It occurred to him, belatedly, that she might take it amiss that he’d given her name when it was another he wanted to see. He looked at her, somewhat fearful of incurring her wrath, but found her smiling at him and shaking her head, indulgently. “She was very worried about you, yesterday, and she confided in me and asked me if there was any chance perhaps that you were out and working on behalf of my Mousqueton.”
D’Artagnan shook his head. “I was… I think I was.” He told her, rapidly, everything that the baker’s family had said.
Hermengarde smiled. “Oh, that is so much nonsense. His daughter, Faustine, is a true fright, and Mousqueton would never marry her, if she were the only woman in the world. Though you know, it is his fault that the Langeliers entertained such thoughts, because he was so jealous of young Langelier that he used to go to the armorer’s simply to be around and make sure he wasn’t saying anything about me or that I… that I wasn’t visiting. So he had to justify it and he pretended he was courting Faustine. But for all the money Monsieur Langelier would have given her, Mousqueton has too much sense to want to be married to a cross-eyed shrew. And as for me…” She shrugged. “It is said that Pierre Langelier spends as much money as he makes-and he makes a lot, for he was his father’s best apprentice-upon the gambling tables. I don’t think being married to me would have made him any better and, anyway, you see, I am probably carrying Mousqueton’s child, so it is all to naught.” She smiled hopefully at D’Artagnan. “Have you heard anything of Mousqueton? How does he fare? Is he in health? He has not…” She crossed both her hands at her chest. “… been tortured? Has he?”
“No, no. That of a certainty he has not,” D’Artagnan said, and was rewarded for his lie-or at least his affirming of something he could not at all know-with a bright smile. Encouraged, he continued. “And I shall do my best to find the true culprit soon and to ensure that he shall not be detained much longer.”
“Oh, good,” Hermengarde said. “And then we may speak to Monsieur Porthos and get married.”
D’Artagnan was sure of it, though he did not inform her, because if Mousqueton hadn’t already, it would be useless to attempt it, that making Porthos understand what the situation was and what they meant to do might prove considerably harder than it would at first seem.
Instead, he sent Hermengarde to Constance to inform her that he was waiting. As Hermengarde was about to turn away, she turned to D’Artagnan. “Oh, your friend Aramis lent me such a pretty embroidered handkerchief yesterday, to dry my tears. I’m sure I was very silly to be crying at all. It must be a side effect of my condition, for never have my tears been more abundant.” She smiled shyly. “At any rate, I have washed the handkerchief, and here it is back again.”
She handed D’Artagnan a square of lace and D’Artagnan, who was quite sure that in the confused babble of last night, between brandy and wine there had been a talk of monogrammed handkerchiefs, looked uneasily down at the monogram, which was MAR. Since he knew for a fact that Aramis was in another life Rene Chevalier d’Herblay, he could but marvel at those initials. And then he remembered the Duchess de Chevreuse who apparently-and for reasons known only to her, or to those more adept at court intrigue than D’Artagnan-called herself Marie Michon. He put the square of lace into his sleeve, and thanked Hermengarde, determined to ask Aramis what all this could mean at the first opportunity.
Not many minutes went by, before Constance came out of the little door through which Hermengarde had disappeared. D’Artagnan started to her, with both hands extended, but the lady made no effort at all to meet his hands. Her own were kept where they were, at the end of her crossed arms.
Instead of the affectionate greeting which the twenty-something blond was likely to give him, frosty accents echoed from her soft and luscious mouth. “So I see,” she said, “that my summons are for nothing. I call you to me with the utmost urgency, and you decide to ignore me and instead”-she gave a pointed look to his arm, where the bandages were perfectly obvious by the lump beneath the borrowed shirt and doublet-“you choose to go to the duel you’d set before.”
“A duel?” D’Artagnan said. He stared at her aghast. “Who told you there was a duel set?”
“Someone,” she said, primly, “has said it. It is common knowledge at court. I heard someone say you and your friends had a duel set for yesterday. And you must know that his eminence is daily in expectation of getting the King to sign that edict which would make it fatal for you to fight. And yet, the marchioness tells me that you would have fought anyway, for you care nothing for your life, nor for how much you’d leave me desolate, should you die. No, you’d rather be killed and leave me quite alone.”
The words came out in such a torrent that D’Artagnan’s mouth dropped open in surprise. “ Constance,” he said. “You cannot meant it.”
“What, that you should not fight so many duels? Of course I mean it. How many times have I imagined-”
“No, that you believe all this nonsense about my meaning to fight a duel. I never did.”
“You weren’t home when I delivered the note on my way to visit Monsieur Bonacieux.”
“Yes, that is true, I wasn’t. I spent most of my afternoon trying to find out something about who might have killed the armorer that Mousqueton is accused of killing. You must know, my dear, that we cannot let the poor boy rot in the Bastille. Not when… well.” He couldn’t bring himself to give away other people’s secrets, so he finished in a halting tone. “Well, Hermengarde loves him, you know.”
Constance, who had been examining D’Artagnan’s features, as though desperately trying to fix in her mind any reason to believe him or disbelieve him, now sighed. “I cannot believe you. I’m sorry. I left the note, and you never came.”
“I came,” D’Artagnan said. “I came and Porthos with me. Ask whoever was at guard last night, to whom I gave Monsieur de la Porte ’s password. I came, and in that courtyard over there, before I could get to you, we were attacked by six men in dark cloaks. They… They wounded me,” he lifted his arm slightly, in vain hope for sympathy. “And then some guards of the Cardinal appeared, and they accused my friends and I of dueling. ‘Dueling’ he said. Among us. And when Porthos proved to them that it wasn’t so, they let us go, but by then I had lost so much blood, that the only thing to be done was to take me to Athos’s place. And then I don’t remember much of anything, save that, for some reason, I was given more brandy than I’ve ever drunk, and some excellent red wine.”
At this point, he realized Constance was crying softly. He said, “No, no. What’s this?” as he fished madly in his sleeve for a handkerchief. He found a square of lace and gave it to her. “Don’t you believe me?”
“I know I believe the drinking,” she said. “But I don’t know how much more. You don’t understand my fears,” she said, and touched her eyes with the handkerchief. “I know you’re out there, free, and so much younger than I, and I know how all the ladies of nobility make it a point of picking out the most handsome of the musketeers. And I am not noble-born, not even of very good family. All I have is my gentle upbringing, my familiarity with the Queen and my beauty, such as it is, and sure to fade fast, as much as you worry me.”
D’Artagnan said, “To me you are more beautiful than any princess.”
It is almost sure his honeyed words and that charm of manner for which his countrymen were known would have carried the day. It would, that is, had not the fair lamenter’s eyes fallen upon the square of lace in her hand. And then she stared at it, in something like horror, dropped it on the ground, and stomped on it with the tip of her dainty, slippered foot. “As beautiful as any princess, am I? Am I as beautiful as any duchess, also?”