A Candle For d'Artagnan

by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

  “Yes; for Anne and her son.”

  Text of a letter from Pere Chape to Padre Fabriano Riccono.

  To that most pious and dedicated priest, Padre Riccono, his Brother in Christ and the Church sends words of report and of warning, and prays that God will protect this letter and the courier who bears it from danger and from harm.

  Now that Mazarin has been made a Cardinal, Richelieu appears to have gained strength. Two months ago that would have seemed impossible, but to the astonishment of many here, the First Minister has rallied and is vigorously endorsing the work of his Italian lieutenant. Many have remarked that they did not know Richelieu was able to do this, for his health, as I have reported in the past, has been failing.

  There are more and more rumors at court that the tide has turned against Richelieu and that there are powerful and discontented nobles who wish to bring Richelieu down before he can entrench Mazarin. There has always been opposition to Richelieu, of course, but with Mazarin now a Cardinal, some of the noblemen are afraid that Richelieu’s influence will extend beyond the very jaws of death. Many fear that Mazarin, for all his new French citizenship, would be a foreigner in great power and that he would use it to the benefit of his family and to the detriment of France. Mazarin has repeatedly insisted that he has taken his adopted country to his heart, but against that are the stories one always hears of stepchildren who turn on those who have taken them in.

  Among those most openly opposing Richelieu—and Mazarin even more—is Monsieur Peyrer de Troisvilles of the King’s Musqueteers. He, along with Monsieur des Essarts of the King’s Guard, has declared that he will do nothing to support or advance either Cardinal or the policies the Cardinals propose. The King is aware of this and thus far has not interfered in the dispute. I have noticed that Richelieu does not often permit himself to be dragged into open conflict with des Essarts or de Troisvilles, but it would be foolish to think that he is unmoved by the oppositions in his own court.

  Mazarin has told me that Bondame Clemens continues to be most useful to him, and has said that her service to his embassy has been so great that he dare not permit her to return to Rome and that the Pope’s concern about the reputation of Bondame Clemens is not truly warranted; what gossip has been spread concerning her has not brought either the Cardinal nor Bondame Clemens any real embarrassment, and unless that should occur and not be answerable, it is Mazarin’s contention that the good Roman widow remain at her post at Chatillon. It seems that having a meeting place outside the gates of Paris is more advantageous than was first believed, for messengers may come there and depart from there and leave no record of their passage because they do not, in fact, have to pass through the Paris gates, where records would be made.

  Related to that consideration, it is of some interest that Bondame Clemens’ stud farm at Tours has been prospering. Her most recent accounting from there has shown a rise in profits which she accounts for because of her presence in France. She has yet to go to Tours, but plans to go there again as soon as the roads are clear. The Cardinal has told her that he approves of this venture so long as she is not gone long and takes proper escort so that she will not be in danger from the highwaymen who prey on travelers.

  I plan to journey to Rome after Lent and the Pascal feasts, should the weather and movements of armies permit. I will beg an audience with His Holiness, your cousin, for purposes of imparting to him my private impressions and to answer any questions he might have that are of too delicate a nature to consign to paper, even paper of this sort which will be ashes minutes after you finish reading it.

  Your kindness to my cousin means much to me, and on behalf of all the family I extend humble thanks. Those of us coming from families of little means do not often have the opportunity to progress in the world; that you are willing to extend yourself on their behalf puts me all the more in your debt than that which I already owe to you for the advancement you have bestowed on me in the missions you have required of me in the name of His Holiness and the Church. I have admonished my cousin to remember your kindness in all his prayers and pray also that he be deserving of the distinction you have shown him, as I pray to be deserving of your continuing favor.

  In the Name of God and His Church, and with the unfaltering belief in their righteousness in this sinful world, I commend myself to you and beg you to review what I have said here with all the subtle wisdom you command. Be sure I will write again in sixty days or less, and that if there are any unexpected developments that might be significant to the Church, you will know of it as swiftly as a courier may bring you word.

  Pere Pascal Chape, Augustinian

  By the Grace of God

  On the Feast of Saint Titus, the 6th day of February, 1642.

  Destroy after reading.

  6

  The villa at Tours was not so grand as Eblouir; it was older, more sprawling, and less elegant, a practical pile of a building with heavy, barred shutters for all the windows and a massive brace to close the gates at night. The stables were extensive, with large paddocks; even these were enclosed by high stone fences and protected with braced gates.

  “Does it disappoint you?” Olivia asked her companion as they rode up to the front gates. Her face was rosy from the chill wind and her smile was open and unguarded.

  “It reminds me of home,” said Charles de Batz-Castelmore, his King’s Guard mantle askew from their long ride. “In Gascony most of the nobility live like this.” He reached out and tugged on the bell chain to summon one of the staff. The sound of the bell was as unmelodious as it was loud and both his and Olivia’s horse shied at the brazen noise.

  “I think perhaps I should replace that,” said Olivia as she brought her horse under control.

  “It will bring assistance,” said Charles confidently. “No one wants to hear that sound twice.” Then he grinned at her, his eyes glinting. “Before your staff comes, I want to tell you something: you surprise me, Madame.”

  “I?” said Olivia. “How do I surprise you?”

  He shrugged. “We’ve been in the saddle for almost seven hours, eight if you count the meal I had at that dreadful inn—I don’t blame you for not touching it, but soldiers can’t afford to be overly nice about food—and you’ve held up like a seasoned trooper.”

  “I told you I was used to long rides,” said Olivia, faintly amused by his remarks.

  “Yes,” said Charles, listening for the sounds of approach on the other side of the gate. “But I was afraid what you meant was that you had learned to go on long, pleasurable jaunts around Chatillon or Rome, and would not be able to keep up on the road.”

  “You do not know some of the roads I have ridden. This was nothing more than a jaunt around Chatillon when compared to—oh, many worse places.” She ended lamely, her face clouding.

  Charles saw the change in her face, and made a shrewd guess. “Were you displaced by war? Is that it?”

  “Among other things,” Olivia said in truthful evasion. “Ah. At last.”

  The brace made a scraping noise as it was drawn back, and the enormous iron hinges groaned as one side of the gate was opened and a squat man in a farmer’s smock stood to block the way. “Well?” He looked from Charles to Olivia and spat.

  “Show respect, you peasant!” Charles ordered sharply, but Olivia gestured him to silence.

  “Forgive the Guardsman; he did not intend any offence.” She looked at the man, reading implacability in his surly expression and defiant posture; she decided to ignore this and to behave as if he had accorded her a reasonable welcome. “Where is the major domo? I would like you to fetch him. Pray tell him that Bondame Clemens wishes to speak with him.”

  “I have work to do,” said the fellow in the smock, not moving and unimpressed with her gracious manner.

  “For this stud farm? Is this where you work?” Olivia asked with the same determined courtesy.

  “Yes,” he said, and spat again, just missing her horse’s front hooves. “For what that may be to you.”<
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  “Then I recommend you bring the major domo at once.” She favored him with a deliberate show of teeth that was not a smile. “If you do not, I will order part of your wages be withheld—for churlishness.” Her horse was sidling, lifting his head, aware of others of its kind nearby. She wanted a little time to quiet the restive animal but contented herself with slapping him with her crop and ordering him to stand.

  He gave a single hostile bark of laughter. “You have nothing to say on it. Now go away.” He started to close the gate, but Charles anticipated him, moving his horse up to block him. “Move back,” said the peasant, his stance more threatening than before, his arms braced for resistance.

  “Never,” said Charles merrily.

  “Bring the major domo,” Olivia repeated, this time in a tone that tolerated no opposition.

  The peasant folded his arms and glowered. “I am not a fool, me, and I won’t be ordered about by a fancy woman and a fop in a King’s Guard mantle and a hat with feathers.” This last was so condemning that Olivia had to keep from laughing.

  “You’ll be ordered about by this woman,” said Charles, clearly enjoying himself. “You will do whatever this woman requires of you or you will regret it. She employs you.” He grinned as he delivered this most unwelcome news.

  The man in the smock snickered. “The woman who employs me is a Roman widow, or so I am told. She never comes here.” He pointed at the jaunty plumed hat perched on Olivia’s fawn-brown hair. “What widow looks like that.”

  “This one does,” said Olivia very clearly, growing tired of the game. “How I conduct myself is not for you to judge, no matter who I am. Stand aside, fellow. I am weary of arguing with you.” She tightened her hold on the reins and wished, as she had for most of the day’s journey, that she could ride straddle and use the pressure of her legs to guide her horse.

  “You cannot enter,” said the peasant, but he moved back as her mouse-colored horse pressed through the narrow opening.

  Charles was right behind her, his horse’s shoulder pushing at her horse’s rump. Once inside, he swung his mount around and leaned to move the brace back into position. “We have entered,” he said to the intractable peasant, gesturing at the stone-flagged courtyard in front of the villa. “Where do we find the major domo, since he appears unwilling to find us.” He looked back once at the peasant who stood with hands on his hips. “What makes that man so … so resentful?”

  “Nothing that has happened to him here, I trust,” said Olivia, and the tone of her voice promised that she would discover the truth of the matter.

  “He’s a peasant,” said Charles as if that explained it.

  “In my employ,” Olivia appended, then went on in a lighter way, “It may be that Niklos was right,” as she rode up to the wide, shallow steps at the front of the villa. “Perhaps I should have arrived with two coaches and my six outriders and all the rest of the panoply. That man might have been convinced.” She kicked her feet free of the wide footrest and waited for Charles to dismount and help her down, though she was completely capable of managing on her own.

  Charles was out of the saddle at once. “How do you women ride with all those skirts?” he marveled as he reached up.

  “Sometimes I wonder,” she said as he put her down.

  Near the door three stag hounds lounged in the shadows; two raised their heads at the newcomers, one giving a tentative wag to his tail, the other merely watching. Apparently satisfied, they dropped their heads back on their long paws.

  “Handsome brutes,” Charles approved.

  Olivia frowned. “Yes, I suppose they are,” she said, recalling no mention of stag hounds in any of the reports she had received over the years. Dogs were part of farm life, she knew, but so large and specialized a breed as these surely deserved some mention. She walked up the steps, secretly glad to be out of the saddle.

  Before she could touch the enormous lion-headed knocker, the door was opened by a plump woman in early middle-age, her hair concealed under a discreet widow’s cap and her clothes covered by a long apron. “God give you a good day, travelers,” she said, bobbing a curtsy, the deeper one to Charles in respect for the mantle of the King’s Guard.

  “And you,” said Olivia, wondering who the devil this creature was.

  “Come in, in the name of our mistress,” said the middle-aged woman, and looked affronted when Charles laughed.

  “Thank you,” said Olivia with a warning glance at Charles.

  “Our major domo is … is not available just now.” She looked anxiously over her shoulder as if she expected him to appear and make her a liar. “But if you will wait in the salon, I will send word…” Her manner grew vague and she hitched her shoulders in an uncomfortable shrug. “It’s … in there,” she added, pointing toward a door in need of paint.

  “Thank you,” Olivia said a second time, and nodded Charles in that direction.

  “I will ask someone to … to bring you refreshments,” said the woman from the doorway. She was tugging on the largest of her apron pockets, for all the world like a naughty child caught with sweetmeats in her hands.

  “Wine and cold meat,” said Charles promptly, his flying brows lifting in amusement. “We’ve been riding since dawn.”

  The woman made a sound in her throat and hurried away.

  “Well,” said Olivia when they were left alone in the salon. It was a room of medium size, its ceilings lower than fashion decreed, the floor no longer even, its paneling lusterless from lack of care, part of the ceiling water-spotted. Two sagging chairs flanked the hearth with a plank table between them and an old-fashioned upholstered bench was placed against the wall, clearly intended for visitors. “I see I have been gone too long.”

  Charles dismissed her concern. “Better that the farm run well than the woodwork shine,” he said, and sat on the sturdier of the two chairs. Dust rose around him, and he smacked at it with his hat. “I’ll wager they haven’t had a maid in here in a long time.”

  “Undoubtedly,” said Olivia. She went toward the windows which were largely obscured by vines on the outside, flyspots and dust on the inside. One or two branches of the vines were so tenacious that they had forced in a few tendrils through the old caulking around the windows. As she took stock of the neglect, she became somber. “I have become lax.”

  “Your staff is lax,” Charles corrected, watching her appreciatively, a brightness in his eyes that Olivia tried not to see. “That’s another matter entirely.”

  “No,” said Olivia, and her manner made it clear that she did not expect him to disagree with her. “This is my land and my holding, and I have not taken the care I should have. Look at this place. What on earth is the matter with the major domo?”

  “If they ever find him, we might discover an answer,” said Charles, going on at once, “Don’t be troubled, Olivia. It rends my heart to see you troubled.”

  She closed her eyes to keep from looking at him, knowing that he would see her longing there, a longing that she denied. “Charles, please.” Magna Mater, how she wanted him, so fiercely that her desire was an ache within her.

  Charles occupied himself brushing off his sleeves. “You told me that you could not stop me thinking whatever I like. You said that yesterday, in the coach.” He stopped what he was doing. “Is that why you wanted to ride today? so you would not be alone in the coach with me?”

  “No,” she said, but the word lacked certainty. “I wanted not to be … surrounded. It is worse than being a captive, sometimes, this requirement to have servants and staff and guards all around. It seems that all my life long I have been enclosed by servants and all the rest. Occasionally, just occasionally, I have to break free of it.”

  “That is dangerous,” he said, his concern genuine. “For a woman like you to be off on her own—”

  “Oh, I know the hazards,” she said, cutting him off. “I’ve known them for longer than you can imagine.” The most absurd thing of her ridiculous fascination for him, she thought, wa
s that she wanted to tell him all about herself, to tell him about the risks she had taken, the places she had been, and when. She wanted to believe that his infatuation would lead him to accept her for what she was, though experience had taught her otherwise. It was foolish to hope that he would be different from the rest, that he would not flinch in repulsion and abhorrence when he learned of her nature and her need.

  “What is it?” Charles asked, feeling her turmoil in her silence.

  Whatever her answer might have been—and she had no notion of how she would answer him—it was lost as the door opened and a skinny youth came into the room with a tray. He put it on the plank table, bowed to Charles, and, as an afterthought, to Olivia, mumbled a few incoherent words, and bolted.

  “Who has been training them?” Charles asked the air, doing his best to lessen the tension building between them. “He can’t have got that bad without instruction.” He leaned forward to inspect what was on the tray. “Slices of ham and beef,” he said. “It smells fresh.”

  “Good,” said Olivia, grateful for the reprieve. She dropped onto the upholstered bench and watched as Charles rolled up one of the slices of ham and began to eat.

  All but one slice of beef were gone when the door was opened again, this time by a stocky, bald man bearing a branch of candles, for the day was waning and the salon was now deep in shadow. His face was flushed and his clothes were dusty. He bowed deeply to Olivia, who watched him with curiosity.

  “You are not Octave,” she said coolly.

  “I am his brother, Perceval.” He bowed once more. “I have seen your portrait, Madame; it hangs in the dining room. If you will permit me to tell you, it does not do you justice.” His effusive welcome was marred by the nervous, darting movements of his eyes and the shine of sweat on the dome of his head. “Octave … sends you his greeting, of course … but regrets he cannot attend you now.”

  “That does not surprise me,” said Olivia austerely. “By the look of the villa, he has not attended to much at all.”