Gemini

by Dorothy Dunnett

  Henry had agreed in the end. It didn’t matter whether or not Henry agreed, so long as he stopped interfering.

  Once settled at Home, however, it was disappointing to obtain no result from their vigilance. Although St Pol took his men and made himself responsible for patrolling the river at several fords—Carham and Wark, Coldstream and Norham—there was no sign of de Fleury, and it began to seem as if he might have made the crossing already. In which case there was nothing for it but to wait for him to return. A journey between York and the Tweed would take several days in each direction, with a stay of unknown length in the middle. They might have to wait for ten days.

  It was not so unpleasant, putting off time. June moved into July. The weather was warm, and the fishing less good than it should be, but there was other sport to be had. At the castle, they relieved the boredom with contests. As the most experienced jouster in Home, Simon had no difficulty winning the prizes, modest though they might be. And he had to admit that Henry also looked well in the saddle, with his brilliant armour, and the hair and eyes so like his own. One of the better archers was Constantine Malloch, whose estate was nearby; but his son had no style; and Henry seldom went near them these days. The girl had been the attraction.

  There were quite a few girls in the township, and inside the castle they drank somewhat, and gambled and told stories. Henry was about all the time, but knew better than to interrupt. Occasionally Simon thought he looked sullen, and reminded him sharply how lucky he was. He was pleased when Henry won things. The day might come when, fit as he was, he himself would succumb to age. With Henry before them, people would not forget how his father had been.

  De Fleury didn’t come. What came was a messenger, bursting into the Castle with news. The bulk of the English army had left York, marching north. It was approaching Newcastle, Alnwick, Berwick. The captain called his lieutenants together, but Simon hardly heard what they said. Perhaps de Fleury’s intentions had changed. Suppose de Fleury had stayed, and had joined the English army, marching with Albany. He couldn’t get at him then.

  Simon hesitated, and settled for remaining at Home. Back through the same route, the note had suggested. It might still be true.

  MESSENGERS ALSO CAME regularly to Anselm Adorne, some of them from Lochmaben. About this time, with a very few men, he left Linlithgow and rode quickly and quietly to Upsettlington, where he avoided the laird’s house, but entered the purlieus of the church. There, he made himself known to the Rector, Will Bell, who had attended St Andrews at the same time as Archie, now Abbot of Holyrood.

  Adorne didn’t stay long. By the time he left to go to ground, he had found out all he wanted, down to the beat of the river patrols. He had asked Bell not to speak of his visit, or not at least until he returned home. Very few knew that Adorne was due to come to the Tweed—Nicholas and Andro, and the Council in Edinburgh. Even Bell had not been told the true story. The negotiation with Albany was too delicate.

  Unlike the St Pols, Anselm Adorne had the advantage of knowing exactly where Nicholas de Fleury proposed to recross the river. He was also better placed to calculate how long the double journey might take. If Nicholas had to return without help, it could take a long time.

  A long time, but not too long, with any luck. An English army marching from York would take days to get to the Border, and longer to draw in its northern contingents. Even if it took Nicholas two weeks to bring out what was necessary—the army’s numbers and plans, Albany’s intentions—it would still be in time. News could be transmitted to Edinburgh and to all the relevant strongholds in hours. Anything Nicholas could tell them would be priceless.

  Adorne could not hope to collect him from the trackless moors of the English interior, but he could be on hand to help when Nicholas and Andro came to the river. So, lying day after day, night after night, watching the river-mouth of the Till down from Norham, Adorne subscribed to a doctrine of patience. It served him for a while. But when the English army actually arrived on the Border, and settled on the Tweed opposite Berwick, increasing daily, Anselm Adorne began to lose his detachment.

  He had known that Nicholas might not return: this large, calm man he had watched grow from boyhood and whose value, after many acrimonious clashes, he had learned to appreciate. The invitation to York, he now began to fear, had never been genuine. Nicholas had been killed because he was troublesome. To die in such a way was not ignoble. It was harder to accept that death was not reserved for grand causes. The countryside was full of masterless men who would kill for a horse.

  IN FACT, NICHOLAS had lost his horse, by shattering mischance, just as he and Andro were about to part company. It was pure accident: it stumbled and fell on uneven ground, breaking its own neck and throwing him heavily. He got up and stood, intending to decide what to do once his head cleared. His head didn’t clear, and Andro simply pulled him up behind him, jettisoning everything he carried except for his weapons and money.

  The horse didn’t like the double burden, and slowed. He must get another, immediately, or get down and let Andro go on. In town, horses were easy to come by. Here, there was nothing. He couldn’t even remember seeing a farm: just a lot of warm, empty countryside with happy larks trilling too high to be seen. Lucky larks.

  Andro, thinking along the same lines, said, ‘Listen for cattle, or dogs. There. Do you hear it? Barking.’

  Nicholas heard. It came from behind, and was blessedly some distance off. Fortunately, he didn’t have to explain, because Andro had realised what it was. ‘Bloody hell!’

  He twisted round and stared at Nicholas, and Nicholas, who couldn’t see very well, attempted to think. He had had concussion before. It wore off. But before that, they had to separate, fast. Wodman should stay with the horse, which could probably outrun the hounds with one rider. Gloucester’s men couldn’t detain him in any case: there was nothing to connect him to Nicholas. Nicholas himself had only to hide.

  Wodman worked it all out for himself anyway. He made for and splashed over a stream, and then located a neighbouring peat bog at which he halted, dismounted, and manhandled Nicholas to the ground. From there, he pushed him down to the floor of the cutting and heaved the stack of peats thudding down over him.

  ‘Will that do?’ he said. He had hardly spoken throughout. The barking was now very much louder.

  Nicholas said, ‘Are you mad? Of course not. Good luck.’

  Nicholas lay, as under a mound of heavy, cold, malodorous blankets, and listened to Wodman’s horse squelch quickly away. The dogs arrived very soon after that, and he heard men’s voices, and the tread of horses, and splashing. Then there came a shout, and more baying, followed by a concerted sound of hooves on the far bank of the stream. Presently, both the hooves and the barking receded.

  Wodman must have laid a fresh trail. In any case, the water had baffled the hounds. The peat would have confounded them, too. Clever Andro. Clean Andro. Andro wasn’t going to be dark brown and stinking for all the foreseeable future. The new Charetty colours: pea green and burnt umber.

  He managed, in between vomiting, to improve on his covering, and give himself air. He hoped it wouldn’t rain. He felt, in general, gloomy. He wondered if, having failed to catch Andro, the men would come back the same way. Or if, having caught Andro and tortured him, they would certainly come back the same way. He thought not. He thought of Andro these days as someone like Crackbene, or le Grant, whom he trusted to do what was right.

  At any rate, Wodman now carried the family silver. The dispatch from the front. The report of all Nicholas had discovered. He hoped to God he remembered it. Part of it was simple enough: the probable size of the army at York; the numbers still to arrive at Durham and Alnwick and Berwick. First target: Berwick, employing heavy artillery, and allowing time to warn Albany’s friends that he was about to make for the throne. Given enough popular support, they would then invade up the East March, and take the King. Alternative: if disappointed in Albany’s friends and threatened by a Scots army, a probable
pitched battle at Coldstream, with Norham prepared as a base.

  At that point, Andro’s reaction had been one of disgusted alarm. He had already expressed himself—they all had—on the subject of Albany’s volte-face in his attitude to the English. ‘So he does plan to usurp the throne, the little bastard. And that’s the hell of an army. That’s the biggest for decades. What’s Edward thinking of?’

  ‘His obituary, some say. There’s more.’

  ‘What?’

  And so he told him. He remembered the sick look on Andro’s face, turned towards him. ‘After all that show of patriotism, he bought himself the throne by promising Scotland to Edward?’ And after a space he had said, ‘Once they know that, no one will follow him.’

  He had spoken with satisfaction, as if it hadn’t occurred to him that few would follow Albany anyway, except for personal profit, and that these few might not care who was overlord. There had been no time to dwell on that; or on Albany’s reasons, or his uncertainties; or what could be done about it. That would have to rest with the small group of dedicated advisers who knew the King and his brother through and through. Later, Andro had asked who else was with Albany and Nicholas had mentioned everyone he had noticed: not the Earl of Douglas; not Holland; but he had seen several Douglases, leaving York, and one of the two Alexander Jardines, who had ridden past him, kicking dirt in his face. For sure, this visit had done Sandy no favours. And he had seen—he thought he had seen—Jamie Boyd.

  Andro had expressed disbelief. ‘Jamie? The Princess’s son? He’s barely twelve!’

  ‘Still,’ Nicholas said. ‘And someone called him Lord Boyd. The old man is dead. It must be Jamie.’ Andro looked shocked, but not horrified. Nicholas had been horrified, and still was.

  In all this, he had made sure of one thing. If Andro got back without him, he was to repeat what he knew to no one except the innermost circle. It was too explosive. It could set off a wave of violence in either direction: a torrent of Anglophile traders with a good personal connection in Leighton Buzzard, or a host of Wallaces led by Blind Harry, baying for his former champion’s blood.

  Baying. There was none at the moment. Nicholas drowsed, and woke dizzily, and drowsed once again, vaguely aware of what was happening and annoyed by it. Finally he let go and sank into some sort of oblivion.

  When he woke, it was quiet; and he felt both better and worse. His eyes had cleared, which was good, and so had most of the nausea; his headache was clangorous but not mind-deadening. He could think. At the same time, pushing his way from the peats, he found himself shivering. Whatever happened, he couldn’t stay here for the night. Indeed, there was no point for, by now, Wodman would be dead or far away. He fervently hoped far away, on a fresh horse, and settling down to carry his information on the long, long ride by the route they had already decided, through northern England and up the Till valley to the Tweed, and Scotland, and safety.

  There was no reason why Nicholas shouldn’t follow him, once he had acquired a horse. No doubt later on he would also be the better for food, but he preferred not to think of that now. Anyway, for God’s sake, he was resourceful. If he weren’t, he would hardly have survived until now. The sooner he got out, the sooner he’d be back in the game.

  The game. Once, it was the term he found reassuring to apply to almost everything that he chose to do: to trade, to war; to the moves and counter-moves, even, for the avoidance of war. But not after Nancy. Not now.

  He forgot to be pleased that he had got into and out of York and had escaped both beheading and hanging. He began to fret over what might go wrong in Scotland without him.

  IN EDINBURGH, JUST before the end of the third week in July, unauthorised news was brought to the King that the English army was fully operational in its camp at Tweedmouth and about to begin a bombardment of Berwick. The same messenger, awed to find himself with the King (he had been let in by mistake, at a shift change), confirmed that the English were led by their King’s brother, Richard of Gloucester. He added, carefully, that he was sorry to report that early rumours seemed to be true, and that his grace the Duke of Albany had come from France to join the English attack, and was in the van of the army with Gloucester.

  The shouting from the King’s chamber brought in his ushers. His ministers of state were haled in thereafter. Within the hour, the proclamation had issued. The incomplete troop now assembling on the Burgh Muir was to march south to fight the Auld Enemy. And James of Scotland would command it himself.

  The waiting was over; the period of grace had come to an end. Now they had to know Albany’s intentions. Now, Nicholas de Fleury had to be found. A rider was sent, sparing nothing, to Upsettlington, to find and notify Anselm Adorne.

  HUME, BESIEGED BY messengers, only heard about Adorne’s mysterious visit after he’d gone. According to a lieutenant from Wedderburn, Lord Cortachy had been conducting an ambush near Upsettlington with a handful of men. Verra secret, it was. A trap for the English, belikes. Now he had left.

  Henry had been on patrol several times at Upsettlington. Simon sought him out. ‘Did you know this?’

  Once, Henry had had only three expressions: bullying, defiant, or sulky. In the last year or two he had acquired one which Simon detested: you could almost call it exasperation. Henry said, ‘No, I didn’t. No one mentioned it. Anyway, he seems to have gone home.’

  ‘Has he? Because his tents are not there? I’m glad you’re sure. I’m not,’ Simon said. ‘Have his horses gone, can you tell me? Are his tents really packed, or have they just been set up elsewhere? Do you know why I’m asking?’

  ‘No,’ said Henry.

  Sometimes, he asked to have his face smacked. Simon said, with force, ‘Because I can think of two explanations. Adorne has gone to meet de Fleury. Or he’s gone to change sides like de Fleury. He’s gone to join Gloucester’s army.’

  ‘You think so?’ said Henry.

  ‘Yes, I think so,’ said Simon. ‘And I’m going to find out which it is. I’m going to tell Borthwick the whole story, and he can give me a troop. Or if he won’t, by God I’ll find out for myself.’

  Henry didn’t argue: at least the Guard had taught him that much. Borthwick, a self-opinionated boor, professed to disbelieve unsigned messages, and poured scorn on the idea that de Fleury or Adorne might be a traitor. At first, he forbade Simon to leave. He couldn’t stop him, of course. When Simon de St Pol walked out with his son and his bowmen, the captain let him go. In a final, typical jibe, he said he had other things on his mind.

  After that, Simon simply rode down to the river at Carham, and then followed it eastwards for seven miles, asking questions. If Adorne had joined Gloucester, he’d be at Berwick. If he’d crossed the river to one of the fortresses, he must have left traces. All the crossings were watched, on both sides.

  He passed by the ford that led over to Wark. He examined Coldstream. Then he had his stroke of luck. Two of Borthwick’s men came up with a prisoner: an English scout from over the river, where the Tweed was joined by the mouth of the Till.

  The Till was a sturdy, small river which carved a long, wilful passage to the frontier, sometimes smiling between sloping banks, sometimes snarling at the foot of a winding ravine. Several keeps guarded its passage. The biggest, by name Castle Heaton, was heavily garrisoned, both to prevent Scottish inroads and to check would-be absconders. The garrison, bleated the scout, was at this moment looking out for a double agent who was on his way to Scotland from York. All the strongholds in the north had been warned.

  He did not know any names. He had been given the agent’s description: a very large man with two pits in his cheeks, and a Burgundian accent.

  Simon de St Pol knew his name.

  SINCE THE RIVER Till was the place of their rendezvous, Nicholas de Fleury shouldn’t have been stunned to find Wodman there. He was stunned, but also grateful to see him alive, that went without saying. But he might have been less stunned and more grateful if they hadn’t parted over two weeks before, and if Nicholas hadn
’t been persuading himself forcibly that Wodman was by now home in Edinburgh, and all the information from York safely delivered.

  Nicholas, in a thumbed felt hat and cowled tunic, was one of a dust-covered group tramping the rough path that led to the hamlet above Castle Heaton. All of them looked like artisans, and the only one mounted and decently dressed had a set square sticking out of his saddlebag. Nicholas, walking cheerfully at his stirrup, was carrying a sack full of tool-shapes over one shoulder. Half his face was smothered in a bright yellow growth of new beard, and Wodman wouldn’t have recognised him if he hadn’t turned his head as he passed. Then Nicholas turned it away and walked on, but his smile had broadened.

  The encounter was almost as much of a surprise to the Archer, but even more of a relief. He knew what could come of a blow like the one Nicholas had taken. For two weeks, he had thought of little else. And here Nicholas was, the ultimate survivor, large and capable and effortlessly in command of himself and probably everything else—except that he was not about to be understanding. From his point of view, he had risked his life to obtain information which Wodman had failed to deliver.

  Wodman watched. At the little inn above the slope to the river, the rider dismounted; someone led off his horse, and the entire group wandered round to the side, where the benches were set out. After a while, Wodman got up and followed them, but to a different part of the yard, where some men he knew were already planted in front of their tankards. They cleared him a seat with a greeting: ‘Aye, Fletcher!’

  Making arrows was a skill Wodman had that he could take anywhere, especially close to a garrison. Fletchers were not all that common.

  He had wondered what Nicholas would do, but he just looked up and sang out the same nickname, ‘Fletcher!’ Then, waving his mug, he rose and wandered over, as if they knew one another quite well. Nodding to him, he grinned easily round at the company. ‘I said to myself, he won’t remember Cuddie the Hod, but there, he did. Fletcher, how are ye?’ There was no trace of French or Flemish in his voice. He was a hellish good mimic. And what he was doing, of course, authenticated them both. The English were looking for a single, displaced Burgundian whom nobody knew.