As in all their homes, in Porthos’s home too they had a room, a particular place where they gathered for their war councils.2
Here it was a broad table, which Mousqueton kept polished to a high gloss. Around it, disposed, were four arm chairs.
D’Artagnan took his place beside Athos, facing Porthos, while Aramis sat next to Porthos. But Porthos sat for only a minute, before getting up, mumbling, “Mousqueton is not here tonight. I’ll get some wine.”
And D’Artagnan who remembered Mousqueton’s pretty friend, smiled and thought that Mousqueton was luckier than all of them. And then thought of his own Planchet, the redheaded stripling, whom he’d cautioned against leaving the house under any conditions.
Fortunately, through their short time together, Planchet had learned that his master meant what he said when he made such conditions. D’Artagnan thought he would be safe, but wondered what Planchet thought had happened. And how much of a confusion would envelop the neighborhood when the bodies were found.
“Why are you back in Paris,” Porthos asked Aramis, as he set a jug of wine and four cups on the table. “I thought you were safe in the countryside.”
D’Artagnan couldn’t read Aramis’s expression at all. It wasn’t dread and it wasn’t boredom, but it was as though both of those and something else besides—something very akin to the terror a pious soul might display at the thought of hell—crossed Aramis’s perfectly symmetrical features. He made a little gesture, as though tossing the idea out of his mind, and he said, “I couldn’t. I couldn’t stay in the country and know my friends were battling who knew what perils for my sake.”
He said it prettily and bravely, and D’Artagnan would almost believe it. Except there was still that look of haunted terror in Aramis’s face.
Porthos only nodded, though, and disappeared, to come back again with a pair of breeches in his hand. “Try these ones, D’Artagnan,” he said.
D’Artagnan took them and pulled them on. They were much too large and since they were ankle length on Porthos, had to be rolled up, but he supposed that looking like he’d gone out wearing his father’s clothes was better than looking half dressed. He tied them on, as tightly as he could.
They sat around the table, and sipped the wine for a long while. D’Artagnan could feel that Athos was working towards saying something. He’d only known the three musketeers for a month, and yet he knew Athos well enough to guess that everything the musketeer said emerged as if out of a deeper silence upon which it was no more than a frail bridge.
After a while, he found himself looking expectantly at Athos, waiting for Athos to speak.
“Aramis,” Athos said, at last. “Do you know any reason why the Cardinal should hate you?”
Aramis frowned. “Not that I . . .” He paused, shrugged. Then sighed. “A week ago I would have told you no, no more cause than he has to hate any of you.”
“And now?” Athos asked.
Porthos turned half around in his chair, as though waiting to hear the revelation.
“Well,” Aramis said. He cupped his long, delicate hands around his wine cup. “I have only one reason, though I don’t understand why it would make him hate me.”
D’Artagnan found himself raising an eyebrow at Aramis, and Aramis’s gaze met his. Only a month ago, those green eyes would have been full of suspicion. Now, when he looked at D’Artagnan, Aramis softened his look, as though in response to the young man’s effort to understand. “You see,” he said. “I found out that the Cardinal Richelieu, when he was young, killed my father in a duel over a girl whom they both loved.”
“Your mother?” Porthos asked.
Aramis closed his eyes, as though fearing the onset of a headache. “Porthos, I’m not a posthumous son.”
But Porthos only grinned. “I fail to see what that has to do with anything, Aramis. You were having an affair with a married woman. Surely you know . . .”
Aramis looked as though Porthos had waved a poisonous snake in front of his eyes. “Not Maman,” he said, with a look of horror. “I’m sure Maman never had an unholy thought in her life. It’s true that she . . . but . . . No!”
And there, D’Artagnan, though he was only seventeen, had to make an effort to remain impassive. The temptation to laugh was much too strong and at finding such a blind spot in such a worldly man as Aramis. D’Artagnan was aware of a smile quirking at the corner of Athos’s lips and of Porthos’s biting his lips together to prevent himself from laughing.
But Aramis, who surely was aware of the great amusement he’d caused all of them, said, looking determinedly ahead, at the face that D’Artagnan hoped was impassive, “Why do you think the Cardinal hates me though? More than he hates any other musketeer?”
D’Artagnan’s Theory; Athos’s Explanation; Porthos’s Ghosts
“I don’t understand,” Aramis said, facing his friends. He’d drank a cup of wine, and he was almost feeling like himself. Here, in Porthos’s lodgings, sitting across from Athos and D’Artagnan, it was possible to pretend that nothing out of the ordinary had ever happened. It was possible to while away the time as though Violette were still alive in her room at the palace.
“You,” he pointed to D’Artagnan. “Think that the only purpose of this whole plot is for the Cardinal to get me out of the city and keep me out of the city. I have to tell you there is some—well, one piece—of corroborating evidence for this theory, in that the Cardinal has sent me a letter.”
“A letter?” Athos asked, his eyebrows raising.
“A letter.” Aramis fished in his sleeve, where he’d earlier put any documents that might be of importance, including Violette’s letter, which he’d managed to retrieve from Monsieur de Treville’s desk. He pushed the Cardinal’s letter across at Athos and D’Artagnan. He did not inflict it on Porthos, who could read as well as any of them, but who had only learned to read after he’d come to Paris to live away from his father, who thought reading was an effeminate activity that should be kept away from boys at all costs. Having learned late, and having taught himself, Porthos often had trouble with the curlier of cursives, such as the one the Cardinal used. To save Porthos the humiliation of trying to peruse the letter, or of asking what the letter said, Aramis said, “As you see, he enjoins me to make a provincial marriage, or to join a monastery out in the country and not to attempt to return to Paris.”
He could feel Porthos visibly relax at the explanation, while Athos nodded, pushing the letter towards Aramis again. “That much I see,” he said. “And yes, it fits well with D’Artagnan’s theory. For you must know, even though I’ve grown to be convinced of it, it was D’Artagnan who created this theory.”
“The theory ignores one thing,” Porthos said. He was bouncing around on his seat, as he did when he disagreed with something that was being said. “It ignores the ghost.”
“There was no ghost,” Athos said. “It was . . . a prank. Possibly engineered by Mousqueton’s Hermengarde.”
“She would never,” Porthos said. “Not if I know Mousqueton. She would not dare. And at any rate, what kind of a prank was it, and how was it effected?”
“Oh, it would be very easy,” D’Artagnan said. “You only had to have someone standing out in the balcony. A slim young girl, so she could crouch out of sight and cast no shadow upon the glass. Then when she got the signal that we were in position, she could pop up and open the door and do her little scene.”
“That’s it,” Athos said. “All through it, I kept feeling as though the girl were performing on a stage. All of it. The mask, the suit, the careful steps, the caper and kiss upon finding the cross.”
“The cross?” Aramis asked, now convinced that in his absence his friends had gone utterly insane. “I don’t have the pleasure of understanding you.”
Athos sighed, in turn. “When we went to the secret passage—”
“There is a secret passage?” Aramis asked.
“Behind the picture,” Porthos said. “Atop the wardrobe, to the right side
of the bed. There is a passage, and you can look through the picture’s eyes. I heard that often the Cardinal—”
Aramis felt his eyes widen and his face blanch, and his expression must have stopped Porthos who suddenly looked horrified at what he had almost said. But Aramis could not let it lie. “The Cardinal spied on us? The Cardinal ? Why?”
“I don’t know,” Athos said. “What we heard is that he didn’t trust the Duchess de Dreux because he feared she worked with the Queen for the Spanish. As such, he was prepared to spy on her.”
“She did not work for Spain,” Aramis said, indignant. “She never even mentioned Spain to me . . . Well, unless she was reminiscing about her childhood.”
The silence around the table echoed back to him, and he waved all that away. “But let’s suppose that this was the case and that . . . I imagine the Cardinal only spied when she was with the Queen, then?”
He did not like Athos’s silence, or Porthos’s fidgeting.
“D’Artagnan, my friend,” Aramis asked, addressing himself to the boy and hoping that D’Artagnan’s great cunning had kept his mind from the insanity that affected the others. “Why would his eminence spy on us?”
“I don’t know,” D’Artagnan said, looking uncomfortable.
“But you think he did?”
“I suspect he did. From the reactions of the servants and what they didn’t say.”
Aramis nodded. This was the type of reasoning that he could understand. “And if you had to hazard a guess as to motive?”
D’Artagnan sighed. “I would have to guess that he wanted to have material to force the Duchess to do something he wished to have her do. Or perhaps . . .” He looked towards Athos. “Your friend said he had news of his wife?”
Athos turned around to face D’Artagnan. “You think the Cardinal was sending Raoul news of his wife’s exploits? The Cardinal? Why?”
“Athos,” D’Artagnan said in that world weary voice that so often made him sound like the oldest—instead of the youngest—of them all. “The Duke came to his wedding and now doesn’t live at court. Have you never thought that perhaps the Cardinal has a grudge against him?”
“The Cardinal has a grudge against all great nobles, and tries to keep the King as far from his extended family as possible,” Aramis put in drily, then concentrated on the part of the conversation he found most fascinating. “You know Violette’s husband?”
Athos sighed. “Raoul is an old childhood friend. I visited him.”
“Did he kill her?” Aramis asked. Only that mattered.
Athos shook his head.
Aramis fished in his sleeve for Violette’s letter announcing her pregnancy. “Not even in light of this?” he asked.
Athos looked over the letter and shook his hand. “No,” he said. “I’m sorry, Aramis.” He pushed the letter back. “I really am sorry, Aramis, for what you’ve lost. But no, not even that.”
He shrugged. “Look, Aramis,” he said, as Aramis took the letter and folded it and put it back in his sleeve. “I knew Raoul when we were both so young that neither of us knew the meaning of dissimulation. I knew Raoul before either of us understood the meaning of lie. I know when he’s lying, and yes, he has lied to me in the past, particularly when we were both very young. He wasn’t lying when he told me he hadn’t killed his wife.” Athos looked as if he was about to say something else, then shrugged again. “Please believe me. You know I’m rarely wrong on such things.”
And it was true. Athos was rarely wrong on such things. Unless, of course, the liar were a certain kind of woman, in which case Athos’s testimony should be taken in the reverse, because he was always wrong. But Aramis would not say that. He would not remind Athos of his luck with women. Instead he said, “I’ll trust you, but it seems very odd to me. And I still don’t understand why the Cardinal would want me to leave town or to stay out of town.”
“Oh, by the Mass,” Porthos, who had continued fidgeting all through the conversation, exploded. “Really, Athos, Aramis, D’Artagnan. The Cardinal has no special reason to want Aramis out of town, only the murder having happened and its looking like Aramis did it, it suits the Cardinal to think that it was Aramis. That way, particularly if Aramis either is arrested before he can disprove the charges, or never comes back to dispute them, the Cardinal, in his next tug of war with Monsieur de Treville can say that at least none of his guards ever killed a defenseless woman. That is all. You are making this into much more than it is.”
“But why would he try to kill us, then?” D’Artagnan asked, baffled.
“I’m afraid that is my fault,” Athos said. “Aramis, do you remember the dagger you gave me that night?”
Aramis had forgotten all about it. Now, as though it were happening all again, he felt the dagger in his hand, slippery with Violette’s blood, and he shrunk from the idea of her corpse, the feel of her skin, the—He realized he had covered his mouth with both his hands, as though to stop a scream struggling to form somewhere deep within himself.
Athos was still waiting for an answer, and Aramis nodded.
“We forgot all about it, till last night,” Athos said, and proceeded to detail how he’d gone from store to store in the jewelers’ row, asking about the dagger and its exquisite ivory work, till he’d come to the shop of Pierre Michou.
“But . . . The King?” Aramis asked.
Athos shrugged. “It was given to the King, but you know his majesty’s habit of giving away whatever he considers a trifle, and which he has lying on his table at the moment of the audience.”
“But that would mean the murderer could be anyone,” Aramis said.
“No, only the persons the Cardinal would be willing to commit murder to defend. Aramis, he’s not as amoral as he seems. Think how many times he must have wished to do away with the three of us,” he looked at D’Artagnan and smiled. “Even perhaps the four of us. But he has never truly tried it till tonight. So it must be to defend someone who is valuable to him, or on whom his good fortune depends.”
“The King,” Aramis said.
“Or the Cardinal himself,” D’Artagnan said.
Porthos’s Clarity; The Greatest Need; Porthos’s Duchess
PORTHOS understood that Aramis knew of Porthos’s impatience with the whole chain of reasoning. Alas, Porthos also knew that if he said anything about that, he would be silenced again, as he had been so many times before.
So Porthos kept silent, but fidgeted in his seat and—only catching himself as he was doing it—sometimes found himself rolling his eyes at Aramis’s or Athos’s comments.
As Athos and D’Artagnan seemed determined to draw the conclusion that the Cardinal himself was responsible for the murder of the Duchess, Porthos let them draw it. He had no doubt at all that Aramis agreed with them, either. It was all part, he thought, of how his three friends viewed themselves. They lived with their heads so firmly stuck in the world of duchesses and countesses, of mannerly households and court manners that they simply couldn’t imagine how someone smaller, someone more at their own level or below could have a true influence in their destiny.
It was not their fault. They’d been raised in noble houses. At least Athos and Aramis had. Noble houses of the kind that had libraries, and which could enumerate their pedigree going back centuries uncounted. Porthos had no doubt that Athos’s and Aramis’s families had been around in some form since the Roman Empire.
Early on, the two of them had been broken on the wheel of how to behave and what people would think of them. In that, he thought, even D’Artagnan who was an outsider and from a relatively poor region, was more like them than like Porthos. His family—though D’Artagnan made fun of their wealth and his own prospects for inheritance—would be the most influential in their village, or even their hamlet. Everyone would have looked up to him as he grew up. He would have been important and regarded as special.
Porthos—ah, Porthos. Oh, theoretically his family was noble, that sort of undefined nobility that had no particular pos
ition at court and merely came from their having held power for so long in one particular region.
Porthos was not blind nor stupid, and had heard enough stories and learned enough history to think that his family must have come over with the Normans, the wild ones in their boats, ravaging and pillaging. There were times when Porthos felt he could have made a good go of ravaging and pillaging too. Particularly when faced with rules he didn’t fully understand or intend to obey and with comrades who seemed so intent on blaming the most powerful man in the land for all their misfortunes.
Look at them, Porthos thought, as he tapped the heel of his left foot on the floor, gently causing his knee to fall and rise with the movement. Look at the lot of them.
“So, how can we determine if the Cardinal meant to entrap Aramis?” Athos was saying, leaning over the table, his dark blue eyes seeming more lit up with enthusiasm than normal. Like the night sky in August, instead of their normal blue: so dark that it passed for black in certain lights.
“We need to talk to the guards,” D’Artagnan was saying. “And to Monsieur de Treville, and see what he knows, what he has heard.”
“Yes,” Athos said. “Surely Monsieur de Treville knows what is happening.”
Porthos doubted it. From what he’d heard in the antechambers and the taverns, Monsieur de Treville actually believed that Aramis had done it.
And all the while, all the while they were talking, Porthos pushed his knee up and down and drummed his fingers on the table. It was like watching children discussing a play. What did the Cardinal matter to them, or they to the Cardinal? Unless they interfered directly in the Cardinal’s plots as they had done before, the Cardinal tended to leave them quite alone and to their own devices.
He noticed Aramis’s look at him out of the corner of his eye, and Aramis only frowned at Athos and D’Artagnan. “I can’t go with you,” Aramis said. “I can’t . . . If they should see me in the city, the Cardinal will send someone to capture me.”
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