Dorothy Dunnett - [House of Niccolo 01]

by Niccolo Rising

  “She doesn’t recognise me,” said Claes, grinning down at her. “Claikine, Tasse. Remember Claikine, aged ten? The boiled eggs under the broody hen?”

  “Claikine!” The formless face, rough as pastry, divided into planes of amazement, and then recognition, and then pleasure. “Claikine, grown!”

  “Like a hedge. The whole tale of my successes. And how is Tasse?” She dropped her apron and Claes put both big hands under her armpits and swung her up in the air. She gasped, and beamed, and gasped, and her hair fell out of its coif in grey ribbons.

  From the doorway came another gasp. Hard on the gasp came a scream. “Murder! Rapine! Robbery!” screamed Madame de Fleury.

  Chapter 11

  IT COULD, THOUGHT Tobie, be no one else, even before Esota de Fleury moved from the doorway and into the light. The brush of a heavy gown, the glimmer of a jewelled collar, the scent of imported essences – that was Madame, or a mistress. And nobody had talked of a mistress. And then the not unmusical voice, trembling with fright: “Husband! Men in the house! Oh Tasse, Tasse, you are ruined!”

  Her voice rose, in a way with which Tobie was familiar. He said, “Put that woman down!” to the youth Claes. He was aware of a tinge of professional pride that, so soon after his recovery, Claes could lift a full-grown woman and hold her. Then he started towards the agitated Madame de Fleury, who immediately fainted. Tobie caught her, staggering a trifle, and lowered her to the tiled floor. Claes, his smile gone, ceased hugging the servant Tasse and set her upright. The negro Loppe, without being told, took a lamp from its bracket and brought it over. Tobie leaned over Jaak de Fleury’s helpmeet.

  He expected to see, without doubt, a large woman. What else he saw was unaccountable. If her husband was, as he seemed, about fifty years old, Madame de Fleury was thirty or less, her skin unlined, her hair, uncovered and dressed as for a party with ribbons, a rich glossy brown. In a mask, apart from a certain lack of proportion, she might have raised a man’s hopes. Without one, there was no denying that she was ugly. Gazing down at the bladdered nose and the great jaw, the low sloping brow and the thumbnail eyes, tightly shut, Tobie wondered, mildly, what the size of her dowry had been to persuade Jaak de Fleury to marry her. Below the face, the solid body was encumbered in velvet. Childless, the notary had said. And decked in emeralds. One of her hands, blindly raised, was groping towards him. He put his own over it. “Don’t be afraid. We are guests, Madame de Fleury. From Bruges. From your kinswoman Marian de Charetty.”

  Her eyes opened, and then her mouth, on a large framework of teeth. She said, “Tasse. He was assaulting her.”

  Tobie slid his arm round her shoulders and helped her, with some trouble, to sit up. “He was greeting her,” he said. “Don’t you see who it is?” He was aware that, behind him, the Englishman Thomas stood impatiently scowling, while the negro Loppe had retired with care to the shadows.

  Claes and the serving-woman stood side by side. The servant, who looked frightened, glanced at the youth. Claes had rested his gaze on the reclining woman. His expression was blank and without dimples, and his mouth occupied less of its line than was normal. Then of a sudden, in its familiar way it expanded. Claes said, “You won’t catch me ravishing anyone with Julius around. He’s the expert on that. Shall I fetch him for you?”

  And the woman frowned, and moved weakly within Tobie’s grasp, and then said, “Little Claikine?”

  “No. Big Claes,” said the apprentice calmly. He did not approach.

  The woman gasped. “I feel …”

  “Let me take you to your chamber,” said Tobie. “I’m a physician. Your husband should have warned you of our arrival.”

  The mountainous face turned up to him, eyes timid. “I forget,” she said. “He is busy. Wine for his guests. My servants …”

  “They will look after us. There’s plenty of time for that. Now. You should be in your bedchamber. I’ll help you. Thomas, Claes, Loppe – stay till I come back.”

  He observed, as he helped her out, the glance she cast over her shoulder at Claes. But Claes, he saw, had already backed himself discreetly to share a wall space with Loppe, and was murmuring to him, and grinning. He thought he caught the reflection of his own voice. Tobie, labouring to lead the invalid lady of Fleury to her room, was conscious that this time, perhaps, he had uncovered a pattern of relationships which would have been better left alone. He could deal with it. He knew his own competence. But this – this did not promise to be pleasant.

  It fulfilled its promise. The mistress of the house, excusing herself, was absent from supper. The master, when he eventually emerged with Astorre and the notary Julius, looked strongly displeased, and confined himself at table to biting courtesies. The inferiors Loppe and Claes, if they ate at all, were not visible, and Thomas, who was, soon learned to keep his mouth shut. The master of Fleury had no time to waste on the emissaries of his non-relative Marian de Charetty, and now their business was done, wished to be rid of them. A thing denied him until tomorrow, when Francesco Nori of the Medici would call on them.

  They shared two bedchambers, as was natural, Astorre and the Englishman in one, with Claes on the floor; and Tobie and Julius in the other, attended by Loppe. Tobie, uneasily served by his digestion, made his way through the night to the appointed place in the yard and found himself accosted, returning, by a shrouded figure he recognised, alarmed, as his hostess. She, no less alarmed, muttered apologies and hurried off, her robes trailing. He took the trouble, before lying down, to check the whereabouts of all his party. In his own room, Julius snored, and so did Loppe. In the next chamber, sleep had claimed both Astorre and his deputy, but had apparently escaped the former apprentice Claes, who was nowhere to be seen.

  He slept, and woke to an empty room and the sounds of pandemonium. He lay, waiting. It was Julius, finally, who opened the door and sat by his mattress, irony on his handsome face. “You hear?”

  “I dare not imagine,” said the doctor, “what has happened. But I might guess, Madame has been ravished?”

  The straight-nosed, classical face relaxed its grimness. “I suppose you’ve met this before.”

  “It is common,” said Tobie. “By the negro this time, perhaps?”

  The face opposite him was bitter. “Where would be the pleasure in that?” said the notary.

  Tobie sat up.

  “Not –”

  “Of course,” said Julius. “Claes.”

  “What will happen?”

  Julius said, “That depends on M. Jaak. If he insists, it will be a long imprisonment. Or they’ll mutilate.” He paused. “Astorre will try to prevent it. I’ll do more. I shall see that they don’t.”

  Tobie had met this kind of calm before, too. He said, “You won’t help him by laying yourself open to punishment. Astorre has only to swear that the boy never left the bedchamber. Can’t he do that?”

  “Astorre and Thomas went to bed drunk,” Julius said. “Everyone saw it. They wouldn’t have noticed if Claes had brought Esota into the same bed and forced her between them.”

  The doctor studied him. “When he met us, M. Jaak referred to another incident. He accused you, I take it falsely. This, therefore, is something Madame de Fleury is accustomed to doing. Something of which her husband is well aware, and probably others. Would an accusation against the boy stand?”

  “Oh yes,” said Julius. “The lady has a reputation. That will spare Claes the ultimate penalty. But not the rest. He’s rich, M. Jaak, and has the favour of the French king. And Claes was out of his room. So were you.”

  “Following Claes,” said the doctor. “How can one explain such a coincidence? Unable to sleep, I visited the yard and finding him there, engaged him in conversation. It was dawn, I believe, before we returned, and fearing to waken his fellows, I invited him to return to my chamber. You must have seen him there yourself when you wakened.”

  A becoming colour had risen under the tanned skin of Julius. “And so,” he said, “who visited Madame de Fleury?”
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  “A dream,” said the doctor. “Unhappy creature, she is plainly subject to such things. I shall prescribe a soothing liquor. When I’ve informed our friend Claes of his own nocturnal movements. Where do you think I could find him?”

  Perseverance being one of his attributes, Tobie discovered the locked cellar which contained the apprentice, and found his way, discreetly, to a useful barred window. It was close to the ground. When he sat down beside it and called, he was answered equally quietly. He was in time at least to prime Claes in his story, if not, he saw, to forestall his first beating from the de Fleury grooms. It was no more, said Claes a trifle shakily, than he had grown accustomed to from Thomas. And so where, asked Tobie mildly, had he actually been on the previous night? He gazed down into the cellar and Claes gazed up, Tobie’s shadow on his disarming face.

  A doctor is never surprised. Tobie Beventini was quite prepared to learn that something had taken place between his former patient and the woman de Fleury. She was quite capable of accosting the boy. The boy, for reasons of his own was quite capable, Tobie thought, of taking advantage of it. Revenge sometimes took curious forms. His reading of Claes was not the same as that of Julius.

  Claes said, “She is abnormally made. He married her for her property.”

  “So?” said Tobie.

  “So it helps her to believe she’s desirable. Meester Julius knows. It’s why he left. It’s sad. But her husband exploits it.”

  “Then why should he accuse you?” Tobie said. “And where were you last night?”

  “With their servants,” said Claes. “But I wouldn’t say so. I got away eight years ago, but many didn’t. There’s another niece … It doesn’t matter. As for accusing me – it was just because I did get away. I have nothing to lose, so I might tell about Madame Esota’s sickness.”

  “Sickness!” said Tobie.

  Claes looked up at him sideways. “You’re not ugly,” he said. “Or married to Jaak de Fleury.”

  Tobie studied the boy. He said, “But for me, de Fleury would have destroyed you. Your notary friend too, very likely. You are very forgiving, my dear Claes. But if you don’t take up your own battles, you leave a heavy task for your betters. Or perhaps that’s what you want?”

  Below him Claes moved, and straw rustled. Claes said, “Do you believe that? I hope not. I can’t thank you enough for your trouble. But indeed, there was no need to do anything.”

  “Losing your nose or your hands wouldn’t matter?”

  Claes said, with diffidence, “It happens or it doesn’t happen. It’s for me to arrange, well or badly. Indeed. I appreciate what you did. A second rescue. But I don’t mean to involve others this time.”

  “You haven’t the choice,” said Tobie. “No one has.”

  The other was silent. It was a deliberate silence. Tobie pressed him. “You’d never thought of that?” said Tobie.

  “I think of people dependent on me,” said Claes. The cellar was cold, but he sat quite still, his crossed arms tight round his body. “But no one needs to shoulder my burdens.”

  “Not even the people who are dependent on you?” said Tobie.

  That disturbed the boy a little. He said, “You and Meester Julius are not.”

  “Perhaps not. But you are our conscience,” said Tobie. “If we let injustice touch you, then we demean ourselves. Whether you want it or not, we have to interfere. As those who owe you something will do. You are not a free agent. Hasn’t your employer told you as much, after one of those escapades of yours? But perhaps it’s unfair to recall them. This time, there is no fault on your part. Therefore accept help willingly given.”

  “Help asked for, yes,” said the boy. “Master Tobie …”

  He could not fathom what the youth wanted. He waited.

  “Master Tobie,” said Claes. “These are unpleasant people, but to punish them isn’t necessary. Especially to punish them mortally.”

  Tobie gazed down at M. Jaak’s grand-nephew and prisoner. He said, “Who could punish them mortally?”

  The face below him lightened a little. “The good Lord,” said Claes. “Although you couldn’t protect them from that. But someone, maybe, with potions.”

  “I see,” said Tobie, and thought. Eventually, he said, “I don’t see any danger of that. Don’t trouble about it.”

  “Then I won’t,” said Claes, his upturned face smiling.

  Tobie, leaving him, felt his own smile stiff on his face as he returned to his room, and his medicine chest. Nothing was missing, as yet. He locked the box … against whom? Astorre and his henchmen, objects of Jaak de Fleury’s contempt? Master Julius, protective of Claes and vengeful on his own account? A plot of one of de Fleury’s own abused servants, overheard in the kitchen? Or even Claes himself, afraid of being driven to the very kind of self-protection that he and Julius had been, in their exasperation, urging upon him?

  But no. He didn’t believe that. He didn’t believe Claes was ever driven to do anything against his own judgement. He had only once seen him truly helpless, and that was on the quayside at Damme. His motive now was probably simpler than anything Tobie imagined. And sadder. For whoever harmed Jaak de Fleury or his wife, Claes would be blamed.

  Thoughtfully, the doctor put the key in his pouch and went off to find his host, Jaak de Fleury, and make him party to the happy news of Claes’ vindication. At first, M. Jaak would hardly believe that his wife had not been ravished. Indeed, unless you knew differently, you might almost think him disappointed. But when Tobie took him aside and explained the exact nature (in Latin) of Madame’s unhappy illness, he began to recover his colour, and breathe more naturally, and even went the length (eventually) of thanking Tobie for his welcome diagnosis.

  After a while, he recalled that the boy Claes was shut in a cellar, and sent to have him released. Asked about compensation to Claes for his beating, M. de Fleury promised to give the matter some thought. There was no sign that he did so. The only compensation Claes appeared to receive was the negative one of retaining his hands and his features. He emerged from the cellar some time later, with a little less than his usual ebullience but otherwise remarkably calm, and Tobie gave Loppe some more ointment. Then Claes disappeared to the stables and the business of the morning began, almost as if nothing had happened.

  No one suggested that the surgeon might visit his hostess in her chamber. In a way Tobie was sorry. He had been looking forward to asking her questions, with Julius on one side and her husband on the other to protect his character. Tobie found his way to the kitchens instead, and was given ale and a pie and had a long talk with the woman called Tasse, while Julius dealt with the representatives of the Medici, for whom Jaak de Fleury professed to care so little.

  Many people might claim to despise the Medici, but few could afford to ignore them. In London, Bruges, Venice, Rome, Milan, Geneva, Avignon, their banks, carefully managed, controlled the business of nations. And the banks in their turn were controlled by the head of the family, that brilliant, gouty old man, Cosimo de’ Medici, from his palace in Florence.

  He had sons to succeed him. But better than that, generations of trained businessmen who followed each other from centre to centre. Julius knew some of them. The Portinari family, of whom Tommaso of the rings was the junior member, while his brothers looked after Milan. The Nori family, including old Simone of London and young Francesco here, many years in Geneva. And coming in with Francesco Nori at this moment, his senior Sassetti, just under forty, with his Roman nose and cropped curly hair, who bestowed on M. de Fleury the most sonorous and formal of greetings before turning to renew acquaintance, cordially, with Julius and clap the shoulder of Astorre, the Charetty captain.

  Astorre had guarded consignments before. Astorre was used to these sessions. Astorre had, Julius noticed, a certain intensity of expression which reminded him that the captain, too, had money tied up here in Geneva according to a boast he had once made. M. de Fleury, it would seem, had offered him family rates, and an assurance that h
is money would be safe if anything happened to the Charetty company.

  It interested Julius that, despising Astorre, Jaak de Fleury still wanted his business. Not the man, clearly, to let personal feelings interfere with profit. Good mercenaries could make a lot of money – a string of successes, a single brilliant capture, a season of looting could reward with uncounted gold any bank which was lucky enough to attract their investments. If Astorre got a first-rate contract in Italy and did well thereafter, de Fleury would make a big profit. His, Julius’s, own money was with the Strozzi. As Marian de Charetty knew, damn her. There were no such things as secrets these days.

  So Astorre stayed through the dealings that morning. It was, in the main, a matter of checking and issuing receipts for the goods consigned from Bruges to Geneva. And there followed a formal inspection of the goods in transit from Bruges to the Medici in Italy. The tapestries were unroped and viewed, and the gold plate. Brother Gilles was summoned and introduced, but excused from an example of his vocal agility. Then there were led from stables to courtyard the four hackneys which were to delight Messer Pierfrancesco.

  Jaak de Fleury retained throughout his air of ineffable superiority, and was no more affable to the Medici managers than he had been to the servants of his distant kinsmen, the Charetty.

  Julius, papers in hand, walked out with Astorre and the rest to see the horses brought out for inspection, and saw that Claes had emerged from the stables and was helping the grooms. Julius was relieved to see him free, and also tickled. Unlike Felix, a walking bible of blood lines and litters, Claes had no close acquaintance with animals. Despite his grand-uncle’s recent jibe, the grand total of his experience extended to draught-oxen, the dog he might or might not have clubbed and the hard-mouthed horses from which he had fallen with regularity most of the way to Geneva. It was remarkable therefore that he had taken to the Medici thoroughbreds, and they to him. The nights spent sharing their straw had led to some sort of companionship. He fed them illicit mouthfuls. When he went near them they nuzzled him so that his ears dripped.