Médicis Daughter (40 page)

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Charles and Mother return reconciled, helped in their rapprochement by the fact His Majesty’s council met at Montceaux without the admiral. The king’s commanders—Montpensier, Nevers, Cossé, and Anjou—spoke with one voice for peace, reinforcing Mother’s position, and Charles, unaccustomed to standing up to so many, declared he has no intention of going to war with Spain. So, for the moment, mother beams at him and leans upon his arm as she ordinarily leans upon Anjou’s.

But while the two appear at peace, all the world else becomes increasingly less so. The heat is partly to blame. Who can be civil in the oven Paris has become? But it is more—it is as Henriette said: there is something about the sight of so many Protestants strolling about both the halls of the Louvre and the avenues of the city as if they were in every manner equal to the Catholics that roils those of the true faith. Priests speak from their pulpits against the “invaders” even though doing so brings the wrath of Her Majesty down upon them.

Within the Court, Anjou and his gentlemen pick fights with my cousin’s men. Every sport becomes serious. Tennis draws blood. Wrestling resembles combat. As in the city, Mother does what she can to quiet mounting tensions. And when she has limited success, she acts to assure they will be of the shortest possible duration, having Charles declare all official business suspended during the events of my wedding, and that two days after those celebrations his entire household will quit the city for Fontainebleau, seeking better air for the Queen Consort.

I weep daily. Last evening I began to cry while in bed with Henri, rendering him so agitated that I feared he would take his dagger and charge through the rooms of the Louvre in nothing but his shirt, seeking my cousin. His lack of control frightened me. Even as I would avoid marrying the King of Navarre if I could, I cannot quite wish him dead. Beyond my moral compunctions, the death of my cousin at Henri’s hands would mean a death sentence for my love in turn. I soothed my Duc and made him swear to me he will not be rash or violent. I cannot, however, keep him from hating, nor from brooding. When we are in company, Henri’s eyes are constantly on the King of Navarre.

“Did I not know the odious duty fell to me, I might think the Duc charged with the King of Navarre’s seduction,” Charlotte jokes from behind her hand.

We are in the King’s apartment, four dozen ladies and gentlemen—the choicest members of my brother’s household and my cousin’s—allegedly enjoying an evening together. My cousin plays dice with the King. Guise walks the perimeter of the room staring at him.

“Were that the case, softer looks might serve Guise better. In fact, they might serve him better now, if you could persuade him to them, Margot,” Henriette says. “It has taken His Grace full long to be restored to royal favor; it would be foolish for him to harm himself there by offending a prince your mother and brother wish embraced.”

I shrug, then curse myself for doing so, as the gesture reminds me of my cousin. “I cannot make Henri other than he is. As he loves me, he cannot bear the King of Navarre.”

“Well, he will have to bear him, just as you have had to bear my sister,” Henriette replies.

The King of Navarre cries out triumphantly and receives a slap on the shoulder from one of his friends, a man I see him with constantly. Is it the Seigneur de Pilles? I can never remember the names of his gentlemen, perhaps because I do not care to know them. My cousin rises. Charlotte sighs and does likewise.

“Wish me luck,” she says before gliding off to fuss over him.

“She is a fool to ask me to wish her luck. I have none myself,” I say.

“You do not need luck, for you have beauty and talent.” Leaning over between Henriette and me, my brother François holds out a lute and smiles. “Will you play for me?”

Taking the instrument, I smile back at him. “Of course.”

François takes a seat on the floor before me. I begin to play and sing softly. Like a siren’s call my voice draws Henri. He stops just behind me and rests a hand on my shoulder possessively. The Prince de Condé says, “Cousin, you miss the performance.”

My cousin turns from Charlotte, with whom he has been whispering. Not understanding Condé’s meaning and seeing me with the lute, he says, “Apologies, Mademoiselle, do you play for us?”

“I play for whoever will listen.”

“What an agreeable woman.” Condé smiles, but there is no warmth in it. “The Duchesse de Valois is not particular. She will entertain all comers.”

Henriette draws an audible breath and puts a hand on my leg. Henri’s hand tightens on my shoulder, but it is François who comes to my defense. Springing to his feet he says, “What do you insinuate, Sir?”

The King of Navarre touches Condé’s arm.

The Prince ignores him. “Come outside and I will be explicit.”

“Gladly, Sir, only let us first send for our swords so that once you have done I may make quick work of you.”

The Protestant gentleman I have come to recognize as Seigneur de Pilles laughs, doubtless because François is untried in combat and the Prince a veteran of the wars. That laugh is a mistake. Enraged, François spins, looking for the source. When he cannot identify it, his eyes come to rest on Charles. “Brother, were these Huguenots not your guests I would slay them all and leave none to make light of Valois honor or ability.”

“And I would gladly help you.” Henri’s voice over my shoulder is soft, but not so soft that the King or the Prince de Condé fail to hear it.

“I do not like your chances,” Condé replies. “We are as many as you, and none of us have surrendered.” This last, an open jab at Anjou and the tale that he killed the Prince’s father only after that gentleman was his prisoner, draws gasps.

Anjou, who until now leaned in a corner with Saint-Mégrin enjoying the unfolding spectacle, moves to join François, clapping his arm around my younger brother’s shoulder in a rare show of unity. “When we send for the swords, brother,” he says, “perhaps we should see if there is an ass in the stables.”

Condé takes a step toward Anjou but only one before Charles jumps to his feet. “What is wrong with all of you?” he shouts. “Are you so fond of dying? Fine, but mark this: I am king. You die when and where I command, not here and not now.” He looks back and forth between the would-be combatants. The King of Navarre again touches Condé’s sleeve, this time to effect. The gentleman steps back. Charles nods in approbation, then looks piercingly at Anjou and Alençon. François moves to join Guise behind me. Anjou gives Condé one last sneer and saunters back toward Saint-Mégrin.

“I am tired of Frenchmen killing Frenchmen,” the King proclaims. “The admiral is right: I must send you all to fight the Spanish, if only so that I may have peace.” Throwing himself back into his seat, he picks up his glass, drains it, and then holds it out for Marie to refill.

In the corner Anjou gives a little smile. I know what he is thinking: here is something to tell Mother that will remove Charles from her favor again.

Condé stalks to where several Protestant gentlemen were, until the disruption, playing cards. He taps one on the shoulder and that gentleman quickly makes way for him. “Deal,” the Prince says. The sound of cards being shuffled breaks the silence.

“That is right,” Charles says, “let us return to more pleasurable pastimes.”

Crossing to where I sit, my cousin gives me a smile. “It seems I have been negligent in my attentions this evening and look where that brought us. If you will play again, my attention is entirely yours.”

I have no desire for my cousin’s attention but nor do I wish the evening to devolve further into unpleasantness or violence. So I smile and take the lute up from my lap. As I begin to play, Henriette vacates her seat. “This place is yours, Sir,” she says to the King of Navarre. Then, moving to Guise’s side: “Brother, you must take me for a turn. We are both, I think, overheated.” I feel the Duc’s hand leave my shoulder.

As he and my friend stroll away, my cousin says, “With so many Henries it is easy to become confused, so I will be plain. I am not my cousin Condé who would defame you. Nor am I your brother who plays everyone to his own end. But just as I would not have you mistake me for them, do not mistake the Duc de Guise for me—I am the man who will, in less than a week’s time, be your husband.”

“Sir, I am under no illusion to the contrary. It is that thought which keeps me awake nights.”

*   *   *

There is a rumor that, with my ceremony of betrothal and wedding mere days away, the papal dispensation has not arrived. My heart is light. My feet have wings as they carry me in search of Charles. I must know the truth. I am nearly running when I round a corner and come upon my cousin,
sans
doublet, shirt open at the neck.

“You look very happy,” he remarks, stopping to bow and forcing me to stop by doing so.

I am stuck for a response. I am happy, but the source of my happiness is hardly something I can disclose without seeming cruel.

I notice he is smiling and take my inspiration there. “You also.”

“I’ve just left your brother Anjou blaming the heat for his loss to me at tennis.”

I smile at the thought of this.

“Can it be we are sharing a moment of enjoyment?” My cousin’s voice is playful. “I believe we are. Well, then, I will seize the chance to say I hope it will be the first of many.”

I do not share his hope, but again, I do not wish to be contrary to no purpose. “I would be glad to see you happy.” It is true. My cousin is far from my favorite person, but he becomes more likable as he becomes more familiar. And unlike many I might name, he has never deliberately sought to harm me. “And I am very glad you beat Anjou.”

“Soundly,” he assures me, his voice both confident and teasing.

I applaud lightly. “The more soundly the better.”

He regards me earnestly, as if trying to puzzle something out. “You know, despite the years I passed with this court as a boy, and despite the reports sent by my mother, I find many things not as I expected. Among these nearly every member of your family.”

“I can well believe it.” I laugh, thinking of what Jeanne de Navarre likely said about me. Doubtless it was no more flattering than what my mother says of the King of Navarre when he is not about. She calls him “the peasant.” I wonder how long it will be before she calls him “my friend.” When she does, all around will know she thinks him a fool—for that is her traditional use of the phrase, to express a patronizing derision—but he will not. The thought of my mother playing such games with my cousin, and he all unaware, is not pleasing.

“Your Majesty”—I reach out and touch his sleeve, the first time I have ever touched him of my own volition without the pressures of etiquette—“I do not know your gentlemen or how things are in your court. If you are representative, however, I must conclude that your courtiers are unaffected and plainspoken.”

“I will take that as a compliment.”

“Take it as you like. But understand: we Valois are a changeable lot. To trust in appearance here is to be made a fool, or worse.”

“I do not mind being thought an idiot so long as I know I am not one.”

I look straight into my cousin’s calm, deep-gray eyes. He is no idiot. I nod. “There is safety in being underestimated.”

“And your family underestimates many, yourself included.” The moment the words are spoken, he seems uncomfortable, as if he has betrayed something he did not intend to.

I am uncomfortable as well, nettled by his perceptiveness, by the truth of his statement, and perhaps most of all by the familiarity of our discussion. Ours are words such as might pass between those with a shared interest. We have none. Or such as might pass between husband and wife and, therefore, decidedly out of place at a moment when I rejoice in a report that His Holiness may render such a union impossible.

Quickly I turn the subject and my mind back to finding Charles. “Was His Majesty among those watching the sport?”

“He left just as I did. Madame Catherine came looking for him.”

“I am off to find him, and you are off—”

“To wash.”

I am relieved my cousin does not offer to escort me. I stand and watch his retreating back until he is out of sight.

Mother and Charles might be closeted in any number of places, but it is always Her Majesty’s preference to be in her own rooms. I will try the secret place.

I wonder, as I ease open the concealed door, if Anjou remembers showing me the vantage point. He ought not to have done that. Once behind the door the short passage must be navigated in silence. I inch forward. I can hear before I can see.

“—delay seems like weakness. I will not have that. I will command the Cardinal de Bourbon to proceed.” I put my eyes to the first of the deliberately widened seams. Charles sits, arms crossed over his chest and sullen-faced. Mother paces before him.

“We cannot be certain he will comply,” she says. “He answers to the Holy Father. If he knows we lack the dispensation, he will not risk Gregory’s ire even to satisfy his king.”

“Then I will make him a guest at Vincennes and find someone else to officiate.”

“Imprisoning the groom’s uncle is unlikely to bring us closer to a wedding. And who would you find to officiate? The Cardinal de Lorraine? I think not.”

So the rumor is true!

“What do we do, then? Gregory is no better than Pius. He proclaims himself ready to oblige me but follows this pretense with a list of conditions he knows cannot be met. Can you imagine my cousin kneeling before me and professing the Catholic faith? He is not so keen to marry Margot as that. I doubt even the admiral could achieve it. Must I let the Pope rule France?”

“No. You will show His Holiness that you alone govern here—not by locking up his cardinals, or by asserting your rights in another letter, but by dispensing with the dispensation.”

“But you just said the Cardinal de Bourbon will not proceed without it.”

“Ah, but if he thought it was coming…”

“Your spies say it is not.”

“I have better spies than His Eminence. All the Court knows this. So, if you tell the Cardinal the document is on the road between Rome and Paris, none will gainsay you. The Cardinal will be placated and this ugly rumor squelched.”