Thief of Hearts Read online

  “One hundred and fifty for sure, for fooling the King and the Cardinal together,” Miriame crowed. “I never dreamed my disguise would work half so well as that.”

  She shook off her jacket and unbuttoned her shirt enough to show off her naked breasts that she had left unbound specially for the occasion. Underwhelming as they might be, they were unmistakably those of a woman. She shook them at the Cardinal, who had turned an unbecoming shade of puce. “Will that convince you, Monsieur Cardinal, that I am a woman in earnest, or would you have me disrobe from head to toe?”

  “A woman,” Francine breathed in a tiny whisper, her cheeks flushed. “You were a woman all along.”

  The King peered shortsightedly at Miriame’s breasts. “A woman indeed, and a fine one at that. Who ever would have thought it? Indeed, Francine, you should pay your little friend what you have promised her. She fooled even the King of France with her disguise. There are few living today who can boast of so much.”

  “It cannot be a woman,” the Cardinal thundered. “This...this thing, be it man or woman, I know not, is the Marquise’s lover.”

  “My lover?” Francine stood up, her back straight, her composure now completely returned. “What nonsense is this? How dare you accuse me of unnatural acts with another woman?”

  The King was equally unimpressed with the Cardinal’s claim. “Francine is our mistress and we are fond of her,” he proclaimed sternly. “It is not your place to question the authority of your King. You displease us with your wild talk. May we suggest that you absent yourself from our presence until you have come to a better understanding of the good sense and discretion we require in our servants.” He shook his head. “Pah, shame on you to be tricked by a girl in man’s dress and to drag your King out on such a fool’s errand as this.”

  The Cardinal’s face grew gray as he realized the enormity of his mistake. He had played for high stakes, and he had lost. “But, Sire---” There was a quiver in his cold voice that took Miriame quite by surprise. It was time for him to pay the forfeit for his failure.

  Francine had recovered enough from her surprise to revel in the downfall of her biggest rival. She shot the Cardinal a malicious smile as he tried to stammer out a belated apology.

  The King was not in a forgiving mood. “On second thoughts, may we suggest that you absent yourself not only from us, but also from Paris, until we choose to forgive you.” He waved the man away with a flick of his wrist. “Begone with you off into the country somewhere where you cannot bother us with your foolishness. You have displeased us greatly this night.”

  Miriame heaved a sigh of relief that all the King’s displeasure at his affronted dignity had fallen on the Cardinal’s head and not on her own. Royalty made her nervous. It was too easy for them to ruin, even kill, a man with a click of their fingers.

  The Cardinal gathered his robes around him, bowed to the King, and backed out of the chamber. The glance that he directed at Francine as he left was so poisonous that Miriame expected to see her keel over where she stood.

  Francine was unmoved by his venom her defeated rival shot her way. “The serpent has been de-fanged,” she whispered into Miriame’s ear. “By Heaven, that is worth one hundred and fifty gold pistoles to me to witness such a sight.”

  “Come, pay the wench what you owe her,” the King said, making his way over to the door, “and send her on her way again. We have had enough tomfoolery for one night and we would speak with you further this evening.”

  Francine beckoned Miriame over to a cabinet in the corner of the room. “I will forgive you for tricking me, you man-woman,” she said, as soon as the door shut behind the King. She took a small silver key from a chain around her neck and unlocked one of the drawers. “Even though you delighted in making a fool out of me.”

  “No one knows that but you and me,” Miriame reminded her, “while the Cardinal will have the whole Court to bear witness against him.”

  “I shall be sure to spread the news myself.” Francine laughed out loud with the joy of her triumph. “The look on his face was priceless. Just as he thought he was about to dispose of me forever, just as I thought he was about to succeed, you snatched the victory from out of his hands. Masterfully done, Mademoiselle Chevalier, masterfully done.”

  “Why, thank you, Madame Marquise. I am much practiced at the art of pretending to be a man.”

  Francine’s curiosity was writ large over her face. “You did not don that disguise just to fool me?” she asked. “Do you really live like that all the time?”

  Miriame nodded.

  “But why?” the Marquise asked avidly. “Surely there are other things you could do, other ways of earning a crust?”

  “Walking the streets?” she asked with distaste.

  Francine shook her head. “You could always find yourself a rich man, as I have done.” She gave an evil smile. “None dare call me whore – at least not to my face.”

  “Why do you whore for the King?” Miriame asked idly in her turn. “Surely you do not need to earn your bread on your back?”

  Francine was not offended by the question as Miriame had expected her to be. “For the glamour, I suppose,” she said, her head on one side. “And for the excitement. And the danger. Definitely the danger.”

  “For the excitement and the danger?” Miriame shrugged. “You would make a good soldier, I imagine, if you were ever to tire of the King. Or he of you.”

  Francine shook her yellow curls. “I do not think so. I would not know what to do with a sword. My battles are fought with words and glances.” She turned her attention back to the cabinet. “Come, let me give you your due, and then you must be gone, Mademoiselle Chevalier. The King is expecting me in his chambers.” She made a face. “And if I have learned one lesson, it is that the King does not brook disappointment easily.”

  Miriame reached into her pocket and drew out a packet of letters. “Before I go, I believe you were wanting these?”

  Francine’s eyes grew wide as she saw what lay in Miriame’s hands. “My letters,” she exclaimed in a low tone. “However did you get them?”

  Miriame grinned. “Never mind that.” There was no time to go into the story right now, even if she wanted to. “I believe you were looking for them?”

  Francine took hold of them gingerly and riffled through the pages. “They are all there?”

  “Every last one of them. I like the Cardinal no more than you do.”

  Francine clutched the papers to her bosom as she made her way over to the fire. “I forgive you a thousand times over for making a fool out of me.” One by one, she fed the letters to the fire, watching each one as it briefly flared up in flames and was reduced to ashes. When all the paper was gone, she stirred around in the fire with the poker that lay on the hearth, to make sure that not a single scrap of half-burned paper remained.

  When all the letters were disposed of to her satisfaction, she dusted her hands off briskly. “God help me, but I will be more careful next time. Never again I will leave such evidence lying around for the Cardinal’s spies to find.”

  “You would be better not to run the risk in the first place.”

  Francine grinned – the first smile of hers that Miriame had seen without any artifice in it. “But without the danger in life, where would the pleasure of living be?”

  She had a point, Miriame conceded with a shrug.

  “I knew you would understand me,” Francine went on. “What else but the love of adventure would make you turn Musketeer?” She gave a low laugh, returned to her cabinet and began counting out a pile of gold pistoles into a large leather pouch. “No wonder I found you so attractive. You and I are kindred spirits. We would not be happy with a life of tameness and dullness such as most women lead.”

  “True enough.” Miriame swallowed hard. Now that the time to ask her question had come, her throat was so dry she could hardly croak it out. “But tell me, how do you manage to keep your shape so well?”

  Francine gave a puzzled fro
wn. “Keep my shape?”

  Miriame could feel her ears grow hot, but she had to explain what she meant. Just the merest thought of Jean-Paul’s hands on her body, teasing her and pleasing her, taking her to heights she had never before dreamed of, and she screwed up her courage to explain. “You are not a virgin, but you are not breeding, either. How do you manage it? Do you have a secret charm to keep the babes out of your belly?” What wouldn’t she give to possess the charm for herself, to be able to lie with Jean-Paul without fear of ruin.

  Francine looked sideways at her. “I see you have the heart of a woman underneath your manly uniform, Mademoiselle Chevalier. No wonder I could make no impression on it, try as I would. I gather you have a practical interest in the answer?”

  “I have been lucky once,” Miriame admitted with a blush that set her face on fire. “I would not care to trust my luck too often.”

  Francine laughed. “It never pays to dice with Fate. She has a warped sense of humor and in one foolish moment you will find yourself with exactly what you wished above all to avoid.” She left the pile of pistoles she was counting for a moment and rummaged around in her cabinet, finally emerging with a small cloth bag which she handed to Miriame. “Soak these in vinegar. Place them inside you beforehand and, God willing, you should prove barren.”

  Miriame peeked inside the bag, which turned out to be filled with sponges. Plain simple sponges as one could buy from any market stall. She picked one out and held it up to the light. There didn’t seem to be anything special about it. Was it really as easy as that? No special prayers to be said every night and morn? No herbs to be picked in mid-winter and eaten during a full moon? “Sponges soaked in vinegar? That really works?”

  “It has so far for me.” Francine made the sign of the cross on her chest. “God willing that it works for a while longer. I shall never keep the King if I am big with child all the time. Louise de la Valliere, the poor silly girl, bore him half a dozen children, and he quickly tired of her when her figure became fat and bloated and her face red and blotched as any common fishwife’s. I hope I shall never meet the same fate.”

  She finished counting out the pistoles now. She rummaged around in her cabinet, found a piece of parchment, and tucked it into the bag along with the gold pieces. “A token of my gratitude for the letters,” she said with a smile at Miriame’s querying look. “My luck is riding high for now. You may as well have a share in it. I have no doubt I will be able to wheedle twice that out of the King tonight, now that the Cardinal has been sent away.”

  Miriame took the pouch and tucked it into her jacket, along with the bag of sponges. “I meant no harm to come of my deception...” She let her voice slide off into nothingness, wondering how to explain what she really felt without rudeness.

  Francine understood her only too well. “But the lure of the gifts I gave you was too much for you to resist?” she suggested with a twinkle in her eye.

  Miriame nodded, slightly ashamed for the first time of her greed. “I was so poor.”

  “You don’t need to explain.” Francine looked slightly shamefaced herself. “They were given with that intention. I meant them as lures to hook you in with.” She sighed. “It is such a pity you are not a man after all. You told the most absurd stories of your exploits in battle that I have ever heard. They made me laugh for days afterwards.”

  Miriame gave an affronted harrumph as she made her way to the door. “Here I was doing my best to impress the Marquise de Montespan, and she was laughing at me behind my back? I swear, that is the last time I try to make eyes at a woman.”

  The Marquise laughed. “Fare thee well, Mademoiselle Chevalier. You have done me a service tonight that I will not soon forget. Take care of yourself and remember, I may have an excellent memory for those who do me evil, but an even better one for those who do me a good turn. I will not forget you.”

  Miriame doffed her hat for the last time. “Adieu, Madame Marquise. May you find the dangerous joy you are seeking and live happy.”

  Chapter 11

  Jean-Paul was waiting for her outside. He rushed up to her as soon as she appeared through the doorway. “Miriame,” he said, taking her shoulders in his hands. “All is well with you?”

  She felt her heart constrict at the sight of the worry on his face. She had been so foolish to give him an entrance into her heart. She’d thought she could displace him again when she pleased, but he was so firmly entrenched there now that to root him up again would take all the courage and strength of will that she possessed – and more. “I am fine,” she said, as lightly as she could manage. “More than fine, indeed. Our plan worked as well as we could have possibly hoped.”

  He looked searchingly into her eyes as if to make sure she told him true. “The Cardinal?”

  She managed a real grin at the thought of the Cardinal’s final exit. He would not be back to trouble them for a long while. If Francine’s star remained in the ascendant, she wouldn’t like his chances of ever returning to Paris. “Is disgraced and banished.”

  Jean-Paul heaved a sigh of relief. “The King believed your story?”

  “He took it like a lamb, and blamed the Cardinal for misleading him. You have made an enemy of the Cardinal, I fear. After tonight’s work, he would murder you himself, were he to get half a chance.”

  Jean-Paul’s forehead creased, but not with worry about the Cardinal. “Francine forgave you for having tricked her? Indeed, I never would have agreed to it if it had not been for the best.”

  Francine, always Francine. Did the foolish boy not think of any one else save for his precious Francine? Would he never forget her? Was the lure of her pink and white beauty more than enough to make up for her disloyal heart that thought only of itself? Would he never stop pining for what he could not have? Her heart was heavy when she spoke again. “The King is content and the Marquise is triumphant. She would have forgiven me a thousand times over to have the Cardinal out of the way. We have nothing to fear now. No more dark assassins lurking in the shadows of the street, waiting to knife us while our back is turned.”

  He seemed puzzled at the dullness she couldn’t quite disguise in her voice. “We have won,” he said, jubilation in his voice. “Our enemies are defeated.” He looked at her more carefully. “So why the long face? What is still troubling you?”

  He wanted her to be happy now that they had beaten their enemies? Ordinarily she would have been, but now? All she could think of now was that there was no need for them to work together any longer to defeat a common enemy. No need even to talk to one another when they passed in the street. No need for anything when they met save for a slight nod of the head, maybe, to acknowledge their acquaintance. Already she felt the pain of his absence gnawing a hole in her heart.

  She forced a smile, not wanting him to guess the wayward turn her thoughts had taken. He had asked her to leave him once already – she could not bear to have him ask again. “I tricked Francine into giving me one hundred and fifty gold pistoles,” she said, with as much enthusiasm as she could muster. “Since I had just saved her from the wrath of the King, she could hardly refuse me, and I felt it was fair enough payment for disposing of her friend the Cardinal with such flair.” She jingled the bag of money in her pocket, thinking of the bag of sponges hidden in her other pocket. How foolishly optimistic she had been to think that she might ever need them. “Come, let’s go somewhere quiet and split it up.”

  To her surprise, he shook his head. “Francine gave it to you, not to me. Keep it all.”

  “Don’t be a fool. You had an equal share in the plan. I owe you an equal share in the booty before we part and go our separate ways.”

  His brows drew together in a frown at her words. “An equal share in the booty. Is that all you owe me?”

  “A new pair of boots, too, I suppose,” she conceded. “I’ll throw in another pistole for those, if that makes you happy.”

  “Damn and blast the boots,” he said, suddenly angry. “I don’t want you to pay
me for them. At least not with Francine’s gold. You can’t buy me off as easily as that.”

  She glared at him, unhappiness making her voice sharp. “I’m not giving your boots back again, so don’t even think about asking for them. I like your boots. They’re mine now.”

  “I told you. I don’t want your damned boots.” He grabbed her by the arm and started to pull her along the street. “Come with me. I swear we are going to sort this out once and for all.”

  Miriame dug in her heels. “Where are you taking me?”

  “To my chamber,” he said between clenched teeth. “Where we can talk in peace.”

  She allowed herself to be dragged along. His chamber would be as good as any other place to divide their takings for the night. Heaven knows they couldn’t do it in plain sight, in the street or in a tavern. One hundred and fifty pistoles was more than most people ever saw in a lifetime of labor.

  He stomped up the stairs to his apartment, not troubling to soften his footsteps despite the lateness of the hour. Miriame followed behind him, trying to make up for the fact that Jean-Paul was making enough noise for both of them.

  Jean-Paul slammed the door behind her as soon as she entered and whirled towards her, his face dark with suppressed emotion. “Are you ready to listen to me now?”

  All she wanted to do was to get out of the torment of his company and go back to her tiny attic where she could be miserable in peace. Why had she even bothered getting the sponges from the Marquise? She shouldn’t take the risk anyway, even if Jean-Paul were to want her. Not that he did...

  “Forget about the talking,” she said, plunking down the bag of coins on the table. “Let’s just divvy up the gold and be done with it.”

  He didn’t move towards the bag. “Take off your boots.”

  She stood her ground, wondering what strange fancy had gotten into him now. Whatever it was, she wasn’t playing. “No.”