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  PRAISE FOR

  Death of a Musketeer

  “A swashbuckling adventure that will appeal to fantasy fans as well as mystery fans.”

  —The Denver Post

  “Dumas fans eager for further details of the lives of his swashbuckling musketeer heroes may enjoy this first in a series of historical mystery novels that transforms those men of action and intrigue into the king’s detectives.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “A fun, swashbuckling historical mystery…filled with action.”

  —The Best Reviews

  “Death of a Musketeer is the perfect opener for what promises to be quite possibly the most sought after series of books in a long time. While those who enjoy historic fiction will get their fill, those who always wanted more of the musketeers will be delighted to find that the opener takes place during the famous story of the necklace, so aptly penned by Monsieur Dumas. Yet the direction that Ms. D’Almeida has chosen for her characters is startlingly unique and thus the Dumas narrative provides the springboard from which the reader can jump into the new narrative. Showcasing a true flair not only for the period but also for the different places each musketeer has approached in life, this novel only has one flaw: It is over too soon! This is a must have for the fiction fan, and the sequels will be eagerly awaited by this reviewer.”

  —Roundtable Reviews

  “A cracking good book that succeeds on many levels…The evocation of early seventeenth-century France is just as Dumas had it. A round of applause too for writing a book set in a period not already overdone and in packing a teasing plot, well-loved characters that spring to life, and plenty of authentic background into a book of just the right length. Waiting until the next book is going to be hard…Highly enjoyable!”

  —MyShelf.com

  The Musketeers Mysteries by Sarah D’Almeida

  DEATH OF A MUSKETEER

  THE MUSKETEER’S SEAMSTRESS

  THE MUSKETEER’S APPRENTICE

  A DEATH IN GASCONY

  A Death in Gascony

  Sarah D’Almeida

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.) Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.) Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.) Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  A DEATH IN GASCONY

  A Berkley Prime Crime Book/published by arrangement with the author

  Copyright © 2008 by Sarah Hoyt.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  ISBN: 1-4362-0434-8

  BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME

  Berkley Prime Crime Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  The name BERKLEY PRIME CRIME and the BERKLEY PRIME CRIME design are trademarks belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  To all the historical mystery writers I’ve admired over the years, starting with the memory of the immortal Ellis Peters and following in no particular order with Steven Saylor, Lynda S. Robinson—I miss Lord Meren—Edward Marston, Robert van Gulik, Peter Tremayne, Stephanie Barron and many others whose books don’t happen to be by my desk at this moment. Thank you for many happy hours and for better examples than I could hope to follow.

  Contents

  Where the Musketeers Are Good Samaritans; Springing His Eminence’s Trap; An Unwelcome Summons

  The Responsibilities of Friendship;

  Why an Agreed Upon Plan Is Not Always

  Agreed Upon;

  For Lack of a Horse

  How Not To Wake a Musketeer; A Little Perfidy in the Right Place

  The Many Inconveniences of Wintry Travel; Meager Purse and Rushing Mind; The Foolhardiness of Highwaymen

  Doubts and Confusion; The Improbability of Dreaming Planchet; The Difference Between a Duel and Murder

  A Close Thing; The Demands of Friendship; The Wealth of Highwaymen

  Philistines and Samaritans Again; Blood and Jewels; The Right Letter in the Wrong Place

  The Advantages of Inns and Taverns; The Languages of Monsieur Porthos; The Livers of Geese

  Where Waking Is the Best Part of Valor; The Very Odd Habits of Gascon Cutthroats; The Finer Points of Treason

  The Dogs of Gascony; A Widow’s Grief; Athos’s Fears

  D’Artagnan’s Fears; The Office of Monsieur D’Artagnan Père; D’Artagnan’s Secret

  The Saints of Gascony; Feuds of Blood; Monsieur Aramis’s Philosophy of Life

  The Wisdom of the Stables; Monsieur Athos’s Refusal to Suspect a Woman; Where Men Are More Than Their Families

  The Lord of the Domain; Talking to Women; The Rules of Dueling

  Porthos’s Mind; Blood in the Fields; The End of the Trail

  A Musketeer’s Piety; Witness to Death; Where Some Truths Are Harder Than Others

  Another Way Not to Wake a Musketeer; A Woman’s Singular Lack of Intuition; The Perversity of a Man’s Heart

  The Richer Branch; Nothing Is Quite as Dead as a Dead Love; The Familiar Binds

  Religion and Fighting; Pastoral Care; A Burden to Keep

  The Useful Lord; The Fine Art of Talking to Village Maidens; A Man in the Noonday Sun

  Where Cousins Rarely Are Highwaymen; Surprises and Shocks; At Monsieur de Bilh’s

  A Musketeer’s Conscience; Religion and the Cardinal; A Matter of Horses

  Dead Man’s Clothes; The Blood Speaks

  An Unexpected Fight; The Eyes of Adulthood; What Man Knows His Own Mother

  The Tale of the Blood; Where D’Artagnan Ponders Unknown Relatives; The Cardinal’s Methods

  Madame D’Artagnan’s Confusion; Where Relatives Aren’t Exactly Relatives; The Impossibility of Making Women Speak

  The Impossibility of Women; Secrets and Their Keepers; An Unexpected Meeting

  On Horses and Roads; Neighbors in Gascony; A Great Lord’s Hospitality

  The Dangers of the Gascon Countryside; Lovers and Fools

  Four Cloaked Men Conspiring; The Many Paths of Enquiry

  A Sacrifice of Blood; Death and Asking; The Search

  Between Musketeer and Servants; Dead Man’s Accounts; Letters

  A Priest’s Doubts; A Musketeer�
��s Fears

  Horses and Men; Monsieur Porthos Engages in Philosophy; The Odd Relationships of Provincial Gentlemen

  A War Council; Horses and Mothers; The Dangers of Cousins

  A Warm Reception; The Matter of a Dagger; Where Monsieur Porthos Loses Patience

  Ghosts; A Musketeer’s Sleeplessness; Eyes Only

  Invading Bedrooms Again; A Son’s Duty; Dogs and Angels

  Old Secrets and New Grievances; Where a Father Is Lost and a Grandfather Found; A Name Worth More Than All Lands

  The Best Laid Plans

  His Eminence’s Displeasure; Where a Letter Falls in the Fire

  Where the Musketeers Are Good Samaritans;

  Springing His Eminence’s Trap;

  An Unwelcome Summons

  “EN GARDE,” Monsieur Henri D’Artagnan said, as he danced back to a defensive position, and lifted his own sword. “Unsheathe your swords.”

  Facing him, under the pale yellow sun of early autumn, outraging him with their presence on the outskirts of Paris, just outside the convent of the Barefoot Carmelites, three guards of Cardinal Richelieu pointedly did not unsheathe.

  Instead, the lead one, a middle-aged blond, looked from D’Artagnan to—behind the young guard—the three musketeers who stood, staring at the scene with varying expressions of amusement.

  “But, monsieur,” the guard of the Cardinal said, lifting his hat and scratching at the sparse blond hair beneath. “All I did was remind you of the edicts against dueling. How would this justify dueling with you?”

  D’Artagnan hesitated, his internal conflict visible only in a straightening of his shoulders and a sharp look up. Seventeen years old, with the lank dark hair and bright dark eyes of his native Gascony, D’Artagnan was muscular and lean like a fine horse. And as in a fine horse, every one of his thoughts was obvious in movement, in stance, in a tossing of the head or a quick glance. He knew this. He was aware of his body’s betraying his impatience.

  “It seems to me,” a mannered, cultivated voice said from behind D’Artagnan, “that you have offered our friend a great insult, monsieur guard.”

  It was a voice that would have sounded very well coming out of a pulpit and explaining in rounded phrases some obscure point of theology. The gentleman who spoke, so far from looking like a priest, was a tall, well-built blond, whose hair, falling in waves to his waist, shone from brushing.

  His clothes, in the last cry of fashion, boasted a doublet that was only vaguely that of the musketeer’s uniform. Though blue, it was made of patterned satin, and crisscrossed with enough ribbon to adorn several court dresses. More ribbons adorned his sleeves and hung in fetching knots from wrist closures. A profusion of silver buttons shone like the ice that sparkled from the ground on this cold November morning.

  His name was Aramis and despite the languid speech and the intent gaze he now bent upon his perfectly manicured nails, he was known as one of the most dangerous blades in the King’s Musketeers and a breaker of ladies’ hearts. It was said he was pursued by princesses, courted by duchesses, and that a foreign queen had sent him the expensive jewel that dazzled from his exquisitely plumed hat.

  D’Artagnan knew Aramis well enough that he did not need to turn to know that his friend’s bright green eyes shone with mischief. Aramis was enjoying this. His enjoyment did not help D’Artagnan calm down.

  “Indeed,” another of the musketeers said. He was as tall as Aramis, but of quite a different type. His clothes were in the fashion of decades ago—a tightly laced doublet and old-fashioned knee breeches that displayed, below the knees, muscular legs encased in mended stockings.

  This musketeer’s curly hair—a black so dark as to appear blue in certain lights—was tightly pulled back and tied roughly with a scrap of leather. His pale skin betrayed the slight creasing around the eyes, the lines around the mouth that showed him the oldest one of those present—and as not having lived an easy life.

  Looking back over his shoulder, D’Artagnan saw that his friend’s smile was guarded, but that his dark blue eyes sparkled with as much mischief as those of Aramis. His name was Athos, though D’Artagnan had found that in another life—before he’d joined the musketeers to expiate what he considered his unforgivable crime—he’d been the Count de la Fere, scion of one of the oldest families in the realm.

  His nobility showed now, as he advanced a foot and tossed back his head. Despite his mended clothes, he was very much the grand seigneur as he said, “I think these gentlemen owe you an apology, D’Artagnan.”

  “What I don’t understand,” the third musketeer said, his voice booming over the landscape and making the guards jump, “is why they assume we were dueling, I mean…” He paused, struggling for words.

  This enmity with language was the trademark of Porthos and despite his present anger D’Artagnan couldn’t help smiling slightly at hearing it. It often made people think Porthos stupid, but very few would tell it to his face, because Porthos looked like a Norse god. Much taller than his companions—or indeed than anyone else—with broad shoulders and a muscular body capable of feats of strength to rival those of mythology, Porthos could not be made more splendid by wrapping himself in finery. This didn’t stop him trying.

  Norsemen had dreamed of such as him in the guise of Thor, working an eternal forge. They probably had failed to imagine his gilded baldric, the rope of gold that surrounded the brim of his hat, or the multiple jewels that flashed from each of his powerful fingers. Most of them glass, if D’Artagnan knew his friend, but splendid-looking nonetheless.

  Porthos shook his head, giving the impression of utter bewilderment, as he asked the guards, “Mort Dieu, can’t four friends meet to go to a dinner without bringing you down on them with your edicts and your…your…dents Dieu, I know not what to say…Your regulations? The precious orders of your…Cardinal?”

  “But, monsieurs…” The guard pointed out reasonably. “Surely…” He shrugged, not in a show of lack of knowledge, so much as in total bewilderment. His bewilderment, his meek pose were an affront to D’Artagnan’s mind and heart. “Monsieurs, surely—” He looked around at the immediate surroundings, where the scuffed ground, two broken swords, and a trail of blood leading, tellingly, to the door of the convent, all spoke of a recent fray. “Surely you see…There’s been a duel here.”

  “Oh, and if there’s been a duel, we must be to blame, eh? Very pretty reasoning that,” Porthos boomed. “That’s the musketeers. Always dueling. Easy thought. And wrong. We were going to dinner.”

  D’Artagnan, who found none of this funny, and whose bloodlust was rising at the guard’s refusal to face him, spoke only through clenched teeth, to repeat yet again, “En garde.”

  “But—” the guard said, and opened his hands in a show of desperation. His companions, two smaller, darker men, stood with hands on the hilts of their swords, but did not draw.

  Aramis sighed, heavily—the sort of world-weary sigh that could be expected from a man who claimed that he was wearing the uniform of a musketeer only temporarily, until he could attain his ambition of becoming a priest. Hearing of it, no one could guess that his seminary education had been interrupted years ago when a gentleman had found Aramis reading the lives of saints—at least that was what he swore he’d been doing—to the gentleman’s wellborn sister and challenged Aramis to a duel, thereby forcing Aramis to kill him.

  “If you must know,” he said, looking up from an intent examination of his nails and speaking in a voice that implied that no well-bred person would push the point so far. “We heard the moans of the injured and we stopped to render assistance. I am, as you have probably heard, all but in orders, and I thought perhaps I could give some comfort to the dying.”

  The guards looked from one to the other. “You’re telling us that you came to help these other men?”

  “Very good of us, it was,” Porthos boomed. “In fact we behaved like true Philistines.”

  The guards looked up at him with disbelief, and even D’Artagnan w
as forced to look over his shoulder at his giant, redheaded friend.

  “I believe you mean Samaritans, Porthos,” Aramis said, and coughed.

  “Do I?” Porthos said, then waved airily. “All the same, I say. All those people were the same, anyway. Always giving their aunt’s wife’s donkey in marriage to each other.” And with such a cryptic pronouncement, he said, “D’Artagnan, if they apologize, will you let them go?”

  D’Artagnan shook his head. No. No and no and no. Their very apologies would only enrage him. The truth was that the guards had come—of course—just at the conclusion of a duel arranged by the musketeers the day before. They’d arrived just after the musketeers had dispatched their opponents and helped the wounded carry the dead to the convent.

  And now they persisted in their nonsensical quest to arrest the musketeers—without drawing swords, without raising their voices, without, in fact, even calling attention to Porthos’s blood-smeared sleeve or the noticeable tear that rent the sleeve of Athos’s doublet on the right side.

  They not only had found out that the musketeers were going to duel—in itself this was not a great mystery, since the duel had been called in a tavern over a handful of noblemen’s refusal to drink to the King’s health—but they refused to fight.

  D’Artagnan’s scornful gaze accessed the guards’ middle-aged countenances, their pasty faces, the fact that each of them carried the sort of extra weight that a few duels a month burned off. He judged them to be nobodies. The type of nobodies given a post in the guards to appease some family connection or some powerful nobleman.

  They wouldn’t fight because they couldn’t. And if D’Artagnan slaughtered them all, the best to be hoped for would be that he would become everywhere known as a killer of the defenseless. There was no honor in a killing such as this. There would only be shame in winning; but losing was unthinkable.

  Sending these men to arrest musketeers was, in fact, not only an insult, but a cunning ploy of the Cardinal’s. The sort of ploy that the snake who ruled behind the throne of France was well known for. And D’Artagnan’s friends didn’t even see it.