The Virgin's War (Tudor Legacy #3)(19)
“There is a man in Le Havre who will help us, with very few questions asked. And I have all I need to pay him.”
Kit raised a skeptical brow as Stephen pulled back his doublet and jerkin to reveal a ruby-set fox pin on his shirt. “Doesn’t look terribly expensive,” Kit said dismissively.
“It doesn’t have to be. It only has to be unique. There is a man in Le Havre who will accept this pin as payment in full. He will help us with whatever we need.”
“And who is this very accommodating man?”
Stephen smiled grimly. “Mariota Sinclair’s business manager.”
After a winter spent profitably between Newcastle and York, Maisie Sinclair drew a metaphorical deep breath and, with a nicely judged amount of notice and fanfare, crossed the border and entered Scotland for the first time in four years. On a day of patchy April sun and squalls of freezing rain, she rode into Edinburgh and dismounted before her late grandfather’s house in the Canongate.
If it had been left to her brother, no doubt the doors would have been locked against her. At the very least the household would have been caught surprised and unprepared for her arrival. But Robert, with all his resentments and dislike, was not solely in control of the Sinclair concerns. And so Maisie was met by well-dressed staff and smiling faces and the full complement of board members who endeavoured to keep Robert from destroying the company his grandfather had so carefully built.
“Maisie, lass, how you have grown in beauty.” That was Andrew Boyd, his spare figure still upright and elegant despite his sixty years. He had been the late William Sinclair’s partner since the age of twenty-five, and if anyone truly ran the concerns these days, it was Boyd.
She smiled, and tipped her cheek up to be kissed. “Well, you can hardly claim that I have grown in height.”
As she accepted and returned the greetings of the staff and board, Maisie made silent notes about personalities and how likely they were to be on her side in the battle to come. She had expected to have the entire household staff in her corner, for Robert had always been a difficult person to please in any matter. From a child, her brother had been rude to the maids and condescending to the grooms and men-at-arms. But apparently Robert had turned his eye to the household staff when he inherited the business, and fully half of them were new to Maisie. It was easy to pick them out—they all had a slight air of slovenliness. And of the men-at-arms present, only a few were familiar. She did not like the look of the rest at all—hard and indifferent and cruel.
The board, however, had been largely beyond Robert’s control. So Maisie was greeted with genuine affection even by those men who would likely oppose her ambitions simply because she was female. That was all right—she could deal with that sort of response. And she had the tacit support of the most important ones already; not only Andrew Boyd, but the four who had served longest with her grandfather. They knew where the brains had gone in this family.
Sulkily, Robert welcomed her home, his discontent plain. “Why did you stay away so long? We expected you to return soon after your husband’s death.”
“Did you? I must have missed your letter of condolence.”
He might be completely unsuited for the task of running a large merchant concern, but Robert had his own native cunning. “You miss only what you do not want to see. Still, you are here now. We can begin to make plans for the next wedding.”
“A wedding! Congratulations, Robert. I cannot wait to meet the…fortunate woman.”
“You know I mean you. There are men aplenty interested in what money you can bring them. So many, that this time we can afford to place a higher price on you.” With an ugly smile, he leaned in and said, more softly, “You see, sister, how I have learned this business. You are a commodity. All I have to do is find the highest bidder.”
Despite expecting it, Maisie found herself shaken at the venom. But she was nothing if not always controlled. “I am no longer fifteen, Robert. I think you will be surprised by what price I command.”
She turned away, and smiling brightly at Andrew Boyd, said, “Shall we go in? No doubt there is a meal prepared…and then we have much to discuss.”
The discussions begun at table that day were not meant to force a confrontation, but to subtly shape the tone of the conversations to come. Everyone except Robert was eager to hear the stories from her travels, and Maisie knew precisely what to highlight in her recitations. Not just the prices and markets of various cities, but the personalities: gossip about who was sleeping with whom and whose son was being forced into an inconvenient marriage and whose brother was working for the opposition. There were stories of the continuing war in the Low Countries and French suspicion of Spain’s increasing aggressiveness.
“Both Scotland and England should give thanks for the native enmity between France and Spain,” Maisie concluded. “If ever they combined their might, our island would be hard-pressed to resist.”
“Like Ireland?” Robert said nastily. He had been drinking a great deal.
She met his eyes steadily. “Yes. Very much like Ireland.”
“You had no trouble opposing the English there.”
Not all the English, she thought. But would never say. Stephen belonged to a separate part of her life, one she did not intend to share with anyone. He belonged to Cahir Castle and Oliver Dane and Liadan—and to Ailis Kavanaugh most of all.