Queens' Play (14 page)

It ended; and there was silence, and then a rattle of cautious, genuine approval; and Marguerite of France, her jewels running like light over her dress, rose and knelt by the ollave. ‘I pray you … play Palestrina for me. And sing me this.’ And she stayed, watching his hands, as the fastidious music was made, watching his face as he sang the words she had requested.

The stamp of her approval, the vivid attention on Henri’s face, the concentration on de Ripa’s, broached the brittle defences of pride, and opened the golden floodgates of fashion. During the poem, someone sighed. Towards the end, the Duchess de Guise pulled out her handkerchief. As it finished, a wave of sensitive acclamation engulfed the singer and, charmingly, other ladies surrounded him. He glanced at them thoughtfully, and roused the strings this time to gentle satire. The song was new, and it pleased them. He sang again, settings by Jannequin and Certon; Il
n’est soing que quant on a fain;
Belle Doette,
Mout me desagree;
and songs even older. He sang in Gaelic,
sírechtach
music; and drawn like the tides by the wordless drag of the pain, they wept this time and were proud of it. And later, he sang them songs which were spicy as well as romantic, and they laughed and cheered and joined in with the catch phrases. But he took no risks, yet.

They were all, or nearly all, his patrons. Condé, for dignity’s sake, was his loudest admirer. Marguerite of Savoy addressed him softly between songs, and Jean de Bourbon, sieur d’Enghien, thoughtfully fluttered his fan. The two senior de Guises smiled with tolerant approval. Did they know who Thady Boy was? Erskine thought it unlikely. The risks were too great.

Only two people reacted differently. Margaret Erskine sat in silence, as she had done the whole evening, her candid gaze on the ollave. Only when he sang, her face changed to something very like pain. And Brusquet, angered, had left.

Towards the end, when the circle about the singer overflowed, and people were moving freely, talking, singing and drinking wine, Sir George Douglas leaned confidentially on Thady Boy’s shoulder as he sat, head downbent, tuning the lute. ‘My dear man, how fortunate that your friend Abernaci was in charge of the elephants.’

The implication was obvious. The Bourbon beside him looked up. ‘You’re wrong this time, my Scots Machiavelli. Abernaci would never permit the big Ué to be fried—not for His Holiness himself.’ And Condé chimed in, yawning. ‘The scents must have been worse
than usual. They ruined the poor creature’s skin. Let that be a lesson to you, my dear.’

It was the oldest woman there who took the point. Diane de Poitiers, Duchess de Valentinois, was not easily moved, but she was intensely curious about the newcomer; and had no intention of competing with the flattering circle on the floor. Neither Condé nor his absent friend the Vidame was a favourite of hers. She moved coolly to remove their protégé to rarer climes. ‘If the elephant was hurt,’ said Madame de Valentinois, ‘did M. Ballagh not suffer injury?’

Like a thunderclap, watching Lymond’s taut back, Erskine realized that she had hit on the truth; and further, that this was no part of the evening’s improvisations. His personal state, both spiritual and physical, was Lymond’s own affair; and injury, if he were injured, spelled nothing but inefficiency within his creed. Nervously, Erskine saw the idea spread among Thady’s admirers; heard the mellow cries of well-bred curiosity; and saw St. André, more than a little in drink, lay hands on the ollave’s soiled shirt.

Lymond sprang to his feet.

He’s going to throw it away, thought Erskine. Step out of character, wreck the whole evening’s work. He’s going to turn round and treat them like bloody servants … Christ! For Lymond’s sharp blue gaze, swinging round, had caught the stiff face of the Queen Mother of Scotland. With every nerve end in his body, Tom Erskine willed the Dowager to school her face. The shadow of a threat, the shadow of an appeal, the slightest effort to prompt him, and she had ceded the evening; she had lost Thady Boy Ballagh; and she had lost Lymond for good.

The Queen Mother stared at Lymond, the sea-cold gaze without focus, and, scratching her nose, turned to ask her neighbour a question. But already the danger had passed. Lymond, standing, had looked beyond her and caught the flare of pure anger in Margaret Erskine’s brown eyes. His own narrowed. He hesitated for a second; then turning, allowed St. André without protest to claw open his doublet.

Under the egg-stained shirt, the burns were obvious where the acid had caught his shoulders and back. Madame de Valentinois rose. ‘Bring M. Ballagh to me.’

From the high chair the King spoke to Lord d’Aubigny and his lordship moved also towards the ollave. John Stewart’s manner had undergone a slight change. A wit, a poet, a singer of sorts who had caught the imagination of the Court, was a different proposition from the shabby bundle of sops he had chivvied from inn parlour to inn.

He halted by Master Ballagh. ‘The King wishes me to say that he
had of course no idea of your hurt, or he would not have thrust this entertainment upon you. He bids me say that you are welcome to join his Court for its winter sojourn on the Loire; and that if he so wishes, the Prince of Barrow may remain also in France. I am to offer you a bed in this lodging for tonight, and to give you the King’s permission to retire.’ He had won.

He also had, by any standards a memorable couchée that night in the King’s Lodging of the Abbey of St. Ouen, painted with egg yolk and turpentine and bandaged under the supervision of the Duchess of Valentinois herself, until at length, unrecognizable in borrowed night robes, he had his bedroom to himself.

When, late that night, the knock came to his door, Lymond was by no means asleep. His occupation since the last servant left was shatteringly clear from his too-steady gaze and his less than steady hands. Wrapped in a furred bedgown, he had been drinking seriously for a long time. Behind him, the little room was cracklingly neat: a characteristic of his own which was quite foreign to Thady Boy. What he had expected as he opened the door no one could have guessed. What he saw made him stop short, vigilant and more than half sobered.

Outside was Margaret Erskine.

Shapeless, brown-eyed, rather pale, neat as a nun in her day dress, with a single good jewel pinned to her breast, Jenny Fleming’s daughter seemed quite composed; visiting wild younger sons in their sleeping quarters might have been a nightly occupation.

A smile, bracketing his still mouth, spread like bane over Lymond’s pale face. ‘Come in, sweeting. I have a friendly bed.’

She disregarded it, entering prosaically and shutting the door at her back. ‘Why drown your victories?’ she asked. ‘You have succeeded, have you not? You need not leave France.’

For answer, Lymond tossed the tangled hair back from his eyes and broke into an accurate parody of the Queen Mother’s fractured Franco-Scots. ‘I mean to take this man in his failure, Master Erskine—in his failure and not in his success.’ He shook his head, mourning. ‘I have succeeded; but unless I’m careful, by God, the Dowager will have me trussed and indented as her servingman yet.’

Margaret Erskine drew out a chair and, sitting, looked up at the sweat-beaded, sardonic face. ‘You heard that. I’m sorry.’

‘Like The O’LiamRoe,’ said Lymond with a large and positive gesture, ‘I feel I deserve a little amusement at someone else’s expense. That is all. I have worked for it. I have paid for it. And I propose to have it. Don’t you approve of me?’ His voice mocked her. ‘I had a
suspicion back there tonight that you didn’t want me to quarrel with our playful friends.’

Her own voice was quite level. ‘Will you really find it enough to fill the next months? Sharpening your claws on them between foolhardy pranks?… The women were already drawing lots for you when you left.’

‘And you won?’ His eyes matched his words.

She bit her lip, the first sign of discomfiture she had shown. ‘I came because a visit from Tom would be dangerous. Whereas a visit from myself would be merely … compromising.’

‘God, how patriotic,’ said Lymond. ‘And considering the relatives you have, what fool would imagine you’d come to talk politics.—Damn it,’ he added with a sudden interest. ‘Only the ladies?’

Her voice remained level. ‘No.’ She drew a deep breath. ‘If you will not serve the Dowager, why are you troubling to stay with the Court?’

He had roved away from her, kicking the preposterous velvet skirts out of his way. He turned, unnecessarily expansive, interested in nothing as yet except being difficult. ‘Because in this sweet realm of France, my dear, lives a small, venal animal who will drown a shipload of men or trample a gathering of women and children to death on the strength of a whim; and I mean to peel his knees with his backbone before I leave.’

Pale, persistent, she outfaced his restlessness and his boredom. ‘I know nothing about
La Sauvée
except what I have heard from Tom. But today’s accident—Tom, my mother, the Dowager, are all sure of it—was an attempt to kill or injure the Queen. It has persuaded the Dowager to tell us plainly what you guessed, perhaps, when she talked to you last. There have been other accidents to Mary, and other coincidences. It was because of these that the Queen Mother asked you to come to France. Openly, she dared say or do nothing without seeming to question the good faith of France, or their capacity to look after the child.… Instead, she relied on you.’

Against the far wall, the window shutters were open. Lounging between them, Lymond took no time for reflection. ‘Why interfere?’ he said airily, over one velvet shoulder. ‘Why interfere? The Dauphin may have plans to marry again.’

A personal attack, this, against her own marriage, following so fast on the death of Tom’s first fiancée, Christian Stewart, killed tragically in Lymond’s service two years before. She knew, and Lymond knew, that only after Christian had gone did Tom Erskine notice the plain person of the widowed Margaret Fleming, who for years had been his silent admirer. She had not been prepared for such a challenge, but she was equal to it. She said quietly, ‘You hate me because I am Christian’s successor—even if inadequately; even if only in Tom’s
eyes. But you didn’t love her. You know that perfectly. Love has never struck you yet, and you should thank God for it. Be honest, at least. You are not refusing to help because of me.’

She waited, while Lymond stood looking out over the quiet cobbled courtyard and the lantern-lit trees of St. Ouen. Then, stepping back, he closed and flicked the latch of the shutters, and turning, faced her again. ‘I’m tired,’ said Lymond,’ of funerals. Show me a project, and I’ll promise you that before it is ended half my so-called friends will have thrown their illusions, their safety and their virtue into the grave. There was Christian Stewart, about whom we need not speak. There was a man called Turkey Mat. And a number of others. I have refused to become a royal informer, my dear, to spare my associates the pains of paying for it.’ There was a difficult pause. Then his cold blue stare softened. ‘I am not really fit to talk to you,’ he said. ‘I think you should go.’

‘But I have something more to say,’ said Margaret Erskine placidly. ‘And I could say it more easily if you were sitting down.’

This worked. After a moment’s hesitation he walked forward, and finding a fireside seat opposite hers, dropped into it and propped his head on his fists. Margaret, watching, chose her moment. ‘You made the point I thought you might make,’ she said. ‘It’s none of my business if you choose to raise a poor kind of monument to your friends. They might well deny, were they alive to say so, that Mary’s life is worth your care. But you are already committed, surely, to your precious project? You want to find a dangerous man, who has the inclination to kill. For that you will need friends; how will you preserve them? And surely, if this man has designs on the little Queen you are likeliest to find him while you are protecting her? Or is she merely the bait in your philanthropic trap?’

He did not stir. ‘Of course not. The Queen Dowager’s purposes and mine are the same; but you must excuse me from promises. This time at least I am quite free. Anything I set out to do I can abandon—and if need be, I will.’

‘And if,’ said Margaret Erskine in a careful voice, ‘I stand surety for your promises? If I say, kindle your fires for us, let them burn freely and light up what they will, and I shall do my utmost to see that no innocent bystander is burnt? Would you accept from the Queen Mother, through me, the task of protecting the young Queen, and trust me to watch over your friends?… Or being Tom Erskine’s second choice,’ said Margaret, her round, unremarkable face pale, ‘am I forever beneath your notice, as well as your trust?’

At which Lymond swore without apology, dropped his hands and fixing her with a stare of numbing austerity remarked, ‘I can grasp the situation without being bludgeoned over the head with either rhetoric or hangman’s humility. However. I gather I have been
lecturing you. I apologize. It was a matter of irresponsible timing on your part. As far as your offer goes—’