‘He was spoiled,’ Diniz said. He bit his lip. He said, ‘Gregorio told us. He didn’t say why.’
‘A good enough reason for a child,’ Nicholas said. ‘Someone insulted his father.’
‘You?’ said Diniz. Tobie opened his mouth and then closed it, glancing at Godscalc.
‘Did I insult him? No. It was another child, the King’s brother. Henry lost his head in the lists and tried to deprive the poor prince of his eyes. He didn’t like being stopped.’
Godscalc said, ‘That was all? When you tried to restrain him, the child turned his attack upon you? And you were injured, but didn’t report it?’
‘And so, as you have heard, obtained a counterhold against the entire St Pol family. I hope you are reassured, Tobie. Your patron, as you see, will spare no pains to safeguard his shareholders … So is that all? Is everyone satisfied? Is there anything else that is urgent? Or, Diniz, might we now send for some food?’
No one demurred. Diniz left. Gregorio collected his papers and Tobie, bending, helped the big priest to rise. Julius said, strolling over, ‘Well, Nicholas, you stood on some toes. So will you go to old man Jordan with Diniz? Go on. Now you can squeeze the brute for anything that you fancy.’
Gregorio caught the priest’s eye. The priest said, ‘The vicomte, of course, must be visited; but were you to ask me, it would be sufficient for Diniz to call in the morning. And alone, I should say. The death of a daughter – ’tis not a matter for strangers. As for Nicholas, I should appreciate a word in his ear.’ He looked towards the chair.
‘Yes?’ Nicholas said. He stood, resting one arm on his chair-back. It was apparent he meant to remain there. Gregorio glanced at him, and went out, taking Julius with him. On the way he caught up with Tobie who, lingering, seemed to receive some sign from Godscalc, and left. The door closed.
‘I am concerned for you,’ Godscalc said.
‘I know,’ said Nicholas. On the other side of the door, the footsteps receded. Tobie had wanted to stay. He said, ‘Come and sit in this chair. The back is better for you.’
‘The master’s chair?’ the priest said. ‘The chair of the lord who decides where and when we all go?’ He moved towards it and lowered himself.
‘You think I was hard?’ Nicholas said. He left the end of the table and taking Gregorio’s place on the long bench disposed himself along it, facing the priest across one uplifted knee, his wrist dangling. He saw Godscalc’s glance caught by his rings.
Godscalc said, ‘I think you are preoccupied.’ He paused. ‘This attack on you by the child. We were afraid, Tobie and I. We feared that the poor scrap had found out whose son he was.’
‘No. You know it, and Tobie, and my wife. Diniz suspects, but I have told him he is mistaken. Three people know there is proof. That is all.’
‘Gelis knows it!’ said the priest. ‘Since when?’
‘It was unintentional. I rambled once, when I was sick. She knew, of course, that her sister and I had been lovers.’
‘She didn’t think Simon ought to be told?’
‘There would have been no fun in that,’ Nicholas said. ‘Or rather, no point. Simon’s range of understanding is small. He has one resource: physical violence. To appear twice a cuckold would merely drive him insane, and probably end in the death of the child. Better growing up wild than not growing.’
Godscalc looked at him. ‘Better growing up to kill his own father? Nicholas, things are not as they were. We cannot lay on that child, all unknowing, a sin such as that. Sometime, you must tell him the truth.’
‘Sometime,’ Nicholas said. ‘But not while Simon is alive. We spoke of this once.’
‘Is that why you re-opened the quarrel?’ Godscalc said. ‘So that you can reclaim your son if you breed a dead child or children, or daughters? As you also said once, you have a fortune to leave, and your life is often at risk. Did you try to kill Simon?’
‘I will not deny,’ Nicholas said, ‘that I am trying to punish him. Or that I did once try to kill him as Henry did me. But not in cold blood. Or not yet.’
‘But why? You made peace,’ Godscalc said.
‘He broke it,’ said Nicholas.
‘And Gelis?’ said Godscalc.
‘What of her?’ he said. He released his knee and turned, laying his arms on the table. His rings shone with absolute steadiness.
‘Will you lay on her the strain of watching you pursue this ignoble duel? You have a young wife and family, and health and riches with which to sustain them. Can you not forgive this poor, silly man who has nothing but a boy who is not even his?’
‘I have rendered him helpless,’ Nicholas said. ‘Julius was right. They can’t harm me without harming Henry. My wife and my forthcoming child will have nothing to fear from Kilmirren. That I can swear to.’
‘Nicholas?’
He looked up, still smiling.
The brown eyes frowned. The tonsure above was already shadowed with stubble, the tangled hair grey at each side. Godscalc said, ‘Do you want this second child? This child Gelis will give you?’
Nicholas said, ‘I want a family. I had none. Henry is seven. He will never be any man’s son now but Simon’s.’
‘You want a family by Gelis?’ Godscalc said.
‘I have no other wife. And many bedfellows, but no serious mistress. Ask Julius.’
‘There is seldom need,’ Godscalc said. ‘Answer me.’
‘I thought I had. Yes, I want a family by Gelis,’ said Nicholas. ‘There is no cause for concern. I have new business in Scotland, that’s all.’ He saw, reflected in Godscalc’s lined face, the weariness that had dogged him all day.
Godscalc said, ‘When did you last make confession?’
‘When did you last know whether I was telling the truth?’ Nicholas said. The words were tired, too.
Godscalc fell silent. Then he shifted his bulk in his chair as if his limbs pained him. He said, ‘Very well. I will not waste your time or mine. I have been entrusted with some information, to impart to you or not as I choose. You have not inspired me with confidence.’
‘I know,’ said Nicholas. If he could not be natural, he could be brief.
Godscalc said, ‘Nor are you helping me now. It is your strongest card, we both know, that absence of personal pleading. Moreover, a priest, like a doctor, can recognise a man who is spending more of himself than he has. You will not trust me with the cause, whatever it is?’
‘I conduct my own life,’ Nicholas said.
‘And you are managing so successfully?’ Godscalc said. Then he looked down and, with a half-smile, lifted his twisted hand in the air. ‘What right have I to say that? But for you, I should not be here.’
‘We have carried each other. You have nothing to thank me for,’ Nicholas said.
‘No?’ The priest let his palm fall on his lap as if it pained him. ‘But you lock me out all the same. I have a message for the Nicholas who almost died for me once. I have a message from Gelis.’
By thud of drum, word passed through the Sahel and into the blood. The ground throbbed like this, and the temples, from the blood beating its way through the body. Nicholas moved. He said, ‘Yes?’
Godscalc surely saw, but did not remark on it. He spoke dryly. ‘As you know, your child was conceived far too early. To me, the responsibility and the blame are both yours, but the girl feels she was thoughtless, and has caused you embarrassment, perhaps anger. I am to find out how you feel, and act accordingly. That is, I know where she is and am empowered, if it seems wise, to tell you.’
‘I knew it would be early.’ Nicholas said. ‘Is it born?’
‘That I have not been told. But you will be able to see for yourself,’ Godscalc said. ‘Of course, you will be discreet. She does not want the world to know. I have told no one.’
‘Not even Tobie?’ he said.
‘I have told no one. It is for you and for her to make what announcement you please. She will know by now you are here. I suggest you set out tomorrow. It will
take you four hours to ride there, and I have had to promise that you will go alone. She has written the name of the convent.’
‘Tomorrow?’ said Nicholas.
‘The day after your arrival. It is what she suggested. You are thinking of Diniz? I shall tell him some white lie, as priests can. He can meet de Ribérac and talk of his mother without you. He knows the circumstances of her death. Julius told him.’
‘If you think so,’ said Nicholas. He sat for a bit while Godscalc was trying to open his purse; then, leaning over, helped him politely.
The paper inside was from Gelis. It was much folded and creased, but the writing on it was bold and familiar with no trace of weakness; the first of hers he had seen since they parted. It contained only four lines: the address of a convent, and the bald directions for finding it. The covering letter was absent and, on reflection, he did not press to see it. He could imagine what it contained.
He did not have to set his men to harrying nunneries.
She had known that he would, and had invented this move to prevent it.
She had lodged the message with Godscalc, relying on Godscalc’s understanding of Nicholas. Godscalc would never wittingly place her in danger.
And wittingly of course, neither he would.
Chapter 15
THE NUNS LIKED Mistress Margot, who was well mannered and handsome and kind, and had been thankful when she left her post with the lawyer in Bruges and came to help them with their difficult Lady.
Newly arrived, sore from her altercation with Gregorio, Margot deduced that the sisters had become a little flustered at first when Gelis van Borselen rode up with her servants and occupied all their guest-quarters, despite the extraordinary sum of money she deposited with them.
They felt a genuine sorrow, although they did not express it, that a lady so well born and wealthy should feel it incumbent to hide from her loved ones. When they learned that, at last, her dear husband was to be permitted to visit, they wept tears of joy.
Margot wept as well: tears of exhaustion and fear, which she kept to herself. She couldn’t guess what was going to happen, for this time she knew Gregorio’s instinct to be wrong. That is, Gregorio, whom she loved, was a lawyer and a temperate man, who thought other men were as he was, and who knew only one woman, herself.
She and Gregorio had been separated many times since first, long ago, they became lovers, but never by her will like this, and never as painfully. And if, because of the outcome, he did not want to take her back at the end, she had no hold over him. They were not man and wife.
Late one afternoon, the courier came to the convent to tell Dame Gelis the Ghost was in Sluys with her husband de Fleury on board. It meant, Margot comprehended, that Nicholas would be in his Bruges house by now. It meant that, if the priest thought it safe, Nicholas would have learned of his wife’s invitation. It meant that tomorrow afternoon he could be here.
That night, Margot did not try to sleep. Lying alone in the darkness of her small chamber, she watched the line of gold under the door that told her Gelis, too, was waiting, awake.
They had parted, Nicholas de Fleury and this girl, on their wedding night. On that night, caught by chance within hearing, Gregorio had heard Nicholas receive such a welcome as, surely, no man ever received from his bride. ‘Look at me. It’s Simon’s child, Nicholas. What shall I do with it? Kill it? Rear it? Tell Simon about it? Or let the world think it’s yours?’
Nicholas had left the room then without answering. But, ignoring advice, he had repudiated neither his bride nor her child. He had merely departed on business, leaving her as his acknowledged wife, with half his fortune still settled upon her. And he had informed her that he intended the child, when born, to be treated as his.
Gregorio did not understand, but Margot did. Nicholas had acted with the cleverness you would expect of him. He had drawn the venom from the girl’s declaration by forcing it underground. And at the cost of inhuman restraint, he had denied her the satisfaction for which she must have ached.
To offer to accept another man’s child as his own seemed an act worthy of the man who, to all appearances, had emerged with some nobility from the ordeal of Africa. But it had not always been so. Long ago, Nicholas had responded very differently, it was said, to men or women who crossed him. Since then, he had directed his energies towards success in business, employing a talent for strategy to force his will on men of far higher birth. There was ruthlessness there, however rarely he let it be seen.
Gregorio could not deny it, but was disarmed, Margot well knew, by the high spirits, the imagination, the courage which had always endeared Nicholas to those in his own chosen circle. Once, Margot herself had had no doubts either. Until this occurred.
Why should a girl – intelligent, capable, united in unorthodox passion with such a man and accepting his offer of marriage – why should Gelis hold Nicholas de Fleury in such hatred that, far more terrible than refusing the marriage, she had slept beforehand in the bed of his enemy, and conceived a child to bring unborn to her husband?
Why? Gelis had never said, and Margot could not ask her.
She could attempt, though, to guess. Chance having made them lovers in Africa, perhaps Nicholas or Gelis – or both – had resented the inevitable bondage of marriage. But then, by all accounts, the illicit union had continued on their return; both had seemed desirous of marriage. And yet that again was contradictory. To plan such a betrayal, Gelis could neither have loved Nicholas de Fleury nor pitied him, for all she had allowed him every liberty, over and over, and must have brought herself to respond.
But physical passion and hatred could live together. She might have been jealous of Umar, except that Umar was married. She might have resented the life of the mind which Nicholas had pursued, except that she, too, was not unread or unintelligent. Perhaps the other wives of Nicholas, his other mistresses haunted her. Or maybe it was something quite different. Perhaps, in their idyll in Africa, Gelis had truly plumbed the nature of Nicholas; had identified what other men had suspected: something that was not humane, or cheerful, or generous. She had seen perhaps that his famous stoicism was something to fear, as you would fear a wolf tormented by children. A wolf she had chosen to challenge.
Once, after she had left Gregorio to come here, Margot had asked about Katelina, the sister who had married Simon de St Pol and died in Cyprus. Gelis had turned the subject. Simon believed, Margot knew, that Nicholas was responsible for his wife’s death. If Gelis believed that as well, it could account for something of this. What was transparent, however, was that Gelis had no interest in the man she had picked to father her child. He was a cipher. He had been chosen to cause Nicholas the utmost – what? Anguish? But that would presuppose affection for Gelis. Anger? Offended pride must feature in all this, of course. And outrage, because she had defiled the legitimate line of his house. His first-born would be a bastard.
Yet Nicholas had offered to make it a de Fleury, and rear it.
Margot did not believe that, although Gregorio did. That was why she had come here in the first instance – because she did not believe that a man like Nicholas would tamely accept Simon’s child as his own. Nor would it matter if it were not Simon’s child, but a substitute, a poor changeling brought in to deceive him. Sooner or later, Nicholas was going to retaliate, and Margot meant to be here. Not to stand between husband and wife. Not to protect this distant fair girl, oppressed and silent, whom she hardly saw and whose private torment she could only guess at. But for the child, if there was to be a child.
A solitary woman, she could offer small help, except for what comfort her presence might bring. She did not expect the girl’s confidence, and did not receive it. But the weeks had been made to pass, and she had been tolerated, and thus was present, now the moment had come. The moment when Nicholas de Fleury would enter these rooms and, after nearly eight months, speak again with his wife.
She might have known that he would not honour the bidding. He came, indeed, the day afte
r his arrival, but at first light, when the lamps still burned in the yard, and the grooms were breaking the ice in the troughs and the smell of warm bread and smoke lingered under the eaves. The gates were already open, but he dismounted and stood, in the way only Nicholas stood, while the porter trod through the crackling slush to announce him. Instead of tomorrow, he had come through the night.
Indoors, the line of light under his wife’s door went out. Gelis had heard the voices and crossed to her window to look. Margot continued to stand watching from hers. There was little to see. He was alone and anonymous, his harness and cloak outwardly undistinctive, his face an obscure patch between hat-brim and scarves. Then the porter returned with the guest-house master, and their shadows moved up the path to the door, which then closed. He would be greeted hospitably, and offered rest and refreshment, for he was barely ashore and dry-shod from the sea. Presently, amid the chatter of servants and nuns you could hear, quiet and sociable, the sound of educated male voices below.
The lamp in the next room had been rekindled. The door between presently opened and Gelis van Borselen stood there, her face in shadow. She said, ‘Ah. You are up. He seems to be here. Do you mind keeping your room? I shall send if I need you.’
It was an order: Unless I say so, don’t speak to him. It was also something more, and worse. All that was said in one room could be heard in the next.
Margot hesitated. Then she said, ‘I should like to send word to Gregorio.’
‘Write a note,’ Gelis said. ‘I shall give it to him before he goes.’ And she turned to walk back to her room.
She wore, half fastened as yet, the undergarment of one of last summer’s gowns. Margot thought, as the door shut, that she looked cold in it already.
The journey, being at night, had taken longer than four hours to accomplish. Nicholas had chosen to set out twelve hours too early, knowing that Gelis would count this as one of his options, and would be prepared. The ease with which he was admitted confirmed it. It meant, of course, that she had been forced to keep vigil too.
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