Scales of Gold: The Fourth Book of the House of Niccolo

  You could see, if you knew him, that Godscalc’s colour had risen. He said, ‘We are not here to speak of our mission. They tell me your father died on the way here. You have lost both parents now to the grave, as well as a sister. We who knew them, mourn with you.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Gelis van Borselen. ‘I have my own confessor.’

  ‘He is with you?’ Godscalc said. She had seated herself, and waved to them all to take seats. A manservant carried in wine.

  ‘No,’ she said. She might have been made out of driftwood. Behind, her attendant sat on her stool, her sewing clutched in both hands, her black eyes glaring.

  Nicholas said, ‘But I remember your maid. That is Matten, surely?’

  A Lenten carnival, when he was an apprentice and Gelis a spoilt child in Bruges, evading Matten’s busy care. Waves of hatred reached him from the corner. He could feel them.

  ‘I am surprised,’ Gelis said. ‘I thought it was only Katelina you knew. Please take some wine. It is harmless.’

  He said, the wine in his hand, ‘It is alone in that property. I came to speak to you about Katelina. Later, perhaps, if the others will forgive us.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Gelis. Unfolding her hands, she raised a kerchief to the corner of each dry, still unwinking blue eye. She said, ‘One day, it would – it will – give me unspeakable comfort. But not just yet. The agitation is more than I can bear. The chamberlain will understand.’

  ‘Of course, of course,’ said that aristocrat, who meant well, and was enjoying his wine. ‘The effect on Senhora Lucia has been tragic. That I know.’

  ‘In what way?’ said Father Godscalc. His knuckles showed white, Nicholas noticed, the way they did when he was apprehensive in battle.

  ‘Oh, anger,’ said Katelina’s sister. ‘It is usual, I think. Anger against anyone and everyone; even against the husband who died.’

  ‘As perhaps you feel anger against Katelina?’ said the priest.

  She placed her chin on one hand and looked at him. ‘For being dead, yes. As a competitor, no. That was what you meant?’

  ‘Forgive me,’ Godscalc said. ‘Each pair of sisters is different. I am glad you are here, at least, with the demoiselle Lucia. And I hope her son is bringing her solace. To know what actually happened, from one who was there, is of great moment.’

  To himself, Nicholas groaned. The girl merely opened her eyes and said, ‘You were there? On Rhodes? In Famagusta?’

  ‘Surely,’ said the priest, ‘you believe Diniz?’ For the sake of the official, he smiled. ‘A boy of transparent honesty, I am told. Unless, impaired in health, he made a bad journey? We have heard nothing of him.’

  ‘Neither have we,’ said the girl. ‘But let us speak of –’

  ‘The young senhor?’ said the chamberlain. ‘There is no news, of course, but we know where he is. So gallant! So determined, despite the terrible siege, to forgo the comfort of home, and strike another blow against Satan! The young man is with the armies in Ceuta.’

  Nicholas found, too late, that he was on his feet. The girl’s brows had lifted. He turned, and walked to look from the window. Crackbene had probably known it, but hadn’t told him. Hadn’t, rather, been given a chance. Godscalc said, ‘Why?’ His voice was rough.

  The chamberlain said, ‘It is not for me to say. One knows, of course, that it was not the wish of my lord his grandfather, but who would deflect a Christian soul so impelled?’

  Not the wish of my lord his grandfather. Behind him, Nicholas heard Godscalc draw breath, and turned. Godscalc said, ‘By what means – That is, when did the boy go?’

  ‘When the Burgundians came,’ said the chamberlain. ‘Was it not? When the fleet came from Bruges with the Bastard of Burgundy? That was when.’

  ‘Naturally, his kinsmen are proud,’ the girl said. ‘What are material considerations when a young warrior leaves on crusade? You, too, have answered the summons, and, whatever the cost, your names will be written in letters of gold. And now, being so recently bereaved, I fear I must ask you to forgive me.’

  Nicholas turned. The chamberlain was already rising. Nicholas said, ‘We have hardly eased your mourning. Perhaps I could, before going. Or at least, speak to the senhora.’

  It was, by now, only a matter of form; a matter of letting her know that he did not propose to give up. As he expected, she refused, sadly and employing the kerchief. The woman Matten had already jerked open the door. The chamberlain, taking his leave, said, ‘We have overtired you,’ a little anxiously.

  ‘I hope we have,’ Nicholas said, facing her. He spoke very softly. ‘I mean you to think about this. Enough lives have been wrecked. How did Jordan get Simon to leave? Did he pay him?’

  Faint as powder on ice, points of colour appeared on her skin. ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘As much as was needed. It was not expensive.’

  He turned then, and let Godscalc walk with him out of the room. He let them bring his horse, too, and actually joined the cavalcade out of the gates and a short way down the hill before he stopped the chamberlain and made his excuses to leave them. Godscalc, looking suddenly grim, took his horse and stared down at him thoughtfully. He said, ‘You will risk yourself unattended?’

  ‘There is no risk, padre,’ said Nicholas. The chamberlain smiled, and set his horse in motion again. It was assumed, naturally, that he had in mind some feminine company. Which, of course, he had.

  He waited until they were all out of sight, while children played, and men and women with their burdens thrust past him. His head felt hollow. A boy climbed up to his level, a basket of live conger eels on his head. The leathery heap passed by his shoulder, the sun rousing the smell. Nicholas crossed the alley and went into a tavern where it was dark and cooler, and a plump, olive-skinned woman brought a flask of wine for him, and a cup, and he tried out his very average Portuguese on her. She helped him finish the flask, and then he emerged and climbed uphill, back to the house of the Vasquez.

  He had misled Godscalc only slightly. It had been politic to have the formal interview first: to be received by them all without protest. After that, he planned a less orthodox entry. He thought he might manage to make one, despite his piquant encounter with Crackbene and his more recent duel, in which different barbs had showered upon him. And the physical shock of – the shock.

  He had expected nothing like that. He had expected tears, and sullen silence, and whispered abuse and perhaps threats from them both. He hadn’t known, either, that Diniz the idiot, the idiot, was fighting in Ceuta. He might already be dead.

  Circling the walls, he found a place with a window he could reach, and enough footholds to get himself up to the sill and unlatch the shutters, and begin to ease them open a fraction. The room from the outside looked small, and he had counted on finding it empty. At worst, one or other of the women would be there and he could say what he had come to say. They must be satisfied by now that he couldn’t afford to do them an injury.

  Unfortunately, he was wrong on every count. The room was not only occupied, it was a bedchamber; and the woman lying in bed was the last person to welcome a man looming between opening shutters. She screamed, and continued to scream.

  A distant woman’s voice spoke. ‘The dolt’s come in the wrong window.’

  Another woman’s voice answered. ‘Don’t you fret; I’ll get the brute. Holy Mother of God, have you blown out my match?’

  He might have closed the shutters, scrambled down the wall he had climbed, and got himself safely away. The option didn’t even enter his mind, any more than it would have when he was eighteen in Bruges. Nicholas lifted both hands and, punching the shutters aside, vaulted over a dressing-chest and crashed with its toiletries into the chamber.

  The floor was covered with shards. Above him was the bed of the screaming woman, who was sitting up, a warming-brick grasped in both hands. The doors flew apart. A second woman jumped in: a squat, grey-haired person on the operating side of what looked like a fully-primed handgun. It was trained in his direc
tion. He noticed, with sorrow, that no one had blown out the match. It glowed in the fingers of Gelis van Borselen, standing behind the grey-haired markswoman and preparing to use it. He started to laugh, and got hiccoughs.

  He was trying to make a placatory joke in three languages when everything exploded at once.

  It couldn’t have been the hackbut, because he was still alive, with a headache.

  He was in the room he had been entertained in hours earlier, except that he was lying stretched on the floor with a circle of women sitting around him. One of them still held a hackbut, but at an unusual angle. She was asleep.

  Next to her was a flushed woman with deep yellow hair and eyes the dense blue of cornflowers. Lucia, widow of Tristão and sister to Simon; the lady who had screamed in the bed.

  Next to her was Gelis van Borselen. She said, ‘Basil the Bulgar-slayer. We assumed you would have noticed the window next door, with a balcony. It was a much easier climb.’

  Nicholas sat up. The room swung. Nothing had been done either to him or for him; he was not bound, and was still fully dressed, if dishevelled. His clothes felt abused, as if penetrated by many ill-wishing eyes through to his skeleton. There was blood in his hair, which was uncovered. He said, ‘Why didn’t you ask me to stay? It would have been simpler.’ He used Flemish, as she had.

  ‘Then we couldn’t have hit you with a brick.’

  ‘You could have killed me,’ Nicholas said. It was a suggestion, not a complaint. ‘As an intruder.’

  ‘Not as of the moment,’ said Gelis van Borselen. ‘We are confined to a small-injury tariff. Push the carpet away. You will stain it.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Nicholas said. He pushed the carpet away and found a handkerchief to apply to his head, which was throbbing. He then made to get up. The yellow-haired woman screamed, and the person with the gun abruptly opened her eyes and levelled it.

  Gelis van Borselen said, ‘I think you should stay where you are. Bel has been up all night watching for you. Lucia, if you scream again, the servants will hear you. Say what you have to say.’

  ‘Me?’ Nicholas said. He remembered having a lot to drink in a tavern.

  ‘Yes. That is Lucia Vasquez. You have to tell her you didn’t kill Tristão her husband, or enslave her son in a dyeyard and then attempt to seduce him.’

  ‘Gelis!’ said the yellow-haired woman. She was perfectly beautiful. She was only ten years older than he was. She started to sob.

  Nicholas said, ‘Look, slow down, will you? I’ll tell her, but that’s no way to do it.’

  ‘You don’t even need to tell her,’ said the young woman. ‘We have Katelina’s own letter. Tristão died by mistake, and you employed Diniz for his own good, and he disliked you so much he took an axe to you. She even says you had nothing to do with the way she was dying. Lucia thinks you dictated the letter, but I’m prepared to believe anything.’

  Lucia, widow of Tristão Vasquez, raised her face. Even weeping, she still looked remarkable. ‘But for Claes vander Poele, Katelina would never have gone to Cyprus.’

  The broad woman with the hackbut laid it down and, crossing, sat down and took Lucia’s hand. She said, ‘My God, she would have had to go somewhere; ask anyone. This last two year and more, Simon never bounced on the same buttocks twice.’

  Nicholas choked. Katelina’s sister said, ‘You understand Scots? Bel of Cuthilgurdy, Lucia’s companion. There’s a lot of truth in what she says. What else did you want to tell us?’

  Nicholas rested on the rather cold tiles and stared at her. He said, ‘I haven’t told you anything yet.’

  ‘That’s true,’ she said. ‘I rather thought you’d be quicker. So the Bank isn’t doing too well, and you’d like to talk of a merger?’

  He sat cross-kneed like a gnome, and covered his face with his hands. He spread his fingers and looked at her. ‘You think Simon would agree?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘We don’t even know where he is. Anyway, he’s had other offers.’

  ‘The fool!’ Lucia said. ‘We’re going to be homeless!’ She dragged her hand away and hugged herself, rocking. The woman Bel patted her back.

  ‘What offers?’ Nicholas said. His head was hot, and his bottom was cold. Someone scratched on the door and the woman Bel got up and answered. The steward came in, glancing at Nicholas, and then at his mistress, who was currently speechless.

  Gelis van Borselen, who was not, spoke to him kindly. ‘Senhor vander Poele was attacked and came back to ask help. You want the senhora?’

  ‘Yes?’ said Lucia, making a feeble recovery.

  The steward said, ‘The gentleman has come back.’

  Nicholas got to his feet. The girl gave him a quick, annoyed glance, but nobody screamed. The steward said, ‘The gentleman who called before. Senhor David de Salmeton.’

  ‘His offer?’ Nicholas said. They all looked at him. There were no stools within reach. He sat down on the floor again, his toes pointing upwards. They were scuffed. The orange side of his hose displayed dirt on the knee. His head swam. There was a conversation, and the steward went out. And in came David de Salmeton, mignon, perfect, composed as in those last days in Cyprus when Zacco … when the King had deliberately brought him to Court. David de Salmeton, agent of the Vatachino company to whom Nicholas had just paid twenty-five thousand ducats – or its equivalent – for the Doria.

  Nicholas said, ‘I was just passing through. I do want you to meet Gelis van Borselen. Or no. You have met already?’

  The lustrous eyes dwelled on him, widened a little in the cleft-chinned delicate face, and then moved to the lady of the house. David de Salmeton bowed to Lucia, inclined his head to her companion and bowed again to Gelis van Borselen, at whom he raised his perfect, arched brows.

  ‘He was just passing through,’ the demoiselle said, switching to French. They both looked down at Nicholas and the servant, after waiting a moment, left the room. The stout woman picked up the hackbut and sat down.

  A small red stain appeared on the rug and Nicholas picked up his kerchief again and put it on top of his head, pushing the carpet away. ‘Sorry,’ he said.

  ‘Monsieur Nikko?’ said David de Salmeton. ‘Or is the name personal between yourself and the King? I should not wish to intrude on past felicity.’

  He didn’t smile, but conveyed musical courtesy. He hadn’t smiled in Zacco’s palace. When the time comes, David de Salmeton had remarked on that occasion, we shall offer you a reasonable price for your business. That was what the concerted financial attack in Venice had been about. And if Martin’s colleague was here, it was because the Vatachino had business in Spain and Portugal, in Madeira and Africa, and wanted no competition.

  Nicholas said, ‘I don’t mind what you call me. I would suggest you came and sat on the rug, but it might soil the skirt of your doublet. I thought you were going to Africa?’

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Gelis van Borselen. They both looked at her. She said, ‘Perhaps, gentlemen, you should retire to a tavern? Unless, of course, you came here to say something?’

  Laughter, unwanted, began to well up again. Nicholas said, ‘I think we’ve both come to say the same thing.’

  ‘Have you?’ said Gelis. ‘Monsieur de Salmeton? You wish to assure us as well that you have no carnal longing for Madame Lucia’s son?’

  ‘Gelis!’ the blonde woman exploded.

  The grey-haired woman thumped the hackbut on the floor. A dribble of powder spilled out. The young exquisite was gazing back at the Borselen girl, a gleam in his eyes. He didn’t look shocked.

  Of course he didn’t: he’d been here before. That was how the Borselen girl had known the Bank was in trouble. And since Simon was not Portuguese, and Diniz Vasquez was away fighting Moors at a singularly inopportune moment – naturally, the Vatachino were here. ‘You want to buy St Pol & Vasquez. Toss you for them,’ Nicholas offered.

  Sober, he would never have said it. Simon’s sister sprang to her feet, her face the only creased object between her immaculate y
ellow hair and her immaculate brocade bedgown. The woman called Bel picked up the hackbut and cradled it to her bosom. The girl Gelis van Borselen sat where she was. ‘You can’t afford us,’ she said.

  ‘Us?’ Nicholas said.

  For the second time, her skin showed a pricking of colour. She said, ‘Katelina’s husband and his sister. What were you going to offer for their business?’

  ‘Promises,’ said David de Salmeton. ‘Part of what he hopes to bring back from Africa. He will give you, in a moment, a promissory note of some size. I, on the other hand, will match his offer in gold ducats now.’

  Since there was no seat, the man had found a book-lectern and leaned on it, one aristocratic hand displayed on its edge. His shirt and pale doublet were embroidered, and he wore slippers, not boots. Nicholas, looking at him attentively, couldn’t see where he could be carrying more than a handkerchief. He frowned, and carried the frown, elevated, to Gelis van Borselen. She said, ‘It doesn’t arise. The company has received other offers.’

  ‘You haven’t heard mine,’ Nicholas said. It was only to see what she would say.

  ‘And we don’t want to!’ said Simon’s sister. ‘Do you think we should dream of selling the business to you?’

  ‘Yes, if it was failing,’ Nicholas said. He shifted on the cold floor. For one reason or another, he was going to have to leave soon.

  ‘And you would still buy it?’ Gelis van Borselen said.

  ‘Yes. Up till now,’ Nicholas said, ‘it hasn’t had me to run it.’ He sat, clasping his bloodstained kerchief round his dirt-encased knees, and let his smile spread and dimple under his matted hair.

  ‘It is a powerful argument,’ said Gelis van Borselen. ‘Very well. Submit your offers in writing, and declare when and how you would settle. Madame will communicate in due course. You are both going to Africa?’

  Nicholas looked at the prie-dieu, and the dark, liquid eyes returned the look. ‘Not together,’ Nicholas said.