And who knew, he might have remained a Catholic if Catherine and the Guises hadn’t made one miscalculation. They’d supposed the massacre of 1572 would terrify the remaining Protestants into silence. It didn’t. Though royal armies attacked in force, the great Protestant strongholds like La Rochelle held out. Soon they were pressing the government for freedom of worship just as strongly as before.

Once again, Henry of Navarre became a Protestant. It took him years to get his following back, but finally, he had a Protestant army behind him.

Would the throne of France be his? Nostradamus had said it would. When Catherine de Médicis had paid him a visit, he’d told her things would fall out this way. None of her sons left a legitimate male heir. Her last son, a talented transvestite, had no interest in producing one. Upon his death, therefore, the throne was Henry’s to inherit.

But the Catholic Guises were not done yet. They formed the Catholic League. Spain came to their aid. When Henry and his army came to Paris, they found a Catholic city, reinforced with Spanish troops.

There was a siege. There were endless talks. But in the end Henry had no choice. Paris, as people said, was worth a Mass. He became Catholic again, and got the throne of France. But he did not turn his back on his Protestant followers. In 1598, he issued the great Edict of Nantes, which allowed Protestants to worship as they pleased.

And he reigned, for all his faults, the most genial king the French had ever known.

They found him in the huge courtyard of the Louvre. There was a party of people with him, more women than men.

“Is the queen there?” Alain whispered as they approached.

If the king’s love life was busy, his marriages were somewhat eccentric. The marriage to Catherine de Médicis’s daughter, back in 1572, had not been a success. Henry and his wife had been cheerfully unfaithful to each other and in the end the pope had obligingly annulled their marriage. They remained friends, however, and Henry had recently built her a splendid palace near the Louvre. For years he had lived only with his mistresses. But finally he had married yet another of the Médicis family.

Marie de Médicis was not among his women today, however.

“They say her conversation’s pretty limited,” Robert informed his brother. “But she is wonderful at breeding children.” The Bourbons didn’t want to run out of heirs like their Valois cousins.