Race of Scorpions Read online

  So Thomas was there when the priest took his keys and led them off to the family church, and then down to the crypt. He had, however, the soldier’s good sense to let the first mourner enter alone. Descending into the crypt, Nicholas carried a lamp, but nothing else: in December, there were no flowers in Dijon. He went, as was right, to his usual place. After that, it was easy to see the new coffin. The light glimmered on brass, where the wreaths – old now, and dried – lay upon the shining lines of inscription. He drew them aside with scrupulous fingers. The plate said what he had expected it to say: 1420–1461: Marian, daughter of the late Berthélémieu of Louvain, and wife of Cornelis de Charetty, 1400–1458. It continued, as he had not expected it to continue: and of Nicholas, son of Simon de St Pol and Sophie de Fleury.

  He sank back on his heels. After a while, he brought himself to think of all the ordinary, mundane implications of that brave proclamation of his parentage. The priest would have seen it, and the engraver, and even perhaps Thibault de Fleury. They presumably accepted it as a lie. Marian had wanted it said, and to please her they had engraved it to lie here in darkness. Even so, it was as well Simon de St Pol didn’t know that Nicholas was written down anywhere as his son, even ten feet underground.

  Afterwards, there were papers to sign, and the priest led the way to his house. When he heard that M. vander Poele wished to endow the chapel, the priest had smiled, deprecating but amiable. The family had made arrangements. Then, receiving the papers from Nicholas, he had scanned them and reddened. At the finish he said, ‘… but not of course on this scale. On this all too generous scale. They will wish to –’

  ‘I would prefer that they didn’t communicate. Anything to do with the fund will find me care of my own bank in Venice. From time to time, they will visit, to see if you require anything.’

  The priest brought out wine at the end of the paperwork, but Nicholas made some excuse and left without tasting it. It embarrassed Thomas, as the priest was still talking, and had offered them supper. On the road, he complained. Nicholas said, ‘We learned nothing new. He only wanted to gossip.’

  Thomas grunted, but as time went by, his expression became somewhat more hopeful. Nicholas could read his mind. It was December, and freezing, but at least nothing stood now between him and Bruges, and warmth, and comfort, and mates of your own ordinary kind who would speak to you.

  In the event, Bruges came upon Nicholas rather suddenly. He had thought he was prepared for it. The sergeant in charge at the bridge was a burgess’s son who recognised him. He said an awkward word or two about the demoiselle’s death, and then asked, after a pause, if Nicholas was going to Spangnaerts Street. Or the dyeyard?

  Spangnaerts Street was the address of the excellent quarters – house, warehouse and stables – where he and Marian and all their clerks lived and had their offices. The yard, elsewhere in Bruges, held their work force. Answering, he saw the other’s eyes flicker. But if something was wrong, Julius would have sent word, or met him. He was aware that news of his coming would have been in Bruges for days. But the sensation, surely, was over. The demoiselle de Charetty was dead, and had left her husband nothing, as everyone knew, because he needed nothing. Why should he be here, except to comfort and help his wife’s daughters?

  Thomas said, ‘There’s something up.’ Simple though Thomas might be, he had an instinct.

  Nicholas said, ‘Yes. Never mind. Too many people. Let’s go.’

  As usual, he had fortified himself against the wrong catastrophe. In the crowded streets, he saw hardly any faces he knew; was stopped for no funereal outbursts. The streets were busy, of course, as they always were, and faces turned as he and Thomas rode by, but he was not called on to act. Thus, with undiluted insistence, there fell on his ears all the sounds he had missed for a year: the clack of the looms, the rumble of barrels, the creak of signs, the echo of under-bridge voices; the splash and trickle and rush of canal water. The sounds and the smells of the great Flemish town where he had grown to manhood and marriage. Marian’s town.

  Spangnaerts Street was not far away, and filled as usual with draught horses and oxen, boxes and barrels, servants and merchants and the chilled and shadowy scents of fruit and spices and dyes. Outside the tall, gabled house he had bought for his wife there were clusters of people who were neither neighbours nor passers-by, but who seemed to be waiting. He saw, as the faces turned, that they were waiting for him. He stopped Thomas. ‘You know the Avignon hostelry? Go there. Find beds for us all, and wait for me.’

  Thomas frowned. ‘Not here? There’ll be beds.’

  ‘If I change my mind, I’ll send for you,’ Nicholas said. There were spikes on the high wall that enclosed the courtyard of his house. He had put them there himself. He had never had guards standing below, as they now did. He rode slowly forward to the gate and dismounted. He said, ‘Will you hold my horse?’ to one of the boys, and walking to the closed gates, pulled the bell. The postern opened.

  It was not Julius who stood on the threshold, or Godscalc, or any of the men he and Marian had employed or trained. The stranger said, ‘Yes?’

  Nicholas said, ‘I am the husband of Marian de Charetty, come home from Venice. Are her daughters there, or Meester Julius, or Father Godscalc perhaps?’

  ‘They are all away,’ said the man.

  ‘Really?’ Nicholas said. ‘Then perhaps I might wait for them?’

  ‘I regret,’ said the man. ‘I cannot admit you.’

  ‘I understand,’ Nicholas said. ‘But I do intend, of course, to come in. There is nothing difficult about it. You can either bring out someone who knows me, or I will bring you a man of good faith to identify me. Which would you like?’

  ‘Monseigneur,’ said the porter. ‘I regret. I have instructions not to admit the late demoiselle’s husband. The guard will tell you out there.’

  ‘Whose instructions?’ said Nicholas.

  The man was unlike any porter he and Marian had employed. Of middle age, weathered and scarred, he had the look of a skilled roving soldier. He said, ‘My mistress is Mathilde de Charetty.’

  Tilde, of course. Tilde, Marian’s daughter. ‘And she is not here?’ Nicholas said. ‘Or is here, and afraid to deal with this personally?’ He pitched his voice to carry as far as the house; and stood, ostentatiously relaxed and ostentatiously alone.

  Tilde’s voice said, ‘The porter has told you. We prefer not to receive you.’ Her voice, trembling slightly, was deeper than you would expect in a girl of under fifteen. He remembered it from Venice. She had been afraid of him then: afraid that he would push her and her sister aside and take over the business; and he had played on the fear, trying to make her stand on her own feet. If her mother’s workmen remained; if he released (and he had) all the senior company men who were willing to go back to Bruges, the business could prosper.

  He had thought, after two or three months, that she would feel secure enough to meet him, at least. He had not expected a public rebuff, and a bodyguard. What was Julius thinking of?

  He saw her now, crossing the yard and standing, her hands tightly together, at the porter’s shoulder. Her hair was a duller brown than her mother’s, and she lacked her mother’s bright colour. Just now, she was white. The spectators around him, grown silent, moved and murmured in anticipation. He said, ‘Tilde? I have something to tell you. I have come from the chapel at Fleury.’

  ‘Is that all?’ she said. ‘I was there before you. If you have something to say, write it down.’

  Someone clucked reprovingly, and someone gave a comic groan and a laugh. Without privacy, exchange was impossible. He said, ‘Is Meester Julius there?’

  ‘He is,’ said Tilde. ‘But he has been forbidden to speak to you. Father Godscalc will not come out either. This is the Charetty business, not yours.’

  ‘And do my clothes fit you?’ said Nicholas. ‘If not, I should like to have them back. And the other effects in my room, unless you have sold them.’

  ‘They will be sent to you,’
said the hard voice of Tilde. ‘If they have perished, you will have an accounting. There are some gifts you made to my mother.’

  ‘Keep them. The rest can go to the Avignon. I shall be there for three days. Thomas wishes to call on you.’

  ‘Why?’ said Tilde.

  ‘To serve you and Catherine. Captain Astorre wants you to have his protection.’

  ‘I have protection,’ Tilde said. ‘A new bodyguard. We have no need of Thomas. Send him back to Astorre.’

  ‘He is not under my orders,’ said Nicholas. ‘I dare say he will find work of some kind in Bruges. If you want him, no doubt you can find him. Is there anything else?’

  ‘Where are you going?’ said Tilde.

  ‘To the Avignon,’ Nicholas said. He paused, about to remount.

  She said, ‘No. After that. Where are you going?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Nicholas said. ‘Into business of some sort. I don’t want to compete with you. But we ought to talk if we’re going to avoid it.’

  She said, ‘You want to know all our plans.’

  Nicholas said, ‘Tilde, I know more about your business than you do. But I’ll leave you alone if you want me to. I do want to collect some things that belong to me. If you let me in, it won’t take me a moment.’

  ‘No,’ said Tilde. ‘Send your mistress.’

  A stir of excitement. Nicholas set his teeth. ‘I would if I had one,’ he said.

  ‘Your future wife, then,’ said Tilde. ‘She’s here to petition the Duke, but the old man’s too sick to appreciate her. She’s been waiting for you for days. A lady from the duchy of Savoy. She calls herself Primaflora.’

  When he got to the Avignon, Thomas was holding public court in the wet, straw-spattered yard. One or two of the listeners around him had strolled off before Nicholas reached them. Among the others were one or two he recognised as old cronies of Astorre and his friends, and one or two he recalled as well-qualified tattlers. As he came up, Thomas greeted him, his face red. ‘They said you wouldn’t get in. They said Spangnaerts Street’s locked, barred and guarded. The girl’s told Meester Julius and Father Godscalc she’ll dismiss them if they speak to you. And it’s the same in the yard. Henninc and Bellobras, Cristoffels and Lippin. None of them dare do anything, or she’ll call in strangers and ruin the business. She says she isn’t going to make the same mistake her –’

  ‘She’s off her head, the poor thing,’ said a woman. ‘What are you going to do, Meester Nicholas?’

  Meester Nicholas. The under-manager of the Medici Bank had called him that too, just now. Had offered to lend him one or two men, indeed, to break his way into the building. Nicholas had replied, with restraint, that he had thought of starving them out. He had then added quickly that it seemed likely that the doors would be unbarred at some point, unless the company were to go out of business, but that he had no intention of forcing himself on his step-daughters. He repeated the gist of this now, and removed himself and Thomas politely into the inn. It was a good one, being sited behind the church of St Donatien, near the burgh square and within a discreet distance of Spangnaerts Street, which was why he had chosen it. There were therefore quite a lot of men of substance who heard Thomas say, as they ascended the stairs, ‘You’ll never guess who is here.’

  ‘I’ve just been told,’ Nicholas said. ‘An envoy of Carlotta of Cyprus. Popular opinion has already made her my mistress. Where is she?’

  ‘Out. But everyone knows she’s been asking for you. What’s she doing in Bruges?’ Thomas said. He opened a door on an empty room.

  Nicholas followed him in and closed the door firmly. ‘At a guess, cajoling money for Cyprus out of Duke Philip,’ he said. ‘If the Queen sent an accredited envoy, she would upset her dear relative France. Hence Primaflora with, I should think, an excellent clerk, a decent retinue and an inadequate chaperon.’

  ‘The Duke’s past it,’ said Thomas.

  ‘But I am not,’ Nicholas said. ‘And the Queen wants me as well.’

  ‘I see,’ Thomas said. He sat down, still in his boots. ‘That Primaflora, she’s just lost her husband.’

  He had picked Thomas to travel with because of all the qualities he was now displaying. It was too late to regret it. Nicholas said, ‘Ansaldo wasn’t her husband. The lady Primaflora, Thomas, is a professional courtesan.’

  Thomas made a visible effort. ‘You could afford one,’ he said.

  ‘No. I think,’ Nicholas said, ‘she would be too expensive.’

  The message was slipped under his door late that night. He rose quietly, lit a taper and read it without waking Thomas. Then he pulled on pourpoint and hose and left, carrying his soft boots and cloak to put on in the passage.

  There was no one awake in the common-room, and he unbarred the front door himself and stepped out into hoar frost and fog. It was as well that he knew every bridge, every well, every street, every house in this city. The night-lanterns were diminished by fog, flat as sequins. As he walked, he saw the Mother of God, eyes upturned, suspended over the city, the Child in her arms. Or perhaps it was an image three inches high, lamplit on some near, pious corner. His soles slid on the cobbles, and crunched on the rime in between them. Once he heard other footsteps, belonging no doubt to the watch. He thought, at one point, of crossing to the warm unseen fire of the cranemen, but thought better of it. They were good friends, who had helped him enough in his escapades. He crossed the bridge by the Spinola quay, and felt his way quietly through Spangnaerts Street.

  The bodyguard were no longer there, although the lanterns had been lit at the gates and all the way along the spiked wall, and there was a rim of light round the porter’s lodge shutters. He walked round, and found the rope hanging over the wall between the spikes, and the mattress laid conveniently over them. He tested the rope, and then jumped, and gripped it, and hauled himself up, and then over.

  Julius met him by the stables: a familiar whisper; a grip on his arm, and then a shadow sprinting before him to the kitchen door. Then he was in and pausing, breathing lightly, while his notary – his one-time teacher – climbed the stairs to see all was well. Then he, too, was upstairs and along a passage and through a door to a big, shuttered room where a lamp had been lit in one corner, showing desks, and papers, and shelves of ledgers, and all the paraphernalia of the business he had created for Marian. In the room were the priest Godscalc, who had been their chaplain and firm friend in Trebizond; whose skill with numbers and letters was serving the Charetty company still. And Loppe, the Guinea slave he had made his quarter-master. And Julius, who closed the door behind him.

  He walked first to Loppe, and embraced him; and then Godscalc. Two large men, nearly as tall as himself, and encouraging to have at your side in a battle. Julius, who had no taste for that sort of thing, slapped him on the shoulder and said, ‘Well. We had to see you. This is all your doing, you know.’ He had the sunburn of Trebizond still on his dark face. He looked active, vivid, successful. Factor, notary, manager now to the Charetty business, and making the best of it. Although, of them all, he had most longed for excitement, and might have made his life in the East, had their venture not come to an end.

  ‘Let him sit down,’ said Godscalc. ‘And keep your voices low. The law is on the side of the girls. And Tilde owns this building, and has forbidden Nicholas to enter.’ He turned, with the balanced weight of a fighting man, but his manner was priestly and calm, as it always was. ‘You must believe we tried to prevent this. And, of course, it will pass.’

  ‘Will it?’ said Julius. ‘Nicholas threw them a challenge, and they picked it up. They want to prove they can beat you. What are you going to do?’

  ‘What are you going to do is more to the point,’ Nicholas said. He saw Loppe smile.

  Godscalc said, ‘Don’t worry. We’re staying. Your wife’s servant is with them. Anselm Adorne keeps discreet watch, and his wife has been a tower of strength. Tilde managed to throw out John le Grant, after a difference of opinion, but she knows she needs us.’<
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  ‘Where did John go?’ Nicholas said.

  ‘To Venice. Gregorio is there, and Crackbene. They have begun to set up their bank. They are expecting you.’

  ‘Is that a good idea?’ Nicholas said. ‘How do you see Tilde’s business developing?’

  ‘Along different lines,’ Julius said. ‘My God, we’re not competing with you. No army, no courier work any longer. But broking, dealing, dyeing. Hides, perhaps. We have a good team, and a lot of capital and goodwill.’

  ‘Gregorio could help you,’ Nicholas said. ‘And you’ll have cheap alum for a while, and first quality dyes. But you must look out. The market is changing. And you don’t have the army to bring in summer money.’

  ‘The little lady wants to keep an army,’ said Loppe. In the subdued light, Nicholas could make out little more than his eyes and his teeth. Loppe added, ‘You have seen some of the men. She went to the armourer and got him to recruit them.’

  ‘How many?’ said Nicholas.

  ‘Not enough to make more than a bodyguard,’ Godscalc said. ‘We have hopes of reducing them. They are a danger, you are right.’

  ‘And Tilde and Catherine?’ Nicholas said.

  ‘Cat and dog,’ Julius said.

  ‘No,’ said Godscalc. ‘They squabble, but they are united in all that matters. In ambition. In mourning. In determination. In opposition to you. It has been, as you saw, a great strength.’

  ‘I told you. It’s all your own fault,’ said Julius.

  ‘They will mature,’ Godscalc said. ‘The town has been patient. As I have said, Anselm Adorne and his wife have been good. The girls have no real enemies.’

  ‘Not even the good lord Simon?’ said Nicholas. He caught the flash of Loppe’s eyes. Julius frowned.