The Strangled Queen

‘Yes, yes, you are doubtless right, Uncle,’ he said. ‘But that is no answer to the cares that oppress me.’

Then, turning to Artois who, his backside to the fire, was steaming like a soup-tureen, he said, ‘So you’re certain, Robert, that she will not yield?’

Artois shook his head.

‘Sire, Cousin, as I told you last night, I pressed Madame Marguerite in every way in my power: I gave her the most convincing arguments,’ replied Artois, with an irony which was valid only for himself. ‘I ran up against such a hard core of refusal that I can assure you with certainty there is nothing to be got from her. Do you know what she’s counting on?’ he added perfidiously. ‘She is hoping that you will die before her.’

Instinctively Louis X touched through his shirt the little reliquary he wore about his neck, and for a moment turned away, wild of eye, his hair in disorder. Then, speaking to the Count of Valois, he said, ‘Well, Uncle, you see it’s not all as simple as you promised, and it seems that my annulment is not to be had tomorrow!’

‘I know, Nephew, I am thinking of nothing else,’ replied Valois, his brow wrinkled in thought.

Artois, standing face to face with The Hutin, whose forehead came up only to his shoulder, said to him in a whisper that could have been heard twenty yards away, ‘If you are afraid of a celibate life, Cousin, I can always furnish your bed with charming young females, whom the promise of a purse of gold and the vanity of pleasuring the King would render most agreeable to you.’

He spoke with a certain relish, as if of a fine roast or a dish with an exquisite sauce.

Monseigneur of Valois spread out his ring-laden hands.

‘Of what use is an annulment to you, Louis,’ he said, ‘so long as you have not chosen the new woman you wish to marry? Don’t be so anxious about your annulment; a Sovereign can always obtain one in the end. What you need to do at once is to set about finding the wife who will make a suitable figure as queen beside you and give you a fine posterity.’

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