Dear all, I am so sorry to have kept you waiting for four months for the next chapter and I expect you have long forgotten the main crux of the story by now. It has been difficult coming back to it because of its associations with the past eight months. Has it really been that long? I moved back home mid-January but work on the house was only finished on April 1st. Long story! Now I have decorating to complete and bags/boxes to unpack.

It's time to get back to the story now that Treville has found the treaty hidden by Athos.

CHAPTER 14

Tréville, his mouth set in a grim line, strode along the corridor to the rooms where the two fit prisoners were housed.

"Loret?" he asked of his two men who stood guard outside the adjacent doors.

Without saying a word, one of the men, Dupont, unlocked and pushed open the door, standing aside to allow his Captain access to the man held within.

Nodding in acknowledgement, Tréville passed him and entered the room. He sensed the Musketeer move behind him to fill the doorway, ready to assist if the prisoner caused any problems or at least to block any attempt to escape.

Loret was sitting slumped on the side of the low, narrow bed but as soon as he saw the officer, he straightened and met Tréville's ice-cold scrutiny with a defiant stare. It was only in the face of the continued silence that his confidence began to waiver.

"Well?" he demanded, as if he were the one in control of the situation.

"I was just wondering," Tréville answered coldly, "who had given you the order to pursue and kill my men."

"Who says there was anyone orderin' me?" Loret said insolently, but Tréville was not fooled. The man was not going to divulge the identity of his employer if he could help it. "I might have thought it all up by myself."

"I doubt that," Tréville countered.

"What makes you say that?" Loret was immediately wary.

"What would make you get such a disorganised group of thugs together to scour the countryside in the hope that three Musketeers will pass by so that you can give chase because they might be carrying something of importance?"

Loret's eyes widened in feigned innocence. "You mean they were carryin' somethin' important?"

His patience wearing thin, Tréville reached out in one deft move, caught Loret by the neck of his shirt, hauled him to his feet, swung him round and thrust him back against the wall. He held him there, the shorter man's toes just touching the ground and his expression suddenly losing its arrogance.

Loret squeaked in fear. "Help me," he begged of the Musketeer by the door, who had not shifted so much as a muscle.

Dupont shrugged. "Why should I do that? I haven't seen anything."

"He's goin' to kill me!"

"I might if you don't start co-operating. I haven't got the time or the inclination for your reluctance in telling me what I want to know," Tréville hissed into his face, their noses barely inches apart. "I could find any number of excuses as to why I found it necessary to slit your throat or gut you like the dog you are with my dagger."

As if to prove his point, Tréville released his hold. His weight firmly on the ground again, Loret breathed a short-lived sigh of relief, only to find the sharp edge of a dagger against his throat in the next instant.

"I do not credit you with the initiative or bravado to take on three highly skilled soldiers unless there was something worthwhile in it for you. The document they carried was of no worth to you personally, even if you knew what it was. Therefore, you must have been tasked with getting your hands on it for someone else, so you will quit your nonsense and tell me who that person is. What were you paid to run the risk?"

"They'll kill me if I tell you," Loret whined.

Tréville gave a false laugh. "And I thought I had made it clear what I would do to you if you didn't tell me! I think your current predicament is far more serious."

Loret hesitated; he was obviously considering what the Musketeer was threatening.

"Do you owe this person so much that you are willing to die in their stead and risk them escaping punishment for treason?"

"Treason?" Loret was panicking now. "I haven't committed any treason!"

"Oh but you have," Tréville insisted. "Have you any idea what the document was that the Musketeers were carrying to Paris?"

The prisoner shook his head wildly. "I didn't have to know, and I know when not to ask too many questions."

The Captain's brow furrowed. "Just tell me what your specific instructions were."

"An' if I do tell you? What's in it for me?" Loret wheedled.

"I don't think you are in any position to bargain," Tréville warned him, "but if you start helping rather than hindering, I can put in a good word for you and at least ensure that you don't lose your head."

"Is that all?" The wheedling turned to a whine.

"Is that not enough? If you think I am going to let you walk free after this, you are very much mistaken. Now, your instructions?"

Loret briefly hesitated, as if weighing up the pros and cons of finally co-operating with the Musketeer captain. He sighed – there was really no choice.

"There were three musketeers on the road to Paris. We were to stop 'em, get the document one of 'em was carryin' an' leave no witnesses."

Instinct told Tréville that something was not right in what he had just heard. "Three. That's what you were told? Three musketeers?"

Loret was puzzled. "Yes, I …"

Tréville persisted in his line of questioning. "Were you informed that you were looking for three men or have you just said that number because that's how many you found?"

"Well, erm …"

"Think, man!" Tréville spat out but his frustration only served to make Loret flustered.

"I was told three. Yea, I'm sure of it: the likely route, when and the fact there were three of 'em, all musketeers." The man was desperate to please the Captain now, as if realising that he was divulging something of importance, although he had no idea what. If he co-operated, perhaps things would definitely go a little easier for him.

Once again, Tréville felt sick at what he had just learned. The only people who knew that number of musketeers were being sent on the mission were the three men directly involved, himself, the King and the Cardinal – who had, as he recalled, also gone as far as requesting them by name.

"Did you know their names?" He hardly dared breathe and slowly repeated his question. "Were you told their names?"

Loret shook his head vehemently, his eyes registering alarm as he realised that the questioning had entered a new phase.

"No, not their names but she described them a bit to me and said …"

"She?" Tréville interrupted, stepping closer at the revelation. "What 'she'? Your employer is female? What's her name?"

"I don't know!"

"How did you contact her then?"

"I - I didn't. She came to me; said she'd heard of me an' some of the jobs I'd done. Didn't seem too strange as most of the work I get is from word of mouth, same as when I'm lookin' for others to work for me."

"Tell me more about her. What did she look like?" Tréville ordered.

"Well, she was a beauty, no arguin' with that," Loret began. "She was quite tall, more so than most women. I remember thinkin' that straight off. I'm not much good at guessin' ages but she was probably late twenties. An' she had masses of thick, dark hair, all in curls about her shoulders. Spoke nicely too an' her clothes were expensive. She was a lady of quality, I could tell that, an' she smelt of flowers. What I remember most though is those green eyes. She looked at you and you felt 'er eyes go straight through you, but I swear she never told me any name."

Tréville nodded distractedly as he tried to link the limited description with anyone he had encountered at court or seen in the company of the Cardinal, but he was unsuccessful. He was willing to accept that Loret had told him everything the man thought he knew but, with some carefully directed questioning, there might still be more that could be gleaned. He softened his approach so that it sounded less like an interrogation.

"So where did you meet this mystery woman? In a house?"

Loret shook his head. "First time was in a tavern. She looked out of place- drew quite a few stares - but it didn't seem to bother 'er at all."

"Which tavern?" It was unlikely to be productive, but questions asked in the right quarter might produce someone else who remembered the woman and could verify Loret's account or add some new detail.

"The White Lion out along the south bank."

"You said the first time. There were others?"

"Yeah, one more. When I first met 'er, she told me I needed to find others; she reckoned a dozen in all would be enough. We'd outnumber 'em. She said they were good at their job. She told me what we'd be paid, half when we set off and the rest when the job was done, she said there might even be a little bit extra if the job was done right and the musketeers were definitely dead, not just wounded. I got the feelin' she didn't much like musketeers. Sorry, no offence meant," he swiftly added as he saw Tréville stiffen.

"Go on," the officer prompted.

"She said there wasn't much time as the musketeers had already left Paris for wherever they were goin' an' we'd to be in place to get 'em on the way back. I 'ad to find the men, prepare everythin' and we were to meet 'er early evenin' outside the city gates two days later. She would give me last instructions, such as where we were headin' an' what the men looked like, an' the first payment."

"Was she alone?"

Loret nodded.

Tréville sucked in a breath. Who was this mystery woman? She had some money if her clothing and bearing were anything to go by, but she was apparently comfortable going into a tavern and riding the streets of Paris unescorted. Either she was totally ignorant of the dangers in which she placed herself - a woman of means on her own would be easy prey to cutthroats and robbers – or she was more than capable of taking care of herself, and he was convinced the latter was the correct answer.

So, she probably had the ability to mix with the higher ranks of society without question and the lowest of the low, hardly a good recommendation for a 'lady' unless …..

He smothered a groan. She was an agent for someone, the middle man. He wryly corrected himself – middle woman! But why did she have a dislike for all things musketeer? Loret suggested that there was something personal in this arrangement as well. Tréville dismissed the notion; he had to be reading too much into this. A female spy. They were not unheard of as they certainly did not arouse suspicion for few considered it as likely employment for a woman. He would not put it past Richelieu to have someone like her in his pay and he was now convinced that the Cardinal was behind the attack on his men. France's First Minister was the only one who knew details of the mission and had the opportunity to pass them on.

But why? What was his reason? He had been in full support of the negotiations and the Treaty.

Or had he? Who knew what went on inside the churchman's head? He always claimed to act in the best interest of France so why would he want to stop the Treaty with Spain?

So many questions made Tréville's head ache. All he knew was that he currently could not trust the Cardinal at all.

Loret shuffled uncomfortably, drawing the Captain's attention back to him and another question.

"So where did you recruit your comrades?"

"Here and there," Loret was evasive. "I know the right places to go for those sorts of men. Criminals and ex-soldiers, the lot of us."

"And which of those two categories are you?" As well as being intrigued by the man standing before him, Tréville was hoping to manoeuvre him into divulging information by catching him unawares with random questioning. It had also served well in the past to alternate the tactics of being threatening and then appearing calmer, more friendly. He had known it wrong-foot a prisoner under interrogation on many occasions and he welcomed any strategy that did not make him resort to actual violence. He was a soldier, not an inquisitor and, surprising to some, did not easily condone torture as a method of gaining intelligence. He had long made the decision that he did not want to know how Richelieu gleaned a multitude of his facts. It was a point on which he was happy to differ.

Loret looked offended. "Ex-soldier. I've seen action." His back straightened. "I was at La Rochelle."

"So were we," Tréville countered. It crossed his mind that Loret was lying to impress him for the 1627 siege against the Huguenot stronghold was common knowledge. He was just about to ask for the man about his regiment.

"I know," Loret said. "I was in Schomberg's reinforcements that came to relieve you against the English."

Tréville raised an eyebrow; maybe Loret was speaking the truth and had been present in the fight against the English forces under the hapless Duke of Buckingham but he still resolved to test him further.

"It was an ignominious retreat by the English to Sablanceau," he declared and immediately saw his prisoner frown.

"I don't like correctin' you, but the English retreated the opposite way, to Loix in the west. We'd cut off their route to Sablanceau."

Tréville gave a thin smile. "You are right of course. How could I make that mistake? We wanted victory over the enemy, but a lot of Englishmen lost their lives that day because of bad judgement."

"It was that damned causeway that did me," Loret announced. "I was one of the first across that causeway through the marshes after them. Hadn't long got to the other side when I was shot in the leg and went down. Ended the battle and my life as a soldier."

There was too much detail for Loret not to have been there in the midst of the conflict. Tréville had seen the limp when the man walked but thought he had sprained an ankle or something similar whilst trying to escape. He certainly had not received any injury from the musketeers that had shed his blood. The Captain could guess only too well what had happened to Loret after that; he had seen it all too often when a career soldier was forced to retire. More often than not, there was little financial aid or other care for a veteran.

"So you have done little since except sell your skills to the highest bidder?"

"A man has to live," Loret sounded bitter. "an' it's certainly not to the one who pays the most. All too often, those sorts of people want a serious job done for as little as possible. That's what made this one so attractive, even what I got as an advance was more than I get for most jobs."

"That causeway led to carnage," Tréville acknowledged after a pause.

"But word was you lot had it tough in Saint Martin," Loret said, not without sympathy; they were speaking now as soldier to soldier.

"We were close to surrendering," Tréville admitted. "Negotiations had begun when you arrived."

"It was lucky we got there at all. We were all camped around La Rochelle when we got the word that we were movin' out in a hurry an' sailing for the island. Rumour had it that a man had swum from Ré to the mainland to tell the King you all needed 'elp. I never knew whether to believe it." His voice trailed off and he looked expectantly at the Captain.

"It's true," Tréville confirmed. "He was one of my men."

"A very brave man," Loret said in awe. "That was some swim."

"Indeed. One man drowned and another was captured by the English. I don't know what happened to him afterwards."

Loret looked awkward. "Sorry. Were they your men too?"

"No," answered the Captain, " and part of me is thankful but it doesn't deny the fact that two other brave men were lost."

"Still, you must've been proud that it was your man who saved the day," Loret grinned. "He was a hero and if I'd met 'im, I'd have shaken his hand. Because of him, we saw off the English."

"I was very proud of him and I still am," Tréville declared, watching Loret carefully. The man was genuine in his respect and the cruel irony was not lost on Tréville.

"He's still a musketeer? I'm glad to hear it. Serve with a man like that an' you know he's got your back."

Loret was delighted even as the Captain reflected on the bizarre turn this interview was taking. Tréville moved towards Dupont and stood to one side.

"Come with me," he said to Loret over his shoulder as he made a decision.

"Sir?" Dupont looked worried.

"It's fine. You can bring up the rear. I have no doubt that, between us, we can prevent him from escaping," he reassured the Musketeer who took his pistol from his belt and gestured with it for Loret to move.

Bemused but eager to comply, Loret got to his feet and scuttled after the tall musketeer officer who led the way down the corridor and through the doorway to the infirmary.

The prisoner skidded to a halt when he saw two of the men whom he'd been pursuing sitting either side of the third who lay, eyes shut, in the bed between them. The two leapt to their feet, clearly angry.

"Captain!" growled the big one. The expression on his face indicated what he would do to Loret if he got his hands on him and the prisoner subconsciously took a step closer to the officer.

"What's he doing here?" demanded the other.

"Stand aside, the pair of you. It's fine; trust me."

The two looked at each other, glared at Loret, glanced back at Tréville, then down at the man lying between them before sharing another look that seemed to silently communicate so much. The shorter soldier shrugged and the two moved away from their friend.

"Come," Tréville instructed, pushing Loret slightly so that he approached the bed.

"He's the one we caught and questioned," Loret admitted.

"The one you beat unconscious," came a voice from behind him, the anger and hatred evident in every syllable.

"Enough, Porthos," Tréville said, his voice strangely soft but the other man fell silent. "Yes, Loret, he is the one you and your men beat relentlessly. He is one of the three you were ordered to hunt and kill. His name is Athos, his friends here are Porthos and Aramis. Fortunately for you, I found all three of them alive, though with differing degrees of injury."

His voice and expression turned cold. "Believe me, if any one of them had died, you would not be standing here now. I would not have bothered taking you back to Paris, you would have breathed your last out there where we found you and I would have done it myself."

Loret swallowed hard; he did believe Tréville completely. He watched as the officer laid a hand with surprising gentleness on the forehead of the injured young man, whose face still bore the evidence of the physical abuse he had endured from Loret and his men.

"You asked about the musketeer who made it to the mainland and said he was a very brave man, claimed you wanted to shake his hand." Tréville straightened and fixed Loret with his piercing blue eyes. "I suggest that you wait until he wakes up and can fully appreciate your gesture. No doubt he has plenty to say to you too."

Loret's mouth fell open as he absorbed what the officer was telling him. His head snapped round to look down at the man and realised the significance of what he had done – and nearly done. He had not known if the rumours about the swimmer had been true but hoped they were and, in accepting them, he had elevated the unnamed soldier to a position of near hero-worship. To find the man existed, had done the deed and so turned the tide of a potential French defeat by the English had made him proud, even when that final conflict had ended his own military career.

Now, he stood beside that same man, saw the injuries he and his men had inflicted – for money, no less, and certainly not honour. He'd sought to kill the man and his friends. For what? A document that meant little to him. Tréville had mentioned treason. How had that come to pass? He had been a soldier, loyal in his service to king and country. He had never contemplated treason!

He had lost everything that he had once held dear, including pride and respect in himself. In his struggle to survive, he had sacrificed integrity, made excuses for himself and blamed everyone else and in so doing, he had almost murdered a true son of France, a man so brave that everything Loret had ever done in his life paled into insignificance. There was a time when he had dreamed of being as courageous as the man who lay before him.

All he felt now was shame. How could he have fallen so low?

Tears of worthlessness burned his eyes and his legs gave way. He felt the hand of someone steadying him and lowering him onto one of the vacated seats. Tréville.

He deserved everything that was coming to him.