Death in Gascony (26 page)

“Oh,” Aramis said. “Indeed. The letter from your father said that your cousin is a gamester and because of it he was penniless and in need of money. The Cardinal suggested bribing him into breaking his engagement. I suppose it never happened.”

“Either that,” D’Artagnan said, “or when my father talked to him, Edmond realized that if he killed my father and me, he would stand to inherit the whole fortune that came from my father—and his father’s—mother. And while the domains of D’Artagnan aren’t much compared with those of de Bigorre, they are more than a second son’s allowance, and they would permit him independence and the chance to marry whom he pleases.”

“What makes you say this of your cousin?” Aramis said. “What would make you suspect him?”

“The dagger at the last hostelry,” he said. “I told only Athos, because it didn’t seem to fit with anything, but the dagger had the shield of the de Bigorres on the pommel.”

“But…surely that doesn’t mean anything?” Porthos said. “There must be people who have such weapons and who are not de Bigorres?”

D’Artagnan sighed. “That’s the devil of it. I’m sure there are. For one, I, myself, have a sword with the coat of arms in my room. And I’m sure there are other descendants in this region that don’t bear the name. It is not enough to condemn him. In fact, it’s barely enough to suspect him of intent against me.

“However, both the attack on my father, by stealth as it was, and the attempts to kill me, making use of hired hands, would seem to point to Edmond, because he can’t handle a sword any better than Irene, so you see…He could never seek revenge in a duel or in a fair fight.”

“But there are many like him,” Porthos said.

D’Artagnan nodded. “This is true and that is why I said there is barely enough evidence to even suspect Edmond, and yet I find myself suspecting him.” He shook his head as though to clear it. “And you, Porthos, what did you find about the horses?”

“I found they came from the de Comminges’ stables, right after the old lord died. The servants think your father bought them.”

“I’m starting to think,” D’Artagnan said, his voice bitter. “I never knew my father at all.” And then, with sudden decision, “I’ll go and ask Edmond what he knows of that dagger.”

“Not alone,” the others said. “Not alone. Should he be the murderer…”

D’Artagnan looked resigned. “Very well. You might as well come with me. Though I beg you to believe, I’m more than equal to fighting Edmond.”

T
HEY
rode in silence to the de Bigorre house, and entered, this time through the back, following D’Artagnan’s lead.

In the stable yard, D’Artagnan handed off his horse and asked one of the servants, “Is Edmond at home?” He could feel his heart as though it were beating at his throat, and he wondered if he wanted Edmond to be home. Perhaps it would be better if his cousin had left for parts unknown. D’Artagnan would never know who had tried to kill him, and who had killed his father. But then, on the other hand, he wouldn’t need to know his cousin had done it. He kept thinking of all the times, growing up, when he’d come to the de Bigorres in search of company.

Oh, Edmond had never been his friend as Irene had. And yet, they’d spent plenty of time hunting together, and D’Artagnan had tried to—unsuccessfully—teach his cousin to use a sword.

He had never been successful, but it could be said that despite their initial cold reception of each other, he and Edmond had warmed up to one another. When there were only so many young noblemen in the neighborhood—and the de Comminges didn’t count since they didn’t act as though they were part of the neighborhood—it was hard to avoid developing, at the very least, a form of camaraderie with them. And he couldn’t believe Edmond would kill his father.

“Monsieur Edmond is in the back parlor. Or was, when I last saw him.”

D’Artagnan nodded. So he was home. Nothing for it but to confront him. He started towards the house, up the big staircase, through the halls, seeing nothing, paying attention to nothing. His heart was beating so fast and loud that it seemed to deafen him. He knew his friends were right behind him, but it was scant comfort.

“Henri,” a voice said. Irene’s voice.

He blinked, to see his female cousin standing in front of him. “Ah, you villain,” she said. “You have come to tell my father after all. After all your promises, you will undo me like this. And it is all for nothing, for you could have had me yourself, but you refused me and—”

“Irene,” he said. The name sounded, even to him, as though he weren’t sure of it and were pronouncing it tentatively, trying to get a handle on who this apparition might be. “Irene, don’t be a fool, my girl. This does not concern you.”

Perhaps it was the tone of his voice, perhaps his words were so unexpected that she stopped the script of her own personal drama to stare. “It…doesn’t?” she asked.

He shook his head and walked past her, without turning to see if she stayed or ran off somewhere. He fancied he heard her steps, but through his heart beating, and the blood rushing through his veins, it was hard to tell where they were heading, or, indeed, if he could hear them at all.

Into the back parlor, in which through their growing up years they’d played many a game and spent hours talking—himself and Irene and her brothers—he erupted like something out of Greek myth, seeking revenge for blood spilled.

“Edmond,” he said, his voice hollow sounding.

His cousin, fully attired for going out, had been sitting and reading something that looked uncommonly like a letter. He looked up startled at their entrance, and something to D’Artagnan’s pale countenance made him drop the letter, jump up and take his hand to his sword.

“Oh, you’d serve me like that?” D’Artagnan asked. “You’d welcome me sword in hand? What have you done? Why does your conscience pain you so that you must receive me by drawing?”

“I’ve done nothing. Why do you invade my home and speak to me in accusing tones?”

“I’m not accusing you of anything yet. But if you wish me to, here it is. You lied to me.”

“Lied? Are you calling me a liar?” Edmond said, and drew his sword.

Upon the same instant, D’Artagnan drew his sword. Somehow, part of him knew it would be murder to duel Edmond. How could it be otherwise? Edmond was the least efficient of fighters, the least proficient of duelists. He’d survived this long only by not dueling. And certainly he couldn’t duel someone of D’Artagnan’s prowess.

He came at D’Artagnan blindly, roaring, his sword held in a shaking hand.

D’Artagnan parried, hooking his cousin’s sword so that it went flying.

In the next moment, the room erupted into pandemonium, in a way that D’Artagnan had never seen happen in the more serious duels he fought in the capital. As Edmond ran for the sword, there were fast steps the other way, and when Edmond got to the sword, Irene put her foot on top of it. “Stop you fool,” she said. “I would be more man to defend myself with that than you are. And if D’Artagnan needs to duel with someone, he should duel with me.”

Edmond, maddened, made as if to pick up the sword nonetheless and Irene hit him, an open-handed slap that echoed through the parlor. “Stop, I said. What are you? A suicidal fool? Have we not had enough of death around here lately?”

And just as D’Artagnan started thinking she might not have been so bad to marry, after all, she turned to him, “Put away your sword, Henri. My brother will talk. Do not insult him though.”

“Or you’ll call me out?” D’Artagnan asked, faintly alarmed.

“Or he’ll become too incoherent to speak to you,” Irene said. “He’s not very good, you see, at emotions, not having been disciplined enough as a child. So, instead of telling him he lied, I suggest you tell him what you came to tell him.”

“I came to ask him if he sent assassins against me on my way to Gascony.”

Another incoherent roar answered him, and he made for the sword, again, but Irene had hidden it behind her back and was leaning against the wall, keeping it secure. They were matched equally in size, and clearly in strength as not all of Edmond’s efforts succeeded in getting hold of the sword.

Suddenly Porthos strode forward and took Edmond in hand. Their size difference was enough that Porthos could hold both his hands together behind his back while demanding, “Answer D’Artagnan, monsieur. If you’re innocent you have no more than to say it.”

Either Porthos’s height or his strength or just the fact that he could hold him immobile seemed to work on Edmond. He glared at D’Artagnan. “Why would I kill you? What would be my interest in you?”

“So that you could inherit my father’s domain,” D’Artagnan said. “And wouldn’t need to marry a woman you don’t love.”

“Even if that is true, and an advantage,” Edmond said, “why would I kill you?” He seemed calmer, just genuinely confused. “You don’t go about killing your relatives,” he said, and added sulkily, “Well, at least I don’t.”

He seemed so thoroughly subdued that Porthos eased up his hold on him a little.

Edmond rubbed his wrists, where the giant redhead’s hand had held it fast. He glowered at D’Artagnan. “And how can you accuse me of trying to kill you? We met in peace and we talked. What about that looked to you like I was trying to kill you, Henri? I think you’ve run mad.”

D’Artagnan shook his head. He didn’t put away his sword. He couldn’t trust this cousin of his. Or at least he felt he couldn’t trust him. And that was bad enough. “Twice on the way here and once since I arrived in Gascony, someone has tried to kill me,” he said. “And in thinking, I realized you where the most likely candidate, because, attend.” He sheathed his sword and started counting on his fingers. “On the first my father was spying on you on the Cardinal’s behalf. You told me so yourself. And someone killed my father—”

“Yes, de Bilh!” Edmond said. “Do I perchance look like de Bilh to you?”

D’Artagnan shook his head and gritted his teeth. Would Edmond try to jest, now? “No. There are…reasons to believe he was wounded before, with a dagger or
poignard
through the back, wounding his heart, but not enough to kill him on the spot. This was why he attacked de Bilh erratically. And you must admit that you’d never be able to face my father in duel. Your only hope would be to hit him through the back with a dagger.”

“But…” Edmond said, and raised his eyes to heaven as though in mute begging for help. “Surely you know that could not be, Henri. I was on the threshing floor at the time.”

“Oh,” D’Artagnan said. The thought had never occurred to him, and it did, indeed, seem to put a stop to any suspicion of Edmond being guilty. For how could he be guilty if he’d been elsewhere all the while? “Oh. So you were. And yet…perhaps you ran?”

“Ask de Bilh,” Edmond said. “Poor Father Urtou can no longer be appealed to, but ask de Bilh. He was there with me a good few minutes, perhaps half an hour, before your father came up.” And then, “But surely that isn’t the only reason to accuse me? There are other men who would be as afraid to face your father in a duel as I am.”

D’Artagnan sighed. In his confused mind, the thought ran that perhaps that was why Father Urtou had been killed. Because, being involved in a duel so shortly after, de Bilh’s memory might be faultier or more inclined to being manipulated. Suspicious, he said, “The other reason is that twice on the way here we were attacked.”

Edmond raised his eyebrows at him, “But the roads of Gascony—”

“No. The times we were attacked, it was clear the malefactors were making for me particularly and it was me they wished to kill. And I was attacked once more after I got to Gascony, just yesterday.”

Edmond stared at him, then sighed in turn. “In truth, there is something smoky in that; something undeniably suspicious. But, cousin, why would it involve me? Surely there are others who might want your death. I can’t think of any right now, but…”

D’Artagnan shook his head in turn, and unsheathed from its case a dagger. “Do you recognize this?” he asked, showing it to Edmond.

“My dagger,” Edmond said. “My dagger.”

D’Artagnan felt blood drain from his features, and his heartbeat increased again in volume till it threatened to deafen him. He had been right then. He had been right. “And yet you say you didn’t try to kill me.”

“Don’t speak in riddles,” Edmond said. “How came you by the dagger?”

“It was in the possession of one of those ruffians who tried to kill me on the way here,” D’Artagnan said. “And now, will you deny that you armed them? That you hired them? That you sent them out to kill me?”

Edmond looked stricken. “Yes, I deny it. I lost that dagger six months since, at a dice game.”

“A dice game?” D’Artagnan asked. Even in the hard and fast dicing and drinking world of the musketeers, he’d never seen anyone bet a dagger. Money, usually, less often jewelry. When Athos was drinking and playing—and when he played he invariably lost—D’Artagnan had seen him remove a ring from his finger or a jewel from his hat to bet upon the table. But never a dagger.

“A dice game with de Comminges, if you must know. He asked me to play, and as he in usual never gambles, I thought it would make capital sport.”

“You thought, in point of fact, that he’d not play well and, therefore, lose,” D’Artagnan said.

Edmond looked sheepish. “Well…perhaps. But he had the devil of a luck, and after taking all my money and jewelry, I bet my dagger, trying to recover it all.”

“And you lost.”

“And I lost.” Edmond said, then rallied. “But you should not for that think that de Comminges has sent someone to kill you!”

D’Artagnan was thinking of what his friends had said, of de Comminges being an old enemy of his father’s. And yet, whatever the offenses of D’Artagnan’s father against de Comminges, he could not possibly imagine they would continue with his son. To try to kill D’Artagnan before he even arrived in Gascony was unwarranted, and something that could not be countenanced as logical.

“He would have given the dagger to one of his servants,” Edmond said. “It was of little value to him.”

D’Artagnan nodded. He felt suddenly very tired. He could imagine de Comminges giving the dagger to a servant who, doubtless, had then in turn lost it in a dice game with some anonymous ruffian. Nothing meant anything. Everywhere he looked he was in danger, and he’d never find the person responsible for it.

He’d die in the dark, with a dagger between his shoulder blades, and no one would even ever know why.

Immersed in gloom, he didn’t remember leaving the house, much less getting his horse and riding out, but as they were dismounting, in his own home, something occurred to him. “And yet,” he told Athos, as the thought appeared, “I find it hard to believe that there is no connection at all between Father Urtou’s death and this. I…It misgives me that he should die like that, when he was one of the three people present when my father died. I just wish I knew what secret he took with him to his grave.”