by Rock, Judith
“No! I am worse hurt than—”
La Reynie took his arm, turned him around, and parted his hair to look at the back of his head. With a glance at Charles, he said, “Not as hurt as you might be, mon père. Come.”
He marched Vionnet down the stairs, across the student court, and toward the main building.
“Through there,” Charles said, when they reached the grand salon. He pointed to a door in the alcove where writing materials were kept.
Donat was sitting behind the desk in his small dark office, apparently doing nothing. Behind his head, Charles could just see the painted head of St. Laurent, eyes meekly raised to heaven as he roasted on his gridiron.
“Monsieur Montmorency is gone from the college, mon père,” Charles said bluntly.
“Gone? But how?” Donat’s face blanched. “He can’t be gone!”
“I don’t know how. We found the proctor guarding his door knocked witless. And Père Vionnet says Montmorency also attacked him before he fled.”
“I was attacked,” Vionnet said shrilly. “I am injured and in pain and this man”—he pointed at La Reynie—“would not let me seek help!”
“Tell Père Donat what Monsieur Montmorency said to you,” Charles said. “Before he attacked you, of course.”
“Said? Only that he was desolate about this daughter of the king. The one marrying the Polish prince. The stupid boy thinks he is in love with her. Women drive men insane. You cannot hold him responsible; he is out of his mind over the little witch. And so I shall tell his noble mother and urge her to forgive him,” Vionnet finished righteously, looking as unconvincingly meek as St. Laurent in the painting behind Donat.
La Reynie advanced on Donat, who was still sitting behind his desk. “You said you were charged with keeping Henri de Montmorency in the college. You have signally failed. He’s almost certainly gone to Marly, where the king—and the girl—are tonight. I am going after Montmorency, and I want Maître du Luc with me. He handles the boy well, and he knows the situation. Knowing what I know of Père Le Picart, I would not advise you to stand in the way of saving whatever can be saved of this situation. Which you have helped to create by your lax supervision. My carriage is in the street,” he said to Charles, and was gone.
Vionnet slipped out behind him, paying no attention to Donat’s sputtering command to stay.
Charles stayed where he was in front of Donat. “Mon père?”
Donat’s color deepened, and he shook his head like someone with a palsy.
“I beg you,” Charles said quietly, “give me leave to go. For yourself. For the college. And for Montmorency. I may be able to help pull him—and us—out of the worst of this tangle.”
“He brought it on himself,” Donat spat at Charles. “Let him take his punishment.”
Charles wanted to follow La Reynie without wasting more words on Donat. But he told himself that Donat was his superior and held himself where he was. “Mon père, the ancients wrote of three Fates, not just one. Do you really think anyone comes to his fate without the doing of others? We were all charged with keeping Montmorency here and safe. We all failed. Do you want to tell the rector that, after that failure, you made no effort to find him? That you did nothing to prevent the damage he may do? Nothing to help his soul, when helping souls is our reason for existing?”
Donat swelled like something gone bad at the market. But he finally got out a single, strangled word. “Go.”
Chapter 20
La Reynie’s carriage was rolling before Charles could pull the door shut.
“I almost left you,” La Reynie snapped.
“I had to make Père Donat tell me to go with you. If he hadn’t, I’d be in nearly as much trouble as Montmorency is.”
“What did you threaten him with?”
“Me, threaten? Only with failing Saint Ignatius. How long will it take to get to the king’s chateau at Marly? Have you sent a message to Père La Chaise about Montmorency?”
“While I waited for you, I sent one of my officers, on horseback. It will take the carriage two hours to get there, perhaps less. It’s very close to Versailles, but the terrain is more hilly near the chateau. Going uphill, the horses will have to walk. Assuming Montmorency is mounted, he will be there long before us. God send that, he—and the girl—will still be there when we arrive.”
“There are half a dozen places near the college to hire a horse,” Charles said over the noise from the street and the rolling of the carriage wheels.
“Let’s hope all of them were out of horses this afternoon.”
They were silent as the coach made its way through the crowded summer evening streets, until Charles said, “I don’t understand why the Grand Duchess of Tuscany would endanger her position by passing letters to Conti, now that the king has let her return from Italy. She’d have to be a fool! And she didn’t strike me as one.”
La Reynie’s mouth quirked. “The duchess is a lady of many sides. And one side is always in debt. I assume she’s doing it for money, just like your Bertamelli.”
“Well, it would explain why Père La Chaise and I found her and Montmorency and Mademoiselle de Rouen together in an alcove at Versailles after the ball for the Polish ambassadors.”
The carriage stopped suddenly and the driver began to shout at someone. La Reynie swore and put his head out the window. “What is it?”
“Accident, mon lieutenant-général. Someone’s cast a wheel and the way’s blocked.”
Charles looked out from his side and saw that they’d reached the square beyond the Sorbonne church and that the narrow way into the rue de la Harpe was full of bellowing men, neighing horses, and a gilded carriage on its side, one of its high back wheels spinning slowly in the air. He craned his neck and looked over his shoulder. Behind La Reynie’s carriage was a solid line of carriages and carts, all the drivers standing on their driving boxes and demanding to be let through.
“I suppose we could walk to Marly,” Charles said, without enthusiasm. “People walk to Versailles.”
“Montmorency could be halfway to the coast with the girl by then.” La Reynie pushed open the door, jumped from the carriage, and strode into the traffic jam, holding his silver-headed stick like a weapon.
Perhaps it would have taken longer without his furious orders, but it still took long enough before they were on their way again. They made good time along the rue des Cordeliers after that, and La Reynie was visibly relaxing into his seat when the driver pulled the horses to a bone-jolting stop.
“Now what?” La Reynie shouted.
“They’re taking down a piece of the old wall, monsieur,” the driver shouted back. “Some of it fell on the street.”
Charles looked out and saw the end of a stretch of city wall straight ahead, beyond a little street that curved to join the rue des Cordeliers. Traffic on the little street was stopped, too, and pedestrians and drivers were gathered where the streets met.
“The stones of the wall are enormous,” La Reynie said, opening the carriage door. “We’ll never shift the damned things.”
He banged his way out of the coach and Charles climbed out after him. A clutch of workmen, stoutly declaiming that it wasn’t their fault, stood leaning on massive hammers as a steady stream of pedestrians picked their way across the huge stones. But the carriages and carts were blocked.
“Turn,” La Reynie told his driver, who had come to stand beside him. “Somehow.” He looked at Charles. “Get in. I’m going to help the driver.”
The driver climbed onto the box, Charles got into the carriage, and La Reynie began working miracles. Standing in the middle of the road, wig flying, he scythed the air with his stick, bellowed directions like a war drum, ran and lunged and turned, and had the traffic reversed and his carriage turned within minutes. Sweating, he flung himself back into the carriage and they were off again.
“We’ll have to take rue de l’Enfer past the walls and turn west again when we can,” he said. “Dear God, I wish I had a drink
.”
“Rue de l’Enfer? Why do they call it Hell Street?”
“Because of the traffic,” La Reynie growled. “Why else?”
Once outside the line of the walls and heading more or less west again, the driver whipped up the horses and the carriage leaped forward.
“Making up time,” La Reynie said. “Whatever other treachery is afoot, pray we get there in time to at least stop Montmorency running off with the girl. If that happens, hell will be nothing to the consequences.” He swore as the carriage rounded a curve and he slid across the seat into Charles. “My apologies, maître.” He pulled his coat straight. “There’s been no time to tell the relatively good news I have for you. Your Lulu did not poison Bouchel. One of my court spies learned that Bouchel was helping the Prince of Conti get the reports about our border fortifications. I’ve thought for some time—and so has Père La Chaise—that Conti has a spy in Louvois’s entourage inspecting French fortifications along the eastern border. Though Louvois has returned, the inspections continue. And the spy is still with the inspectors. No, I won’t tell you who he is. We’re giving him a long rope so he can hang himself more thoroughly.”
Charles frowned. “I got to know Bouchel a little at Versailles. You know he looked after Père La Chaise. I never saw sign of any hostility toward the king.”
“He would have made sure you didn’t. And maybe he had none, I don’t know; maybe he was only helping Conti for the money. But I do know that Bouchel’s father was a mason at Versailles when the place was first being built. His father fell from a wall and the overseer forced him back to work, though his leg was badly hurt. The leg made him unsteady and he fell again. That time he broke his neck. Not long after, the king came to inspect the building, and the mason’s mother—Bouchel’s grandmother—spit in Louis’s face and called him a murderer. The king had her flogged. I’ve been told that Bouchel grew up hearing the story.”
“Blessed Mary.” Charles winced. “I would surely hate the king for that.”
“It seems that when Conti heard the story, he saw that he could make use of Bouchel. Bouchel in turn recruited one of the king’s couriers, a young man his own age, whose family is from the village and who knew the story of Bouchel’s father and grandmother. This courier is the one who carries the spy’s letters from the border to Troyes, where he disappears into the old town and passes the letters to someone else. Then someone else brings them to Paris. To the Grand Duchess of Tuscany, it seems. Possibly through your Montmorency.”
“Or his tutor,” Charles said suddenly. “Montmorency could not leave the college or receive anything unexamined. But the tutor could.”
“Yes. While I waited for you, I sent two men to arrest Père Vionnet for questioning. So. The chief of my court spies thinks that Bouchel was killed because Conti is about to change the letters’ route. And that the footman not only knew too much, he was growing greedy for more pay. For his work and for his continued silence.”
“Which is now assured,” Charles said sadly. He was thinking that if Bouchel had demanded more money, it might have been for Lulu. “Well, that’s very good news about Lulu, anyway. That she didn’t kill poor Bouchel.”
The coach leaned precariously as they rounded a corner, and La Reynie clutched at the straps hanging from the carriage roof. Charles braced himself on the seat, wishing more every moment that he were on horseback, though the miles seemed to pass like single footsteps as they hurtled through the bright June evening. He’d never traveled much by carriage and never so fast. Trees, fields, houses, people whirled by so fast, they made his head spin. To his relief, the carriage slowed as the driver pulled the horses to a trot and then to a resting walk.
“What would happen between France and Poland if Lulu did run off with Montmorency?” Charles said. “Would King Louis lose the Polish king’s goodwill?”
La Reynie shrugged. “I don’t know. Jan Sobieski is nobody’s fool. He might be able to see past the antics of two idiot children. In which case, he’d shrug and look for another bride for his son.”
“They’re not idiots. Not even Montmorency. I’ve always found him dull-witted, but he truly cares for the girl. And she is certainly bright enough. But no creature thinks clearly when it’s struggling in a trap.”
“So your sympathies are with those two, are they?” La Reynie said sourly.
“Far more than they are with the king’s greed for glory and power.”
“You’d better hope I didn’t hear that. The king is the head of France’s body. He is responsible for France’s wealth and glory and power.”
“And he’s selling his people, including his daughter, to get it.”
The horses began to trot again, and La Reynie bounced nearly to the roof of the carriage as the wheels hit what felt like a boulder.
“Even if the boy’s not intentionally passing letters,” he growled, “he commits treason if he rides off with the girl. And if he does, for two sous, I’d leave them to get on with it and take the consequences.”
“There’s always the possibility that Montmorency may not come near Marly. God send he doesn’t.”
La Reynie slapped his wig straight after another bounce. “Maybe he’s gone home to his terrifying mother. Or to Siam. Someplace where I have no jurisdiction.”
“If he does try to take the girl, and is caught, what will happen to him?”
“If he’s only being used with regard to the spy’s letters, he might only be exiled. If he’s working with Conti—he could lose his head.” The lieutenant-général lurched against the side of the carriage. “At the moment, damn him, I wish he’d already lost it!”
“Falling in love isn’t a crime,” Charles said sadly, trying to shield his injured shoulder from another collision with the gold brocade carriage wall.
“For the bon Dieu’s sake! You sound like every idiotic young man since Adam. I thought you were past that sort of thing.”
“Montmorency’s actions are wrong, yes. What he feels for the girl is not. How could it be? He isn’t married. He—”
“She is. Almost.”
“Against her will! She doesn’t want the marriage and she’s damnably trapped!”
“Her father has the right to impose his will. Every father does.”
“And if his will is destroying his child?”
“Oh, it’s like that, is it? No authority, no order, only womanish feeling. Pah! You sound exactly like my son!”
La Reynie put out a hand to fend off the front carriage wall. For a long moment there was only the thud of trotting hooves and the rattle of the much-tried carriage.
“Gabriel?” Charles said carefully. He knew La Reynie had a son, but it was the first time the lieutenant-général had spoken of him voluntarily.
La Reynie’s big shoulders rounded suddenly, as though something hurt inside him. “I am too harsh, he says. He wants none of my rules. None of my—my life. He says he will go to Rome. And not return.”
“I’m sorry,” Charles said inadequately.
La Reynie crossed his arms over his chest and frowned at his rumpled brown coat sleeves. “So what will you say when you’re a priest? And some fool like Montmorency or Gabriel comes to you? Will you say, oh certainly, by all means, flout the commandment, no need to honor your father?”
“Scripture also says that the sins of the fathers will be visited on the children.”
“And so will yours be visited on them when you’re Père du Luc and guide them wrong!”
Suddenly they were glaring at each other from opposite corners of the coach. Charles turned his head away and closed his eyes, leaning back against the thick brocade upholstery. The horses’ trot on a smoother stretch of road was making the carriage rock pleasantly now… The carriage lurched and he sat up in alarm.
“We’re nearly there,” La Reynie said, glancing at him. “You’ve slept.”
The carriage rolled to a stop and Charles put down the window glass and peered out. They were stopped at a tall, tree-shadowed,
heavily guarded gate. La Reynie lowered the glass on his side and spoke to a pike-carrying guard.
“Has a young horseman passed through the gates recently? Henri de Montmorency?”
“No, mon lieutenant-général,” Charles heard the guard say. “No horseman has come in since noon.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, mon lieutenant-général.”
“If Montmorency does come, say nothing about my being here or asking about him. Let him pass but send me word.”
The guard nodded smartly, the gates opened, and the carriage crossed an arcaded circular court. Then Charles nearly fell forward as they began to go steeply downhill.
“The chateau is at the bottom of this slope,” La Reynie said. He turned on the seat to face Charles. “You heard what the guard said? Montmorency is not here.”
“Yes, but I can hardly believe it. Are there other ways in?”
“I suppose he could go through the forest. There are paths. But then he’d have to climb the garden wall. Without being seen and taken by a guard. The guards are nearly as thick here as at Versailles. Otherwise, though, Marly is different. It is private, not open for public gawking. Officials, like me, can get in on emergency business. Otherwise, entrance is strictly at the king’s invitation.” La Reynie braced an arm on the front wall against the incline. “I know of at least one visit Montmorency has made here. So he may know a way through the forest. But if he breaks in over the wall, that will not endear him to the king.”
Charles looked out his window again and saw that they were near the bottom of the steep allée. The chateau was directly ahead. The last of the long evening’s sun lay across its front and Charles exclaimed in surprise. “The red pillars—they’re Languedoc marble, from my home region. What an incredible front the place has!”
Beside him, La Reynie merely snorted.
The sunlight gleamed on the chateau’s gold balustrade, its gold sculpted figures and vases, its golden pediments and window panels, all picked out against brilliant royal blue walls. The carriage stopped at a second, smaller gate and was passed through. Charles, still gaping out his window like a tourist, gasped in astonishment.