him for his strength and size. From there to falling in love with their daughters had been a step. In fact it had been such an unequal romance that had caused his father to send Porthos to Paris, in search of fortune—and away from an impudent, doe-eyed farmer’s daughter who had dared dream of becoming Lady du Vallon.
But now Porthos had a legitimate reason to haunt the palace kitchens. He’d promised his friends he’d find out about passages. He took a deep breath, and twirled his moustache. He’d dressed as if he were about to pay a visit to a duchess, in the finest silk shirt, an embroidered velvet doublet and over breeches embroidered in a matching pattern of gilded flowers. In this garb, he’d stood guard, getting very odd looks from people who went in and out of the palace. Granted, the uniform of musketeer wasn’t mandatory, yet most people wore it, or at least wore the tunic and the hat. And very few of them stood guard in clothing more appropriate to a royal soiree.
“Come, Mousqueton,” Porthos said when he’d been relieved by another musketeer, a young man by the name of De Trebouchard.
Mousqueton, who had been amusing himself nearby, playing dice with the other servants in the shadow of the walls, approached.
“Come,” Porthos said, heading into the palace—which in this part meant heading into a narrow courtyard that looked much like the paved courtyard of a farmhouse, the place where hay would be baled and horses groomed. “Show me the way to the kitchens.”
“The kitchens?” Mousqueton asked, catching up with his master. “Can we not go to a tavern? I have some money I won at the dice and I—”
Porthos shook his head, impatient. “This is not about food, Mousqueton. In a tavern I’m not likely to know what I need to find out about the palace.”
“About the palace?” Mousqueton asked.
“Have you become like the Greek nymph that was transformed into an echo, Mousqueton?” Porthos asked, impatient and not a little happy to have remembered the legend which Athos had expounded upon the last time that Porthos had taken it into his head to repeat the ending of every sentence Athos said.
“But . . .” Mousqueton said, then, with a quick look around, as if to verify they were alone—which they were, in the middle of a deserted and dark courtyard—“Would this have to do with Monsieur Aramis?”
Porthos nodded. “We must know certain details about the layout of the palace, details that not even its inhabitants are likely to know. To be honest, it is something I need to ask the servants about.”
Mousqueton moaned like a soul in eternal punishment. “And you think I can . . . help you in this? Because of all the times I got you wine and bread from the kitchen? You think I know the maids?”
“Well,” Porthos said. “I don’t expect you to know them by name, no. But I do expect that you’ll have some acquaintance with them and that by having you with me, you can provide me with that modicum of introduction that a man needs before getting down to talking to maids and cooks.”
Mousqueton only moaned again, while fixing his master with a look of such terror that if Porthos hadn’t known the wretch he would think him in danger of being sent to the gallows. “Come, Mousqueton, what is the problem?” Porthos asked, as an idea occurred to him. “Have you romanced one of the wenches and are you afraid she might catch you in the bonds of matrimony?”
Mousqueton shook his head. “Would that it were,” he said. “But the truth is . . .” He took a deep breath. “Look, the palace kitchens are haunted by the servants of musketeers. Servants, and sometimes their masters cluster around the maids and cooks begging for this, asking for that. So do the servants of all the noblemen and women who live in the palace. Hundreds of them. In such a way, that cooks and maids and wenches have become hardened to pleas.”
“But you bring me wine and bread and meat when I ask.”
At this, Mousqueton shrugged shoulders that were almost as massive as those of his master, as though to signify that he couldn’t help himself. The gesture took Porthos back to the day he had met his servant—then graced with the incongruously peaceful name of Boniface.
Porthos himself was then a young rural nobleman newly arrived in Paris, still dazzled by the wonders of the city. He’d