Dorothy Dunnett by Checkmate

Author:Checkmate [Checkmate]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 7

Au mois troisiesme se levant le soleil

Sanglier, liepard au champ mars pour combatre.

He had changed since last year in England, when he had accepted from his great-nephew Francis Crawford a life-pension to keep Sybilla’s reputation unblemished.

Then, Leonard Bailey had been a great, neglected hulk of a man in stained coat and bonnet, living meanly alone with his servants in the estate his treachery had brought him in England.

Now the heavy jowls were the same, and the great nose, spread like a garlic clove, and the odour of unbathed old age, and of malice. But his ribbed doublet and breeches this time were new and uncreased and stiff, and the sleeveless coat lined with some sort of fur, and his trailing hair trimmed under a new velvet bonnet.

He had done well from his great-nephew’s pension, had Leonard Bailey, who detested herself and Sybilla, and most of all loathed his great-nephew, who had forced his blackmail of Sybilla to finish. It was his doing that Lord Grey’s men had taken Francis at Flavy. It was because of him that Osias and his colleagues had been paid by Francis to safeguard her. It was because of him—did she know it? Or was there merely impatience in the look she was bending on him?—that Isabelle Roset had lost a sister at Flavy-le-Martel this winter.

But she could hardly know it, for she said, looking from one to the other, ‘Do you know each other?’

‘Yes, of course,’ said Leonard Bailey. He did not move but stood, heavily expansive, on the threshold. Behind him two … men-servants? soldiers?—had occupied positions at each doorpost in silence. Bailey continued. ‘Madame de Sevigny has not had time to tell you who her husband is. You may know him merely as the Count of that designation, but I have to enlighten you, Madame Roset. His own name is Francis Crawford, and he is my great-nephew, the rogue, and that same base-born infant you tell me you delivered here in this house to Lady Culter.’

He smiled, with his strong lips, at Philippa. ‘Sybilla was kind enough to let me have the use of her house while I am in Paris. A charming bower for lovers. Do you not envy me?’

Nymphs, severe, delightful, gazed at her from the friezework. There was a blue Turkey carpet with roses, and roses wreathed the velvet housing of a pair of exquisite virginals. By the heaps of books bound in Levantine marocain lay scrolls of music, tinted with sepia. There was a lute in a case, and a box inlaid in sandalwood with garlands of shells and sea flowers. And in marble over the fireplace ran a throng of light, laughing figures, following the spoked wheels of a frail Roman carriage being drawn by young men between tree stems. Below, were written two fine lines in silver:

I shall harness thee a chariot of lapis-lazuli and gold

Come into our dwelling, in the perfume of the cedars.

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