The Cardinal's Blades by Pierre Pevel, Tom Translated by Clegg Read Free Book Online Page B

tidily bound manuscripts. This was the object of his search. Another key, a tiny one, opened its secrets to him. Inside were letters waiting to be initialled and sealed by the cardinal. The ensign thumbed through them impatiently, and took out one which he perused more closely.
    “That’s it,” he murmured.
    Turning, he brought the letter closer to the candle and read it twice in order to memorise its every comma. But as he refolded the document, he heard a noise.
    The squeak of a floorboard?
    The ensign froze, heart thumping, with all his senses alert.
    Long seconds passed …
    Nothing happened. No one entered. And, almost as if it had never occurred, the sound was not repeated.
    Pulling himself together, Laincourt replaced the letter in the box and the box in the cupboard, which he relocked with his key. He assured himself that he had disturbed nothing, and then departed silently, taking his log-book with him.
    But Laincourt had barely gone when someone pushed open another door, left ajar and hidden behind a wall hanging.
    Charpentier.
    Returning in haste from the Louvre to fetch a document which Cardinal Richelieu had not thought he would need, he had seen everything.

10
     
    Having saddled his horse, La Fargue was strapping on the holsters of his pistols when Delormel joined him in the stable, amidst the warm smell of animals, hay, and dung.
    “You’ll come see us again soon?” asked the fencing master. “Or, at least, not wait another five years?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “You know you are always welcome in my home.”
    La Fargue patted his mount’s neck and turned round.
    “Thank you,” he said.
    “Here. You left this in your room.”
    Delormel held out a small locket on a broken chain. The old gentleman took it. Worn, marked, scratched, and tarnished, the piece of jewellery seemed worthless, lying there on his big gloved hand.
    “I didn’t know you still kept it after all this time,” added the fencing master.
    La Fargue shrugged.
    “You can’t give up your past.”
    “But yours continues to haunt you.”
    Rather than answer, the captain made to check his saddle.
    “Perhaps she didn’t deserve you,” Delormel commented.
    His back turned, La Fargue went rigid.
    “Don’t judge, Jean. You don’t know the whole story.”
    It wasn’t necessary to say anything more. Both men knew they were speaking of the woman whose chipped portrait was to be found inside the locket.
    “That’s true. But I know you well enough to know that something is eating at you. You should be delighted by the prospect of reuniting the Blades and serving the Crown once again. So I’d guess that you only accepted the cardinal’s proposal under duress. You yielded to him, étienne. That’s not like you. If you were one of those who yielded easily, you would already be carrying a marshal’s baton—”
    “My daughter may be in danger,” La Fargue said suddenly.
    Slowly, he turned to face Delormel, who looked stunned.
    “You wanted to know the whole truth, didn’t you? There, now you know.”
    “Your daughter … ? You mean to say …”
    The fencing master made a hesitant gesture toward the locket which the captain still held in his fist. La Fargue nodded: “Yes.”
    “How old is she?”
    “Twenty. Or thereabouts.”
    “What do you know of the danger she’s in?”
    “Nothing. The cardinal simply implied there was a threat against her.”
    “So he might have lied to you in order to secure your services!”
    “No. I doubt he would have played this card with me without good reason. It is—”
    “—despicable. And what will you say to your Blades? These men give you their blind trust. Some of them even look on you as a father!”
    “I shall tell them the truth.”
    “All of it?”
    Before mounting his horse, the old captain admitted, at some cost: “No.”

11
     
    Fiddling distractedly with his steel signet ring before returning it to the third finger on his left hand, Saint-Lucq watched the everyday drama