Plague of Lies (9781101611739)

by Rock, Judith

  Jouvancy and La Chaise, suddenly a united front in the face of this insubordinate outburst, hushed him.

  “And I think that Mademoiselle de Rouen may be growing more reconciled to the marriage,” Charles said anyway.

  The two priests glared at him, and La Chaise refilled his wineglass and sat turning it in his hands. “She was at the king’s bedside last night,” he said thoughtfully. “Until Madame de Maintenon sent her to get some rest. That she was there speaks well for her, I admit.”

  “And she’s been praying in front of our reliquary, which Madame de Maintenon has put on a side altar in the chapel for her benefit,” Charles put in doggedly.

  To Charles’s surprise, no one hushed him a second time. Père Jouvancy looked pleased at the news of the reliquary, and La Chaise looked thoughtful.

  “That seems a good sign,” the king’s confessor said consideringly, “that she’s praying. A young girl asking the help of a holy virgin is very appropriate. Last night, she joined me in praying for the king.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “Very well. You two can return to Paris. I will arrange for one of the Franciscans who cares for the chapel to keep a watch on the girl there. And Bouchel can—” He looked at Charles. “No, perhaps not Bouchel, after what you told me. Not that the boy would step out of his place. But Lulu has obviously stepped out of hers in asking him for help, and I’ll give her no more chances to take that further. The oldest of her ladies can be persuaded to extra vigilance.” He sighed. “I will take it on myself to help keep Lulu away from the Duchess of Tuscany at the evening entertainments tonight and tomorrow.”

  Charles’s heart lifted, and he took an involuntary step toward the door.

  But La Chaise shook his head. “I only ask one thing,” he said to Jouvancy. “That you, mon père, take your ease for the remainder of the morning. You have never yet seen the gardens, and I propose that you and I spend the morning there. While you, Maître du Luc, pay a farewell visit to Mademoiselle de Rouen and perhaps have a last consoling talk with her. After you see her, we three will dine together. And after that, Bouchel will find you a carriage, mon père. You say you can manage both horses, Maître du Luc?”

  “I can.”

  “Then go and find Mademoiselle de Rouen. She is likely with her mother, Madame de Montespan, this morning.”

  Telling himself that a morning was not long, and that there would be a leisurely and solitary ride at the end of it, Charles went to Madame de Montespan’s door. He’d learned that one never knocked on a palace door, but instead scratched lightly at the glossy white paint with a fingernail. The composure of the manservant who opened the door was almost as glossy as the paint, but when Charles said that Père La Chaise had sent him, the man’s eyes widened.

  “The king?” he whispered. “Is he—”

  “A little better, I’m told.”

  The servant admitted Charles inside and went to announce him. Left alone in the anteroom, Charles turned in a slow circle, frankly gaping. Between classical pillars, the thickly carved paneling was a riot of fat, naked baby angels hovering like butterflies among botanically impossible leaves and flowers. The walls’ flat spaces gleamed with polished marble and on the ceiling, a mostly naked Venus lay on a rosy cloud. Swans paddled in the air around the goddess, and doves fluttered as well, though Venus had eyes only for the hulking Adonis with Louis’s face.

  When Charles was ushered into the next room, he found Madame de Montespan, Lulu, and Margot sitting together. So much for keeping Mademoiselle de Rouen away from the Duchess of Tuscany, Charles thought. Lulu’s mother was dressed in loose blue silk and sitting decorously on a sturdy chair, a cloud being unlikely now to support her weight. In spite of her size and her aging, she was beautiful. The lines of silver in her curling blond hair only made it shine more, and her fat lent a spurious smoothness to her dazzling skin. Her eyes were the bluest Charles had ever seen…

  “Were you looking for me, Maître du Luc?” Lulu’s voice was small and sad, and Charles saw that she was bent over a lacy pile of sewing in her lap.

  “Forgive me, mesdames.” Charles inclined his head to Madame de Montespan, hoping she hadn’t noticed his staring. “I’ve come to say that the king, God be thanked, is better.”

  Margot laughed. “Good for my cousin. And even better to have the news from such a handsome courier.”

  Charles willed himself not to blush. “I am surprised to see you here so early in the day,” he said to her.

  “Oh, I stayed last night. One could not leave when the king was so ill. One feared—many things.”

  “Thank you for coming to tell us he’s better,” Lulu said softly. “I was very anxious for him.”

  She kept her head down, curled in on herself like a small animal protecting its soft parts, and Charles wondered unhappily if his talks with her had created this subdued sadness. Had his effort at “counsel” only quenched the life in her?

  “Besides my errand here,” he said, “I was also looking for you.”

  She smiled a little and started to say something, but male laughter came suddenly from behind her. The Duc du Maine put his head around her chair. “Bonjour, maître. I was reading to them. But since I am not handsome, they don’t want to see me, only to hear. Or perhaps it is that I am too handsome and will distract them from their sewing, only they don’t like to say so.” His sister laughed suddenly and reached down, trying to pinch him. Maine ducked aside and pulled his cushion out so he could sit beside her.

  Madame de Montespan put her own sewing aside on a low stool and said to Charles, “Did the king send you to me?”

  “No, madame. It was feared you would be worrying, if you’d had no recent word.”

  “Oh. I no longer worry. He has others to worry over him now.” She blinked slowly, waiting to see what Charles would do with that.

  The Duc du Maine said quickly, “Shall I read again, madame? Or perhaps Maître du Luc would read to us. Or—”

  “Of course he doesn’t want to read, Louis, don’t be a child.” Margot twitched an apricot taffeta shoulder at Maine and patted her yellow wig. “Let him tell us exactly how the king is faring.”

  “Sleeping, I think,” Charles said carefully. “The last I heard, he was no longer spewing.”

  “So now all that is left is to find the poisoner.” Madame de Montespan’s eyes were still fixed on Charles. “Is that the real reason they sent you here? To charm me into admitting I poisoned him?”

  Charles’s jaw dropped. “Did you?” he blurted, before he could stop himself.

  The other two women and Maine recoiled as though he’d dropped a dead rat on the blue-and-rose carpet, but Mme de Montespan only smiled.

  “I ask your pardon, madame,” Charles stammered, wanting to kick himself.

  “Oh, you are delicious.” Margot’s caw of delight drowned his apology. “Of course she didn’t poison him. But no doubt there are those saying she’s at it again.”

  “No doubt, Margot,” Madame de Montespan returned, in a voice like fermenting honey. “And no doubt they are saying it of you, as well. After all, Italy is the land of poisoners, and you lived there for years. Everyone says you tried to poison your husband.”

  “The bon Dieu knows I wanted to! But only because Cosimo was trying to poison me. And I’ve no reason at all to harm dear Louis now that he’s let me come back to France.”

  With sudden energy, Lulu stabbed her needle through the white silk in her lap. “If he was poisoned. Everyone cries poison here if you eat a green apple and spend the day on your chaise de commodité. I’m sure he’s just ill. Like old Fleury was.” She glanced up at Charles. “Like you and the other Jesuits were, too—and why would anyone poison you?”

  The older women exchanged looks. “Why anyone would poison you in particular, mon cher, I cannot imagine,” Margot said to Charles. “Or that little priest your companion. But your Père La Chaise is altogether another question. We all know who might poison Père La Chaise.”

  “She wouldn
’t!” Maine cried, clambering awkwardly to his feet. “You know she wouldn’t, Madame de Maintenon is the best, kindest woman in the world!”

  His mother’s slow blue gaze found him and he bit his lip.

  “Besides you, I mean, madame, you know you are always first!”

  His mother said nothing. With a miserable glance at Lulu, he limped to a side table and fingered the hothouse apricots heaped there in a gleaming silver bowl.

  “Why might she poison Père La Chaise, Your Highness?” Charles said to Margot.

  “Because they hate each other,” Lulu said wearily. “Everyone knows that. But she wouldn’t poison him because the king wouldn’t like it. No one has poisoned anyone! Unless God poisoned the Comte de Fleury—it’s easy to imagine God seeing that the Comte de Fleury was poisoned for his sins. At least, that is what everyone is saying!” Lulu shifted a little in her chair and looked up at Charles through her long, pale lashes. “You said you were looking for me, maître.” Her small hand went to her throat, fingering a gold cross that hung from the tight circle of pearls around her neck.

  “To see how you were faring, Your Highness. After the talk we had yesterday. And also to take my leave. We are going back to Paris today.”

  “Oh, no, you mustn’t leave!” Margot trilled.

  “Lulu has told us about your talk,” Maine said, gravely regarding the crystal vase of rosy peonies beside the fruit bowl. “I should be glad that you’ve helped her to accept her duty as a king’s daughter.” He took a peony from the vase and came back to his sister’s chair. “But I will miss her sorely when she goes to Poland.” He tucked the flower into her hair.

  Lulu let go of the little cross and reached up a hand to him. As he brought it to his lips, she said, “I will miss you, too, Louis.” She drew her hand away. “As you see, maître, you did help me.” Changing expressions flitted across her face like cloud shadows. “What could be more resigned than sewing bridal linen?”

  Margot picked up the sheer ivory linen in her lap and shook it out, revealing a lace-trimmed chemise so finely woven that it rippled like silk. She dangled it enticingly, making it jump as though it were alive, her eyes sparkling maliciously as she watched Charles.

  A wave of anger swept through him at the woman’s taunting, but he said lightly, “I have sisters, Your Highness. I have seen a chemise before.” He forced a smile and started to invite Lulu to the chapel for one last conversation. But Madame de Montespan forestalled him.

  “It is nearly dinnertime, maître, and I am sure you don’t wish to be late at the table you are gracing.” She held out a smooth white hand.

  Lulu looked daggers at her mother, but Charles accepted the dismissal. When he only bowed over her hand—without kissing it—she shrugged slightly and then gave him what seemed like a real, though brief, smile.

  “Thank you for receiving me, Madame,” he said. “I am glad to have met you.” He bowed slightly to Margot. “Your Royal Highness.” To Lulu, whose mouth was trembling with disappointment, he said, “I am glad you are turning your attention to being a bride. I—” He stopped as she bent her head and a shower of tears broke through her control and fell on her sewing. He looked helplessly at the pale slender neck and the white ribbons trailing on either side of it from her headdress. “God can bring good out of what seems like the blackest misery,” he said softly, as though no one else were in the room.

  She dried the tears with a handful of lace from her lap and looked up. Her face was so set and bleak that Charles caught his breath in pain, as though her sore heart beat suddenly in his own chest.

  “Lulu—” He stopped, realizing he’d used the nickname he had no right to use, but no one chided him. “Obedience can begin bitterly. As yours begins. But, with time, it can grow sweet. I know this for myself, and it is hard learning. But it can happen.”

  Margot snorted loudly, but Charles ignored her. In Lulu’s case, obedience growing sweet seemed more than unlikely, but unlikely was not the same as impossible.

  She nodded slightly, and her hand went to the cross again. But her miserable expression didn’t change.

  “God go with you.” Charles turned toward the door, but she called him back.

  “Maître.” It might have been the king looking at him. Her illusionless Bourbon eyes were as dry as though she’d never in her life wept. “I am my father’s daughter. I can do what I must as ruthlessly as he does.”

  Charles found no answer to that. But as he crossed the antechamber dedicated to love, he looked back at the salon. Margot looked at Mme de Montespan, and the two resumed their sewing. Lulu took up her scissors and cut her needle free of the white cloud of lace. Charles suddenly saw the women as the ancient world’s three Fates, those daughters of the gods who spun the thread of a man’s life, fixed its length, and cut it off. He went out into the passage, trying to remember the ancients’ other name for the Fates. It came to him as he climbed the stairs in the south wing. They’d been called Daughters of the Just Heavens.

  Chapter 13

  When Charles reached Père La Chaise’s chambers, no one was there. Hoping he wouldn’t have to search the entire gardens, he went to look for Jouvancy and La Chaise but, to his relief, found them walking slowly toward him across the gravel, deep in talk, as he emerged from the palace.

  Charles reported the results of his morning’s visit.

  “I’m not surprised that Maine was there,” La Chaise said. “He’s taking his sister’s leaving very much to heart and will no doubt be her shadow until she goes. Which is to the good, since we don’t want her left alone. Ah,” he said, as bells began to ring, “that means dinner. Come. We’ll go to the Grand Commons.”

  They went into the palace and started along the ground-floor gallery, but La Chaise suddenly pulled them to a stop. A fast-stepping procession led by a gentleman with a baton of office was bearing down on them. All along the gallery, courtiers were drawing aside, sweeping off hats, bowing and curtsying nearly to the ground. A ripple of murmuring accompanied the courtiers’ reverences as the procession passed.

  “Uncover and bow,” La Chaise hissed, whipping off his own bonnet.

  Charles and Jouvancy did the same, and when the procession had nearly reached them, Charles heard what the courtiers were murmuring as they bowed.

  “The king’s dinner,” La Chaise and Jouvancy said in their turn, as the line of gentlemen carrying covered silver dishes passed, leaving a savory smell behind. La Chaise elbowed Charles. “Say it!”

  Speechless, Charles turned to La Chaise.

  “Didn’t you hear me?” La Chaise hissed, as the three of them replaced their bonnets.

  “Yes, mon père. But—why were we bowing to the king’s dinner?”

  “Because it is the king’s dinner,” Jouvancy said, scandalized. “It is soon to be part of the king.”

  Biting his tongue to keep from asking if they must bow to Louis’s chamber pot as well, Charles followed the others to the Grand Commons across the street.

  The Grand Commons was enormous and new. La Chaise told them that it contained a plethora of kitchens and a nicely graded series of refectories, where courtiers, guards, and flocks of servants ate. The kitchens also prepared much of the food for private chambers and rushed it across the road and through the galleries to its destination. Which made Charles think of the abortive dinner at La Rochefoucauld’s table. The food had been delicious, but nothing he’d eaten had been more than faintly warm.

  After a surprisingly good dinner of roasted cod in a butter sauce with cloves and capers, and a side dish of spinach with raisins, they went back to La Chaise’s chamber. Charles gathered his and Jouvancy’s belongings, and the three Jesuits made their farewells.

  “And I beg you to remember,” La Chaise said, “it is imperative to keep a close eye on Henri de Montmorency. Especially you, maître. He must not leave Louis le Grand until Lulu is gone. Not for any reason.”

  “But”—Jouvancy looked in confusion from one to the other—“if his mothe
r demands it—”

  “Forgive me, mon père,” La Chaise said. “I forgot that you have not been part of all this. Your Henri de Montmorency fancies himself in love with Mademoiselle de Rouen and talks foolishly of stopping her going to Poland.”

  Jouvancy’s eyes rounded in horror. “That beggars belief. How could even Montmorency be so stupid! Of course we must keep him inside the college. For his own sake!”

  “And for ours,” La Chaise said dryly.

  Charles picked up the saddlebags and the three of them went out into the gallery.

  “Are you sure you can manage both horses, maître?” Jouvancy said anxiously.

  “Assuredly, mon père. But first, I will get you a carriage.”

  La Chaise shook his head. “You go ahead, maître. I will see Père Jouvancy into a carriage and on his way.”

  Charles bowed to the two of them, shouldered the saddlebags, and went decorously to the stairs. When he was out of sight, he bolted down the stairs two at a time, feeling like a boy let out of school and caring nothing for the looks he got from people climbing past him. Outside, the air was warm and fresh, and the afternoon promised settled riding weather to accompany two of his favorite earthly pleasures: riding and solitude. A whole afternoon of privacy rarely came his way.

  But first, he had to make the long trudge from the palace to the stable. When he finally arrived there, he found himself facing a stone façade worthy of this palace for horses. The large cobbled forecourt was mostly empty, but inside the stables, he found a small army of grooms, ostlers, and saddlers currying horses as glossy as polished parquet, putting fresh straw down in stalls far larger than his bedchamber at Louis le Grand, polishing saddles and harness until the leather gleamed like the king’s mirrors. Somewhere a blacksmith was making the air ring with the blows of hammer on anvil, like bells clanging above a busy city. Wishing he could have spent his days at Versailles here instead of in the palace for courtiers, Charles wandered happily between the stalls, stroking velvet noses and admiring the elegant, long-legged English hunters the king favored for the chase.