The Queen and the Courtesan Read Online Free

engaged in a ferocious fight.
    â€˜What means this? What goes on here?’ Henry asked a goggle-eyed page.
    â€˜Sire, the gentlemen fight over a woman.’
    Henry snorted. ‘I should have guessed. Who is the fortunate, or perhaps I should say unfortunate lady this time?’
    â€˜Mademoiselle de Balzac.’ Enthralled at being in conversation with the King himself, the young page poured the gossip into Henry’s ready ear. ‘Prince de Joinville has been paying the lady his addresses, but now the Duke de Bellegarde has come forward as a rival.’
    â€˜Has he indeed?’ Henry growled, remembering how the Equerry had once begged permission to marry Gabrielle, and how he’d been obliged to banish him from court as a consequence. What an unfortunate fellow he was to always fall in love with the wrong woman. Henry called out to them, half-amused by the altercation, which did not appear to endanger life, and yet he was partly irritated that these two should dare to compete with a king. ‘Stop behaving like fools, the pair of you. The lady is taken, and by a better man than either of you.’
    Certain of being obeyed, Henry had half turned away to return to his bed when he heard the unmistakable sound of a sword being unsheathed from its scabbard. Before anything could be done to stop him, Joinville had rushed at Bellegarde and pierced his rival’s thigh with his rapier.
    Henry leaped out into the courtyard and was upon him in a second, de Villars and Rambouillet at his side. ‘Are you mad?’ he roared, knocking Joinville to the ground and snatching the weapon from him. ‘You could have killed the Duke.’
    â€˜Sire, he has intruded upon my pleasure.’
    â€˜And you intrude upon mine.’ Turning to Villars, he cried, ‘Summon the President of the Parliament. I’ll have this young fool arrested and brought to trial. Mayhap that will knock some sense into him.’
    But come morning the Duchesse de Nemours called upon the King to beg mercy for her grandson. ‘He is as hot-blooded as his father was, and Guise was no enemy of yours, Sire.’
    â€˜How can you say that when he was the love of Queen Margot’s life.’
    The old duchess gave a small smile. ‘You never objected at the time. What a pair you were, each outdoing the other with your intrigues and affaires . Surely you, of all men, can sympathize with a young blood hot with love for a woman.’
    Henry felt obliged to concede the point and contented himself with banishing Joinville from the court. But did not hasten to forgive him. By the time he did allow the fellow back to court, his own liaison with Henriette would surely be settled, and any hope of future rivalry for her favours forever banished. He meant to have her, and although Henry had no wish to share his throne with the daughter of the mistress of Charles IX, there had never been a woman he could not persuade into his bed.
    The King took her to meet his children at St Germain. He sent her more gifts including some hangings that were conservatively valued at three thousand livres . He flattered and charmed her, freely admitted that he had lost his heart to her. It was not enough. Henriette coolly refused to surrender, and, quite against her father’s advice, returned to Bois-Malesherbes.
    â€˜Do not push him too far or you risk losing all,’ Balzac warned his ambitious daughter.
    Henriette smiled. ‘Do not worry, Papa, my absence will only serve to show the King what he is missing.’
    Her clever game worked as Henry quickly followed her, but yet again she refused him. This time he left in high dudgeon and in retaliation turned his attentions to a maid of honour at Chenonceaux where he was visiting Louise of Lorraine, widow of Henri III.
    Later, on his return to Fontainebleau, Henry despatched the Comte de Lude to discuss a certain proposition with Henriette and her father. ‘Let her think that my