bring the parrot, why not.’