Médicis Daughter (49 page)

“I am sorry for your reception,” he says when we are alone in his bedchamber. “Tempers run high. It is rumored the King will let Guise escape. And there is continued talk your family was involved. It is even said Anjou’s purse paid the shooter.”

I have no time to discuss theories. “Guise may well escape,” I say, “but you would do better to plan your own than worry about him. That is why I have come. I too hear rumors; the latest is that if your coreligionists do not temper their calls for justice, and if they continue to show themselves armed in the streets, inciting the ordinary people, there will be arrests.”

“His Majesty would not dare! Arrest the guests at his sister’s wedding—men he invited to the city—when they have done nothing more than deplore a cowardly attempt to assassinate one of His Majesty’s true servants? ’Twould be an ignoble act, and an unwise one.”

“Is that a threat?”

My cousin looks startled. “No.”

“Well, it sounds like one. Can you not perceive that? So much of what you and your fellows do is being seen as threatening, whatever your intentions. You need to urge restraint upon your gentlemen. No more demands upon the King. Keep off the streets, or at least do not go about so obviously armed.”

“Cower?” He looks at me with disgust. “You urge us to cower? No, Madame, we will not. In fact, we will send a delegation to His Majesty tomorrow morning, a delegation I will be a member of, to accuse Guise formally.”

“Cousin, you must not. Is Guise’s head more valuable to you than your own freedom and safety?”

“Is that what the Duc bid you say? He would like it very well if we did not pursue this.”

“Argh!” I throw both my hands into the air. “I cannot help you. Why do I try? Listen to me: If you go to Charles tomorrow, be prepared to fly afterwards. And if you do not do so successfully, do not expect me to visit you in the dungeons of Vincennes.”

I assume he will bristle. Instead he gives me the most cavalier of smiles—almost a smirk. This is far more maddening, for it tells me that he thinks he knows better. Fine! I am finished trying to help him, just as I am finished trying to help Henri. These men are fools and must survive—or not—by their own wits. Mine are wasted on them.

*   *   *

I arrive at Her Majesty’s apartment to offer a dutiful evening of attendance, and find Mother relaxed as I have not seen her since word came that the admiral had been shot. She embroiders quietly, her hand steady, her smile beatific.
Unnerving
.

Claude, seated
tout près
to Her Majesty, pats the cushion beside her. I seat myself.

“How is the King this evening, Madame?” I ask.

“He was well when I left him.”

Well? Under such circumstances?
The implausibility of her answer raises my suspicions even further.

“I am glad to hear it.” Two can dissemble.

Henriette moves to join Claude and me. When she sits down, she angles herself so that her back is to Mother, partially blocking that lady’s view of me. “The
prévôt des marchands
have been here,” she says quietly.

There is nothing inherently odd about Charles meeting with the authorities charged with securing Paris, but under the circumstances the news seems significant, as do the looks given me by my sister and my friend.

“Duchesse, would you go to my wool stores and get me another ball of this blue?” The request is pretext. A servant might be sent for the wool. It is clear Mother does not want Henriette speaking to me.

“With pleasure, Your Majesty.”

While Mother hands Henriette a sample of the blue, Claude leans in and whispers, “They reminded Charles of Montceaux today.”

Of the long-ago kidnapping attempt?

“Who?” I whisper back.

“Birague, Tavannes, Montpensier,” she says. “Retz has been with Charles for hours by Mother’s express command.”

Henriette moves out of Her Majesty’s line of vision and Claude sits bolt upright.

What is she trying to tell me? The men she names are influential with the King and all heavily under the influence of Mother. Tavannes is a military man and much inclined, therefore, to military solutions.

“May I have something from your basket to work on?” I ask Claude, careful to speak unconcernedly, as if nothing more than embroidery were on my mind.

She bends down to take up the basket and I with her.

“Mother has bent Charles to her will,” Claude whispers frantically. “It is no longer justice he seeks.”

Straightening, I am not surprised to find Mother’s eyes upon us.

I take up a needle and attempt to thread it, but my hands shake. Is Claude trying to reassure me Henri is safe? If so, why is there terror in her voice? What exactly is there to fear if Charles has given up his investigation into the attempt upon the admiral’s life?

“Margot, you look tired,” Mother observes. “You must go to bed early. In fact, you may go now.” I stare at her, wide-eyed. I do not wish to be dismissed. Not until I have divined what goes on.

“Your Majesty, I thank you for your concern, but I assure you I am fine. Will you not permit me the honor of helping you prepare for bed, as is my right and duty?”

“It is pleasing to have a dutiful child,” she replies. “But as your mother I must look to your health before my own pleasure in your company. You can be spared and it is my wish that you return to your rooms.”

There is nothing for it. I must go. I hand Claude the basket, stand, and curtsy. As I rise a hand clutches my sleeve. Half turning, I find tears coursing down my sister’s face.

“Margot,” she says, choking back a sob, “do not go! This is not a night for bed.”

“Enough! Claude, you are overwrought and will upset your sister to no purpose.”

“Your Majesty, I beg you—”

“Not another word.”

Claude hangs her head.

“Good night, then.” I move toward the door, keenly aware all eyes are upon me.

When I reach my apartment, Gillone sticks her head out of the next chamber. Within moments she is ghosting away with a note for the King of Navarre. Something dire goes on, and no mistaking.

I am on my knees at my
prie-dieu
when they come
en masse
in response to my summons—my cousin and three dozen of his gentlemen. “Let only the King come through,” I instruct, staying where I am. Having humbled myself before Guise earlier, I now mean to do the same before my husband. Well, I tell myself as he crosses the threshold, humility is a virtue before God.

“Wife, you may cease your prayers, for I am come.” The joke, the smile—awkward and out of place—put me in mind of all the times he vexed me as a youth.

“I did not pray for your arrival, Sir, but for both our safety.”

“You have news.”

“The Duchesse de Lorraine tells me the King no longer seeks justice.”

“
Ventre-saint-Gris!
Well, we seek it still. If that is all, I will leave you to your devotions.”

“Do not be so hasty. I have been with my mother and something has changed. She smiles the sort of smile that generally presages ill for those she considers her enemies.”

“Surely I do not fall into that category. If she considered me such, I doubt sincerely she would have given you, her own daughter, to me as a bride, embraced me as a son, and encouraged the King to call me ‘brother.’”

“The use of the word ‘surely’ in conjunction with Her Majesty is a grievous error, Sir. But never mind. I do not need to convince you to be as fearful as I am. I have brought you here to ask a favor.”

He tilts his head slightly, clearly both curious and wary.

I swallow and plunge onward. “Stay with me tonight.”

“You cannot be eager for my company, so you must truly feel to your bones that something is coming.”

“I am as certain as the day I saw blood.”

“All right. If you will rest more easily knowing I am here, it will be so. But the hour is early; my gentlemen and I have much to discuss. I will go and return.”

I wait for a feeling of relief. It does not come. So I shake my head. “No. Do not return to your rooms. You and your gentlemen may have the use of my antechamber. Gillone and I will stay tucked away here and leave you to your business.”

“You wish my gentlemen to remain too?”

“I have seen how they guard you. If the King’s men are sent to arrest you, then your own men will buy you time to flee.”

“In such an instance I will do my best to escape, for I know I shall have no visitors at Vincennes.”

“That is right,” I reply, trying to match his bravado. It is yet another of the day’s lies, for, without understanding why, I know I would descend to the dungeons to see him were he taken.

Gillone returns. “You grow accustomed to your husband, I think,” she says as she helps me change.

“Go to sleep if you like,” I tell my shadow. “God and I are not finished.” I return to my
prie-dieu
. The rise and fall of voices—sometimes angry—punctuates my devotions. The tapers burn down and the room, dim to begin with, becomes dark. I pray on. So lost am I in my thoughts and mumbled words that I do not hear the door open.

“You do not sleep.”

My cousin stands on the threshold, a light in his hand and his
valet de chambre
beside him.

I feel suddenly embarrassed—worried that Armagnac will think I wait up for my husband, and half expecting that same husband to mock my devotion. Instead he says, “Shall we withdraw awhile longer?”

“No, no.” I stand. “You must be exhausted, and I am content to rest.”

“My man…” he says awkwardly.

“Perhaps he would be comfortable at the foot of the bed?”

Armagnac bows, fully and without reservation. I find myself smiling at him. Why not? He is the first of my husband’s companions not to temper his show of respect for me with thinly veiled disgust.

Climbing into bed, I wait. Unlike last evening, my cousin does not bounce. As he slides beneath the covers he says, “God grant you rest, Madame.”

God does not. I seem to have lost the capacity for rest. Did it leave me when Henri did, climbing down the ladder in his wake and creeping away in darkness? I have not slumbered decently since the night we parted. Tonight I am not entirely sure I desire sleep. My sister’s admonition that this is not a night for bed weighs upon me, leaving me with the sense I ought to listen for sounds of trouble. For quite a while all I can hear are the voices of my husband’s gentlemen. But at last even they fall silent. I make up my mind that some rest is necessary, but when I close my eyes I see Pilles’ four hundred in the courtyard, Henri’s face as he shook me, Mother’s unnatural smile, Charles’ wild eyes through the crack in the door, and I am wide awake once more, my heart racing. I am determined to see dawn break. More than once I claw my way back from the brink of sleep before, at last, losing consciousness.

I awake with a start. My cousin sits upright beside me. “What was that?” he asks.

“What was what?”

He shakes his head in the moonlight that filters through my shutters. “Something woke me, I am sure of it. All the more sure because it woke you too.”

Rising, he goes to the nearest window and opens the shutters. The room is flooded with light from the nearly full moon. My cousin peers out.

I struggle to a sitting position. Both of us are silent, ears straining. Nothing. Not a sound. Very quietly I feel, gingerly, for my small clock made by the
Horloger du Roy
at Blois. Unable to see its face, I slide to the other side of the bed and hold it out to my cousin. “What time is it?”

He takes the timepiece and angles it to take advantage of the moon. “Just gone four.”

“A strange hour for a noise sufficient to wake a man who sleeps as soundly as you. Perhaps you had a dream.”

He shrugs, sets the timepiece on the nearest table, and strikes a light. I watch in surprise as he begins to dress.

“Where are you going?” After all the rumors and my sister’s hysterics, I do not like the idea of my cousin wandering about the Louvre in the dark.

“I am awake and not likely to slumber again.” He peers at me. “You have circles beneath your eyes and I think will sleep better alone. So I will gather my men and play tennis.”

“You are mad. This is not the hour for sport, nor the occasion for it. The Court is agitated and God knows what will happen next.”

He shrugs. “As far as I can see, nothing is happening. And nothing will happen unless we press His Majesty. So I will play until the King is awake. Then those of us so deputized will present our petition.”

So nothing has changed.
Perhaps I ought to argue with him further, but I have not the energy. My cousin is right, I am tired. Bone-tired. Not just from lack of sleep. I am tired of being worried when he is not.

While the King of Navarre finishes dressing Gillone wakes. “For God’s sake,” I tell her after my cousin and his valet take their leave, “bolt the door and go back to your rest. We will not stir until I am sought by some person of importance. Her Majesty eschewed my services last evening; she can do without them
ce matin
.” Sliding down between the covers, I close my eyes. My cousin is right: my bed does suit me better without him in it.

*   *   *

“Navarre! Navarre!” The cry jolts me from my slumber—loud, urgent, and accompanied by such a pounding upon the bedchamber door that I am surprised not to hear wood splinter. Gillone, on her feet, clutches the blanket from her pallet before her. If it is dawn, it is just so.

“The door! Hurry! It may be my husband!”

The cry “Navarre!” comes again as she races forward. It is not my cousin’s voice but he may be accompanied. If he must fly, I wonder that he stops here first.

As soon as the bolt is drawn a man, sans doublet, his white shirt covered in blood, staggers in and runs at me. It is the Seigneur de La Mole, with whom I so recently sat at tennis. His eyes are glazed with terror. He cradles one of his arms in the other. When he releases it—to grab the front of my shift with a single bloody hand—he cries out in pain. Before I can say a thing, I know the reason for his terror. Four members of the King’s guard dash into my bedchamber. The last actually knocks Gillone to the floor as he passes.