Dying By The Sword Part 10

Athos frowned at his friend, and finished drinking the cup of wine he held. "It might be," he said, and dipped his head a bit. "But I will admit, my dear Aramis, that the situation seems to me somewhat more complex than that."

He had the gratification of seeing Aramis raise eyebrows at him.

"I mean," Athos said, "that there might indeed be some sort of conspiracy at work, though most of the part where the Cardinal thinks it applies to him . . . well, it seems to have originated whole cloth out of his mind." He poured himself more wine, then said, "As far as my conversations, first with his eminence," he said.

"Athos," Porthos said, in shock, his hand going to his sword hilt, then forcibly away, as though he had but remembered that Athos was his blood brother, and one of those who had so often and unstintingly risked his life for Porthos. As though only awareness of that kept him from drawing, even right here, in Athos's own lodging.

Athos looked back at him, pleased to note that his eyes were becoming unfocused through the action of the alcohol. "Well, Porthos . . . I needed to do something. And no, Aramis, I was in no hurry to implicate our Queen in anything. In fact, as the Cardinal so kindly reminded me, a Queen's value by far trumps a p.a.w.n's, so that I would not even consider such an exchange." He shook his head. "But I . . ." He drew a long breath. "I have told his eminence that I will try to unravel this conspiracy against him, if conspiracy it is." He frowned, as he dredged from the depths a memory fast becoming clouded by the wine, the exact words and implications of what the Cardinal had told him. "Aramis, you who are up on all court rumors-have you heard of the Queen and . . . Marie Michon courting Ornano, the governor of the Prince's house?"

"Oh, that," Aramis said. "I heard some rumor that they were opposed to the marriage of Monsieur, his being the heir apparent and all. But I'm not sure . . ."

"I'm not sure either, except that the Cardinal seems to think that this means they are in a conspiracy to kill him, which he seems to have got from some correspondence between the Queen and Marie Michon. He also hinted-though I cannot credit it-that they intended to kill the King. Or rather, Rochefort hinted that. It is, I'm sure, something destined to spur me on into investigating this conspiracy the Cardinal pretends to see."

"And will you investigate it?" Aramis asked. "How?"

Athos shrugged. "That, my friend, I do not have the slightest notion about. The Cardinal himself hinted that I do not . . . That I lack the cunning, and the contacts to penetrate this sort of court intrigue. I confess . . ." His gaze was now fairly unfocused, which promised that by the time he got to talking about what he feared, his brain would be fogged enough that perhaps he could avoid making a complete fool of himself. "I confess my intention was simply to buy time-to have Mousqueton unharmed, until we could find who killed the armorer."

"Right," Porthos said. "And that's the sort of thing we know how to do."

Athos looked at him, and lifted his cup of wine a little, in a silent toast. "That is indeed, Porthos, but perhaps this case is a little more complex?"

"How more complex?" D'Artagnan asked, and, from the way his voice sounded, he was quite a good bit ahead of Athos in pursuit of a good drunk. "So far . . . well . . . if it was not Mousqueton-and don't glare daggers at me, Porthos. I don't believe it was Mousqueton-then it seems likely it was something happening in the man's life. Something, perhaps, having to do with his wish to marry his daughter to Mousqueton. Perhaps the daughter decided to kill the father and implicate Mousqueton."

"Right now," Athos said, "I am quite willing to believe anything of any woman. But it seems a little odd to be judging a creature we don't even know, save for a report that she is cross-eyed." For some reason, this struck him as funny, and he added softly, "I will remind you, D'Artagnan, that being cross-eyed is not a proof of being a murderer. In point of fact, it has been recorded, throughout history, that various people have been cross-eyed without being murderers."

D'Artagnan looked up at him, his expression vacant, which probably meant that, being further on the road to drunkenness than Athos, he would not retain any of this. Athos must remember to ask Aramis to relay to the boy what he heard. Because Athos didn't think he could repeat it. Right now, Athos shook his head, and poured himself another cup of wine.

Porthos frowned at the cup as Athos took it to his lips. "Athos . . . I don't mean to count, but I think that is your fifth."

"Sixth. I figured I needed at least that, to . . ." He shook his head again. "Look, I don't know what we can do to investigate the conspiracy, but . . . Aramis, on the off chance the conspiracy exists . . . And frankly, I don't like the idea that Marie Michon is writing to Monsieur de Vendome. We all know he's hated the King ever since they were very young, and the hatred has only grown with time."

Aramis sighed. "You can't deny it's a sad thing for a sovereign to have been married ten years, and still lack an heir to the throne."

"I can't deny it," Athos said. "But I do find that perhaps Richelieu's iron grip on France is causing more conspiracies than it should. If every lord were still independent in his own domain, it would be far more difficult to consider Paris, and what happens in Paris, all-important."

The others didn't say anything, though Aramis nodded.

And after a while in silence, Porthos said, "But that is not why you are looking like you died on your feet and are looking for a good place to fall over." And then in a rush, "Or, forgive me, perhaps it is, but I've never known you to look like this . . . well . . . not since . . ."

Athos could well imagine what the since since was that took up his friend's mind. He felt his jaw set, and a muscle work on the side of it, like a metronome to his anger and sorrow. Another woman, another . . . He shook his head, again. "No," he said. "No, though for all I know that might be tied in. I can't imagine the lady in question thinks well of me, or has any kindness towards me," he said. "She has to have heard of me from . . ." He shook his head again. "She would . . . You know . . ." And suddenly, one question rising foremost in his mind, he asked. "Why didn't she come to me? If it was all a misunderstanding . . . why didn't she explain? Surely she knew I loved her still?" was that took up his friend's mind. He felt his jaw set, and a muscle work on the side of it, like a metronome to his anger and sorrow. Another woman, another . . . He shook his head, again. "No," he said. "No, though for all I know that might be tied in. I can't imagine the lady in question thinks well of me, or has any kindness towards me," he said. "She has to have heard of me from . . ." He shook his head again. "She would . . . You know . . ." And suddenly, one question rising foremost in his mind, he asked. "Why didn't she come to me? If it was all a misunderstanding . . . why didn't she explain? Surely she knew I loved her still?"

He looked out at his friends, who, at that moment, through the foggy veil of his emotions, looked like so many figures, sculpted in stone, their features blurry. He saw one of them thrust his head forward. It was the blond figure, and it was Aramis's voice which spoke out. "What do you mean? Who is this 'she' you speak of?"

"My wife."

"Your . . ." Porthos said.

Athos felt suddenly very exasperated with his friends. He was not sure what he had told them before, but he was sure it had been enough for them to piece together something of his past. "I . . ." He normally told this story in the third person. He didn't know how to tell it any other way. And yet, this time he must. "When I was very young, shortly after I inherited the domain from my father . . . well . . . I needed a wife and I knew that. My father had neglected to arrange a marriage for me, and I was in no hurry to find one through the usual channels. The daughters of my neighbors bored me; the prospect of marrying a stranger through some arranged exchange filled me with dread.

"I am . . . in the normal way of life, rather reserved and would prefer to keep private, or only in the company of my close friends. And the idea of coming to Paris, of leaving my domains, made me feel as though my heart was breaking. You see . . . I was very fond of my domains. I had great plans for orchards and vineyards, and I'd grown up there, amid the rolling ground, and I knew all of my peasants from infancy. I looked forward to living the rest of my life there." He shrugged, dismissing this as one would dismiss an impossible childhood dream. "And then, suddenly, one of the parishes on my land came vacant and the new inc.u.mbent was a young man, almost my age. Very pious. Fervent, in fact. His beautiful sister lived with him. I was aware that in the eyes of the world, she was as far below me as one of my own peasants. But she was so beautiful, so chaste, so religious. I fell in love with her and spent many a pleasant evening talking to her brother in their little cottage. In the way of things, I, who had never fallen in love before, fell in love with this beautiful blond woman and I married her. One week after she'd been elevated to countess, we were out, hunting. She hunted like Diana, a swift rider and an exacting markswoman. She was riding ahead of me, and turned back to say something. As she turned, she went under a low branch. It caught her and pulled her off her horse." He stopped, because he could hear his voice tremble, on the edge of tears. Fortunately not being able to see his friends' faces made it easier, but he heard Porthos draw breath as though to say something and, right now, pity was more than he could endure. "I dismounted and ran to her, naturally. She had lost consciousness. I panicked, also naturally, and took my hunting knife and cut her dress away, to give her the room to breathe. Which is when I found that she was marked with a fleur-de-lis."

This time he couldn't avoid hearing someone-he thought Porthos-say "Sangre Dieu" under his breath.

"I, after all my careful picking, and my refusal to be drawn in to a contracted, loveless marriage, had given my hand, my lands, my honor, to a marked criminal. You must understand . . . I was as in love as anyone can be, and I was a callow youth. It would have been better, perhaps, if my father hadn't raised me away from the world and its fas.h.i.+ons, if he hadn't kept me from society. If I'd been sent to Paris, years before, for a while, and spent some time with young men my age, I might not have fallen for Charlotte. Or, if I had, since she was so very beautiful and so very accomplished, I would have had more resources of mind and heart to turn my crus.h.i.+ng pain into something more manageable. I had none of those. Thoroughly provincial, I could think only that my honor was crushed forever. I could divorce her. I could judge her publically, for having imposed upon me. In . . . in my domains, the feudal law still held. As such, I thought that I could . . . justly condemn her. Only . . . it wasn't like that. If I tried her publically, all my tenants and all my serfs would know of it. It would be spoken about till the end of my life. I could not do that. It wasn't in my mind-set.

"So, still shocked and grieved, you realize, my mind roiling, my heart in turmoil, I took her, and I lifted her and put around her neck a noose from my saddlebag. And I hanged her from a low branch. Only afterwards, when I was riding away, did I think that because I had not exerted my authority through the normal channels and in an open way, this would be believed to be a murder-that whoever found her would think someone had murdered, and doubtless would think of me.

"Well, I was sure I could defend my actions, but I had started all of this because I wished to keep my family and myself from notoriety. So I did what I could to keep the talk down. I arranged things so that a distant cousin of mine would come and administer my domains in my absence. And I took some possessions from my house, but not too much. I let it be known that I would be going on a long voyage and didn't know when I could return. I didn't explicitly say my wife would be with me, but I let it be understood that she would be. That she had, in fact, gone ahead of me. I thought that way, if no one found her, it would be believed that we had left on some voyage together and, if I chose to come back in many years, I could do so and mention she had died, without exciting comment. And if she were found, I would be far, far away, and even though they might suspect me, no one would search for me.

"By nighttime I was on my way to Paris, with Grimaud. By the end of the week I was installed, as you see me, and I'd spoken to Monsieur de Treville, an old family friend, and obtained a post in the musketeers. Since then, every year, I've considered returning. But I've found I have very little interest in revisiting the site of my misguided idylls. And even if I did, I'd prefer it if the present generation has pa.s.sed away, and no one there remembers how much in love I used to be."

He was pacing again, between chair and window, his steps rubbery, the room seeming to tilt under his feet. Through his window he saw lights come and go, like torches in the night. Carriages, he supposed, or perhaps parties of people walking and carrying a torch or a lantern. Though this was not a place known for revelers, there was some foot traffic, at night. "I thought it a little odd that I never heard of her being found, or even of her missing. We were somewhat lost in my hunting preserve, but after all, other people hunted there, if no one else, my cousin when he came into residence. And if someone had found her, they could not at all be at a loss about who she was. She was wearing her clothes. But no one found her, and I simply waited and was happy of a momentary respite."

He stopped, his mind in confusion, thinking he hadn't been glad of a respite at all. All this time, all the years he'd been away from La Fere, he'd been waiting for doom to come upon his head again. The one time he'd been happy in his life had ended in the greatest dishonor and pain. The one time. And now, he wasn't even happy, but he had his position and his friends. He had been waiting for something horrible to happen. And it might well have had.

"And what happened?" a voice asked. He thought it was Porthos. "Did they find her?"

Athos heard a very odd sound, half cackle, half sob escape his lips. "No. No, my friend. I found her. Today. Outside the Palais Cardinal."

"What?" another voice asked, almost certainly D'Artagnan's. "But how can her body . . ."

"It wasn't her body. Or rather, yes, it was, but she had moved it herself, she still being very much alive."

"You never verified that you had killed her?" Porthos asked.

Athos shook his head. "I couldn't. Even such as I did . . . it has tormented my mind and heart . . . all these years."

"And are you sure it was her?" Aramis asked. "You know women can look devilishly alike, and after all this time . . ."

Athos nodded. "Aramis, I've dreamed about her every night since it happened. In my heart, I've never really stopped thinking about her. Her image is etched in my heart and seared in my soul. I could never not recognize her. It was her, but she went by me as if she didn't recognize me . . . which . . . perhaps she didn't, but . . . Why the Palais Cardinal?"

There was another soft bout of swearing. From its definite near-pious characteristics, and the soft voice in which it was p.r.o.nounced, Athos was sure it was Aramis. He tried to protest that he truly wanted to know, but his tongue had, unaccountably gone thick and unyielding. So had his legs, which presently stopped obeying him and lost all force under him.

"Porthos," Aramis's voice said, as though from a long way off. "You help me carry him to the bed. And you'd best stay here. I think both he and D'Artagnan are quite out of human reach, just now. I . . . I have some things to do, and I will return in the morning."

"Things to do?"

"I know a man," Aramis said, "who might tell me who this blond servant of the Cardinal is. I'm hoping, I'm almost praying, that she is not . . . whom Athos thought she was."

And Athos, lost between consciousness and a deep, black abyss of nothing, wanted to explain he wouldn't prefer that. Then he would still be waiting for them to find her body.

But his mouth could form no more than a long, low moan, and, as he felt Porthos lift him, he plunged fully into the black nothingness.

The Garden after the Fall; Where Aramis Knows Several Men; The Cardinal's New Right Hand

ARAMIS stepped out into the cool night, to find himself as if in a prefiguration of the Garden of Eden. Granted, at best Paris was a built-over garden of Eden, but now at the end of winter, when the night wasn't quite as icy as it had been, it was possible to imagine the night perfumed with newly grown flowers, with soft, ripe gra.s.s, with the promise of the coming spring.

He looked at the stars above, and thought of his friends, up in Athos's lodging. Porthos, perhaps because he had heard Athos's story, had felt unusually fearful of attack. He'd told Aramis, in a perfectly serious tone, that since they still didn't know why they'd been attacked in the gardens of the royal palace, it was not unheard of for them to be attacked in their own lodgings. And he did not feel confident with the three of them being in separate rooms.

Aramis had thought of explaining that people who broke into musketeer lodgings were, by definition, desperate enough to face practically anyone or anything. Or of pointing out that he doubted anyone at all, who knew Athos well enough to know where he lived, would find it a good idea to break into his house.

He did neither. Both of those might be true and sensible, but, in point of fact, neither mattered. Porthos felt threatened, and therefore they'd managed to lay Athos and D'Artagnan, side by side, on Athos's bed, which had, fortunately, been brought from his domain and was therefore large and st.u.r.dy enough to fit another two musketeers, if needed, without their needing to touch.

Porthos had brought a chair from the sitting room, and half lain upon it, wrapped in his cloak. For good measure, Grimaud, who clearly felt as threatened as Porthos did, even without hearing Athos's story-which he possibly already knew-had set a rotation of servants on guard outside the door.

So, Aramis thought, this was a paradise where the fall had occurred. And a serpent lurked somewhere out of sight. This thought sharpened his eyes, as he looked around. And he saw enough shadows lurking that he tightened his pace. And when the shadows detached from doorways and the darkened mouths of alleys, he started running, to avoid them.

It rankled to run, as he'd never before turned from offered combat. But he remembered the fight all too vividly, and he was not about to allow himself to be caught. There were far more of them than of him, and under those circ.u.mstances, it would not be a fight, but a slaughter.

He took various turns, blindly, with only one thought in mind-to get to the portions of the town where taverns were still busy and the streets thronged with strangers. There, even should his pursuers set on him, he would be more than able to call to his aid those musketeers nearby-and in the area where taverns cl.u.s.tered, there would be a lot of musketeers.

By the time he reached the nearest of these streets-Saint Antoine-he was running full force, and careened into the crowd of prost.i.tutes and late-night drinkers like a man diving into a tawdry sea. Like water, they closed about him, carrying him along, in their revels.

He took several turns at random, and whenever he could, he turned to look back. Soon he was glad to note not a single man cloaked in black in sight. Not that there might not be black-cloaked people who were in no way related to those pursuing him, but on these streets you were more likely to find peac.o.c.k colors and a blazing display of jewels that would shame Porthos himself.

He turned and turned again, surrounded by the smell of wine, of perfume, of sweaty bodies, taking care always to be in the thick of the crowd. A woman's hand-at least he hoped it was a woman's-took rather disconcerting liberties with his breeches, and a wishful sigh echoed from the direction the hand emerged.

Aramis resisted curiosity, which told him to turn and look, and walked on. At one of the edges of the drinking district, the one closest to the Palais Cardinal, he found himself quite free of pursuers.

He headed at a fast clip for the Palais Cardinal, or rather for a small tavern near it, where some of the Cardinal's more . . . a.s.siduous servants ate their evening meals, and often stayed by to drink their evening drinks. It wasn't frequented by guards, as such. Or even by the Cardinal's secretaries. No. Here came the keepers of the Cardinal's clothes, the people who cleaned the Palais Cardinal and those who cooked for him.

While Aramis stuck out in there, like a lion at a congregation of ants, he'd been coming to the place for so many years that his entrance, in his well-cut suit, his plume-trimmed hat, occasioned not even a stare. The men ignored him. They usually did. The truth was that, for all that Aramis claimed to know a man, mostly-as Porthos was always quick to point out-he knew women. And women who made their living from scrubbing and cleaning were still, and ultimately, women. Women who had trouble resisting Aramis's pale blond hair, his sparkling green eyes, his well-molded lips and his soft, whispering voice.

Aramis had first come in here out of a fascinated interest, like a man who sets out to explore an unknown jungle. He wasn't of Porthos's cut. He didn't view these places, attended by laborers and humble artificers, as the true source of humanity's best. Aramis thought that, all other things being equal, the best of humanity should come better washed, and, if at all possible, more fas.h.i.+onably attired.

But he knew that servants found out as much or more about their masters, as did their best-trusted secretaries and their guards. Sometimes more. It was, after all, highly unlikely that even the Cardinal had a personal secretary wash his underwear. So he'd started coming here, night after night, when he could spare the time from more urgent pursuits. And now, after all this time, he could come into the darkness, illuminated by sputtering candles made of bacon grease, with hardly a flinch and without actually attempting to avoid the touch of his fellow customers.

He made his way between tables packed with drinkers, to the one table at the back where he usually sat and listened to the conversations, while doing his best to dispense spiritual advice.

He'd no more sat down, and asked his server-the burly son of the tavern keeper-for a pint of their best wine, when a woman emerged from the shadows and sat across from him, giving him a brilliant smile.

She was very young-maybe no more than sixteen or so-which in this environment was the only explanation for her still possessing all her teeth. She was also somewhat pretty, or would be, with her little round face washed, her blondish hair properly combed, and wearing something other than a formless grey sack. Her name was Huguette, or at least that's what they called her, when they weren't calling her "pretty" and "sweet" and other such names.

Aramis had heard that she worked in the Cardinal's kitchens, and he suspected that she engaged in a bit of prost.i.tution on the side, just for the fun of it. Whether this was true or not, she was clearly unchaperoned, unguarded, and quite, quite determined to make the conquest of the fine-looking gentleman who consented to sit among them.

Today was no different, as she sat on the bench across from him, and pulled up her legs, so that the sack fell, and her legs were displayed from the thigh down. She wasn't to know that those thighs, with their bony knees and the almost too thin legs, excited nothing in Aramis but a profound sense of pity. In fact, long as it had been since he'd seen D'Artagnan's bare legs, and unexciting as he'd found the occasion, he would probably say that D'Artagnan's legs-hair and all-were far more luscious. All Huguette made him wish to do was buy her a loaf of bread and a slice of meat. But he'd tried that at first and found that she considered it payment in advance and became, therefore, even harder to evade.

So he'd taken a sip of his wine-more to prove friendly than because he had any wish to drink it, since the vintage here was vinegary and quite a few steps below Athos's excellent burgundy, of which Aramis had not drunk more than a few sips. In fact, faced with how incapable of self-defense the wine had made his comrades back at Athos's house, Aramis felt not at all like drinking. He said to Huguette in his softest, most clerical voice, "Good evening my daughter."

She gave him a look full of mischievous fun. "Your daughter, am I? Coo. I knew you gentlemen were strange, but not that strange. Even Rochefort is not that odd."

Aramis refused to rise to the bait, either of pretending to believe her misunderstanding, or wis.h.i.+ng to explore Rochefort's strangeness. The idea of what Rochefort might or might not want to do in the privacy of his chamber left Aramis completely uninterested. It was what Rochefort did to France, in full light of day, and with the Cardinal's orders to back it up, that made Aramis's heart beat faster. Usually with fear. He took another sip of his wine, to disguise his confusion, and Huguette laughed softly.

None of the other women were coming near today, which, probably, meant none of the other women were in the tavern. Aramis would have preferred to get his gossip from a more informed source or, at least, since he didn't think that Huguette was ill-informed, from a more stable source. But if Huguette was all there was, he would have to cater to her topics, and he would have to approach the subject, he judged, via Rochefort. Though he refused to ask about Rochefort's habits, in general.

"So," he said. "Is the blond lady one of Rochefort's friends?"

"What blond lady?" she asked. "There are so many."

"The one who came in earlier," Aramis said, and relayed what he remembered of Athos's description without the superlatives, which he was sure were only how Athos saw her, and in no way connected to reality-or only very little.

Huguette raised her knees a little, bringing her grimy bare feet closer to her body, on the bench. "Are you in love with her too?" she asked.

"Too? And of course I'm not in love with her. I've never seen her."

Huguette looked wishful. She had eyes somewhere between green and brown, and large, all out of proportion to her face. She stared at him a long time, then sighed. "You'll be in love with her," she said. "As soon as you see her."

"Doubtful," Aramis said, thinking of the only woman who had ever commanded his love, though he'd had a continuous stream of beauties grace his bed. Violette had not been branded with a fleur-de-lis. "And who has fallen in love with her, that you should say I'll fall in love with her too?"

"Oh, everyone," she said and sighed. "Everyone who sees her. But you shouldn't fall in love with her, you know? Because she's not very nice. I've heard her talk to the Cardinal, and she says that she has . . . killed people." The huge eyes stared out at him, with what seemed to be very sincere shock.

"Lots of the Cardinal's people kill other people," Aramis said, and shrugged.

The girl sighed. "Yes, I guess they do. But not, normally, with poison. Or not while they're in bed with them."

Aramis raised his eyebrows. He was so completely taken aback, he was surprised into blurting, "I'll take care never to be in bed with her."

"See that you do," Huguette said, very seriously. "I've heard that she has killed three husbands and a lover."

"And does she have a name," Aramis asked. "This sinner?"

"Why do you want to know? Do you want to meet her?"

Aramis shook his head. "No. But I think it will be easier to stay away from her if I know her name, and where she's likely to be."

"Most people just call her milady," the girl said. "You know, in English. The last husband she killed with slow poison is said to have been an English earl. So she gets the t.i.tle, you know. But his family was very suspicious and as soon as he died, they set about investigating his death, and she found things too hot for her in England, and so she came here."

She hugged her bony knees, in a curiously unselfconscious and childish gesture. "I bet you no one else could tell you her name, but I can, because I heard her talking to Rochefort, and Rochefort was calling her Charlotte."

Aramis felt as though an icy finger had run down his spine beneath his clothes. Whatever else was said, he was sure that Athos had referred to his wife as Charlotte. "Was she . . . was one of her husbands a count? A French count?"

The tavern waif shook her head, then shrugged. "I don't know," she said. "He might have been. But . . . You know they're all dead, so what does it matter. There is a guard, in the palace, who calls her the black spider. He's sensible at least, but most of the others aren't. They say she's so pretty that she must most certainly be as good as an angel." She sighed. "I find that men can be very stupid."

Agreeing with her, and counting out his money to pay the server, Aramis was about to say his farewells when he heard the next words tumbling out of the young woman's mouth. "It is all very well, you know, but I heard her price for working for the Cardinal. I know that you're a musketeer, which is why I feel a little naughty talking to you, and I know that you and your friends are forever fighting the guards of the Cardinal. But I also know that you look so kind, and I know you speak so sweetly, that it can't probably be provoked by you." She shrugged, completely unconscious of the irony of her words. "But I also know that when you do fight the guards, it is in duels, and it is all fair and correct. But milady is not like that. And I heard her tell the Cardinal that there was a musketeer she wanted dead. It appears he has done something to her, some time ago. Only I guess he wasn't a musketeer then."

She looked at Aramis, eyes wide, lips trembling a little. "She has found out he has become a musketeer, and her price for whatever she's doing for the Cardinal is a safe conduct to be allowed to do what she wishes to this musketeer and his friends."

"Do you remember the musketeer's name?" Aramis asked, cold sweat now trickling down his body, and his mind clenching in panic. "Anything that might tell me who he is?"

"His name is Athos," Huguette said. And, quite unaware that Aramis felt as though he'd just turned to stone, "I remember because it's an odd name. Like yours."

Where Monsieur Aramis Attempts to Investigate; Creditors with No Sense of Humor; It Is Better to Bless Than to Fight