City of God by Cecelia Holland Page B

seriously expected to find Valentino here waiting for him. He propped his chin on his hand, his elbow on the arm of the chair.
    â€œItalians,” Miguelito said. With his thumb he tripped the latch. “Light-minded pigs.”
    Nicholas said nothing. He cast a quick look around the room. One wall was hung with a heavy old-fashioned tapestry of northern workmanship. Only one lamp burned, on the wall by the door, but with the window shut the room heated rapidly.
    Miguelito pulled his coat off. He walked aimlessly around the room, tugging on the neckband of his shirt. Without his coat he seemed smaller; slender and dark, with high narrow shoulders and long hands, he reminded Nicholas of the garrotting wire. There was a rip in the sleeve of his white shirt. He faced Nicholas, belligerent, hands on hips.
    â€œWhat is your interest in Navarre?”
    â€œI was born in Pamplona,” Nicholas said.
    The other man’s face grew round with surprise. He fingered the tear in his shirt. Suddenly he was speaking Spanish. “In Pamplona? Your name is not Navarrese.”
    â€œMy parents were exiles.”
    â€œI do not believe you. Where is the Church of the Holy Spirit?”
    â€œFacing the marketplace. On the south side. The portico’s a favorite place of wool traders. The graveyard behind is supposed to be haunted by a nun and her lover.” The room was swelteringly hot. Nicholas longed for the courage to remove his coat. He wished he could stop thinking of the garrotte so much connected with the name of Miguelito.
    â€œPerhaps you do know Pamplona,” Miguelito said. “That proves nothing, of course. What are you doing here? Among these dogs?”
    â€œThe Italians?” Nicholas shrugged his shoulders; his coat encumbered him; he felt laden down and trapped between the arms of the chair. “I am not Navarrese, either.”
    â€œOr Spanish?”
    The voice behind him brought him to his feet like the touch of a hot coal. He wheeled, putting his back to Miguelito, and faced Cesare Borgia, the Duke of Valentinois.
    â€œMagnifico.” Nicholas flexed his knee and bowed his deepest courtly bow.
    â€œMesser Nicholas Dawson.” Valentino walked around to the chair Nicholas had just left and disposed himself on it. He was smiling. Like his sister, he was fair, with fine pale skin and bright hair, although his hair was darker than hers. He wore black, unrelieved even by rings or medals, so that there was nothing to look at save his handsome leonine head. He let Nicholas stare at him a long moment before he spoke. Like his lackey, he used Spanish.
    â€œYou and I have never met, have we? Yet of course all Rome knows you—the shrewd secretary of the vainglorious Florentine ambassador, forever rescuing his master and his arrogant little state.”
    Nicholas felt Miguelito’s silent presence behind him like a weight against his back. A stream of sweat coursed from his armpit down his side. He did not answer Valentino; all the customary flatteries and modesties sounded false to his inner ear. He searched the splendid young face of the prince before him for some sign of what Valentino intended.
    Valentino smiled at him. “Dawson. That name is hardly Navarrese.”
    â€œMy parents were English-born,” Nicholas said tonelessly.
    â€œOh? Why came they to Pamplona?”
    â€œI do not know. I only know their names—they died when I was still very young. I was raised in a monastery—” he twisted to speak over his shoulder — “by the monks of Saint Dominic, hard by that haunted graveyard.”
    â€œWhere were you educated?” Valentino said. “Your Spanish has no trace of accent.”
    â€œWhen they found some aptitude in me the monks sent me to Salamanca to study law.”
    â€œAnd you never went back?”
    â€œThere was nothing in Pamplona for me.”
    For a moment there hung before his eyes the image of the loved old monk