“You couldn’t,” Planchet said, softly. “Not you.”

“Don’t try my patience too high,” D’Artagnan said, then seriously, “I know something is eating at you, Planchet. I’m not that cloddish. Tell me what it is. If you feel that much of a need to tell me something, chances are it is something I need to know.”

Planchet sighed, a heavy, doleful sigh, full, so it seemed, of the cares of the world. “Monsieur, it is only that I have a bad habit of listening at doors.”

D’Artagnan grinned. “Oh, no need at all to tell me that, Planchet. I never say anything with you in the house that I should not wish you to know.”

“Yes, yes, monsieur. But the other gentlemen, your friends, do not know that.”

“I see. What have you listened to?”

Planchet sighed again. “How castaway were you last night, sir? What is the last thing you remember?”

“Well… I remember Athos giving me wine, after all that brandy, which even then, and given the way I felt, seemed to me far less than a good idea.”

“And?”

“And then he talked a lot about some duchess that answers to Marie Michon, but I confess there my memory is foggy and I have no clue at all what he meant. He seemed to imply there was a conspiracy on the life of the King.”

Planchet shook his head. “No, Monsieur Athos only said that the Cardinal had told him there was a conspiracy on the life of the King, but that he didn’t quite believe it, as it were, sir.”

D’Artagnan nodded. “I’m not sure I believe it either. Though there must be a conspiracy on the Cardinal’s part. Or at least… if there isn’t…” He shook his head. “He either wants us to be roped in, or he’s fighting for his life. Either of those would justify his inventing a conspiracy on the King to get us to defend him.”

“Yes,” Planchet said. But he bit his lip. “You don’t remember… that is… I’m sure he would want you to know, because he was talking to all three of you, but you must pretend I don’t know it, myself.”

“Planchet, you make no sense at all.”

Planchet sighed again. “It is only that I shouldn’t know this, but… sir… Do you remember Monsieur Athos saying he is a count?”

D’Artagnan shrugged. “Not from hearing it this time, but I’ve suspected it for a long while. You see… I went with him to his friend the Duke de Dreux and it was all ‘milord this’ and ‘milord that’ and ‘Would the Count de la Fere wish water for his shaving?’ I haven’t said anything, because I wasn’t sure he wanted anyone else to know. I suspect too, though he’s only a count, that there is family prestige or other, because the duke treated him quite as an equal.”

Planchet nodded. “Well, he told them all he was a count. And that… that is… that he’d just seen his wife.”

“His wife?!” D’Artagnan echoed. “Am I drunk still or were you, Planchet? Athos isn’t married.”

“Well, Athos might not be,” Planchet said. “But the count was. To a beautiful woman who turned out to be marked with the fleur-de-lis.”

“The… Poor Athos.”

“Yes, sir. And he hanged her, and he left his domains. And then… And then yesterday he saw her.”

D’Artagnan whistled under his breath. “No wonder he was drinking. But it must be all a chance resemblance. I mean, women look like each other, and there are cousins and sisters, and daughters, if it comes to that.”

But Planchet inclined his head. “Only he says he never made sure she was dead, after he hanged her, and you know…”

“I know,” D’Artagnan said thinking he couldn’t have been very sure he wanted her dead. Slicing her throat and leaving her in a thicket would have been the way to that. Trying to hang her, no. After all, it took expert hangmen to kill people with a rope and they had traps and deep falls and properly constructed gallows. So Athos can’t have been sure in his mind and his heart that he wanted her dead. And he’d left her… without checking. “And what does this have to do with me, Planchet?” D’Artagnan asked, curiously.

“Well, sir, Monsieur Athos said that she was called ‘milady’ by those in the Cardinal’s service. And then…”

“And then?”

“And then she looked uncommonly like the foreign lady you just described.”

“Athos’s wife?” D’Artagnan asked, bowled over. “But… you said the Cardinal’s service?”

“That’s where he saw her. At the Palais Cardinal.”

“Oh,” D’Artagnan said, then, turning around. “Do you mean… I mean, does she know who Athos is and what…”

“I don’t know,” Planchet said. “I’m afraid, sir, I would assume the worst.”

“Yes. I suppose I must do so,” he said. He thought how the lady didn’t seem to be truly threatened by the ruffians he’d chased away and how she had invited him to dinner on such small a service. “A fleur-de-lis…” he said.

“On her left shoulder,” Planchet said. “If you should…”

“I hope I shan’t,” D’Artagnan said, whose heart had never been sanguine over even flirting with a woman not his Constance. Now it was cringing at the idea. And anything more…

“I would call it off altogether,” he said. “But then, if she is bent on having her revenge on us, that would be the same as putting her on her guard. And besides, if it’s her… and if she means to entrap us, better myself, with my eyes open, than the others.” He thought about it for a moment. “Far better myself than Athos.”

Where Athos Tries to Understand the Impossible; Porthos Contemplates the Inscrutable; And Madame Bonacieux Keeps Her Silence

“MADAM,” Athos said. “I understand that we had to be informed of Hermengarde’s death. In fact, with poor Mousqueton still in the Bastille, and her being killed in the same way that the armorer was killed, I understand our being apprised of it immediately. But why did you ask D’Artagnan to come here? And why with such urgency?”

To himself, Athos was thinking that, in fact, the woman had probably sent for D’Artagnan as part of an attempt at reconciliation. At least, he hoped he wasn’t underestimating her, and of course, anyone would shrink from using the death of an innocent girl, almost a child, for such personal purposes. But then, Athos had known enough women to know that women weren’t everything. In point of fact, when it came to manipulating circumstances and in any possible way using someone else’s misfortune to advantage, there was very little he’d put past a determined woman.

His suspicions seemed to be confirmed by the look of almost fright that Madame Bonacieux darted at him. Then she looked behind him, and around her, as if to ascertain that no one could hear her, and she dropped her voice to a whisper. “Because, Monsieur, D’Artagnan talked to her this morning, and with her friend being the servant of one of you, and with her being… well… it was rumored, though she denied it when asked, that she was with child. The rumors have already started,” she said, looking frightened, “that her killer was one of you. One of the inseparables, they say. Some say that it was because she was with child, and you feared she’d hang on you or ask for support after her friend was executed. And some wonder if she knew something to Mousqueton’s detriment and was therefore silenced.” She took a handkerchief from her sleeve and wiped at her eyes. “No one has done anything about it, yet, monsieur, but I can tell you that as rumor grows, well, people will start to get some strange ideas about you and… and about D’Artagnan. And though I fought with him, I… well… I wouldn’t want any harm to come to him, or any of you.”

Perhaps because he felt guilty about having thought ill of her before, Athos forced himself to bow. “No,” he said. “No, I understand that. I wouldn’t wish any ill to come to any of us, either, and while I’m sure that D’Artagnan is utterly innocent, I also know how rumors can grow and fester. I will… warn him. And I will do what I can to solve this.”

A look to the side showed him that Porthos looked like he’d heard everything, and his eyes were full of that intent light that showed that Porthos was thinking. This was always a perilous proposition. Porthos could think very well, and indeed very fast, but the things his thoughts could wreak were often far less than orthodox.