Christian Cameron - Tom Swan and the Head of St. George Part Five - Rhodes

Swan shook his head. ‘Only when they annoy me,’ he said, hoping he had the tone of the conversation right. ‘Do you know Cyriaco? The Italian?’

The man on the chair raised an eyebrow. ‘Perhaps.’ He affected indifference. ‘There are many Italians named Cyriaco,’ he said.

‘De’ Pizzicolli?’ Swan asked. ‘From Ancona?’ He reached into his purse and extracted a good coin — a Venetian soldino which he’d kept because it was new minted, shiny, and the relief was excellent.

The old drunk eyed the coin for a moment. ‘I don’t sell wine,’ he said. ‘And a Venetian coin on a Genoese island is a hard thing to spend. Eh?’ He got up and went inside.

Walking away, Swan realised that he might have played that game better — he might have had a small payment ready in the form of a gift — or even a jug of wine. He might have spoken to the man in a more private place. He might have done many things, but he hadn’t, and he’d only make a fool of himself trying to get the man back.

And he wondered how the Gattelusi would feel about his quest for informants. He began to watch the streets around him the way he would have done if it had been Venice. Or Rome.

After a breakfast of stale bread and wine, he tried again, at the third address. This time, he watched the house for an hour from the steps of the nearest Greek church — watched the owner turn a key in his door, and walk off towards the harbour with a bag on his back. Swan followed him into the main market in the middle of the town, where the man hooked curtains over the bare poles of` a stall, hauled a table from a nearby shed, and began to lay out wares.

Swan wandered over. The man was a silversmith, and Swan examined his wares and chose a set of twenty buttons, equally useful to a rich Greek or a prosperous Italian, with the head of the Virgin on each one.

He took the last six ducats from his purse and counted down two for the buttons. And then two more.

‘Cyriaco of Ancona sends his greetings,’ he said as casually as he could manage.

The man’s hand hovered over the gold coins.

Swan’s gut tightened.

And then the hand pounced like a cat on a rat. ‘I have missed our chats,’ the Greek said. ‘I sent a letter,’ he whispered. ‘I never got a reply.’

Swan nodded. ‘All I want is for you to continue writing letters,’ he said. ‘Perhaps a cup of wine?’ he added, motioning to where a small taverna was just opening, the owner blinking in the new sunlight.

The Greek man’s smile tightened.

Inside his own head, Swan kicked himself. ‘Ah — of course. Perhaps we might meet …’ Swan struggled for some way they might appear together in public — a Greek and a Frank.

‘Cyriaco sometimes liked to visit the old ruins,’ the Greek said. ‘I can hire donkeys and horses — if you have time. Perhaps tomorrow?’

Swan bowed. ‘I would like that of all things,’ he said. ‘Might we visit the temples near Kalloni?’

The Greek sniffed slightly, as if detecting a foul smell. ‘That is … very far. The baths at Thermi? A quick trip.’

Swan sighed. ‘Of course.’

They parted with every evidence of goodwill.

The next few hours taught Swan that spying — the gathering of information — was the very dullest of occupations. Had there been anyone to train him … But there was not, and Swan criss-crossed the town, seeking excuses to talk to people who would never, ordinarily, talk to foreigners. He had the advantage of a list of people who had, at least, been willing to do such a thing in the past — but the list of people didn’t include any methods of making the first contact, and he had to learn every element from first principles.

By mid-afternoon, when the church bells rang for nones, he was tired, hungry and irritable.

And then he realised that he was due in two hours at the castle, and he hurried to his inn.

‘There’s a package on the bed for you,’ Fra Tommaso said. ‘And a note from a Greek silversmith, and another from a man who rents horses. What a busy, busy boy you are.’

The package on the bed was a magnificent piece of linen with woven-in stripes of deep Tyrian red-purple, the very colour most prized by the emperors at Constantinople. It had a stripe along each selvedge. The whole was sewn in a tube. There were, included in the package, a pair of pins — really, brooches — that were in the form of lions. They were made of solid gold, and worth … Swan guessed they were worth twenty ducats a piece. There was also a belt of tiny gold links, and a pair of sandals in red leather with gold buckles. And a very short cloak — a wonderful, soft wool, dark blue, but with a Tyrian red hem that matched the rest.

Swan played with the fabric, trying to imagine how to put it on.

Then he went to the baths. This time, he moved more quickly, avoided boys with trays of wine, and was neat, clean, and presentable an hour before he was due at the castle. He walked down the beach, where two work parties — oarsmen and sailors who had earned Fra Tommaso’s wrath — were scraping the hulls and applying clean, new pitch.

The Lord of Eressos was watching. With him were a dozen mounted stradiotes and two heavy wagons. Swan walked carefully across the sand and paused, a little unsure of himself. As a volunteer of the order, did he outrank a local lord? Or rather, would he annoy the knights?

He was saved from his social predicament by the Lord of Eressos bowing from the saddle. ‘Ah! The English prince.’

Swan returned the bow with interest. ‘My lord,’ he said.

‘Happy Saint George’s Day, Your Grace’ the man said. He smiled. ‘For you heretics!’

The Lord of Eressos was not as old as he had appeared the day before. Rare among Greeks, he had blond hair — ruddy blond, with a snub nose and freckles. With time to examine him, Swan noted that he had Genoese gloves tucked in his belt, and wore Italianate hose and boots, very different from what his retainers wore. And a fine sword that looked — to Swan’s professional eye — like a German sword with some age to it.

All this in an instant. Swan nodded. ‘I shall sail back in ten days and wish you the same, my lord.’ He wasn’t sure he’d ever actually been referred to as ‘Your Grace’ before, and he was prepared to like it.

‘My father was a great one for Saint George,’ the lord went on. ‘And Saint Andrew and Saint Patrick. He was not a Greek.’

‘English?’ Swan asked, because he was coming to believe that half the population of Lesvos was English.

‘Scots,’ the Lord of Eressos said. ‘He came out when the Company of Saint George took the condotta for the Gattelusi. He was constable,’ the young man said with pride. ‘By the way, I’m called Hector. Hector Zambale of Eressos.’

Swan tried to parse Zambale and came up with nothing. ‘Is Zambale a local name?’ he asked.

The young tow-headed Greek grinned. ‘In Scots, its Campbell. Zambale is what the Emperor made of Da’s name.’

Swan grinned. The Lord of Eressos’s smile was infectious. ‘Enjoying our ships?’ he asked.

‘The prince ordered us to provide pitch this morning. Prince Dorino likes to see his orders carried out quickly. He wants you to sail away and leave us alone as soon as possible, so that if the Turks return he can claim he didn’t know you.’ Zambale watched two men with a red-hot iron sealing the patched seam on the bow of the Blessed Saint John. ‘We offered shipwrights, but apparently your knights don’t trust Greeks near their ships.’

There didn’t seem to be a good answer to that.

‘Is it true you are a prince of England?’ Zambale asked. ‘I hope I don’t offend when I say you seem a lot more relaxed than the princes I know.’