The contessa shrugged. "Riding out in the hills. They left hours ago.
They took their own guards and the old Franciscan with them. He told me
they were restless."
_God's wounds!_
Simon remembered the bloody fight between the Venetians and the
Armenians. He remembered Giancarlo and his bravos. He thought about what
the contessa had just said about the enmity of the Filippeschi.
He pictured the mutilated bodies of the Tartars sprawled on a mountain
road.
"Did my French knights go with them?"
The contessa shrugged. "They are in the palazzo courtyard, practicing
with wooden swords."
Simon ground his teeth in rage.
_The idiots! Training themselves for some future battle while their
charges go off to face God knows what dangers!_
"Which road did the Tartars take? I must go after them."
The contessa was by now rather obviously annoyed at his lack of interest
in her. "I do not know. Perhaps Cardinal Paulus knows. He spoke to them
before they left."
Simon bade the contessa a polite good-bye. She insisted on embracing
him. He wondered if he had looked as foolish to Sophia as Donna Elvira
now appeared to him.
* * * * *
For the second time that day Simon found himself sitting in a chair that
was too small for him. The back of this one came to an abrupt stop
halfway up his spine, and his shoulders ached even though he had been
sitting for only a few moments. He had taken off his gloves and tucked
them in his sword belt, and he sat with his fists clenched in his lap.
De Verceuil strode across the room and stood over Simon. "I may yet
demand that you be sent home. I cannot imagine why the Count of Anjou
entrusted such a stripling with a mission of this importance."
"Your Eminence may not approve of my visiting Cardinal Ugolini," Simon
said, keeping his voice firm, "but can you show me where I have done
wrong?" He did not want to talk about Ugolini; he wanted to find out
where the Tartars were. But de Verceuil had not even given him time to
ask.
"You could have gone wrong in a thousand ways," said de Verceuil,
staring down at Simon. "Both the king and Count Charles have confided in
you. Rashly, I believe. You might have revealed more about their
intentions than you should have."
Simon remembered how Ugolini had reacted at once to the idea that the
purpose of the alliance was to conquer Islam completely. Saying that
might indeed have been a blunder. He felt his face grow hot.
Discomfort and anger pushed Simon to his feet. De Verceuil had to take a
step backward.
"Why have you allowed the ambassadors to go riding in the hills with
only six men to escort them?" Simon demanded. "That is negligence, Your
Eminence. A good deal more dangerous than my visit to Cardinal Ugolini.
Where have they gone?"
De Verceuil whirled, the heavy gold cross on his chest swinging, and
paced to the mullioned window, then turned to face Simon again. His
face, a deep crimson, seemed to glow in the light that came in through
the translucent glass.
"Guarding the ambassadors is your responsibility, Count." He spoke in a
low, relentless tone. "I did not bother to inquire where they were
going. If you think they should not have gone out into the countryside,
you should have been here to stop them." His voice rose to a shout. "Not
waiting upon Cardinal Ugolini!"
Simon's face grew hot with shame. De Verceuil had him.
Even if he had not done anything wrong by visiting Ugolini, he should
have first made sure the ambassadors would be safe while he was gone. He
could have left explicit orders with Henri de Puys or with Alain de
Pirenne.
"I will go after them now." Simon started for the door.
"I have not dismissed you."
Rage boiled up within Simon. "I am the Count de Gobignon. Only the king
can command me."
De Verceuil crossed the room to thrust his face into Simon's once again.
"God can command you, young man, and the Cardinal-Archbishop of Verceuil
is God's spokesman. Have a care, or I doubt not God will show you how
fleeting is worldly rank."
_Is he trying to use God to threaten me?_ Simon thought, dumbfounded.
"If you overstep your bounds again," de Verceuil went on, "I promise you
my messenger will fly to the Count d'Anjou, demanding that you be
removed from this post. If the count must choose between you and me, I
have no doubt he will choose the more experienced head and the one more
influential with the pope."
"Do that," said Simon, his voice trembling with fury. "And I will make
my own report to the count."
He turned on his heel, and de Verceuil's shout of "What do you mean by
that?" was cut off by the slam of the heavy oak door.
* * * * *
It seemed to Simon as if the air were filled with motes of gold. He, his
equerry, Thierry, and de Pirenne and de Puys were riding high on the
western slope of a mountain thickly clad with pines. Shadow drowned the
valley below. The horizon to the west was an undulating black
silhouette. From beyond that range, the platinum glow of the setting sun
dazzled his eyes.
"Look ahead, Monseigneur," said Alain, gripping Simon's shoulder and
pointing toward a dark green hill with a rounded top to the north.
Simon's stomach tightened as he saw a party of riders strung out along
the road. They rode in sunlight, and he recognized the flame-colored
tunics of the Armenians.
_At last_, he thought, sighing and smiling. The Tartars' party had
ridden far. He had followed their trail most of the afternoon, and found
them only now because they were coming back.
He squinted, trying to see the Tartars. He clucked to his palfrey and
spurred her lightly from a walk to a trot. His three companions did the
same.
Two carts with high sides lurched down the road behind the Armenians. A
single mule pulled the cart in front, two drew the second. A man in a
red tunic drove each cart. Where the devil were the Tartars? Bringing up
the rear of the party on the back of a donkey, he saw a figure in brown.
Friar Mathieu. Simon began to feel panic again.
"Do you see the Tartars?" he asked his men.
De Puys snorted. "They are probably too lazy to ride. They are sitting
in one of those carts, fancying themselves lords of the earth."
"Tartars think it unmanly to be carried when they can ride," Simon told
de Puys, annoyed at the old knight's ignorance.
"But I see horses without riders," Alain de Pirenne said. "Four of
them."
Simon squinted again and saw that each of four Armenians on horseback
was leading a riderless horse.
Even though it was a warm evening, he felt as if a sudden blast of cold
wind were blowing right through him. He sat frozen in the saddle.
_Dear God, are we too late?_
"Follow me," he snapped, kicking his palfrey hard.
Riding as quickly as they dared down the rocky, unfamiliar road, they
heard church bells chiming out the Angelus. The shadow cast by the hills
to the west rose to engulf them as they descended.
The Armenians had gathered on the other side of a meandering river at
the very bottom of the valley and seemed to be trying to decide where to
cross. Simon still saw no sign of the Tartars, but it was too dark to
make anyone out clearly.
In his dread he rode his horse straight into the river. She stumbled on
the rocky bed a time or two, and once plunged into a deep place where
she had to swim. It being the end of August, all the streams hereabout
were at their lowest level. Even so, when Simon got across he was soaked
up to his waist.
He saw the Armenians unslinging their bows and nocking arrows. "It is I,
de Gobignon!" he shouted. He heard Friar Mathieu call something to the
men, and they lowered their bows. Good that they were alert, he thought,
but what might have happened to them on the road to make them so?
He rode in among the Armenians, and felt a hollow pit in his stomach as
he saw the rich saddles on two of the riderless horses, silver and
mother-of-pearl inlays glistening even in the darkness of the forest.
"Simon!" Friar Mathieu, on donkeyback, called.
Simon turned to the nearest cart and looked in over the shoulder of the
driver, one of the Armenians, who stared at him from under heavy brows.
There, on a bed of straw, lay two bodies. They had the short, broad
build of the Tartar ambassadors. Simon's heart stopped beating.
"Mary, Mother of God!" Simon whispered. He got down from his horse.
Mathieu was beside him, gripping his arm. "Did you come looking for us,
Simon?"
Simon was sick with despair. He gestured feebly at the two bodies.
"What happened to them?"
"You might call it a mischance due to their inexperience. I tried to
warn them, but they would not heed me."
"Mischance? What sort of mischance?" Did it matter, Simon wondered, how
this had happened? He had failed utterly and absolutely, that was all
that counted. His foolish decision to go to Ugolini had led to this
disaster. Another stain on the house of Gobignon.
He put his hands to his face. "If only I had stayed with them this
morning."
Mathieu patted his arm. "Do not reproach yourself. No one will blame
you. It would probably have happened just the same even if you were
there."
Simon felt the old friar's words like a blow in the face. What shame, to
be thought so useless that even his presence would not have saved the
Tartars. But, he told himself, turning the knife in his own guts, it was
true. Anyone stupid enough to let something like this happen _would_
surely be useless in a moment of danger.
"Did you not know how dangerous these hills could be?" he asked.
"They were determined on a long ride," said Friar Mathieu. "Tartars are
used to vast distances and great spaces. You cannot imagine how
miserable they were feeling, cooped up in a hill town surrounded by a
wall on top of a rock. I felt sorry for them. In fact, I even feared for
their health."
Simon was indignant. "Feared for their health! The devil you say! Now
look at them."
Friar Mathieu squeezed Simon's arm. "Do not mention the devil. He may
come when you call. As for them"--he waved a hand at the two inert
forms in the cart--"this is embarrassing, to be sure, but we need not
blame ourselves."
"Embarrassing? Embarrassing! Is that all you call it?"
One of the bodies on the straw moved. As Simon stared, it lurched to its
knees. He heard a few slurred words in the guttural speech of the
Tartars. The figure crawled on hands and knees to the side of the cart,
lifted its head, and vomited loudly and copiously.
"They are not dead!" Simon cried.
"Dead drunk," said Friar Mathieu.
Relief was so sudden and stunning that for a moment Simon could not
breathe. He caught his breath and gasped. The gasp was followed by a
roar of laughter. Simon stood, his head thrown back, helpless with
laughter. He pressed his hands against his aching stomach.
Friar Mathieu had gone to attend the sick Tartar. He wiped the man's
face with the sleeve of his robe, went to the stream and washed the
sleeve, then came back and pressed the wet wool to the Tartar's brow.
"Can you not stop laughing?" he said on his second trip to the stream.
"The Armenians do not like you laughing at their masters."
"Dead drunk!" Simon shouted, and went into another spasm of laughter.
* * * * *
It started innocently enough, Friar Mathieu explained as they rode back
together. He himself had proposed to take the road to Montefiascone,
along which he had heard there was a particularly impressive view of
Orvieto. Simon remembered the spot. He had been enjoying that same view
when David of Trebizond's servant--what was his name?--Giancarlo, came
along with those three heavily armed men.
The Tartars had been pleased enough with the view, but they wanted to
ride on. Friar Mathieu felt some trepidation that they might encounter
highwaymen in the hills. But he had confidence in the Armenians, too,
and so they pressed on along the mountain road.
"They observed everything and talked to each other in such low voices I
could not hear them." Mathieu turned to give Simon a pained look. "I
think they were discussing how an army might be brought through these
hills."
Simon was appalled. He pictured a Tartar army, tens of thousands of
fur-clad savages on horseback, sweeping through Umbria on its way to
Rome, burning the towns and the farms and slaughtering the people. Simon
shook his head in perplexity. If such a thing happened, he would have
helped to bring it about.
By the time the Tartars and their entourage reached the little town of
Montefiascone, Mathieu went on, in the heart of vineyard-covered hills,
they were all hungry and thirsty. They took over the inn--the black
looks cast by the Armenians were enough to drive out the other
patrons--and proceeded to drink up the host's considerable supply of
wine.
"The wine of Montefiascone is a great gift from God," Mathieu said.
"Very clear, almost as light as spring water, just a touch sweet, just a
touch tart. And the host brought it up from a stone cellar that kept it
deliciously cold. Not strong wine, actually, but the Tartars drank _all
there was_."
Friar Mathieu pointed to the young Armenian leader, Prince Hethum, who
was now riding beside Alain de Pirenne, at the head of their procession
back to Orvieto. The prince was carrying the Tartars' purse, now
somewhat less fat with gold florins. The host at the inn had been
delighted to serve his thirsty guests, but when his supply of wine was
gone, the Tartars turned ugly. Philip Uzbek, the younger Tartar, grabbed
the host by the throat. The Armenians, who were careful to drink
sparingly, fingered their bows. The innkeeper left his wife as a hostage
and went out to the nearby farms, and after a tense hour arrived back
with a cartload of wine barrels. This time the wine outlasted the
Tartars.
"They have no head for wine, you see," Mathieu said. "Poor innocent
world conquerors. They drink a beverage called kumiss, which is
fermented mare's milk. Very mild, but it satisfies their desire to get
drunk. When they conquered the civilized lands, for the first time they
could have as much wine as they wanted. They have an ungodly appetite
for it."
When the Tartar ambassadors collapsed, unconscious, Mathieu and the host
had both sighed with relief. With the Tartars' gold, Mathieu bought two
carts and three mules, and they loaded John Chagan and Philip Uzbek in
one and the remaining barrels of Montefiascone wine in the other.
"Montefiascone may be the only town in the world that can say it has
been invaded by Tartars and profited," said Mathieu. Simon laughed.
He had thought to bring flint, tinder, a lantern, and a supply of
candles with him, and now Thierry rode at the head of the party with the
lantern raised on the end of a long tree branch, giving them a little
light to follow. At least this way the Tartars would not go over a cliff
in their cart in the dark.
"If I could have found you this morning, I would have asked you to come
along and bring some of your Frenchmen," the old friar said. "But you
were meeting with Cardinal Ugolini, were you not?"
When Mathieu mentioned Ugolini, Simon immediately found himself thinking
of the cardinal's beautiful niece. He wondered, was she older than he?
How would she react if he tried to see her again? He wished he could
forget Tartars and crusaders and Saracens and devote himself to paying
court to Sophia. Of course, if he went anywhere near Ugolini's
establishment again, de Verceuil would undoubtedly think he was trying
to continue the forbidden negotiations.
"My efforts went badly," he told Friar Mathieu. Before going on, he
peered as far along the road ahead as he could see. De Pirenne and de
Puys were both riding at the head of the party, just behind Thierry with
his lantern. Hethum and the other Armenians came next, and they
understood no French. Simon and Friar Mathieu were at the end of the
line, behind the two carts. There was no risk in talking.
"Cardinal Ugolini nearly convinced me that our efforts to liberate the
Holy Land are futile. And then de Verceuil knew that I had gone to
Ugolini, and he was furious. How did he know where I had been?"