“The Cardinal!” D’Artagnan said, trying to reach for the sword and his hat at the same time and managing only to kick his chair out of the way-since his sword was on the table and his hat on a chair in the opposite direction. “The Cardinal. Is one of my friends in danger of arrest, then?”

Bazin started to shake his head, then shrugged. “Well, monsieur, the life you gentlemen live, are you ever more than a few moments away from being thrown in prison for one reason or other?”

D’Artagnan opened his mouth to retort, then closed it with a snap. Part of the problem was that Aramis made no attempt to control his servant’s mouth, the other part was that Bazin was in fact not a real servant and certainly not a musketeer’s servant. Rather, he was a monk playing at being a servant. And every chance he could possibly get to sermonize he would seize with the enthusiasm of a preacher on a mission through heathen territory.

Before he answered, D’Artagnan could see himself goading Bazin into a never-ending, spiraling argument, which would include the fate of those who lived by the sword as well as a plethora of details and curiosities on the lives of obscure saints and martyrs, at least one of which Bazin would-invariably-compare himself to.

So instead he inclined his head in less than an affirmative and reached first for his sword in its scabbard, which he fastened to his waist, and then for his hat, which he slapped on his head with grim determination. In doing so he caught sight of Planchet’s mildly amused look. “Planchet,” he said for no better reason than to spoil the young man’s amusement. “Follow me.”

He felt inner satisfaction in seeing the young man’s startled and worried face, but didn’t stay to savor it, nor did he wait for Bazin to take the lead. D’Artagnan knew his way to Porthos’s place well enough. And besides, while Aramis and even Athos might think they needed a servant to walk ahead of them and cut a path through the Paris crowds for their impressive selves, D’Artagnan had no such great idea of himself.

Oh, his family was the wealthiest and noblest in their village. Which wasn’t saying much. All told his father’s land, all small inherited parcels put together, wouldn’t equal the amount used for the children’s cemetery in Paris. His father had been a glorified farmer with better pedigree, and the whole of the servants in their commodious farm-house had been two-his father’s valet and helper, and his mother’s maid. A couple married to each other and inclined to treating D’Artagnan as one of their own children.

He was no more used to having a servant to separate him from the populace than he was used to regarding himself as a great lord. He ran down the stairs and opened his door and stopped.

Before him stood a vision of loveliness. She was blond and her features were of the sort young men dream angels might have. D’Artagnan stared at her, shocked, none too sure she hadn’t come out of his own disordered dreams.

Oval faced, slim but with an ample bosom shown to great advantage in a well-cut gown of the sort worn at court, the sort that D’Artagnan had only seen from a distance while helping his friends guard the entrance to the royal palace. It was velvet and pink and… it pushed up where it should and it molded where it must.

Its owner was looking at D’Artagnan with the thunder-struck expression and the slight blush that made him absolutely sure that he was dreaming. Women-particularly women as beautiful and delicate as angels-never smiled at him and certainly not this way.

“I… I…” he said, and realized he had his hat still on his head and whipped it off with a flourish. “I’m sorry, madam. I’m not used to seeing duchesses in this neighborhood. My name is D’Artagnan and I lodge here. I am a guard of Monsieur des Essarts.”

The woman smiled wider, a slowly widening smile that made D’Artagnan feel his cheeks heat as though in the full blaze of sun.

“I thank you,” she said, inclining her head. “But I am not a duchess. My name is Constance Bonacieux and I live here too,” and with her hand she indicated the door to Monsieur Bonacieux’s dwelling.

D’Artagnan tried to imagine the wizened old man and this beauty and shook his head. “You are his daughter?” he asked. “His niece?”

But she only laughed. “His wife. Though most of the time I stay at the royal palace where I serve her Majesty.” She blushed and looked down. “I am Madame Bonacieux.”

D’Artagnan registered the disappointment that she was married at the same time that he thought she’d looked down as though embarrassed at being married. And he thought that Porthos’s lover was married. And Aramis’s lover had been. And then he couldn’t think anymore because his mind was too full and his heart ready to burst and he could neither move nor speak looking at her.

A throat was cleared loudly behind him and he turned to see Bazin glare. “My master said-”

“That I should hurry, of course,” D’Artagnan said, and turned back to see Constance curtseying at him. Again his heart was full to bursting, but this time it compelled him to action. He ran to the side of the house where roses with broad satiny pink petals spilled over the garden wall. Late blooming roses, their fragrance intoxicating in the air. He reached for one, ignoring the bite of the thorns on his fingers, and pulled it free of the vine, then scraped the thorns off with his fingernail and, bowing, with hat held to chest, proffered Madame Bonacieux the rose.

She blushed as pink as the rose and for a moment looked as young as D’Artagnan’s seventeen years of age. A glimmer of tears appeared in her eyes as she said, “You shouldn’t, monsieur.”

“The flower deserves to be ornamented by you, madam,” D’Artagnan said, and bowed.

She blushed darker. “Thank you,” she said. And she took it.

He bowed to her again then ran, since Basin and Planchet were already walking a bit down the street. It wasn’t till he’d caught up with them and passed them, on the crowded sidewalk that he realized he’d given her one of her husband’s own roses. And it wasn’t till he was almost at Porthos’s door that he realized that the way she had blushed she must not be used to such gallant gestures. Well. He’d never had too good an opinion of Monsieur Bonacieux and now this decided it all. The man was a low creature, not deserving such a wife.

With this thought in his mind he started towards the front door of Porthos’s lodging.

“Not there, Monsieur D’Artagnan,” Basin said. “The practice room. At the back.”

“The practice room?” D’Artagnan asked. Basin nodded and D’Artagnan started down the alley towards the back gate, then trotted along the garden to the broad door at the back of the house which led to what he assumed was an abandoned cellar where the four of them often practiced sword fighting.

That they were meeting here must mean he was required for second in a duel that demanded extraordinary skill. He flung the door open and stopped, shocked.

The three musketeers were there, assembled around something lying on the floor of the room.

Not something. Someone. A corpse. But it was not a corpse as D’Artagnan was used to seeing them, after duels or brawls. It was smaller, more delicate. A child. It was a child.

“Sangre Dieu,” he said. “What is this?”