Louvois shook his head. “I’m sure I do not know.”

Farther back among the worshippers, Chevalier strolled with two stunning beauties, almost twins of one another – the Lady Beatrice, distant cousin to Chevalier, and her breath-takingly lovely daughter, sixteen-year-old Sophie. Beatrice chastised her daughter for her inability to move gracefully.

“Slow down,” said Beatrice. “Eyes up, chin down. You’re either looking or being looked at. Walking is a skill, like dancing.”

Chevalier pursed his lips. “She needs help with that, too.”

“Why does the King ignore her?” asked Beatrice. “She’s the beauty of the court.”

“The King cares more for character than beauty. No wonder he does not look on you.”

Sophie, humiliated, and Beatrice, determined, moved on with the crowd as Chevalier shook his head.

The King watched them all, the gossiping of his subjects sounding much like the chatterings of well-dressed geese. With him were Fabien, Bontemps, and the chestnut-haired Louise de la Vallière, who, though proper in a gown of pale blue and gold, was clearly nervous about being in God’s House in her condition, and standing so boldly with the one who had put her in that condition.

“Bossuet spoke a beautiful Mass,” Louise said, hoping to get the King’s attention.

“Your piety becomes you, Madame Louise,” said Louis. Without looking at her, he whispered, “I want you.”

Louise nodded. “I serve Your Majesty as I serve God. With all my heart. Yet…yet, Sire, I feel a change in you. I know you. And I see it.”

“You are very dear to me.”

Louise touched her belly. “I…I hope with all my heart it will be a healthy child.”

At last the King looked at Louise. His smile was what she’d hoped for. “No matter what, it will be a child of France. Of that you can be sure.”

Louise stepped closer to the King. He did not put his arm around her but did not move away.

“Fabien,” said Louis with a flick of his finger. “Was that the noble Montcourt I saw with Louvois a moment ago?”

Fabien nodded. “In blue, Sire. Yes. A word about this Spanish plot, if I may –”

But Louis shook his head. “Not now.” He took Louise’s arm and led her from the box.

Bontemps watched them go. “Answer his questions, Monsieur Fabien,” he warned. “But where the King is concerned it is not your place to offer information.”

Fabien scowled. “You would have me remain silent?”

“Yes. Deeply.”

“So we are being robbed?” asked Louis. He slammed his pen down beside the paper on which he’d been drawing a design for a large, ornate building. He fixed an accusatory gaze on Colbert.

Colbert, seated at the large table with the other black-robed ministers of state, shifted uneasily. At the door, Fabien stood beside a tall, silent Swiss guard, watching, listening.

“Sire?” Colbert asked.