‘We accept!’ I said, leaping to my feet. I had on my own plaque belt, the heavy belt that showed my status as a knight. Mine was silver with heavy gilding, and was worth roughly the price of my ransom: that’s what we used to say they were for. I realised that I looked incongruous — knights don’t sit about repairing horse tack and mule saddles.
But the prince took no heed. ‘Here’s a man of sense — your squire, I doubt not?’
Fra Peter raised an eyebrow. ‘No one’s squire, my lord. This is Sir William Gold-’
‘Ha! The Cook!’ cried the prince. ‘But I know of you, of course! Knighted at Florence, attacking my home city! My bastard brother wrote and told me every cut, every blow. He said you were the best caveliere he had ever seen.’
Too much praise can be as confusing as an insult. ‘My lord has the better of me,’ I said, a little stiffly.
‘Ah, my pardon!’ he bowed.
Fra Peter laughed. ‘William, this is the richest man in the world and one of the best knights I’ve ever met. Ser Niccolo Acciaioli, of Florence. And Naples. And the Morea?’
‘I am no longer Baillie,’ Acciaioli said. ‘I remain Count of Melfi.’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘A fine accomplishment for a man who started as a baker’s errand boy, eh?’
‘I started a cook, my lord baron,’ I said. Acciaioli seemed to boil with energy and good humour, and I had to like him. His neat pointed beard and perfectly groomed hair were the height of Italianate fashion. His eyes were large, and almost never serious.
‘So this is true?’ Acciaioli took my arm. ‘I think we are both the better for humble origins. Eh? Do you love chivalry? My heart says you do.’
This man was an assault on the senses: rich, quick of wit, brilliant — and penetrating. ‘Yes,’ I said.
‘He’s not easy to share a campfire with, either,’ Fra Peter said. ‘Has Father Pierre brought you here?’
Ser Niccolo shrugged. ‘I could make excuses, but yes. My Lady Queen has sent me with some letters of support, and I will arrange some funds.’ He smiled at me. ‘Do you like to spend money, Messire Le Coq?’
‘At least as much as any banker I’ve ever met,’ I said.
Ser Niccolo laughed. ‘Well struck. Although let me tell you that in my family, they think my talent for spending gold a fault, not a virtue.’
Fra Peter interrupted him to introduce the other squires. He embraced Juan. ‘I know your uncle,’ he said. ‘You must be close to your knighting?’
Juan blushed to the roots of his hair.
Ser Niccolo looked at Fra Peter.
Fra Peter shrugged. ‘It hasn’t been talked of, but he is ready.’
I felt like a fool — I had been knighted and I hadn’t thought about Juan.
Miles Stapleton bowed to the Florentine. ‘Messire is a famous knight,’ he said. ‘I have heard of your exploits in Greece from my father.’
Ser Niccolo made a face and grinned. ‘It is good to be both handsome and rich and good at arms,’ he said. He laughed. ‘Come, i miei amici. Let us go to the streets of Bologna and see the papal legate’s retinue better equipped.’
Fra Peter caught at his trailing sleeve. ‘Niccolo!’ he said in rapid Italian, ‘You shame us! We can raise the funds for saddles.’
Niccolo put a hand to Fra Peter’s cheek, an intensely familiar gesture, even from a Florentine. ‘By God, if I buy you a saddle for every time you saved my worthless life, I would still be the richest man in Bologna when I was done, and you would be buried in Cordoba leather. Eh? So let us hear no more piss.’ He looked at me. ‘Tell me, English Knight. What are the seven virtues of Chivalry?’
I nodded. ‘Preux!’ I said. ‘Loyalty to my lord, Faith in Christ Jesus, Prowess on the field of battle, Love of a Lady, Courage to face the foe, Generosity to all, Mercy to my foes and to the weak.’
‘Well said,’ Ser Niccolo said. ‘So when I practice generosity, is it enough if I give a few pennies to the poor? Listen, if a poor knight gives half his cloak to the poor, he gives more than I live when I buy you saddles.’
‘You argue like a Dominican,’ Fra Peter said.
Niccolo Acciaioli fluttered his eyelashes. ‘But of course! I was to have been a Dominican!’ He winked at me. ‘Only the chastity was lacking.’
So the richest man in Italy took us out into a Bologna evening.
He was joined at the gates of the palace by a retinue of men-at-arms, a dozen, all well dressed. He had a squire dressed in his heraldic colours and his entire retinue wore his badge, so that they made a glittering parade.
Men and women cheered his name.
Shops opened that had closed. In the street of leather workers, all the saddlers knew we were coming before we walked to the corner, and every master was in the door of his shop, bowing to the great man.
Sister Marie received a fine mule saddle with silver buckles and a matching bag which buckled behind the back of the saddle, all in fine red Spanish leather and Fra Peter spent the better part of the hour before compline protesting various magnificent war saddles, each finer than the last, ivory plaques, gilding, heraldic decoration, matched reins and bridles and straps. In the end, though, while Fra Peter denied that he would ever use a brilliant saddle in Hospitaller scarlet, I nodded to my new friend, Ser Niccolo, and while Fra Peter protested, I was arranging to bring the knight’s charger the next morning for a fitting, and promising to bring Sister Marie’s mule as well.
It was great fun. Ser Niccolo’s men-at-arms were as pleasant a set of men as the great man himself, and they were free with a jibe or a compliment. As they were all Florentines, I expected that they would hold some rancour for my attack on their city, but they seemed to have the opposite views, holding all their ire for Duke Rudolph, who they viewed as a poor soldier.
One young knight, Ser Nerio, had actually witnessed my feat of arms, and his flattery was effusive, and, to me, very sweet.
‘Were you fighting, messire?’ I asked.
He laughed. ‘I was on the walls with the ladies,’ he said. ‘My harness was in Naples with my lord, and I was home for a wedding and a funeral.’ He shrugged.
Another young knight, a blonde who had to be five years my younger, leaned over. ‘Don’t believe him! He’s so rich he has ten armours, all different, spread across Italy like his women, and he was watching from the walls because he’s a great coward.’
I thought there must be a fine pun on amours and armours but I couldn’t get it right.
Ser Nerio didn’t take offence. Rather, he laughed. ‘I rode well that night and drank deep, Antonio. While you-’
Ser Antonio turned his blonde curls to me. ‘I exchanged blows with two of your valiant gentleman, although I find now that one of them may indeed have been an Amazon.’
We all went to church together, laughing. I knew I was leaving Juan and Fiore and Miles to flounder, but I make friends easily, and I liked these men.
We heard compline sung in the Italian manner. Italian Latin is virtually incomprehensible to an Englishman and so I translated for Miles Stapleton, who gazed at the altar with pious devotion.
After church, we gathered around Father Pierre, and he and Ser Niccolo embraced. Then the Florentine lord departed, inviting all of us to dine at his house the next day.
I was up early the next morning. By then, I had discovered that Father Pierre was in Bologna to arrange grants and loans in aid of the Crusade and because he had a writ from the Pope to establish a chair of Theology at the university, which would, of course, greatly enhance the prestige of Bologna. But it meant that for the next three days he would be sitting with six other great prelates in examination of two candidates for the honour of a Doctorate in Theology.
The world is more complex than we often imagine. That the good men and women of Bologna were being pressed to provide funds for the crusade was true, but the Pope, and Father Pierre, who loved the Bolognese and had made many friends at the university, were providing value for money, a chair of theology would bring students from all over Italy and even all over Europe, and Father Pierre, himself one of the most famous theologians since Aquinas, would add enormous lustre to the founding.