Catherine: One Love is Enough (Catherine Series Book 1) Read Online Free

men who were tying him up and propped him up between them. With a sudden bound the young man broke free, and Catherine gave a cry, which passed unnoticed. For his age, Michel de Montsalvy was unusually strong and powerful. Thrusting the butchers aside, he ran toward the Duke of Burgundy and stopped, panting, before him. His angry voice made itself heard above the tumult.
    ‘Jean de Bourgogne, I hereby proclaim you a craven coward, and a traitor to your King whose dwelling you allow to be desecrated thus! I proclaim you unfit to wear the spurs of a knight –’
    Caboche and Denisot, who had by now recovered from their surprise, once more seized hold of their prisoner. They tried to force him to kneel before the man he had insulted, but he kicked out so fiercely that he managed to break free once more, in spite of his bound hands, and again went up to Jean-sans-Peur, as if intending to add something further. The Duke’s face was livid with rage. He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could utter a word, the onlookers saw his face pale and one hand fly up to his cheek. Michel de Montsalvy had spat in his face …
    Catherine realised that the young man had just signed his own death warrant.
    ‘Take him away!’ the Duke cried hoarsely. ‘Do what you like with him! Let the others be taken to my house, where they will remain as my guests for the night. You have my word upon it, son-in-law!’
    The Dauphin did not answer, but turned his back on the Duke and leant his face against the chimneypiece. The little Dauphine still wept, refusing to allow herself to be comforted by her brother.
    ‘I will never forgive you … never!’ she stammered between her sobs. Caboche and Denisot meanwhile had seized the prisoner firmly and were pushing him toward the stairs.
    Catherine slid a trembling hand into Landry’s and whispered, ‘What will they do to him?’
    ‘Hang him, and sharp about it, I should hope! It’s all he deserves, dirty Armagnac scum that he is! Did you see what he did? He spat in the Duke’s face …’
    Landry joined vigorously in the chorus of voices now chanting bloodthirstily: ‘Death to him! To the gallows with him!’
    Catherine snatched her hand away. She was crimson to the roots of her hair.
    ‘Oh! Landry Pigasse! You disgust me!’
    Before Landry could recover his surprise, she had whirled round and vanished into the crowd, which had parted briefly to allow the prisoner and his captors to pass. She pushed frantically after him.
    Catherine would have found it difficult to explain just what was going on in her childish heart at this point. She had never laid eyes on Michel de Montsalvy before. An hour before, she had not even heard his name. Yet suddenly he seemed as near and dear as her father or sister, and she felt as if she had always known him. Invisible bonds had suddenly been forged between the young nobleman and the goldsmith’s daughter. Bonds rooted deep in the heart; and ones that would ultimately cause great suffering.
    Catherine’s only conscious thought was that she must follow the prisoner and discover, at all costs, what was to become of him. She had seen him twice at close quarters; once when the skinners had been tying him up and once when he had insulted the Duke. Both times, the light from the window had been shining full on his face, and the sight of him had made her feel quite giddy, with red spots dancing in front of her eyes, like the time she had tried to outstare the sun for a joke. It did not seem credible that a young man could be so beautiful.
    Beautiful he undoubtedly was, with fine, clear-cut features that might have seemed almost feminine in their perfection but for the firm chin and mouth and haughty blue eyes. His gleaming blond hair, which he wore short at the nape and above the ears, had the smooth casque-like look that was then fashionable, and that permitted a helmet to be worn on top without discomfort. He had an athlete’s shoulders under the purple silk