The King's Diamond Read Free Page A

the border into the Duchy of Savoy, a region still untouched by the carnage of war. After that I would cross the mountains into France: calm, peaceful France. There were no armies there, roving and looting at will, no plague, no famine; there would be bandits and wolves, perhaps, but they were no more than the common dangers of European travel. A few weeks would bring me to English Calais, that comforting outpost of home planted on the edge of the Continent, and then it would be over the Channel and back to London.
    I pictured myself back home on Broken Wharf by the bank of the Thames, climbing the creaking old stairs to the counting house and stepping inside. Here my mother, Miriam Dansey, known to all London as the Widow of Thames Street, directed her many ingenious business endeavours. I imagined laying before her my haul, the emeralds and sapphires, the great ruby, the amethysts and all the rest. I imagined her with her trading partner, William Marshe, the two of them drawing in their breaths and raising their eyebrows in wonder. Yes, I would have a triumph, of a kind. But I would know in my own heart that I had failed. I would have to take my gems to be cut and set by one of the London goldsmiths. I knew these men, and I knew that my stones, that had the capacity to be so extraordinary, would come out looking like all the other trinkets fashioned on Goldsmiths’ Row. I might make a profit on my venture, yes, but it would be small, and I would have lost the glory I longed for, that would come only if I could astonish and dazzle a king.
    There was another way. I could turn south, and head for Rome. Rome: opulent capital of Christendom, where the finest goldsmiths,artists and dealers in luxuries flocked to make their name and fortune, and supply the endless appetites of His Holiness, Pope Clement VII, his cardinals and nobles. Rome: the seat of a mighty temporal power, for Pope Clement held absolute sway over all central Italy, as well as numerous cities in the north, and commanded Florence through his Medici relations. Rome. Only there would I find the craftsman truly worthy to work on my stones. In my dreams I saw the golden swirls and figures that must surround the gems. I saw something nobler than the common run, something alert and alive, something I had never seen in London.
    As I sat, my servant, Martin Deller, paced up and down behind me. He was some ten years my elder, stocky and dark, a useful man with a dagger who had helped me out of trouble more than once. He was also, to my frequent annoyance, the voice of conscience and caution.
    â€˜Please, master! We have had good luck. Let’s leave while we can for home.’
    He was right. Plainly he was right. It was a wonder how we had crossed from Venice overland: first past the army of the Pope’s Holy League camped at Cremona, which they had recently won from the Emperor’s Spaniards, then across into the Duchy of Milan where this war had first begun. This was Imperial territory. We found the farms broken up, the fields burnt. The Emperor’s army, starved of pay and plunder, roved the shattered countryside in bands, robbing travellers of whatever they could get. We had travelled by night and hidden in the day, winning through by a mixture of my boldness and Martin’s sense.
    The patch of sun on the wall of the Arsenal opposite had shrunk upwards as far as the parapet. It was drawing towards evening. At sunset the Speranza would sail. Few ships were putting out for Rome in these days of war. If I was to strike south, this would be my only chance. Perhaps she had sailed already. And that was best, I argued to myself: by far the best. The time had come to call enough, andturn for home. I faced Martin. I was on the point of telling him to unpack the trunk again, and order horses for tomorrow and a guide for the journey inland.
    â€˜Well, master?’
    A sudden, sick rage swelled up in me. Was I to give up now on the triumph I had sworn I