‘They grew on the graves of Tristan and Yseult. King Mark burned them down three times, but the hazel and the honeysuckle always grew back.’
She rolls over on her stomach and peers at her reflection in the water. ‘That sounds like the end of the story. Tell me from the beginning.’
I might as well not have bothered with the swim. I’m sweating into my clean tunic more than I ever sweated under my armour. I should go, plead some chore that Gornemant has for me. I can’t trust myself.
I sit down on the bank, what I hope is a respectful distance away.
‘Long ago, when Arthur was king …’
The words are a key, unlocking my anxiety. They relax me; I find I can go on. My mother never told me the tale, but I have heard it many times in Guy’s hall. I’m surprised Ada doesn’t know it.
None of the troubadors I’ve heard entirely agreed with each other, and mine is changed again.
‘Tristan was a knight from Lyonesse, who served his uncle, King Mark of Cornwall.
In my mind, uncle Mark is a fat oaf in a vair-fur cloak that leaves powder on the table.
‘Mark sent him to Ireland to fetch his bride, Yseult the Blonde. Yseult was the fairest maid in all Britain.’
From the corner of my eye, I see Ada winding a lock of her golden hair around her finger. Is she seeing Yseult as I do, with soft blue eyes and a dimple on her chin, lying on a riverbank among the camomile?
‘Yseult’s mother was a sorceress. To ensure a happy marriage, she concocted a love potion and gave it to Yseult’s maid for the wedding night. But on the ship from Ireland, Tristan grew thirsty. He found the bottle and thought it was wine; he drank it. Yseult found him in the cabin and asked to share his drink. She didn’t know what it was.’
‘Where was the maid?’ Ada asks archly.
‘The story doesn’t say. Tristan and Yseult stared into each other’s eyes, and at that moment they fell headlong in love. The walls of the boat seemed to melt away and all they knew was each other.’
I don’t know where Ada’s looking. At that moment, I am very deliberately not staring into her eyes. I’m dizzy; the sun is hot on my skin; I drank too much beer at lunchtime. I’m desperate to make her understand, to tear down the cautious walls of protocol and speak truthfully.
Ada pulls the petals off a daisy and tosses them onto the water. ‘It must have been a strong potion.’
‘When they reached Cornwall, Yseult was married to King Mark. But on her wedding night she crept away from the marriage bed to be with Tristan. She had her maid take her place with the King. In the dark, he didn’t know the difference. Before dawn, Yseult stole back.’
‘It sounds horrible. So dishonest.’
‘She was in thrall to the potion. They both were.’ I’m quick to defend them. In the stream, a brown trout noses against the current. He doesn’t move; he barely twitches his fins. I’m the same, forcing myself to be still in the face of the vast currents swirling about me.
‘Eventually, the lovers grew careless. Rumours circulated. King Mark’s advisors went to the king and warned him he was being cuckolded by his nephew. So Mark set a trap. When Yseult went to bed, he had his servant scatter flour on the floor. He thought it would show up any footprints left in the night.’
‘Clever.’
‘Yseult saw the trap and warned Tristan. But his love was so strong he couldn’t resist her. He leaped from the doorway and landed on Yseult’s bed in a single bound.’
‘Was that love?’ Ada’s sceptical. ‘It sounds more like plain lust.’
I blush. I’m furiously aware that she’s far more experienced than I am in this area. Suddenly my story of the lovers seems false, like an ill-tuned harp. Embarrassment ties my tongue. I turn away.
‘Go on,’ Ada says gently. ‘I want to hear how it ends.’
‘In his leap, Tristan had opened a wound he was carrying from his last battle. He cleared the flour, but three drops of blood fell and landed in it. When Mark found them next morning, he had the two lovers arrested for treason.
‘He imprisoned Tristan in a tower on the edge of a high cliff. But Tristan managed to pull open the bars on the window and leap down onto the beach. Because he was innocent, God made sure he was unhurt.’
Ada raises an eyebrow. She doesn’t think Tristan was innocent.
‘His squire found him and fetched his horse. Just as Mark was about to set the pyre under Yseult, Tristan galloped into the courtyard. He cut Yseult free from the stake and pulled her onto his saddle. They rode away into the forest where King Mark’s men couldn’t find them.’
‘And?’
‘And they lived happily ever after.’
She throws a pebble at me. ‘Cheat. That’s not the ending I know.’
It’s not the ending I know either. That has a poisoned wound; Tristan lying in agony waiting for a ship with white sails to announce Yseult has come to heal him; Yseult dying over his corpse as she arrives too late. But I don’t want that ending on a summer’s day that smells of honeysuckle.
I throw the pebble back at her. ‘If you’re the storyteller, you get to choose how it ends.’
XV
‘Talhouett Holdings SA owns a thirty-five per cent stake in a Romanian mining operator which is currently on trial accused of massive arsenic spillages into the Danube basin.’
Ellie sipped her water. Her mouth felt dry as dust. In the conference room in front of her, a dozen men stared at her from around an oval table. These were the board of Monsalvat Bank: a monochrome conclave of white men and black suits, grey hair and hard grey faces. Blanchard’s tie, deep crimson, was the only colour in the room, as if a vandal had splashed paint across an ancient photograph. Some watched from behind hooded lids, half closed; others pored over the table and wrote indecipherable notes. Several eyed her as if she were something on a menu.
‘The stake doesn’t appear anywhere in their published accounts because, under Luxembourg law, it isn’t considered a controlling stake. But under Romanian law, as the largest shareholder, they’re liable for any damages.’
‘Do the other bidders know this?’ demanded a balding man with liver spots on his skull. Flecks of spittle flew as he talked.
‘I don’t think so. The only reference I found was a letter in an unopened personnel file.’
‘The letter is no longer there,’ Blanchard added. Ellie cringed. She remembered the hard corners of the paper tucked in the waist of her skirt, the terror it would rustle or fall out as the data-room guard looked her over. If the men in the room guessed what she’d done, they didn’t seem troubled by it.
‘What are the chances of a conviction?’ fired in a hatchet-faced man on the other side of the table.
‘Romania’s under a lot of pressure from Europe to prove that they’re getting serious about environmental regulation. A high-level prosecution team from Germany have flown out to help them secure a conviction. If they find out Talhouett’s involved it’ll make a politically attractive target. It’s not a local firm, and it’ll send a message internationally.’
‘How much?’
Ellie blinked. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘How much money?’
‘Based on recent rulings, the fines might run to several hundred million euros.’
‘And to make the problem go away?’
‘I don’t —’
Blanchard stood, uncoiling like a snake. ‘Thank you, Ellie. I think you have given us all the information we need.’ He ushered her out into the corridor. ‘You did very well. The board are hard men to impress.’
Did that mean she’d impressed them? It was hard to believe from those stony faces.
‘We will take the Talhouett project from here. We need you on another job now. You’ll find the files in your office.’
Ellie walked down the corridor and sank into her chair. New files had appeared like magic on her desk — even the sight of them made her sick. She’d spent most of the last forty-eight hours preparing her presentation and she was exhausted. At least it had allowed her to put off thinking about the other questions hammering at her mind.