Gemini

by Dorothy Dunnett

  ‘What!’ said Nicholas.

  ‘The Queen thought she should have some,’ said Henry Arnot over his shoulder. ‘Not my field. I needed an expert.’ There came the squeal of the key, and the rumble of a door beginning to open, followed by the Abbot’s voice showering someone with apologies. The someone came in, punctuating the flow with short, Teutonic reassurances. You could tell who it was, under the dirt, because he strode through the low door without stooping.

  ‘Oh!’ said Father Moriz, gazing at Nicholas.

  ‘It’s all right; you don’t need to worry; he’ll take them,’ said Abbot Henry. Adorne, damn him, was looking entertained.

  ‘Nicol will?’ said Father Moriz. He sounded cautious. Placed in the candlelight, he coughed as the Abbot pattered round him, shaking his tippet and banging off dust.

  The Abbot gave him a final blow and stepped back. ‘Your M. de Fleury. The Council’s secret adviser to the Queen.’

  Father Moriz’s pleased exclamation coincided with Nicholas’s fevered disclaimer. He scowled at Moriz, and at Abbot Henry, and finally at Anselm Adorne. ‘When did that happen?’ Nicholas said.

  ‘Before you arrived at the meeting. I’m sorry,’ Adorne said. ‘I know you’re tired of handling people. But—’

  ‘No,’ said Nicholas.

  ‘You speak her language. She likes you. You would have access to the young Princes—’

  ‘No,’ said Nicholas. ‘What am I, bloody Ada?’

  Moriz was examining the guns. Rare in the company of Henry Arnot, there was a short silence.

  I want the teachers sprung of your line to help instruct the poor fools sprung of mine. I mean to match you, child for child.

  Except that they were not just his children: they were all children.

  The Abbot said, ‘Well now, Nicol: don’t be daft. You’ll forgive me if I call you Nicol? They told me in Stirling you’d jib. Your friend said that, if you did, I was to send you to see her and get sorted.’

  The little bugger. ‘My friend? In Stirling?’

  ‘You’ve got so many with that kind of relationship? She’s been away, not wanting to court lawyer’s questions. But if you were to go now, with the guns, you would find her. Bel of Cuthilgurdy. Who in Heaven’s name else?’

  Who, indeed. She had been hiding from Julius. Moriz, who would realise that as well, had turned and was looking at them both. Nicholas said, speaking slowly because he was thinking so fast, ‘Of course, being in Stirling, you would know her.’

  Arnot nodded to Moriz. ‘Have you seen all you want? Shall we go?’ And, picking up the original candle, continued to Nicholas: ‘Not as her confessor, more’s the pity, but as a real friend to the monastery. Not all mothers feel that way, but she was happy for John. I can’t tell you how sad we felt when we lost him.’

  Adorne looked puzzled, but Moriz was genuinely astonished. He said, ‘Bel of Cuthilgurdy’s son was a monk at Cambuskenneth?’

  The Abbot said, ‘No one mentioned it? Of course, the Charteris family now have the title, but after John’s father died, Bel was generous with her gifts to the Abbey. It was kind, for they were young, and not very long married.’

  Adorne still conveyed friendly interest. He said, ‘I was told she had grandchildren.’

  He looked at Nicholas. Nicholas returned a blank face, behind which was sheer mutiny. Moriz said, his grating voice oddly subdued, ‘So perhaps she married twice. We should not probe. But, my friend Nicholas, for your own peace of mind, I think you must agree to go to Stirling to see her, at least.’

  ‘And since you are going,’ said Abbot Henry, ‘you might place us all in your debt by taking a few crates to a warehouse? The goods may be removed from here by night. It is an old smugglers’ route. The cellar tunnel leads to the Nor’ Loch. We discovered it when we acquired the house for the monastery.’

  A smugglers’ route, Nicholas would wager, that had seen a few barrels of illicit French wine bundled in by repentant sinners. No wonder there was a gleam in the Abbot’s bright eye. And he had induced Nicholas to go to Stirling with the handguns. And see Bel. And, undoubtedly, get involved with the Queen, whether he wished to or not, although that would not, to be accurate, be Arnot’s doing. Umar cast a long shadow.

  He found he was no longer resentful, but mysteriously lighter of heart. What was being asked of him was difficult. It was bloody unfair to plunge him into yet another quagmire of intrigue when he was barely disentangled from Albany. But it was the kind of adventure, the kind of risks that he loved. And he was good at working with people. And it might make a difference, at that.

  It was time to go. Moriz and the Abbot were chattering amicably on their way to the ladder. The light travelled with them. Adorne extinguished the cellar candles and stood, without immediately following. All Nicholas could see was the fairness of his face and his hair and his hands. Then Adorne moved thoughtfully over and surveyed him. ‘We place a great burden upon you, Nicholas. It is as well that you have these broad shoulders.’ He rapped them lightly, half smiling; then, spreading his fingers, ushered him after the others.

  It was when they had all four climbed from the cellars that Nicholas heard someone sneeze, and uttered an unthinking, ‘Bless you!’

  They all looked at him. The Abbot said, ‘Well, thank you, Nicol, but why?’

  It seemed that no one else had heard anything. The ghost of Tobie, perhaps. Or of some master smuggler long dead, athletic enough to have swum over the loch. Or nothing at all; in which case he, Nicholas, had left an unused blessing about. From him, blessings wouldn’t carry much weight: his forte was giving advice, and you couldn’t leave that behind you. And even if you could, there were some people who never took it.

  BEL OF CUTHILGURDY’S town house in Stirling was built of timber, and lay with others at the foot of the castle rock, which was so like that of Edinburgh. It was a district favoured by well-doing burghers: their neatly thatched premises with stables, bakehouse and well-head were set in swept yards and pleasant patches of grazing and orchard and herb-garden. The enclave was central enough, without being subject to the dusty traffic on the ridge leading up to the castle, or deafened by the clamour of the riverside wharves. Dame Bel’s house was not held in her name, and Nicholas, having duly delivered his crates, would hardly have found his way there without Adorne’s written direction.

  Adorne, of course, had seen quite a lot of Bel since she took to visiting his little daughter at Haddington. So had Kathi and Tobie, for the same reason. Even Jordan had called at the Priory once or twice, accompanying Sersanders, or Robin. From wherever he encountered Bel, Jordan always returned with a minding and some new, funny tale of her doings. He no longer called her his aunt, but there was an attachment, clear to see, between the boy and the elderly woman. Only Nicholas, absent in France during Bel’s stay in Edinburgh, and carefully absent ever since, had seen less of her than anyone, and had listened without comment to the reports that he heard. It was Julius who wished to excavate the St Pols and their attachments. He preferred to forget.

  The servant who opened Bel’s door had the speech of a local man rather than one you would associate with the St Pols of Kilmirren, and pointedly left Nicholas standing while he vanished inside with his name. But, almost immediately, the door opened again, and Bel herself stood on the threshold considering him, with her round, pugilistic face puckered about with glistening linen, and her short person as sturdy as when he first met her, companion to Lucia, Simon’s sister, in Portugal.

  ‘Aye,’ she said. ‘Thrawn as ever, I see. Well, ye’d better come in.’

  He was never sure what greeting she would allow. Bel resolved it, once in her parlour, by opening her arms. She was the first to break away, gently, and find a seat for him.

  ‘Bloody Henry Arnot,’ he said.

  ‘You think so. He’s a wise wee soul. It’s getting near time to stop all this nonsense. I’m getting too old, and so’s Jordan.’

  ‘Which Jordan?’ he said.

  ‘The on
e that didn’t have you for a father,’ Bel said.

  He got his breath back, and said, ‘I’m glad I didn’t meet his father, in that case.’

  ‘Are you? You don’t ever apply your brain to the St Pols, do you? If ye think Simon’s your father, then Jordan’s your grandfather, isn’t he?’

  ‘Moriz,’ said Nicholas. He had been stupid enough, recently, to put that into words to Father Moriz.

  ‘Aye. He’s Clémence’s confessor. Remember it. And if Master Julius wanted more evidence, he only has to compare Monseigneur Jordan and yourself, for I never saw two characters more alike.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Nicholas. It was childish to care. It was childish to mind, as he did, whenever Bel talked like this about … about Monseigneur Jordan.

  ‘It’s no trouble. He gets an idea, and won’t leave it. For him, every stitch in the cloth must be perfect. Give him an objective and he won’t notice who or what stands in his way till he’s finished.’

  ‘I’m like that?’ Nicholas said.

  ‘You were. You stayed a feckless apprentice until you were eighteen years old, because you knew that whatever challenge you chose, it would dominate your life, if you let it. Now maybe you’ve got your demon in hand, and if you have, you have Gelis and old man Jordan to thank for it. They both made you fight; and they both made you grow. Only Gelis did it for you, as well as herself; and Jordan did it for Simon.’ She broke off and looked at him quizzically. ‘Now you’re sorry you came and you want to go home.’

  ‘Not if you’re enjoying yourself,’ Nicholas said. ‘You got a parcel I sent?’

  She looked at him with a half-grudging appreciation, in which there was a great deal of fondness. ‘I got it. The Duchess Eleanor’s book, discreetly rewrapped and redirected, with all the French names covered over, in case. I appreciated the thought but, Nicol, anyone who has the time and the patience and the curiosity can follow my history easily enough. Every Scottish Archer knows that in France, Asquin stands for Erskine, and Échaut for Shaw, and Moncourt for Moncur. And that if my husband was John Dunbarrow of Cuthilgurdy, in France they’d spell it Dunbereau. Every Scottish Archer knows; and so do the sisters and cousins of Eleanor of the Tyrol, because she and I went to Paris together when I was a widow, and she was twelve years old.’

  ‘But you didn’t go with her to the Tyrol, because you married again,’ Nicholas said. ‘You had John by your first marriage, and your daughter Claude by your second, in France. John didn’t marry, but Claude married a Scot with an estate on the Loire, and gave you your grandchildren.’

  ‘Grandchild,’ Bel said. ‘There is only one left; the one you saw. You didna go to Coulanges that time just to find out about Jodi’s nurse Clémence. You wanted to know how she connected with the Moncur family of Chouzy, in the same valley, and how the Moncur family connected with me. You probably found out as well. Clémence is wholly French, and related to another Moncur by a wife’s marriage. I knew she’d make a fine job of Jodi, until you and Gelis came to your senses. I didna ken you’d go bursting into Chouzy, or that Robin and Dr Tobie would see you there.’

  ‘You’ve forgotten. I didn’t go of my own volition to Chouzy; I was taken there,’ Nicholas said. ‘After having my bones smashed by the thugs of your esteemed friend my grandfather. I didn’t need to visit your daughter. I’d confirmed it all at La Guiche. I’d even guessed about Andreas’s mistress, with the palatial houses in Lyons and Blois. I don’t know why everyone fusses about my divining, and no one prevented that pair from breeding. Do you suppose my grandfather was trying to kill me?’

  ‘No,’ said Bel. ‘If he’d meant you to be dead, you’d be dead. I jalouse he wanted you taught a lesson, or held up, or both, and someone exceeded their orders.’

  ‘And,’ Nicholas said, ‘does the same apply to Simon and Henry? I have just antagonised them both to the point where one or other will certainly try to commit murder, and Monseigneur will probably let them, perceiving my usefulness finished. I suppose I ought to go back to Flanders.’

  He thought she would take him up on that, but she didn’t. The battle light left her face, and she exclaimed. ‘Ah, no, no, Nicol. Is that what all this is about? Henry? I’m mortally sorry. Simon should never have been sent for.’

  ‘He had to come back some time,’ Nicholas said. ‘And Henry had to deal with it some time. I just didn’t want other issues dragged in to confuse matters. Now, as you say, perhaps it doesn’t matter what people know.’

  ‘Because Henry’s opinion of you won’t alter now?’

  Nicholas looked at her. He said, ‘Bel: what in God’s name do you think Henry’s opinion of me matters? Nothing matters to Henry but the approval of Simon’s father and Simon. There were other ways he might have earned that, but they’re gone. Now, if he can only obtain it by attacking me, then he will. Hence, I do see, an exposé of his family by you, or by me, or by Julius can’t make anything worse.’

  ‘It could unite them,’ she said. ‘It would unite them, of course, for all the worst reasons, but that’s maybe better than nothing. Or don’t you think so?’

  He was silent. ‘I don’t know,’ he said.

  ‘No,’ said Bel. ‘Even you can’t quite think through that one. But loneliness, I have to tell you, is a terrible thing. A man alone will do from a whim what a tribe of villains would rarely do, even for profit. A tribe of adventurers will survive, but very few men can face fear and self-hatred on their own.’

  She wasn’t talking of Henry; she was talking of the fat, solitary man who was his grandfather. Nicholas said, ‘I really don’t know, Bel. I want the same thing for them that you do, but I can’t do much more. I won’t have my family hurt.’

  She smiled. She said, ‘They won’t be. I have seldom seen any family as secure as the one you have made, Nicholas. I have to pray that nothing dissolves it. But if you didn’t take risks, the boy wouldn’t worship you as he does.’

  ‘So that I am really here to impress Jodi,’ Nicholas said. ‘That is what you are supposed to be doing: appealing to me to place my dashing services at the small Danish feet of the Queen?’

  ‘No. I knew you would do it,’ said Bel. ‘You didn’t come here for that. You came to find out how I can stomach a man who does what Jordan does, and love you as well.’ She stopped, presumably reading his face. She said, ‘Did I have to put that into words?’

  ‘It helps,’ he said. He cleared his throat. ‘I hoped you knew I felt the same. But I couldn’t pretend to want to be as close as you are to Simon or his father. Long ago, perhaps; but not now.’

  ‘Then I’ve not properly explained what I feel for them,’ Bel said. ‘It’s not what you’d call unalloyed love or respect. It’s more the same feeling, I jalouse, that you have. You’ve been harsh with them, as they have with you. In spite of everything, you still feel protective. They’re your family. I feel the same, in a different way. I can carry the burden. So can you. Just so’s ye ken, as we were saying, that you’re not on your own.’

  Someone else had said that, when it mattered. The miracle was, he had long since realised, that he had never been alone; even in Poland. You tried to safeguard other people, and, all the time, the lifeline was working both ways.

  Chapter 36

  A quene suld be richt werraye sapient,

  Of gud maner, and chaist of hir entent,

  Borne of gud blud, obeyand to the king

  And besy in her barnis nurysing.

  MARGARET, QUEEN OF Scots, received the younger Burgundian in her apartments at Stirling Castle, with the three men who constituted her private council about her.

  She had first met Nicholas de Fleury when she was an inexperienced little child-bride of twelve, excluded from the family games of the King and his siblings, and suffering James’s untutored petting through the long evenings when the Court entertained itself, with the help of amusing, musical friends such as the Burgundian. De Fleury could speak in the Danish-German of her father and brothers: she could converse with him. He had be
en very correct, but also easy to talk to. Sandy had been smitten.

  After that, the Burgundian had come back at intervals, but she herself had been less at Court; and during the present long stay, she had followed the policy they had all deemed to be best, and had seen little of M. de Fleury, except on formal occasions. By this time, as he would have noticed, she had grown from a pale, sharp-eyed waif to an active young woman with a mind of her own, and an acquired grasp of statecraft. It was necessary. The King her father could hardly have realised how much. It was one of her personal weapons, along with the stock of jewels and clothes which she obtained through her excellent revenues, and also from her husband, as she presented him with each son. To begin with, she had believed that all husbands behaved as hers did. Then she had discovered what else was different about James, and his brothers and sisters.

  It might have frightened someone without her kind of Scandinavian determination. Only gradually had she come to realise that the truth was also known to the old men who surrounded James, and that they were working, in ways she had not noticed, to make life tolerable for her. Then, as they saw how her nature developed, they helped her choose her own private council, surrounding herself with astute men—Shaw, Colville, McClery—who were agreeable to James, but also attached to her interests.

  The King’s men had continued to be helpful. It was Dr Andreas who explained to the King how marital duty might damage a pregnancy, and who advised on the required interval of abstinence after every delivery. She was eternally grateful to Dr Andreas, and Dr Tobias, and Master Scheves, who was now an Archbishop. At the same time, too much frustration could send James into one of his painful passions, when he forgot himself. He was always contrite when it was over, and when, as was only right, she had pointed out to him what he had done. Her father—her poor father, who had just died—used to say she was a saint.

  She stayed at Stirling most of the time, or Linlithgow. The boys, for their own security, were always in Stirling. All of them had received excellent fostering, and the care of a good married matron in the royal tradition—Mistress Preston, with Betha Sinclair and the wife of Dr Tobias to call upon for advice. As their mother, she herself saw her sons often enough when they were babies, but did not find them interesting, any more than she was personally devoted to important jewels and fine clothes. The production of heirs was one of the requirements of ruling. She took the oldest son in hand when he was five, and she was officially appointed his guardian. Now he was eight, he had his own household and teachers for everything: academic, religious and military. She took care to spend time with him regularly and check on his training.