Scales of Gold by Dorothy Dunnett Read Free Book Online Page B

Which was a pity, because even an hour away over the water, the air was still filled with the din of a city going to war and, in the morning, the sea was as busy as the Grand Canal with boats going to market, bearing their fish and their produce to feed the overstuffed, overwrought Serenissima.
    Now the traffic was thin, although the soldiers stayed alert, and Loppe’s vigilance, Gregorio noted, never flagged. Tilde, remembered as a girl of some fortitude, had nevertheless moved close to Julius. Nicholas, his gaze on the sea, paid no attention to anyone.
    It had been foolish of Julius to let the girl come, and wrong of Nicholas to encourage it. Julius, in Gregorio’s view, was a competent Bologna-trained notary with a cast of mind which led him too often into pointless adventure. He had been, no doubt, an excellent and comradely mentor to the Charetty young, including Nicholas in his subservient youth. He still entertained, Gregorio thought, a delusion of ascendancy over Nicholas which Nicholas had either failed or chosen not to dispel, although, Gregorio supposed, he had some means, in crisis, of making sure that Julius respected his wishes.
    Compared with Julius, Gregorio had little shared background with Nicholas: had seen none of his boyhood; had never fought with him; had never taken part in his bizarre escapades overseas. But he had looked after the Charetty business in Bruges when Nicholas was abroad, and his wife still alive, with young daughters. For over two years, he had run his Bank in Venice, and had beenforced to receive for that period a torrential correspondence he would not have foregone.
    Gregorio, not a vain man, recognised that it was a common experience to imagine one understood Nicholas vander Poele; and to harbour an impulse to help and protect him. He reminded himself that the subject of such a humane interest did not always remain innocent, or worthy of it. One must not be beguiled.
    Gregorio sat, his face remote; and his fingers of their own volition caressed the place on his shoulder where once, for upholding Nicholas, he had received a sword-thrust from the lord Simon of St Pol who had written that chilling letter. The letter with the accusation which Nicholas had not repeated in full. Killer of women and gentlefolk , it had said. And despoiler of boys , it had added. Gregorio felt cold, and then amazingly hot.
    ‘It’s getting hotter,’ Tilde de Charetty said. She sat up. The holy island, the one nearest to Venice, had fallen behind. Ahead in the distance lay the sunlit snows of the blue mainland mountains. By contrast, the land which now seemed so close to their bows was green and populous, scattered with red and cream buildings and the towers of churches. By some trick of the sun, the composition appeared to be sparkling, like the effect of dew on a garden. ‘Why is it getting warmer?’ she said.
    ‘Because this is Murano,’ said Gregorio, emerging from his thoughts and wiping his brow. ‘It’s hot because of the glasshouses. This is where all the glass of Venice is made.’
    The island’s sultriness eddied about them, carrying odours of baked clay and charred wood and metal. ‘Glass!’ said Tilde. ‘You didn’t tell me!’
    She was looking at Julius who was far too interested in gazing elsewhere. Nicholas, in laconic Italian, was directing the oarsmen towards the entrance to the nearest and narrowest of the canals that wound through the island. As it began to open to view, you could see the mooring posts with their boats on either side, and the piles of boxes and barrels and sacks on the working-space between the water and the irregular line of crooked brick buildings. It was the Rio di Santo Stefano, where all the workshops were. Gregorio hoped to God Nicholas knew what he was doing.
    Julius said to the girl, ‘I thought you’d enjoy the surprise.’ He chopped Nicholas on the arm. ‘I knew it. You’ve bought your way into glass, haven’t you?’
    ‘It would be hard to