The Vicomte de Bragelonne

Original Transcriber’s Note:

The Vicomte de Bragelonne is the final volume of D’Artagnan Romances: it
is usually split into three or four parts, and the final portion is entitled
The Man in the Iron Mask. The Man in the Iron Mask we’re familiar with
today is the last volume of the four-volume edition. [Not all the editions
split them in the same manner, hence some of the confusion…but
wait…there’s yet more reason for confusion.]

We intend to do ALL of The Vicomte de Bragelonne, split into four etexts
entitled The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Ten Years Later, Louise de la Valliere, and
The Man in the Iron Mask; you WILL be getting The Man in the Iron Mask.

One thing that may be causing confusion is that the etext we have now, entitled
Ten Years Later, says it’s the sequel to The Three Musketeers. While this
is technically true, there’s another book, Twenty Years After, that comes
between. The confusion is generated by the two facts that we published Ten
Years Later BEFORE we published Twenty Years After, and that many people see
those titles as meaning Ten and Twenty Years “After” the original
story…however, this is why the different words “After” and
“Later”…the Ten Years “After” is ten years after the
Twenty Years later…as per history. Also, the third book of the
D’Artagnan Romances, while entitled The Vicomte de Bragelonne, has the
subtitle Ten Years Later. These two titles are also given to different volumes:
The Vicomte de Bragelonne can refer to the whole book, or the first volume of
the three or four-volume editions. Ten Years Later can, similarly, refer to the
whole book, or the second volume of the four-volume edition. To add to the
confusion, in the case of our etexts, it refers to the first 104 chapters of
the whole book, covering material in the first and second etexts in the new
series. Here is a guide to the series which may prove helpful:

The Three Musketeers: Etext 1257—First book of the D’Artagnan
Romances. Covers the years 1625-1628.

Twenty Years After: Etext 1259—Second book of the D’Artagnan
Romances. Covers the years 1648-1649. [Third in the order that we published,
but second in time sequence!!!]

Ten Years Later: Etext 1258—First 104 chapters of the third book of the
D’Artagnan Romances. Covers the years 1660-1661.

The Vicomte de Bragelonne: Etext 2609 (our new etext)—First 75 chapters
of the third book of the D’Artagnan Romances. Covers the year 1660.

Ten Years Later: forthcoming (our next etext)—Chapters 76-140 of that
third book of the D’Artagnan Romances. Covers the years 1660-1661. [In
this particular editing of it]

Louise de la Valliere: forthcoming (following)—Chapters 141-208 of the
third book of the D’Artagnan Romances. Covers the year 1661.

The Man in the Iron Mask: forthcoming (completing)—Chapters 209-269 of
the third book of the D’Artagnan Romances. Covers the years 1661-1673.

If we’ve calculated correctly, that fourth text SHOULD correspond to the
modern editions of The Man in the Iron Mask, which is still widely circulated,
and comprises about the last 1/4 of The Vicomte de Bragelonne.

Many thanks to Dr. David Coward, whose editions of the D’Artagnan
Romances have proved an invaluable source of information.

Introduction: In the months of March-July in 1844, in the magazine Le Siecle,
the first portion of a story appeared, penned by the celebrated playwright
Alexandre Dumas. It was based, he claimed, on some manuscripts he had found a
year earlier in the Bibliotheque Nationale while researching a history he
planned to write on Louis XIV. They chronicled the adventures of a young man
named D’Artagnan who, upon entering Paris, became almost immediately
embroiled in court intrigues, international politics, and ill-fated affairs
between royal lovers. Over the next six years, readers would enjoy the
adventures of this youth and his three famous friends, Porthos, Athos, and
Aramis, as their exploits unraveled behind the scenes of some of the most
momentous events in French and even English history.

Eventually these serialized adventures were published in novel form, and became
the three D’Artagnan Romances known today. Here is a brief summary of the
first two novels:

The Three Musketeers (serialized March—July, 1844): The year is 1625. The
young D’Artagnan arrives in Paris at the tender age of 18, and almost
immediately offends three musketeers, Porthos, Aramis, and Athos. Instead of
dueling, the four are attacked by five of the Cardinal’s guards, and the
courage of the youth is made apparent during the battle. The four become fast
friends, and, when asked by D’Artagnan’s landlord to find his
missing wife, embark upon an adventure that takes them across both France and
England in order to thwart the plans of the Cardinal Richelieu. Along the way,
they encounter a beautiful young spy, named simply Milady, who will stop at
nothing to disgrace Queen Anne of Austria before her husband, Louis XIII, and
take her revenge upon the four friends.

Twenty Years After (serialized January—August, 1845): The year is now
1648, twenty years since the close of the last story. Louis XIII has died, as
has Cardinal Richelieu, and while the crown of France may sit upon the head of
Anne of Austria as Regent for the young Louis XIV, the real power resides with
the Cardinal Mazarin, her secret husband. D’Artagnan is now a lieutenant
of musketeers, and his three friends have retired to private life. Athos turned
out to be a nobleman, the Comte de la Fere, and has retired to his home with
his son, Raoul de Bragelonne. Aramis, whose real name is D’Herblay, has
followed his intention of shedding the musketeer’s cassock for the
priest’s robes, and Porthos has married a wealthy woman, who left him her
fortune upon her death. But trouble is stirring in both France and England.
Cromwell menaces the institution of royalty itself while marching against
Charles I, and at home the Fronde is threatening to tear France apart.
D’Artagnan brings his friends out of retirement to save the threatened
English monarch, but Mordaunt, the son of Milady, who seeks to avenge his
mother’s death at the musketeers’ hands, thwarts their valiant
efforts. Undaunted, our heroes return to France just in time to help save the
young Louis XIV, quiet the Fronde, and tweak the nose of Cardinal Mazarin.

The third novel, The Vicomte de Bragelonne (serialized October, 1847 to
January, 1850), has enjoyed a strange history in its English translation. It
has been split into three, four, or five volumes at various points in its
history. The five-volume edition generally does not give titles to the smaller
portions, but the others do. In the three-volume edition, the novels are
entitled The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Louise de la Valliere, and The Man in the
Iron Mask. For the purposes of this etext, I have chosen to split the novel as
the four-volume edition does, with these titles: The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Ten
Years Later, Louise de la Valliere, and The Man in the Iron Mask. In this, the
first of the four etexts, the situation is thus:

It is now 1660, and although promised the captaincy of the musketeers at the
close of Twenty Years After, D’Artagnan is still trailing his sword in
the Louvre as a lowly lieutenant. Louis XIV is well past the age where he
should rule, but the ailing Cardinal Mazarin refuses to relinquish the reins of
power. Meanwhile, Charles II, a king without a country, travels Europe seeking
aid from his fellow monarchs. Athos still resides at La Fere while his son,
Raoul de Bragelonne, has entered into the service in the household of M. le
Prince. As for Raoul, he has his eyes on an entirely different object than his
father—his childhood companion, Louise de la Valliere, with whom he is
hopelessly in love. Porthos, now a baron, is off on some mysterious mission
along with Aramis, who is now the Bishop of Vannes.

Now begins the first chapter of the last of the D’Artagnan Romances, The
Vicomte de Bragelonne. Enjoy!

John Bursey, May, 2000

Chapter I. The Letter.

Towards the middle of the month of May, in the year
1660, at nine o’clock in the morning, when the sun, already high in the
heavens, was fast absorbing the dew from the ramparts of the castle of Blois, a
little cavalcade, composed of three men and two pages, re-entered the city by
the bridge, without producing any other effect upon the passengers of the quay
beyond a first movement of the hand to the head, as a salute, and a second
movement of the tongue to express, in the purest French then spoken in France:
“There is Monsieur returning from hunting.” And that was all.

Whilst, however, the horses were climbing the steep acclivity which leads from
the river to the castle, several shop-boys approached the last horse, from
whose saddle-bow a number of birds were suspended by the beak.

On seeing this, the inquisitive youths manifested with rustic freedom their
contempt for such paltry sport, and, after a dissertation among themselves upon
the disadvantages of hawking, they returned to their occupations; one only of
the curious party, a stout, stubby, cheerful lad, having demanded how it was
that Monsieur, who, from his great revenues, had it in his power to amuse
himself so much better, could be satisfied with such mean diversions.

“Do you not know,” one of the standers-by replied, “that
Monsieur’s principal amusement is to weary himself?”

The light-hearted boy shrugged his shoulders with a gesture which said as clear
as day: “In that case I would rather be plain Jack than a prince.”
And all resumed their labors.

In the meanwhile, Monsieur continued his route with an air at once so
melancholy and so majestic, that he certainly would have attracted the
attention of spectators, if spectators there had been; but the good citizens of
Blois could not pardon Monsieur for having chosen their gay city for an abode
in which to indulge melancholy at his ease, and as often as they caught a
glimpse of the illustrious ennuye, they stole away gaping, or drew back their
heads into the interior of their dwellings, to escape the soporific influence
of that long pale face, of those watery eyes, and that languid address; so that
the worthy prince was almost certain to find the streets deserted whenever he
chanced to pass through them.

Now, on the part of the citizens of Blois this was a culpable piece of
disrespect, for Monsieur was, after the king—nay, even perhaps, before
the king—the greatest noble of the kingdom. In fact, God, who had granted
to Louis XIV., then reigning, the honor of being son of Louis XIII., had
granted to Monsieur the honor of being son of Henry IV. It was not then, or, at
least, it ought not to have been, a trifling source of pride for the city of
Blois, that Gaston of Orleans had chosen it as his residence, and held his
court in the ancient Castle of the States.

But it was the destiny of this great prince to excite the attention and
admiration of the public in a very modified degree wherever he might be.
Monsieur had fallen into this situation by habit.

It was not, perhaps, this which gave him that air of listlessness. Monsieur had
already been tolerably busy in the course of his life. A man cannot allow the
heads of a dozen of his best friends to be cut off without feeling a little
excitement; and as, since the accession of Mazarin to power, no heads had been
cut off, Monsieur’s occupation was gone, and his morale suffered from it.

The life of the poor prince was then very dull. After his little morning
hawking-party on the banks of the Beuvron, or in the woods of Cheverny,
Monsieur crossed the Loire, went to breakfast at Chambord, with or without an
appetite, and the city of Blois heard no more of its sovereign lord and master
till the next hawking-day.

So much for the ennui extra muros; of the ennui of the interior we will give
the reader an idea if he will with us follow the cavalcade to the majestic
porch of the Castle of the States.

Monsieur rode a little steady-paced horse, equipped with a large saddle of red
Flemish velvet, with stirrups in the shape of buskins; the horse was of a bay
color; Monsieur’s pourpoint of crimson velvet corresponded with the cloak
of the same shade and the horse’s equipment, and it was only by this red
appearance of the whole that the prince could be known from his two companions,
the one dressed in violet, the other in green. He on the left, in violet, was
his equerry; he on the right, in green, was the grand veneur.

One of the pages carried two gerfalcons upon a perch, the other a hunting-horn,
which he blew with a careless note at twenty paces from the castle. Every one
about this listless prince did what he had to listlessly.

At this signal, eight guards, who were lounging in the sun in the square court,
ran to their halberts, and Monsieur made his solemn entry into the castle.

When he had disappeared under the shades of the porch, three or four idlers,
who had followed the cavalcade to the castle, after pointing out the suspended
birds to each other, dispersed with comments upon what they saw: and, when they
were gone, the street, the palace, and the court, all remained deserted alike.

Monsieur dismounted without speaking a word, went straight to his apartments,
where his valet changed his dress, and as Madame had not yet sent orders
respecting breakfast, Monsieur stretched himself upon a chaise longue, and was
soon as fast asleep as if it had been eleven o’clock at night.

The eight guards, who concluded their service for the day was over, laid
themselves down very comfortably in the sun upon some stone benches; the grooms
disappeared with their horses into the stables, and, with the exception of a
few joyous birds, startling each other with their sharp chirping in the tufted
shrubberies, it might have been thought that the whole castle was as soundly
asleep as Monsieur was.

All at once, in the midst of this delicious silence, there resounded a clear
ringing laugh, which caused several of the halberdiers in the enjoyment of
their siesta to open at least one eye.

This burst of laughter proceeded from a window of the castle, visited at this
moment by the sun, that embraced it in one of those large angles which the
profiles of the chimneys mark out upon the walls before mid-day.

The little balcony of wrought iron which advanced in front of this window was
furnished with a pot of red gilliflowers, another pot of primroses, and an
early rose-tree, the foliage of which, beautifully green, was variegated with
numerous red specks announcing future roses.

In the chamber lighted by this window, was a square table, covered with an old
large-flowered Haarlem tapestry; in the center of this table was a long-necked
stone bottle, in which were irises and lilies of the valley; at each end of
this table was a young girl.

The position of these two young people was singular; they might have been taken
for two boarders escaped from a convent. One of them, with both elbows on the
table, and a pen in her hand, was tracing characters upon a sheet of fine Dutch
paper; the other, kneeling upon a chair, which allowed her to advance her head
and bust over the back of it to the middle of the table, was watching her
companion as she wrote, or rather hesitated to write.

Thence the thousand cries, the thousand railleries, the thousand laughs, one of
which, more brilliant than the rest, had startled the birds in the gardens, and
disturbed the slumbers of Monsieur’s guards.

We are taking portraits now; we shall be allowed, therefore, we hope, to sketch
the two last of this chapter.

The one who was leaning in the chair—that is to say, the joyous, laughing
one—was a beautiful girl of from eighteen to twenty, with brown
complexion and brown hair, splendid, from eyes which sparkled beneath
strongly-marked brows, and particularly from her teeth, which seemed to shine
like pearls between her red coral lips. Her every movement seemed the accent of
a sunny nature; she did not walk—she bounded.

The other, she who was writing, looked at her turbulent companion with an eye
as limpid, as pure, and as blue as the azure of the day. Her hair, of a shaded
fairness, arranged with exquisite taste, fell in silky curls over her lovely
mantling cheeks; she passed across the paper a delicate hand, whose thinness
announced her extreme youth. At each burst of laughter that proceeded from her
friend, she raised, as if annoyed, her white shoulders in a poetical and mild
manner, but they were wanting in that richfulness of mold that was likewise to
be wished in her arms and hands.

“Montalais! Montalais!” said she at length, in a voice soft and
caressing as a melody, “you laugh too loud—you laugh like a man!
You will not only draw the attention of messieurs the guards, but you will not
hear Madame’s bell when Madame rings.”

This admonition neither made the young girl called Montalais cease to laugh nor
gesticulate. She only replied: “Louise, you do not speak as you think, my
dear; you know that messieurs the guards, as you call them, have only just
commenced their sleep, and that a cannon would not waken them; you know that
Madame’s bell can be heard at the bridge of Blois, and that consequently
I shall hear it when my services are required by Madame. What annoys you, my
child, is that I laugh while you are writing; and what you are afraid of is
that Madame de Saint-Remy, your mother, should come up here, as she does
sometimes when we laugh too loud, that she should surprise us, and that she
should see that enormous sheet of paper upon which, in a quarter of an hour,
you have only traced the words Monsieur Raoul. Now, you are right, my dear
Louise, because after these words, ‘Monsieur Raoul’, others may be
put so significant and incendiary as to cause Madame Saint-Remy to burst out
into fire and flames! Hein! is not that true now?—say.”

And Montalais redoubled her laughter and noisy provocations.

The fair girl at length became quite angry; she tore the sheet of paper on
which, in fact, the words “Monsieur Raoul” were written in good
characters; and crushing the paper in her trembling hands, she threw it out of
the window.

“There! there!” said Mademoiselle de Montalais; “there is our
little lamb, our gentle dove, angry! Don’t be afraid, Louise—Madame
de Saint-Remy will not come; and if she should, you know I have a quick ear.
Besides, what can be more permissible than to write to an old friend of twelve
years’ standing, particularly when the letter begins with the words
‘Monsieur Raoul’?”

“It is all very well—I will not write to him at all,” said
the young girl.

“Ah, ah! in good sooth, Montalais is properly punished,” cried the
jeering brunette, still laughing. “Come, come! let us try another sheet
of paper, and finish our dispatch off-hand. Good! there is the bell ringing
now. By my faith, so much the worse! Madame must wait, or else do without her
first maid of honor this morning.”

A bell, in fact, did ring; it announced that Madame had finished her toilette,
and waited for Monsieur to give her his hand, and conduct her from the salon to
the refectory.

This formality being accomplished with great ceremony, the husband and wife
breakfasted, and then separated till the hour of dinner, invariably fixed at
two o’clock.

The sound of this bell caused a door to be opened in the offices on the left
hand of the court, from which filed two maitres d’hotel followed by eight
scullions bearing a kind of hand-barrow loaded with dishes under silver covers.

One of the maitres d’hotel, the first in rank, touched one of the guards,
who was snoring on his bench, slightly with his wand; he even carried his
kindness so far as to place the halbert which stood against the wall in the
hands of the man stupid with sleep, after which the soldier, without
explanation, escorted the viande of Monsieur to the refectory, preceded by a
page and the two maitres d’hotel.

Wherever the viande passed, the soldiers ported arms.

Mademoiselle de Montalais and her companion had watched from their window the
details of this ceremony, to which, by the bye, they must have been pretty well
accustomed. But they did not look so much from curiosity as to be assured they
should not be disturbed. So, guards, scullions, maitres d’hotel, and
pages having passed, they resumed their places at the table; and the sun,
which, through the window-frame, had for an instant fallen upon those two
charming countenances, now only shed its light upon the gilliflowers,
primroses, and rose-tree.

“Bah!” said Mademoiselle de Montalais, taking her place again;
“Madame will breakfast very well without me!”

“Oh! Montalais, you will be punished!” replied the other girl,
sitting down quietly in hers.

“Punished, indeed!—that is to say, deprived of a ride! That is just
the way in which I wish to be punished. To go out in the grand coach, perched
upon a doorstep; to turn to the left, twist round to the right, over roads full
of ruts, where we cannot exceed a league in two hours; and then to come back
straight towards the wing of the castle in which is the window of Mary de
Medici, so that Madame never fails to say: ‘Could one believe it possible
that Mary de Medici should have escaped from that window—forty-seven feet
high? The mother of two princes and three princesses!’ If you call that
relaxation, Louise, all I ask is to be punished every day; particularly when my
punishment is to remain with you and write such interesting letters as we
write!”

“Montalais! Montalais! there are duties to be performed.”

“You talk of them very much at your ease, dear child!—you, who are
left quite free amidst this tedious court. You are the only person that reaps
the advantages of them without incurring the trouble,—you, who are really
more one of Madame’s maids of honor than I am, because Madame makes her
affection for your father-in-law glance off upon you; so that you enter this
dull house as the birds fly into yonder court, inhaling the air, pecking the
flowers, picking up the grain, without having the least service to perform, or
the least annoyance to undergo. And you talk to me of duties to be performed!
In sooth, my pretty idler, what are your own proper duties, unless to write to
the handsome Raoul? And even that you don’t do; so that it looks to me as
if you likewise were rather negligent of your duties!”

Louise assumed a serious air, leant her chin upon her hand, and, in a tone full
of candid remonstrance, “And do you reproach me with my good
fortune?” said she. “Can you have the heart to do it? You have a
future; you will belong to the court; the king, if he should marry, will
require Monsieur to be near his person; you will see splendid fetes, you will
see the king, who they say is so handsome, so agreeable!”

“Ay, and still more, I shall see Raoul, who attends upon M. le
Prince,” added Montalais, maliciously.

“Poor Raoul!” sighed Louise.

“Now is the time to write to him, my pretty dear! Come, begin again, with
that famous ‘Monsieur Raoul’ which figures at the top of the poor
torn sheet.”

She then held the pen toward her, and with a charming smile encouraged her
hand, which quickly traced the words she named.

“What next?” asked the younger of the two girls.

“Why, now write what you think, Louise,” replied Montalais.

“Are you quite sure I think of anything?”

“You think of somebody, and that amounts to the same thing, or rather
even more.”

“Do you think so, Montalais?”

“Louise, Louise, your blue eyes are as deep as the sea I saw at Boulogne
last year! No, no, I mistake—the sea is perfidious: your eyes are as deep
as the azure yonder—look!—over our heads!”

“Well, since you can read so well in my eyes, tell me what I am thinking
about, Montalais.”

“In the first place, you don’t think, Monsieur Raoul; you think, My
dear Raoul.”

“Oh!—”

“Never blush for such a trifle as that! ‘My dear Raoul,’ we
will say—‘You implore me to write you at Paris, where you are
detained by your attendance on M. le Prince. As you must be very dull there, to
seek for amusement in the remembrance of a provinciale—’”

Louise rose up suddenly. “No, Montalais,” said she, with a smile;
“I don’t think a word of that. Look, this is what I think;”
and she seized the pen boldly, and traced, with a firm hand, the following
words:

“I should have been very unhappy if your entreaties to obtain a
remembrance of me had been less warm. Everything here reminds me of our early
days, which so quickly passed away, which so delightfully flew by, that no
others will ever replace the charm of them in my heart.”

Montalais, who watched the flying pen, and read, the wrong way upwards, as fast
as her friend wrote, here interrupted by clapping her hands.
“Capital!” cried she; “there is frankness—there is
heart—there is style! Show these Parisians, my dear, that Blois is the
city for fine language!”

“He knows very well that Blois was a Paradise to me,” replied the
girl.

“That is exactly what you mean to say; and you speak like an
angel.”

“I will finish, Montalais,” and she continued as follows:
“You often think of me, you say, Monsieur Raoul: I thank you; but that
does not surprise me, when I recollect how often our hearts have beaten close
to each other.”

“Oh! oh!” said Montalais. “Beware, my lamb! You are
scattering your wool, and there are wolves about.”

Louise was about to reply, when the gallop of a horse resounded under the porch
of the castle.

“What is that?” said Montalais, approaching the window. “A
handsome cavalier, by my faith!”

“Oh!—Raoul!” exclaimed Louise, who had made the same movement
as her friend, and, becoming pale as death, sunk back beside her unfinished
letter.

“Now, he is a clever lover, upon my word!” cried Montalais;
“he arrives just at the proper moment.”

“Come in, come in, I implore you!” murmured Louise.

“Bah! he does not know me. Let me see what he has come here for.”

Chapter II. The Messenger.

Mademoiselle de Montalais was right; the young cavalier
was goodly to look upon.

He was a young man of from twenty-four to twenty-five years of age, tall and
slender, wearing gracefully the picturesque military costume of the period. His
large boots contained a foot which Mademoiselle de Montalais might not have
disowned if she had been transformed into a man. With one of his delicate but
nervous hands he checked his horse in the middle of the court, and with the
other raised his hat, whose long plumes shaded his at once serious and
ingenuous countenance.

The guards, roused by the steps of the horse, awoke, and were on foot in a
minute. The young man waited till one of them was close to his saddle-bow:
then, stooping towards him, in a clear, distinct voice, which was perfectly
audible at the window where the two girls were concealed, “A message for
his royal highness,” he said.

“Ah, ah!” cried the soldier. “Officer, a messenger!”

But this brave guard knew very well that no officer would appear, seeing that
the only one who could have appeared dwelt at the other side of the castle, in
an apartment looking into the gardens. So he hastened to add: “The
officer, monsieur, is on his rounds; but, in his absence, M. de Saint-Remy, the
maitre d’hotel, shall be informed.”

“M. de Saint-Remy?” repeated the cavalier, slightly blushing.

“Do you know him?”

“Why, yes; but request him, if you please, that my visit be announced to
his royal highness as soon as possible.”

“It appears to be pressing,” said the guard, as if speaking to
himself, but really in the hope of obtaining an answer.

The messenger made an affirmative sign with his head.

“In that case,” said the guard, “I will go and seek the
maitre d’hotel myself.”

The young man, in the meantime, dismounted; and whilst the others were making
their remarks upon the fine horse the cavalier rode, the soldier returned.

“Your pardon, young gentleman; but your name, if you please?”

“The Vicomte de Bragelonne, on the part of his highness M. le Prince de
Conde.”

The soldier made a profound bow, and, as if the name of the conqueror of Rocroi
and Lens had given him wings, he stepped lightly up the steps leading to the
ante-chamber.

A. de Bragelonne had not had time to fasten his horse to the iron bars of the
perron, when M. de Saint-Remy came running, out of breath, supporting his
capacious body with one hand, whilst with the other he cut the air as a
fisherman cleaves the waves with his oar.

“Ah, Monsieur le Vicomte! You at Blois!” cried he. “Well,
that is a wonder. Good-day to you—good-day, Monsieur Raoul.”

“I offer you a thousand respects, M. de Saint-Remy.”

“How Madame de la Vall—I mean, how delighted Madame de Saint-Remy
will be to see you! But come in. His royal highness is at breakfast—must
he be interrupted? Is the matter serious?”

“Yes, and no, Monsieur de Saint-Remy. A moment’s delay, however,
would be disagreeable to his royal highness.”

“If that is the case, we will force the consigne, Monsieur le Vicomte.
Come in. Besides, Monsieur is in an excellent humor to-day. And then you bring
news, do you not?”

“Great news, Monsieur de Saint-Remy.

“And good, I presume?”

“Excellent.”

“Come quickly, come quickly then!” cried the worthy man, putting
his dress to rights as he went along.

Raoul followed him, hat in hand, and a little disconcerted at the noise made by
his spurs in these immense salons.

As soon as he had disappeared in the interior of the palace, the window of the
court was repeopled, and an animated whispering betrayed the emotion of the two
girls. They soon appeared to have formed a resolution, for one of the two faces
disappeared from the window. This was the brunette; the other remained behind
the balcony, concealed by the flowers, watching attentively through the
branches the perron by which M. de Bragelonne had entered the castle.

In the meantime the object of so much laudable curiosity continued his route,
following the steps of the maitre d’hotel. The noise of quick steps, an
odor of wine and viands, a clinking of crystal and plates, warned them that
they were coming to the end of their course.

The pages, valets and officers, assembled in the office which led up to the
refectory, welcomed the newcomer with the proverbial politeness of the country;
some of them were acquainted with Raoul, and all knew that he came from Paris.
It might be said that his arrival for a moment suspended the service. In fact,
a page, who was pouring out wine for his royal highness, on hearing the
jingling of spurs in the next chamber, turned round like a child, without
perceiving that he was continuing to pour out, not into the glass, but upon the
tablecloth.

Madame, who was not so preoccupied as her glorious spouse was, remarked this
distraction of the page.

“Well?” exclaimed she.

“Well!” repeated Monsieur; “what is going on then?”

A. de Saint-Remy, who had just introduced his head through the doorway, took
advantage of the moment.

“Why am I to be disturbed?” said Gaston, helping himself to a thick
slice of one of the largest salmon that had ever ascended the Loire to be
captured between Paimboeuf and Saint-Nazaire.

“There is a messenger from Paris. Oh! but after monseigneur has
breakfasted will do; there is plenty of time.”

“From Paris!” cried the prince, letting his fork fall. “A
messenger from Paris, do you say? And on whose part does this messenger
come?”

“On the part of M. le Prince,” said the maitre d’hotel
promptly.

Every one knows that the Prince de Conde was so called.

“A messenger from M. le Prince!” said Gaston, with an inquietude
that escaped none of the assistants, and consequently redoubled the general
curiosity.

Monsieur, perhaps, fancied himself brought back again to the happy times when
the opening of a door gave him an emotion, in which every letter might contain
a state secret,—in which every message was connected with a dark and
complicated intrigue. Perhaps, likewise, that great name of M. le Prince
expanded itself, beneath the roofs of Blois, to the proportions of a phantom.

Monsieur pushed away his plate.

“Shall I tell the envoy to wait?” asked M. de Saint-Remy.

A glance from Madame emboldened Gaston, who replied: “No, no! let him
come in at once, on the contrary. A propos, who is he?”

“A gentleman of this country, M. le Vicomte de Bragelonne.”

“Ah, very well! Introduce him, Saint-Remy—introduce him.”

And when he had let fall these words, with his accustomed gravity, Monsieur
turned his eyes, in a certain manner, upon the people of his suite, so that
all, pages, officers, and equerries, quitted the service, knives and goblets,
and made towards the second chamber door a retreat as rapid as it was
disorderly.

This little army had dispersed in two files when Raoul de Bragelonne, preceded
by M. de Saint-Remy, entered the refectory.

The short interval of solitude which this retreat had left him, permitted
Monsieur the time to assume a diplomatic countenance. He did not turn round,
but waited till the maitre d’hotel should bring the messenger face to
face with him.

Raoul stopped even with the lower end of the table, so as to be exactly between
Monsieur and Madame. From this place he made a profound bow to Monsieur, and a
very humble one to Madame; then, drawing himself up into military pose, he
waited for Monsieur to address him.

On his part the prince waited till the doors were hermetically closed; he would
not turn round to ascertain the fact, as that would have been derogatory to his
dignity, but he listened with all his ears for the noise of the lock, which
would promise him at least an appearance of secrecy.

The doors being closed, Monsieur raised his eyes towards the vicomte, and said,
“It appears that you come from Paris, monsieur?”

“This minute, monseigneur.”

“How is the king?”

“His majesty is in perfect health, monseigneur.”

“And my sister-in-law?”

“Her majesty the queen-mother still suffers from the complaint in her
chest, but for the last month she has been rather better.”

“Somebody told me you came on the part of M. le Prince. They must have
been mistaken, surely?”

“No, monseigneur; M. le Prince has charged me to convey this letter to
your royal highness, and I am to wait for an answer to it.”

Raoul had been a little annoyed by this cold and cautious reception, and his
voice insensibly sank to a low key.

The prince forgot that he was the cause of this apparent mystery, and his fears
returned.

He received the letter from the Prince de Conde with a haggard look, unsealed
it as he would have unsealed a suspicious packet, and in order to read it so
that no one should remark the effects of it upon his countenance, he turned
round.

Madame followed, with an anxiety almost equal to that of the prince, every
maneuver of her august husband.

Raoul, impassible, and a little disengaged by the attention of his hosts,
looked from his place through the open window at the gardens and the statues
which peopled them.

“Well!” cried Monsieur, all at once, with a cheerful smile;
“here is an agreeable surprise, and a charming letter from M. le Prince.
Look, Madame!”

The table was too large to allow the arm of the prince to reach the hand of
Madame; Raoul sprang forward to be their intermediary, and did it with so good
a grace as to procure a flattering acknowledgement from the princess.

“You know the contents of this letter, no doubt?” said Gaston to
Raoul.

“Yes, monseigneur; M. le Prince at first gave me the message verbally,
but upon reflection his highness took up his pen.”

“It is beautiful writing,” said Madame, “but I cannot read
it.”

“Will you read it to Madame, M. de Bragelonne?” said the duke.

“Yes; read it, if you please, monsieur.”

Raoul began to read, Monsieur giving again all his attention. The letter was
conceived in these terms:

“MONSEIGNEUR—The king is about to set out for the frontiers. You
are aware the marriage of his majesty is concluded upon. The king has done me
the honor to appoint me his marechal-des-logis for this journey, and as I knew
with what joy his majesty would pass a day at Blois, I venture to ask your
royal highness’s permission to mark the house you inhabit as our
quarters. If, however, the suddenness of this request should create to your
royal highness any embarrassment, I entreat you to say so by the messenger I
send, a gentleman of my suite, M. le Vicomte de Bragelonne. My itinerary will
depend on your royal highness’s determination, and instead of passing
through Blois, we shall come through Vendome or Romorantin. I venture to hope
that your royal highness will be pleased with my arrangement, it being the
expression of my boundless desire to make myself agreeable to you.”

“Nothing can be more gracious toward us,” said Madame, who had more
than once consulted the looks of her husband during the reading of the letter.
“The king here!” exclaimed she, in a rather louder tone than would
have been necessary to preserve secrecy.

“Monsieur,” said his royal highness in his turn, “you will
offer my thanks to M. de Conde, and express to him my gratitude for the honor
he has done me.” Raoul bowed.

“On what day will his majesty arrive?” continued the prince.

“The king, monseigneur, will in all probability arrive this
evening.”

“But how, then, could he have known my reply if it had been in the
negative?”

“I was desired, monseigneur, to return in all haste to Beaugency, to give
counter-orders to the courier, who was himself to go back immediately with
counter-orders to M. le Prince.”

“His majesty is at Orleans, then?”

“Much nearer, monseigneur; his majesty must by this time have arrived at
Meung.”

“Does the court accompany him?”

“Yes, monseigneur.”

“A propos, I forgot to ask you after M. le Cardinal.”

“His eminence appears to enjoy good health, monseigneur.”

“His nieces accompany him, no doubt?”

“No, monseigneur; his eminence has ordered the Mesdemoiselles de Mancini
to set out for Brouage. They will follow the left bank of the Loire, while the
court will come by the right.

“What! Mademoiselle Mary de Mancini quit the court in that manner?”
asked Monsieur, his reserve beginning to diminish.

“Mademoiselle Mary de Mancini in particular,” replied Raoul
discreetly.

A fugitive smile, an imperceptible vestige of his ancient spirit of intrigue,
shot across the pale face of the prince.

“Thanks, M. de Bragelonne,” then said Monsieur. “You would,
perhaps, not be willing to carry M. le Prince the commission with which I would
charge you, and that is, that his messenger has been very agreeable to me; but
I will tell him so myself.”

Raoul bowed his thanks to Monsieur for the honor he had done him.

Monsieur made a sign to Madame, who struck a bell which was placed at her right
hand; M. de Saint-Remy entered, and the room was soon filled with people.

“Messieurs,” said the prince, “his majesty is about to pay me
the honor of passing a day at Blois; I depend on the king, my nephew, not
having to repent of the favor he does my house.”

“Vive le Roi!” cried all the officers of the household with frantic
enthusiasm, and M. de Saint-Remy louder than the rest.

Gaston hung down his head with evident chagrin. He had all his life been
obliged to hear, or rather to undergo, this cry of “Vive le Roi!”
which passed over him. For a long time, being unaccustomed to hear it, his ear
had had rest, and now a younger, more vivacious, and more brilliant royalty
rose up before him, like a new and more painful provocation.

Madame perfectly understood the sufferings of that timid, gloomy heart; she
rose from the table, Monsieur imitated her mechanically, and all the domestics,
with a buzzing like that of several bee-hives, surrounded Raoul for the purpose
of questioning him.

Madame saw this movement, and called M. de Saint-Remy.

“This is not the time for gossiping, but working,” said she, with
the tone of an angry housekeeper.

A. de Saint-Remy hastened to break the circle formed by the officers round
Raoul, so that the latter was able to gain the ante-chamber.

“Care will be taken of that gentleman, I hope,” added Madame,
addressing M. de Saint-Remy.

The worthy man immediately hastened after Raoul. “Madame desires
refreshments to be offered to you,” said he; “and there is,
besides, a lodging for you in the castle.”

“Thanks, M. de Saint-Remy,” replied Raoul; “but you know how
anxious I must be to pay my duty to M. le Comte, my father.”

“That is true, that is true, Monsieur Raoul; present him, at the same
time, my humble respects, if you please.”

Raoul thus once more got rid of the old gentleman, and pursued his way. As he
was passing under the porch, leading his horse by the bridle, a soft voice
called him from the depths of an obscure path.

“Monsieur Raoul!” said the voice.

The young man turned round, surprised, and saw a dark complexioned girl, who,
with a finger on her lip, held out her other hand to him. This young lady was
an utter stranger.

Chapter III. The Interview.

Raoul made one step towards the girl who thus called
him.

“But my horse, madame?” said he.

“Oh! you are terribly embarrassed! Go yonder way—there is a shed in
the outer court: fasten your horse, and return quickly!”

“I obey, madame.”

Raoul was not four minutes in performing what he had been directed to do; he
returned to the little door, where, in the gloom, he found his mysterious
conductress waiting for him, on the first steps of a winding staircase.

“Are you brave enough to follow me, monsieur knight errant?” asked
the girl, laughing at the momentary hesitation Raoul had manifested.

The latter replied by springing up the dark staircase after her. They thus
climbed up three stories, he behind her, touching with his hands, when he felt
for the banister, a silk dress which rubbed against each side of the staircase.
At every false step made by Raoul, his conductress cried, “Hush!”
and held out to him a soft perfumed hand.

“One would mount thus to the belfry of the castle without being conscious
of fatigue,” said Raoul.

“All of which means, monsieur, that you are very much perplexed, very
tired, and very uneasy. But be of good cheer, monsieur; here we are, at our
destination.”

The girl threw open a door, which immediately, without any transition, filled
with a flood of light the landing of the staircase, at the top of which Raoul
appeared, holding fast by the balustrade.

The girl continued to walk on—he followed her; she entered a
chamber—he did the same.

As soon as he was fairly in the net he heard a loud cry, and, turning round,
saw at two paces from him, with her hands clasped and her eyes closed, that
beautiful fair girl with blue eyes and white shoulders, who, recognizing him,
called him Raoul.

He saw her, and divined at once so much love and so much joy in the expression
of her countenance, the he sank on his knees in the middle of the chamber,
murmuring, on his part, the name of Louise.

“Ah! Montalais!—Montalais!” she sighed, “it is very
wicked to deceive me so.”

“Who, I? I have deceived you?”

“Yes; you told me you would go down to inquire the news, and you have
brought up monsieur!”

“Well, I was obliged to do so—how else could he have received the
letter you wrote him?” And she pointed with her finger to the letter
which was still upon the table.

Raoul made a step to take it; Louise, more rapid, although she had sprung
forward with a sufficiently remarkable physical hesitation, reached out her
hand to stop him. Raoul came in contact with that trembling hand, took it
within his own, and carried it so respectfully to his lips, that he might have
been said to have deposited a sigh upon it rather than a kiss.

In the meantime, Mademoiselle de Montalais had taken the letter, folded it
carefully, as women do, in three folds, and slipped it into her bosom.

“Don’t be afraid, Louise,” said she; “monsieur will no
more venture to take it hence than the defunct king Louis XIII. ventured to
take billets from the corsage of Mademoiselle de Hautefort.”

Raoul blushed at seeing the smile of the two girls; and he did not remark that
the hand of Louise remained in his.

“There!” said Montalais, “you have pardoned me, Louise, for
having brought monsieur to you; and you, monsieur, bear me no malice for having
followed me to see mademoiselle. Now, then, peace being made, let us chat like
old friends. Present me, Louise, to M. de Bragelonne.”

“Monsieur le Vicomte,” said Louise, with her quiet grace and
ingenuous smile, “I have the honor to present to you Mademoiselle Aure de
Montalais, maid of honor to her royal highness MADAME, and moreover my
friend—my excellent friend.”

Raoul bowed ceremoniously.

“And me, Louise,” said he—“will you not present me also
to mademoiselle?”

“Oh, she knows you—she knows all!”

This unguarded expression made Montalais laugh and Raoul sigh with happiness,
for he interpreted it thus: “She knows all our love.”

“The ceremonies being over, Monsieur le Vicomte,” said Montalais,
“take a chair, and tell us quickly the news you bring flying thus.”

“Mademoiselle, it is no longer a secret; the king, on his way to
Poitiers, will stop at Blois, to visit his royal highness.”

“The king here!” exclaimed Montalais, clapping her hands.
“What! are we going to see the court? Only think, Louise—the real
court from Paris! Oh, good heavens! But when will this happen, monsieur?”

“Perhaps this evening, mademoiselle; at latest, to-morrow.”

Montalais lifted her shoulders in a sigh of vexation.

“No time to get ready! No time to prepare a single dress! We are as far
behind the fashions as the Poles. We shall look like portraits from the time of
Henry IV. Ah, monsieur! this is sad news you bring us!”

“But, mesdemoiselles, you will be still beautiful!”

“That’s no news! Yes, we shall always be beautiful, because nature
has made us passable; but we shall be ridiculous, because the fashion will have
forgotten us. Alas! ridiculous! I shall be thought ridiculous—I!”

“And by whom?” said Louise, innocently.

“By whom? You are a strange girl, my dear. Is that a question to put to
me? I mean everybody; I mean the courtiers, the nobles; I mean the king.”

“Pardon me, my good friend; but as here every one is accustomed to see us
as we are—”

“Granted; but that is about to change, and we shall be ridiculous, even
for Blois; for close to us will be seen the fashions from Paris, and they will
perceive that we are in the fashion of Blois! It is enough to make one
despair!”

“Console yourself, mademoiselle.”

“Well, so let it be! After all, so much the worse for those who do not
find me to their taste!” said Montalais, philosophically.

“They would be very difficult to please,” replied Raoul, faithful
to his regular system of gallantry.

“Thank you, Monsieur le Vicomte. We were saying, then, that the king is
coming to Blois?”

“With all the court.”

“Mesdemoiselles de Mancini, will they be with them?”

“No, certainly not.”

“But as the king, it is said, cannot do without Mademoiselle Mary?”

“Mademoiselle, the king must do without her. M. le Cardinal will have it
so. He has exiled his nieces to Brouage.”

“He!—the hypocrite!”

“Hush!” said Louise, pressing a finger on her friend’s rosy
lips.

“Bah! nobody can hear me. I say that old Mazarino Mazarini is a
hypocrite, who burns impatiently to make his niece Queen of France.”

“That cannot be, mademoiselle, since M. le Cardinal, on the contrary, had
brought about the marriage of his majesty with the Infanta Maria
Theresa.”

Montalais looked Raoul full in the face, and said, “And do you Parisians
believe in these tales? Well! we are a little more knowing than you, at
Blois.”

“Mademoiselle, if the king goes beyond Poitiers and sets out for Spain;
if the articles of the marriage contract are agreed upon by Don Luis de Haro
and his eminence, you must plainly perceive that it is not child’s
play.”

“All very fine! but the king is king, I suppose?”

“No doubt, mademoiselle; but the cardinal is the cardinal.”

“The king is not a man, then! And he does not love Mary Mancini?”

“He adores her.”

“Well, he will marry her then. We shall have war with Spain. M. Mazarin
will spend a few of the millions he has put away; our gentlemen will perform
prodigies of valor in their encounters with the proud Castilians, and many of
them will return crowned with laurels, to be recrowned by us with myrtles. Now,
that is my view of politics.”

“Montalais, you are wild!” said Louise, “and every
exaggeration attracts you as light does a moth.”

“Louise, you are so extremely reasonable, that you will never know how to
love.”

“Oh!” said Louise, in a tone of tender reproach, “don’t
you see, Montalais? The queen-mother desires to marry her son to the Infanta;
would you wish him to disobey his mother? Is it for a royal heart like his to
set such a bad example? When parents forbid love, love must be banished.”

And Louise sighed: Raoul cast down his eyes, with an expression of constraint.
Montalais, on her part, laughed aloud.

“Well, I have no parents!” said she.

“You are acquainted, without doubt, with the state of health of M. le
Comte de la Fere?” said Louise, after breathing that sigh which had
revealed so many griefs in its eloquent utterance.

“No, mademoiselle,” replied Raoul, “I have not let paid my
respects to my father; I was going to his house when Mademoiselle de Montalais
so kindly stopped me. I hope the comte is well. You have heard nothing to the
contrary, have you?”

“No, M. Raoul—nothing, thank God!”

Here, for several instants, ensued a silence, during which two spirits, which
followed the same idea, communicated perfectly, without even the assistance of
a single glance.

“Oh, heavens!” exclaimed Montalais in a fright; “there is
somebody coming up.”

“Who can it be?” said Louise, rising in great agitation.

“Mesdemoiselles, I inconvenience you very much. I have, without doubt,
been very indiscreet,” stammered Raoul, very ill at ease.

“It is a heavy step,” said Louise.

“Ah! if it is only M. Malicorne,” added Montalais, “do not
disturb yourselves.”

Louise and Raoul looked at each other to inquire who M. Malicorne could be.

“There is no occasion to mind him,” continued Montalais; “he
is not jealous.”

“But, mademoiselle—” said Raoul.

“Yes, I understand. Well, he is discreet as I am.”

“Good heavens!” cried Louise, who had applied her ear to the door,
which had been left ajar; “it is my mother’s step!”

“Madame de Saint-Remy! Where shall I hide myself?” exclaimed Raoul,
catching at the dress of Montalais, who looked quite bewildered.

“Yes,” said she; “yes, I know the clicking of those pattens!
It is our excellent mother. M. le Vicomte, what a pity it is the window looks
upon a stone pavement, and that fifty paces below it.”

Raoul glanced at the balcony in despair. Louise seized his arm and held it
tight.

“Oh, how silly I am!” said Montalais; “have I not the
robe-of-ceremony closet? It looks as if it were made on purpose.”

It was quite time to act; Madame de Saint-Remy was coming up at a quicker pace
than usual. She gained the landing at the moment when Montalais, as in all
scenes of surprises, shut the closet by leaning with her back against the door.

“Ah!” cried Madame de Saint-Remy, “you are here, are you,
Louise?”

“Yes, madame,” replied she, more pale than if she had committed a
great crime.

“Well, well!”

“Pray be seated, madame,” said Montalais, offering her a chair,
which she placed so that the back was towards the closet.

“Thank you, Mademoiselle Aure—thank you. Come, my child, be
quick.”

“Where do you wish me to go, madame?”

“Why, home, to be sure; have you not to prepare your toilette?”

“What did you say?” cried Montalais, hastening to affect surprise,
so fearful was she that Louise would in some way commit herself.

“You don’t know the news, then?” said Madame de Saint-Remy.

“What news, madame, is it possible for two girls to learn up in this
dove-cote?”

“What! have you seen nobody?”

“Madame, you talk in enigmas, and you torment us at a slow fire!”
cried Montalais, who, terrified at seeing Louise become paler and paler, did
not know to what saint to put up her vows.

At length she caught an eloquent look of her companion’s, one of those
looks which would convey intelligence to a brick wall. Louise directed her
attention to a hat—Raoul’s unlucky hat, which was set out in all
its feathery splendor upon the table.

Montalais sprang towards it, and, seizing it with her left hand, passed it
behind her into the right, concealing it as she was speaking.

“Well,” said Madame de Saint-Remy, “a courier has arrived,
announcing the approach of the king. There, mesdemoiselles; there is something
to make you put on your best looks.”

“Quick, quick!” cried Montalais. “Follow Madame your mother,
Louise; and leave me to get ready my dress of ceremony.”

Louise arose; her mother took her by the hand, and led her out on to the
landing.

“Come along,” said she; then adding in a low voice, “When I
forbid you to come the apartment of Montalais, why do you do so?”

“Madame, she is my friend. Besides, I had but just come.”

“Did you see nobody concealed while you were there?”

“Madame!”

“I saw a man’s hat, I tell you—the hat of that fellow, that
good-for-nothing!”

“Madame!” repeated Louise.

“Of that do-nothing Malicorne! A maid of honor to have such
company—fie! fie!” and their voices were lost in the depths of the
narrow staircase.

Montalais had not missed a word of this conversation, which echo conveyed to
her as if through a tunnel. She shrugged her shoulders on seeing Raoul, who had
listened likewise, issue from the closet.

“Poor Montalais!” said she, “the victim of friendship! Poor
Malicorne, the victim of love!”

She stopped on viewing the tragic-comic face of Raoul, who was vexed at having,
in one day, surprised so many secrets.

“Oh, mademoiselle!” said he; “how can we repay your
kindness?”

“Oh, we will balance accounts some day,” said she. “For the
present, begone, M. de Bragelonne, for Madame de Saint-Remy is not over
indulgent; and any indiscretion on her part might bring hither a domiciliary
visit, which would be disagreeable to all parties.”

“But Louise—how shall I know—”

“Begone! begone! King Louis XI. knew very well what he was about when he
invented the post.”

“Alas!” sighed Raoul.

“And am I not here—I, who am worth all the posts in the kingdom?
Quick, I say, to horse! so that if Madame de Saint-Remy should return for the
purpose of preaching me a lesson on morality, she may not find you here.”

“She would tell my father, would she not?” murmured Raoul.

“And you would be scolded. Ah, vicomte, it is very plain you come from
court; you are as timid as the king. Peste! at Blois we contrive better than
that, to do without papa’s consent. Ask Malicorne else!”

And at these words the girl pushed Raoul out of the room by the shoulders. He
glided swiftly down to the porch, regained his horse, mounted, and set off as
if he had had Monsieur’s guards at his heels.

Chapter IV. Father and Son.

Raoul followed the well-known road, so dear to his
memory, which led from Blois to the residence of the Comte de la Fere.

The reader will dispense with a second description of that habitation: he,
perhaps, has been with us there before, and knows it. Only, since our last
journey thither, the walls had taken on a grayer tint, and the brick-work
assumed a more harmonious copper tone; the trees had grown, and many that then
only stretched their slender branches along the tops of the hedges, now, bushy,
strong, and luxuriant, cast around, beneath boughs swollen with sap, great
shadows of blossoms or fruit for the benefit of the traveler.

Raoul perceived, from a distance, the two little turrets, the dove-cote in the
elms, and the flights of pigeons, which wheeled incessantly around that brick
cone, seemingly without power to quit it, like the sweet memories which hover
round a spirit at peace.

As he approached, he heard the noise of the pulleys which grated under the
weight of the heavy pails; he also fancied he heard the melancholy moaning of
the water which falls back again into the wells—a sad, funereal, solemn
sound, which strikes the ear of the child and the poet—both
dreamers—which the English call splash; Arabian poets gasgachau; and
which we Frenchmen, who would be poets, can only translate by a
paraphrase—the noise of water falling into water.

It was more than a year since Raoul had been to visit his father. He had passed
the whole time in the household of M. le Prince. In fact, after all the
commotions of the Fronde, of the early period of which we formerly attempted to
give a sketch, Louis de Conde had made a public, solemn and frank
reconciliation with the court. During all the time that the rupture between the
king and the prince had lasted, the prince, who had long entertained a great
regard for Bragelonne, had in vain offered him advantages of the most dazzling
kind for a young man. The Comte de la Fere, still faithful to his principles of
loyalty, and royalty, one day developed before his son in the vaults of Saint
Denis,—the Comte de la Fere, in the name of his son, had always declined
them. Moreover, instead of following M. de Conde in his rebellion, the vicomte
had followed M. de Turenne, fighting for the king. Then when M. de Turenne, in
his turn, had appeared to abandon the royal cause, he had quitted M. de
Turenne, as he had quitted M. de Conde. It resulted from this invariable line
of conduct, that, as Conde and Turenne had never been conquerors of each other
but under the standard of the king, Raoul, however young, had ten victories
inscribed on his list of services, and not one defeat from which his bravery or
conscience had to suffer.

Raoul, therefore, had, in compliance with the wish of his father, served
obstinately and passively the fortunes of Louis XIV., in spite of the
tergiversations which were endemic, and, it might be said, inevitable, at that
period.

A. de Conde; on being restored to favor, had at once availed himself of all the
privileges of the amnesty to ask for many things back again which had been
granted to him before, and among others, Raoul. M. de la Fere, with his
invariable good sense, had immediately sent him again to the prince.

A year, then, had passed away since the separation of the father and son; a few
letters had softened, but not removed, the pain of absence. We have seen that
Raoul had left at Blois another love in addition to filial love. But let us do
him this justice—if it had not been for chance and Mademoiselle de
Montalais, two great temptations, Raoul, after delivering his message, would
have galloped off towards his father’s house, turning his head round,
perhaps, but without stopping for a single instant, even if Louise had held out
her arms to him.

So the first part of the journey was given by Raoul to regretting the past
which he had been forced to quit so quickly, that is to say, his lady-love; and
the other part to the friend he was about to join, so much too slowly for his
wishes.

Raoul found the garden-gate open, and rode straight in, without regarding the
long arms, raised in anger, of an old man dressed in a jacket of violet-colored
wool, and a large cap of faded velvet.

The old man, who was weeding with his hands a bed of dwarf roses and
arguerites, was indignant at seeing a horse thus traversing his sanded and
nicely-raked walks. He even ventured a vigorous “Humph!” which made
the cavalier turn round. Then there was a change of scene; for no sooner had he
caught sight of Raoul’s face, than the old man sprang up and set off in
the direction of the house, amidst interrupted growlings, which appeared to be
paroxysms of wild delight.

When arrived at the stables, Raoul gave his horse to a little lackey, and
sprang up the perron with an ardor that would have delighted the heart of his
father.

He crossed the ante-chamber, the dining-room, and the salon, without meeting
any one; at length, on reaching the door of M. de la Fere’s apartment, he
rapped impatiently, and entered almost without waiting for the word
“Enter!” which was vouchsafed him by a voice at once sweet and
serious. The comte was seated at a table covered with papers and books; he was
still the noble, handsome gentleman of former days, but time had given to this
nobleness and beauty a more solemn and distinct character. A brow white and
void of wrinkles, beneath his long hair, now more white than black; an eye
piercing and mild, under the lids of a young man; his mustache, fine but
slightly grizzled, waved over lips of a pure and delicate model, as if they had
never been curled by mortal passions; a form straight and supple; an
irreproachable but thin hand—this was what remained of the illustrious
gentleman whom so many illustrious mouths had praised under the name of Athos.
He was engaged in correcting the pages of a manuscript book, entirely filled by
his own hand.

Raoul seized his father by the shoulders, by the neck, as he could, and
embraced him so tenderly and so rapidly, that the comte had neither strength
nor time to disengage himself, or to overcome his paternal emotions.

“What! you here, Raoul—you! Is it possible?” said he.

“Oh, monsieur, monsieur, what joy to see you once again!”

“But you don’t answer me, vicomte. Have you leave of absence, or
has some misfortune happened at Paris?

“Thank God, monsieur,” replied Raoul, calming himself by degrees,
“nothing has happened but what is fortunate. The king is going to be
married, as I had the honor of informing you in my last letter, and, on his way
to Spain, he will pass through Blois.”

“To pay a visit to Monsieur?”

“Yes, monsieur le comte. So, fearing to find him unprepared, or wishing
to be particularly polite to him, monsieur le prince sent me forward to have
the lodgings ready.”

“You have seen Monsieur?” asked the comte, eagerly.

“I have had that honor.”

“At the castle?”

“Yes, monsieur,” replied Raoul, casting down his eyes, because, no
doubt, he had felt there was something more than curiosity in the comte’s
inquiries.

“Ah, indeed, vicomte? Accept my compliments thereupon.”

Raoul bowed.

“But you have seen some one else at Blois?”

“Monsieur, I saw her royal highness, Madame.”

“That’s very well: but it is not Madame that I mean.”

Raoul colored deeply, but made no reply.

“You do not appear to understand me, monsieur le vicomte,”
persisted M. de la Fere, without accenting his words more strongly, but with a
rather severer look.

“I understand you quite plainly, monsieur,” replied Raoul,
“and if I hesitate a little in my reply, you are well assured I am not
seeking for a falsehood.”

“No, you cannot tell a lie; and that makes me so astonished you should be
so long in saying yes or no.”

“I cannot answer you without understanding you very well; and if I have
understood you, you will take my first words in ill part. You will displeased,
no doubt, monsieur le comte, because I have seen—”

“Mademoiselle de la Valliere—have you not?”

“It was of her you meant to speak, I know very well, monsieur,”
said Raoul, with inexpressible sweetness.

“And I asked you if you have seen her.”

“Monsieur, I was ignorant, when I entered the castle, that Mademoiselle
de la Valliere was there; it was only on my return, after I had performed my
mission, that chance brought us together. I have had the honor of paying my
respects to her.”

“But what do you call the chance that led you into the presence of
Mademoiselle de la Valliere?”

“Mademoiselle de Montalais, monsieur.”

“And who is Mademoiselle de Montalais?”

“A young lady I did not know before, whom I had never seen. She is maid
of honor to Madame.”

“Monsieur le vicomte, I will push my interrogatory no further, and
reproach myself with having carried it so far. I had desired you to avoid
Mademoiselle de la Valliere, and not to see her without my permission. Oh, I am
quite sure you have told me the truth, and that you took no measures to
approach her. Chance has done me this injury; I do not accuse you of it. I will
be content, then, with what I formerly said to you concerning this young lady.
I do not reproach her with anything—God is my witness! only it is not my
intention or wish that you should frequent her place of residence. I beg you
once more, my dear Raoul, to understand that.”

It was plain the limpid eyes of Raoul were troubled at this speech.

“Now, my friend,” said the comte, with his soft smile, and in his
customary tone, “let us talk of other matters. You are returning,
perhaps, to your duty?”

“No, monsieur, I have no duty for to-day, except the pleasure of
remaining with you. The prince kindly appointed me no other: which was so much
in accord with my wish.”

“Is the king well?”

“Perfectly.”

“And monsieur le prince also?”

“As usual, monsieur.”

The comte forgot to inquire after Mazarin; that was an old habit.

“Well, Raoul, since you are entirely mine, I will give up my whole day to
you. Embrace me—again, again! You are at home, vicomte! Ah, there is our
old Grimaud! Come in, Grimaud: monsieur le vicomte is desirous of embracing you
likewise.”

The good old man did not require to be twice told; he rushed in with open arms,
Raoul meeting him half-way.

“Now, if you please, we will go into the garden, Raoul. I will show you
the new lodging I have had prepared for you during your leave of absence; and
whilst examining the last winter’s plantations, and two saddle-horses I
have just acquired, you will give me all the news of our friends in
Paris.”

The comte closed his manuscript, took the young man’s arm, and went out
into the gardens with him.

Grimaud looked at Raoul with a melancholy air as the young man passed out;
observing that his head nearly touched the traverse of the doorway, stroking
his white royale, he slowly murmured:—“How he has grown!”

Chapter V. In which Something will be said of
Cropoli.

Whilst the Comte de la Fere with Raoul visits the new
buildings he has erected, and the new horses he has bought, with the
reader’s permission we will lead him back to the city of Blois, and make
him a witness of the unaccustomed activity which pervades that city.

It was in the hotels that the surprise of the news brought by Raoul was most
sensibly felt.

In fact, the king and the court at Blois, that is to say, a hundred horsemen,
ten carriages, two hundred horses, as many lackeys as masters—where was
this crowd to be housed? Where were to be lodged all the gentry of the
neighborhood, who would gather in two or three hours after the news had
enlarged the circle of its report, like the increasing circumferences produced
by a stone thrown into a placid lake?

Blois, as peaceful in the morning, as we have seen, as the calmest lake in the
world, at the announcement of the royal arrival, was suddenly filled with the
tumult and buzzing of a swarm of bees.

All the servants of the castle, under the inspection of the officers, were sent
into the city in quest of provisions, and ten horsemen were dispatched to the
preserves of Chambord to seek for game, to the fisheries of Beuvron for fish,
and to the gardens of Cheverny for fruits and flowers.

Precious tapestries, and lusters with great gilt chains, were drawn from the
cupboards; an army of the poor were engaged in sweeping the courts and washing
the stone fronts, whilst their wives went in droves to the meadows beyond the
Loire, to gather green boughs and field-flowers. The whole city, not to be
behind in this luxury of cleanliness, assumed its best toilette with the help
of brushes, brooms, and water. The gutters of the upper town, swollen by these
continued ablutions, became rivers at the bottom of the city, and the pavement,
generally very muddy, it must be allowed, took a clean face, and absolutely
shone in the friendly rays of the sun.

Next the music was to be provided; drawers were emptied; the shop-keepers did a
glorious trade in wax, ribbons, and sword-knots; housekeepers laid in stores of
bread, meat, and spices. Already numbers of the citizens whose houses were
furnished as if for a siege, having nothing more to do, donned their festive
clothes, and directed their course towards the city gate, in order to be the
first to signal or see the cortege. They knew very well that the king would not
arrive before night, perhaps not before the next morning. Yet what is
expectation but a kind of folly, and what is that folly but an excess of hope?

In the lower city, at scarcely a hundred paces from the Castle of the States,
between the mall and the castle, in a sufficiently handsome street, then called
the Rue Vieille, and which must, in fact, have been very old, stood a venerable
edifice, with pointed gables, of squat but large dimensions, ornamented with
three windows looking into the street on the first floor, with two in the
second, and with a little oeil de boeuf in the third.

On the sides of this triangle had recently been constructed a parallelogram of
considerable size, which encroached upon the street remorselessly, according to
the familiar uses of the building of that period. The street was narrowed by a
quarter by it, but then the house was enlarged by a half; and was not that a
sufficient compensation?

Tradition said that this house with the pointed gables was inhabited, in the
time of Henry III., by a councilor of state whom Queen Catherine came, some say
to visit, and others to strangle. However that may be, the good lady must have
stepped with a circumspect foot over the threshold of this building.

After the councilor had died—whether by strangulation or naturally is of
no consequence—the house had been sold, then abandoned, and lastly
isolated from the other houses of the street. Towards the middle of the reign
of Louis XIII. only, an Italian named Cropoli, escaped from the kitchens of the
Marechal d’Ancre, came and took possession of this house. There he
established a little hostelry, in which was fabricated a macaroni so delicious
that people came from miles round to fetch it or eat it.

So famous had the house become for it, that when Mary de Medici was a prisoner,
as we know, in the castle of Blois, she once sent for some.

It was precisely on the day she had escaped by the famous window. The dish of
macaroni was left upon the table, only just tasted by the royal mouth.

This double favor, of a strangulation and a macaroni, conferred upon the
triangular house, gave poor Cropoli a fancy to grace his hostelry with a
pompous title. But his quality of an Italian was no recommendation in these
times, and his small, well-concealed fortune forbade attracting too much
attention.

When he found himself about to die, which happened in 1643, just after the
death of Louis XIII., he called to him his son, a young cook of great promise,
and with tears in his eyes, he recommended him to preserve carefully the secret
of the macaroni, to Frenchify his name, and at length, when the political
horizon should be cleared from the clouds which obscured it—this was
practiced then as in our day, to order of the nearest smith a handsome sign,
upon which a famous painter, whom he named, should design two queens’
portraits, with these words as a legend: “TO THE MEDICI.”

The worthy Cropoli, after these recommendations, had only sufficient time to
point out to his young successor a chimney, under the slab of which he had
hidden a thousand ten-franc pieces, and then expired.

Cropoli the younger, like a man of good heart, supported the loss with
resignation, and the gain without insolence. He began by accustoming the public
to sound the final i of his name so little, that by the aid of general
complaisance, he was soon called nothing but M. Cropole, which is quite a
French name. He then married, having had in his eye a little French girl, from
whose parents he extorted a reasonable dowry by showing them what there was
beneath the slab of the chimney.

These two points accomplished, he went in search of the painter who was to
paint the sign; and he was soon found. He was an old Italian, a rival of the
Raphaels and the Caracci, but an unfortunate rival. He said he was of the
Venetian school, doubtless from his fondness for color. His works, of which he
had never sold one, attracted the eye at a distance of a hundred paces; but
they so formidably displeased the citizens, that he had finished by painting no
more.

He boasted of having painted a bath-room for Madame la Marechale d’Ancre,
and mourned over this chamber having been burnt at the time of the
marechal’s disaster.

Cropoli, in his character of a compatriot, was indulgent towards Pittrino,
which was the name of the artist. Perhaps he had seen the famous pictures of
the bath-room. Be this as it may, he held in such esteem, we may say in such
friendship, the famous Pittrino, that he took him in his own house.

Pittrino, grateful, and fed with macaroni, set about propagating the reputation
of this national dish, and from the time of its founder, he had rendered, with
his indefatigable tongue, signal services to the house of Cropoli.

As he grew old he attached himself to the son as he had done to the father, and
by degrees became a kind of over-looker of a house in which his remarkable
integrity, his acknowledged sobriety, and a thousand other virtues useless to
enumerate, gave him an eternal place by the fireside, with a right of
inspection over the domestics. Besides this, it was he who tasted the macaroni,
to maintain the pure flavor of the ancient tradition; and it must be allowed
that he never permitted a grain of pepper too much, or an atom of parmesan too
little. His joy was at its height on that day when called upon to share the
secret of Cropoli the younger, and to paint the famous sign.

He was seen at once rummaging with ardor in an old box, in which he found some
brushes, a little gnawed by the rats, but still passable; some linseed-oil in a
bottle, and a palette which had formerly belonged to Bronzino, that dieu de la
pittoure, as the ultramontane artist, in his ever young enthusiasm, always
called him.

Pittrino was puffed up with all the joy of a rehabilitation.

He did as Raphael had done—he changed his style, and painted, in the
fashion of Albani, two goddesses rather than two queens. These illustrious
ladies appeared so lovely on the sign,—they presented to the astonished
eyes such an assemblage of lilies and roses, the enchanting result of the
changes of style in Pittrino—they assumed the poses of sirens so
Anacreontically—that the principal echevin, when admitted to view this
capital piece in the salle of Cropole, at once declared that these ladies were
too handsome, of too animated a beauty, to figure as a sign in the eyes of
passers-by.

To Pittrino he added, “His royal highness, Monsieur, who often comes into
our city, will not be much pleased to see his illustrious mother so slightly
clothed, and he will send you to the oubliettes of the state; for, remember,
the heart of that glorious prince is not always tender. You must efface either
the two sirens or the legend, without which I forbid the exhibition of the
sign. I say this for your sake, Master Cropole, as well for yours, Signor
Pittrino.”

What answer could be made to this? It was necessary to thank the echevin for
his kindness, which Cropole did. But Pittrino remained downcast and said he
felt assured of what was about to happen.

The visitor was scarcely gone when Cropole, crossing his arms, said:
“Well, master, what is to be done?”

“We must efface the legend,” said Pittrino, in a melancholy tone.
“I have some excellent ivory-black; it will be done in a moment, and we
will replace the Medici by the nymphs or the sirens, whichever you
prefer.”

“No,” said Cropole, “the will of my father must be carried
out. My father considered—”

“He considered the figures of the most importance,” said Pittrino.

“He thought most of the legend,” said Cropole.

“The proof of the importance in which he held the figures,” said
Pittrino, “is that he desired they should be likenesses, and they are
so.”

“Yes; but if they had not been so, who would have recognized them without
the legend? At the present day even, when the memory of the Blaisois begins to
be faint with regard to these two celebrated persons, who would recognize
Catherine and Mary without the words ‘To the Medici’?”

“But the figures?” said Pittrino, in despair; for he felt that
young Cropole was right. “I should not like to lose the fruit of my
labor.”

“And I should not wish you to be thrown into prison, and myself into the
oubliettes.”

“Let us efface ‘Medici’,” said Pittrino,
supplicatingly.

“No,” replied Cropole, firmly. “I have got an idea, a sublime
idea—your picture shall appear, and my legend likewise. Does not
‘Medici’ mean doctor, or physician, in Italian?”

“Yes, in the plural.”

“Well, then, you shall order another sign-frame of the smith; you shall
paint six physicians, and write underneath ‘Aux Medici’ which makes
a very pretty play upon words.”

“Six physicians! impossible! And the composition?” cried Pittrino.

“That is your business—but so it shall be—I insist upon
it—it must be so—my macaroni is burning.”

This reasoning was peremptory—Pittrino obeyed. He composed the sign of
six physicians, with the legend; the echevin applauded and authorized it.

The sign produced an extravagant success in the city, which proves that poetry
has always been in the wrong, before citizens, as Pittrino said.

Cropole, to make amends to his painter-in-ordinary, hung up the nymphs of the
preceding sign in his bedroom, which made Madame Cropole blush every time she
looked at it, when she was undressing at night.

This is the way in which the pointed-gable house got a sign; and this is how
the hostelry of the Medici, making a fortune, was found to be enlarged by a
quarter, as we have described. And this is how there was at Blois a hostelry of
that name, and had for a painter-in-ordinary Master Pittrino.

Chapter VI. The Unknown.

Thus founded and recommended by its sign, the hostelry
of Master Cropole held its way steadily on towards a solid prosperity.

It was not an immense fortune that Cropole had in perspective; but he might
hope to double the thousand louis d’or left by his father, to make
another thousand louis by the sale of his house and stock, and at length to
live happily like a retired citizen.

Cropole was anxious for gain, and was half-crazy with joy at the news of the
arrival of Louis XIV.

Himself, his wife, Pittrino, and two cooks, immediately laid hands upon all the
inhabitants of the dove-cote, the poultry-yard, and the rabbit-hutches; so that
as many lamentations and cries resounded in the yards of the hostelry of the
Medici as were formerly heard in Rama.

Cropole had, at the time, but one single traveler in his house.

This was a man of scarcely thirty years of age, handsome, tall, austere, or
rather melancholy, in all his gestures and looks.

He was dressed in black velvet with jet trimmings; a white collar, as plain as
that of the severest Puritan, set off the whiteness of his youthful neck; a
small dark-colored mustache scarcely covered his curled, disdainful lip.

He spoke to people looking them full in the face, without affectation, it is
true, but without scruple; so that the brilliancy of his black eyes became so
insupportable, that more than one look had sunk beneath his, like the weaker
sword in a single combat.

At this time, in which men, all created equal by God, were divided, thanks to
prejudices, into two distinct castes, the gentlemen and the commoner, as they
are really divided into two races, the black and the white,—at this time,
we say, he whose portrait we have just sketched could not fail of being taken
for a gentleman, and of the best class. To ascertain this, there was no
necessity to consult anything but his hands, long, slender, and white, of which
every muscle, every vein, became apparent through the skin at the least
movement, and eloquently spoke of good descent.

This gentleman, then, had arrived alone at Cropole’s house. He had taken,
without hesitation, without reflection even, the principal apartment which the
hotelier had pointed out to him with a rapacious aim, very praiseworthy, some
will say, very reprehensible will say others, if they admit that Cropole was a
physiognomist, and judged people at first sight.

This apartment was that which composed the whole front of the ancient
triangular house; a large salon, lighted by two windows on the first stage, a
small chamber by the side of it, and another above it.

Now, from the time he had arrived, this gentleman had scarcely touched any
repast that had been served up to him in his chamber. He had spoken but two
words to the host, to warn him that a traveler of the name of Parry would
arrive, and to desire that, when he did, he should be shown up to him
immediately.

He afterwards preserved so profound a silence, that Cropole was almost
offended, so much did he prefer people who were good company.

This gentleman had risen early the morning of the day on which this history
begins, and had placed himself at the window of his salon, seated upon the
ledge, and leaning upon the rail of the balcony, gazing sadly but persistently
on both sides of the street, watching, no doubt, for the arrival of the
traveler he had mentioned to the host.

In this way he had seen the little cortege of Monsieur return from hunting,
then had again partaken of the profound tranquillity of the street, absorbed in
his own expectations.

All at once the movement of the crowd going to the meadows, couriers setting
out, washers of pavement, purveyors of the royal household, gabbling,
scampering shop-boys, chariots in motion, hair-dressers on the run, and pages
toiling along, this tumult and bustle had surprised him, but without losing any
of that impassible and supreme majesty which gives to the eagle and the lion
that serene and contemptuous glance amidst the hurrahs and shouts of hunters or
the curious.

Soon the cries of the victims slaughtered in the poultry-yard, the hasty steps
of Madame Cropole up that little wooden staircase, so narrow and so echoing;
the bounding pace of Pittrino, who only that morning was smoking at the door
with all the phlegm of a Dutchman; all this communicated something like
surprise and agitation to the traveler.

As he was rising to make inquiries, the door of his chamber opened. The unknown
concluded they were about to introduce the impatiently expected traveler, and
made three precipitate steps to meet him.

But, instead of the person he expected, it was Master Cropole who appeared, and
behind him, in the half-dark staircase, the pleasant face of Madame Cropole,
rendered trivial by curiosity. She only gave one furtive glance at the handsome
gentleman, and disappeared.

Cropole advanced, cap in hand, rather bent than bowing.

A gesture of the unknown interrogated him, without a word being pronounced.

“Monsieur,” said Cropole, “I come to ask how—what ought
I to say: your lordship, monsieur le comte, or monsieur le marquis?”

“Say monsieur, and speak quickly,” replied the unknown, with that
haughty accent which admits of neither discussion nor reply.

“I came, then, to inquire how monsieur had passed the night, and if
monsieur intended to keep this apartment?”

“Yes.”

“Monsieur, something has happened upon which we could not reckon.”

“What?”

“His majesty Louis XIV. will enter our city to-day, and will remain here
one day, perhaps two.”

Great astonishment was painted on the countenance of the unknown.

“The King of France is coming to Blois?”

“He is on the road, monsieur.”

“Then there is the stronger reason for my remaining,” said the
unknown.

“Very well; but will monsieur keep all the apartments?”

“I do not understand you. Why should I require less to-day than
yesterday?”

“Because, monsieur, your lordship will permit me to say, yesterday I did
not think proper, when you chose your lodging, to fix any price that might have
made your lordship believe that I prejudged your resources; whilst
to-day—”

The unknown colored; the idea at once struck him that he was supposed to be
poor, and was being insulted.

“Whilst to-day,” replied he, coldly, “you do not
prejudge.”

“Monsieur, I am a well-meaning man, thank God! and simple hotelier as I
am, there is in me the blood of a gentleman. My father was a servant and
officer of the late Marechal d’Ancre. God rest his soul!”

“I do not contest that point with you; I only wish to know, and that
quickly, to what your questions tend?”

“You are too reasonable, monsieur, not to comprehend that our city is
small, that the court is about to invade it, that the houses will be
overflowing with inhabitants, and that lodgings will consequently obtain
considerable prices.”

Again the unknown colored. “Name your terms,” said he.

“I name them with scruple, monsieur, because I seek an honest gain, and
that I wish to carry on my business without being uncivil or extravagant in my
demands. Now the room you occupy is considerable, and you are alone.”

“That is my business.”

“Oh! certainly. I do not mean to turn monsieur out.”

The blood rushed to the temples of the unknown; he darted at poor Cropole, the
descendant of one of the officers of the Marechal d’Ancre, a glance that
would have crushed him down to beneath that famous chimney-slab, if Cropole had
not been nailed to the spot by the question of his own proper interests.

“Do you desire me to go?” said he. “Explain
yourself—but quickly.”

“Monsieur, monsieur, you do not understand me. It is very
critical—I know—that which I am doing. I express myself badly, or
perhaps, as monsieur is a foreigner, which I perceive by his
accent—”

In fact, the unknown spoke with that impetuosity which is the principal
character of English accentuation, even among men who speak the French language
with the greatest purity.

“As monsieur is a foreigner, I say, it is perhaps he who does not catch
my exact meaning. I wish for monsieur to give up one or two of the apartments
he occupies, which would diminish his expenses and ease my conscience. Indeed,
it is hard to increase unreasonably the price of the chambers, when one has had
the honor to let them at a reasonable price.”

“How much does the hire amount to since yesterday?”

“Monsieur, to one louis, with refreshments and the charge for the
horse.”

“Very well; and that of to-day?”

“Ah! there is the difficulty. This is the day of the king’s
arrival; if the court comes to sleep here, the charge of the day is reckoned.
From that it results that three chambers, at two louis each, make six louis.
Two louis, monsieur, are not much; but six louis make a great deal.”

The unknown, from red, as we have seen him, became very pale.

He drew from his pocket, with heroic bravery, a purse embroidered with a
coat-of-arms, which he carefully concealed in the hollow of his hand. This
purse was of a thinness, a flabbiness, a hollowness, which did not escape the
eye of Cropole.

The unknown emptied the purse into his hand. It contained three double louis,
which amounted to the six louis demanded by the host.

But it was seven that Cropole had required.

He looked, therefore, at the unknown, as much as to say, “And
then?”

“There remains one louis, does there not, master hotelier?”

“Yes, monsieur, but—”

The unknown plunged his hand into the pocket of his haut-de-chausses, and
emptied it. It contained a small pocket-book, a gold key, and some silver. With
this change, he made up a louis.

“Thank you, monsieur,” said Cropole. “It now only remains for
me to ask whether monsieur intends to occupy his apartments to-morrow, in which
case I will reserve them for him; whereas, if monsieur does not mean to do so,
I will promise them to some of the king’s people who are coming.”

“That is but right,” said the unknown, after a long silence;
“but as I have no more money, as you have seen, and as I yet must retain
the apartments, you must either sell this diamond in the city, or hold it in
pledge.”

Cropole looked at the diamond so long, that the unknown said, hastily:

“I prefer your selling it, monsieur; for it is worth three hundred
pistoles. A Jew—are there any Jews in Blois?—would give you two
hundred or a hundred and fifty for it—take whatever may be offered for
it, if it be no more than the price of your lodging. Begone!”

“Oh! monsieur,” replied Cropole, ashamed of the sudden inferiority
which the unknown reflected upon him by this noble and disinterested
confidence, as well as by the unalterable patience opposed to so many
suspicions and evasions. “Oh, monsieur, I hope people are not so
dishonest at Blois as you seem to think; and that the diamond, being worth what
you say—”

The unknown here again darted at Cropole one of his withering glances.

“I really do not understand diamonds, monsieur, I assure you,”
cried he.

“But the jewelers do: ask them,” said the unknown. “Now I
believe our accounts are settled, are they not, monsieur l’hote?”

“Yes, monsieur, and to my profound regret; for I fear I have offended
monsieur.”

“Not at all!” replied the unknown, with ineffable majesty.

“Or have appeared to be extortionate with a noble traveler. Consider,
monsieur, the peculiarity of the case.”

“Say no more about it, I desire; and leave me to myself.”

Cropole bowed profoundly, and left the room with a stupefied air, which
announced that he had a good heart, and felt genuine remorse.

The unknown himself shut the door after him, and, when left alone, looked
mournfully at the bottom of the purse, from which he had taken a small silken
bag containing the diamond, his last resource.

He dwelt likewise upon the emptiness of his pockets, turned over the papers in
his pocket-book, and convinced himself of the state of absolute destitution in
which he was about to be plunged.

He raised his eyes towards heaven, with a sublime emotion of despairing
calmness, brushed off with his hand some drops of sweat which trickled over his
noble brow, and then cast down upon the earth a look which just before had been
impressed with almost divine majesty.

That the storm had passed far from him, perhaps he had prayed in the bottom of
his soul.

He drew near to the window, resumed his place in the balcony, and remained
there, motionless, annihilated, dead, till the moment when, the heavens
beginning to darken, the first flambeaux traversed the enlivened street, and
gave the signal for illumination to all the windows of the city.

Chapter VII. Parry.

Whilst the unknown was viewing these lights with
interest, and lending an ear to the various noises, Master Cropole entered his
apartment, followed by two attendants, who laid the cloth for his meal.

The stranger did not pay them the least attention; but Cropole approaching him
respectfully, whispered, “Monsieur, the diamond has been valued.”

“Ah!” said the traveler. “Well?”

“Well, monsieur, the jeweler of S. A. R. gives two hundred and eighty
pistoles for it.”

“Have you them?”

“I thought it best to take them, monsieur; nevertheless, I made it a
condition of the bargain, that if monsieur wished to keep his diamond, it
should be held till monsieur was again in funds.”

“Oh, no, not at all: I told you to sell it.”

“Then I have obeyed, or nearly so, since, without having definitely sold
it, I have touched the money.”

“Pay yourself,” added the unknown.

“I will do so, monsieur, since you so positively require it.”

A sad smile passed over the lips of the gentleman.

“Place the money on that trunk,” said he, turning round and
pointing to the piece of furniture.

Cropole deposited a tolerably large bag as directed, after having taken from it
the amount of his reckoning.

“Now,” said he, “I hope monsieur will not give me the pain of
not taking any supper. Dinner has already been refused; this is affronting to
the house of les Medici. Look, monsieur, the supper is on the table, and I
venture to say that it is not a bad one.”

The unknown asked for a glass of wine, broke off a morsel of bread, and did not
stir from the window whilst he ate and drank.

Shortly after was heard a loud flourish of trumpets; cries arose in the
distance, a confused buzzing filled the lower part of the city, and the first
distinct sound that struck the ears of the stranger was the tramp of advancing
horses.

“The king! the king!” repeated a noisy and eager crowd.

“The king!” cried Cropole, abandoning his guest and his ideas of
delicacy, to satisfy his curiosity.

With Cropole were mingled, and jostled, on the staircase, Madame Cropole,
Pittrino, and the waiters and scullions.

The cortege advanced slowly, lighted by a thousand flambeaux, in the streets
and from the windows.

After a company of musketeers, a closely ranked troop of gentlemen, came the
litter of monsieur le cardinal, drawn like a carriage by four black horses. The
pages and people of the cardinal marched behind.

Next came the carriage of the queen-mother, with her maids of honor at the
doors, her gentlemen on horseback at both sides.

The king then appeared, mounted upon a splendid horse of Saxon breed, with a
flowing mane. The young prince exhibited, when bowing to some windows from
which issued the most animated acclamations, a noble and handsome countenance,
illuminated by the flambeaux of his pages.

By the side of the king, though a little in the rear, the Prince de Conde, M.
Dangeau, and twenty other courtiers, followed by their people and their
baggage, closed this veritably triumphant march. The pomp was of a military
character.

Some of the courtiers—the elder ones, for instance—wore traveling
dresses; but all the rest were clothed in warlike panoply. Many wore the gorget
and buff coat of the times of Henry IV. and Louis XIII.

When the king passed before him, the unknown, who had leant forward over the
balcony to obtain a better view, and who had concealed his face by leaning on
his arm, felt his heart swell and overflow with a bitter jealousy.

The noise of the trumpets excited him—the popular acclamations deafened
him: for a moment he allowed his reason to be absorbed in this flood of lights,
tumult, and brilliant images.

“He is a king!” murmured he, in an accent of despair.

Then, before he had recovered from his sombre reverie, all the noise, all the
splendor, had passed away. At the angle of the street there remained nothing
beneath the stranger but a few hoarse, discordant voices, shouting at intervals
“Vive le Roi!”

There remained likewise the six candles held by the inhabitants of the hostelry
des Medici; that is to say, two for Cropole, two for Pittrino, and one for each
scullion. Cropole never ceased repeating, “How good-looking the king is!
How strongly he resembles his illustrious father!”

“A handsome likeness!” said Pittrino.

“And what a lofty carriage he has!” added Madame Cropole, already
in promiscuous commentary with her neighbors of both sexes.

Cropole was feeding their gossip with his own personal remarks, without
observing that an old man on foot, but leading a small Irish horse by the
bridle, was endeavoring to penetrate the crowd of men and women which blocked
up the entrance to the Medici. But at that moment the voice of the stranger was
heard from the window.

“Make way, monsieur l’hotelier, to the entrance of your
house!”

Cropole turned around, and, on seeing the old man, cleared a passage for him.

The window was instantly closed.

Pittrino pointed out the way to the newly-arrived guest, who entered without
uttering a word.

The stranger waited for him on the landing; he opened his arms to the old man,
and led him to a seat.

“Oh, no, no, my lord!” said he. “Sit down in your
presence?—never!”

“Parry,” cried the gentleman, “I beg you will; you come from
England—you come so far. Ah! it is not for your age to undergo the
fatigues my service requires. Rest yourself.”

“I have my reply to give your lordship, in the first place.”

“Parry, I conjure you to tell me nothing; for if your news had been good,
you would not have begun in such a manner; you go about, which proves that the
news is bad.”

“My lord,” said the old man, “do not hasten to alarm
yourself; all is not lost, I hope. You must employ energy, but more
particularly resignation.”

“Parry,” said the young man, “I have reached this place
through a thousand snares and after a thousand difficulties; can you doubt my
energy? I have meditated this journey ten years, in spite of all counsels and
all obstacles—have you faith in my perseverance? I have this evening sold
the last of my father’s diamonds; for I had nothing wherewith to pay for
my lodgings and my host was about to turn me out.”

Parry made a gesture of indignation, to which the young man replied by a
pressure of the hand and a smile.

“I have still two hundred and seventy-four pistoles left and I feel
myself rich. I do not despair, Parry; have you faith in my resignation?”

The old man raised his trembling hands towards heaven.

“Let me know,” said the stranger,—“disguise nothing
from me—what has happened?”

“My recital will be short, my lord; but in the name of Heaven do not
tremble so.”

“It is impatience, Parry. Come, what did the general say to you?”

“At first the general would not receive me.”

“He took you for a spy?”

“Yes, my lord; but I wrote him a letter.”

“Well?”

“He read it, and received me, my lord.”

“Did that letter thoroughly explain my position and my views?”

“Oh, yes!” said Parry, with a sad smile; “it painted your
very thoughts faithfully.”

“Well—then, Parry.”

“Then the general sent me back the letter by an aide-de-camp, informing
me that if I were found the next day within the circumscription of his command,
he would have me arrested.”

“Arrested!” murmured the young man. “What! arrest you, my
most faithful servant?”

“Yes, my lord.”

“And notwithstanding you had signed the name Parry?”

“To all my letters, my lord; and the aide-de-camp had known me at St.
James’s and at Whitehall, too,” added the old man with a sigh.

The young man leaned forward, thoughtful and sad.

“Ay, that’s what he did before his people,” said he,
endeavoring to cheat himself with hopes. “But, privately—between
you and him—what did he do? Answer!”

“Alas! my lord, he sent to me four cavaliers, who gave me the horse with
which you just now saw me come back. These cavaliers conducted me, in great
haste, to the little port of Tenby, threw me, rather than embarked me, into a
little fishing-boat, about to sail for Brittany, and here I am.”

“Oh!” sighed the young man, clasping his neck convulsively with his
hand, and with a sob. “Parry, is that all?—is that all?”

“Yes, my lord; that is all.”

After this brief reply ensued a long interval of silence, broken only by the
convulsive beating of the heel of the young man on the floor.

The old man endeavored to change the conversation; it was leading to thoughts
much too sinister.

“My lord,” said he, “what is the meaning of all the noise
which preceded me? What are these people crying ‘Vive le Roi!’ for?
What king do they mean? and what are all these lights for?”

“Ah! Parry,” replied the young man ironically, “don’t
you know that this is the King of France visiting his good city of Blois? All
these trumpets are his, all those gilded housings are his, all those gentlemen
wear swords that are his. His mother precedes him in a carriage magnificently
encrusted with silver and gold. Happy mother! His minister heaps up millions,
and conducts him to a rich bride. Then all these people rejoice; they love
their king, they hail him with their acclamations, and they cry, ‘Vive le
Roi! Vive le Roi!’”

“Well, well, my lord,” said Parry, more uneasy at the turn the
conversation had taken than at the other.

“You know,” resumed the unknown, “that my mother and my
sister, whilst all this is going on in honor of the King of France, have
neither money nor bread; you know that I myself shall be poor and degraded
within a fortnight, when all Europe will become acquainted with what you have
told me. Parry, are there not examples in which a man of my condition should
himself—”

“My lord, in the name of Heaven—”

“You are right, Parry; I am a coward, and if I do nothing for myself,
what will God do? No, no; I have two arms, Parry, and I have a sword.”
And he struck his arm violently with his hand, and took down his sword, which
hung against the wall.

“What are you going to do, my lord?”

“What am I going to do, Parry? What every one in my family does. My
mother lives on public charity, my sister begs for my mother; I have, somewhere
or other, brothers who equally beg for themselves; and I, the eldest, will go
and do as all the rest do—I will go and ask charity!”

And with these words, which he finished sharply with a nervous and terrible
laugh, the young man girded on his sword, took his hat from the trunk, fastened
to his shoulder a black cloak, which he had worn all during his journey, and
pressing the two hands of the old man, who watched his proceedings with a look
of anxiety,—

“My good Parry,” said he, “order a fire, drink, eat, sleep,
and be happy; let us both be happy, my faithful friend, my only friend. We are
rich, as rich as kings!”

He struck the bag of pistoles with his clenched hand as he spoke, and it fell
heavily to the ground. He resumed that dismal laugh that had so alarmed Parry;
and whilst the whole household was screaming, singing, and preparing to install
the travelers who had been preceded by their lackeys, he glided out by the
principal entrance into the street, where the old man, who had gone to the
window, lost sight of him in a moment.

Chapter VIII. What his Majesty King Louis XIV. was at
the Age of Twenty-Two.

It has been seen, by the account we have endeavored to
give of it, that the entree of King Louis XIV. into the city of Blois had been
noisy and brilliant; his young majesty had therefore appeared perfectly
satisfied with it.

On arriving beneath the porch of the Castle of the States, the king met,
surrounded by his guards and gentlemen, with S. A. R. the duke, Gaston of
Orleans, whose physiognomy, naturally rather majestic, had borrowed on this
solemn occasion a fresh luster and a fresh dignity. On her part, Madame,
dressed in her robes of ceremony, awaited, in the interior balcony, the
entrance of her nephew. All the windows of the old castle, so deserted and
dismal on ordinary days, were resplendent with ladies and lights.

It was then to the sound of drums, trumpets, and vivats, that the young king
crossed the threshold of that castle in which, seventy-two years before, Henry
III. had called in the aid of assassination and treachery to keep upon his head
and in his house a crown which was already slipping from his brow, to fall into
another family.

All eyes, after having admired the young king, so handsome and so agreeable,
sought for that other king of France, much otherwise king than the former, and
so old, so pale, so bent, that people called the Cardinal Mazarin.

Louis was at this time endowed with all the natural gifts which make the
perfect gentleman; his eye was brilliant, mild, and of a clear azure blue. But
the most skillful physiognomists, those divers into the soul, on fixing their
looks upon it, if it had been possible for a subject to sustain the glance of
the king,—the most skillful physiognomists, we say, would never have been
able to fathom the depths of that abyss of mildness. It was with the eyes of
the king as with the immense depths of the azure heavens, or with those more
terrific, and almost as sublime, which the Mediterranean reveals under the
keels of its ships in a clear summer day, a gigantic mirror in which heaven
delights to reflect sometimes its stars, sometimes its storms.

The king was short of stature—he was scarcely five feet two inches: but
his youth made up for this defect, set off likewise by great nobleness in all
his movements, and by considerable address in all bodily exercises.

Certes, he was already quite a king, and it was a great thing to be a king in
that period of traditional devotedness and respect; but as, up to that time, he
had been but seldom and always poorly shown to the people, as they to whom he
was shown saw him by the side of his mother, a tall woman, and monsieur le
cardinal, a man of commanding presence, many found him so little of a king as
to say,—

“Why, the king is not so tall as monsieur le cardinal!”

Whatever may be thought of these physical observations, which were principally
made in the capital, the young king was welcomed as a god by the inhabitants of
Blois, and almost like a king by his uncle and aunt, Monsieur and Madame, the
inhabitants of the castle.

It must, however, be allowed, that when he saw, in the hall of reception,
chairs of equal height for himself, his mother, the cardinal, and his uncle and
aunt, a disposition artfully concealed by the semi-circular form of the
assembly, Louis XIV. became red with anger, and looked around him to ascertain
by the countenances of those that were present, if this humiliation had been
prepared for him. But as he saw nothing upon the impassible visage of the
cardinal, nothing on that of his mother, nothing on those of the assembly, he
resigned himself, and sat down, taking care to be seated before anybody else.

The gentlemen and ladies were presented to their majesties and monsieur le
cardinal.

The king remarked that his mother and he scarcely knew the names of any of the
persons who were presented to them; whilst the cardinal, on the contrary, never
failed, with an admirable memory and presence of mind, to talk to every one
about his estates, his ancestors, or his children, some of whom he named, which
enchanted those worthy country gentlemen, and confirmed them in the idea that
he alone is truly king who knows his subjects, from the same reason that the
sun has no rival, because the sun alone warms and lightens.

The study of the young king, which had begun a long time before, without
anybody suspecting it, was continued then, and he looked around him attentively
to endeavor to make out something in the physiognomies which had at first
appeared the most insignificant and trivial.

A collation was served. The king, without daring to call upon the hospitality
of his uncle, had waited for it impatiently. This time, therefore, he had all
the honors due, if not to his rank, at least to his appetite.

As to the cardinal, he contented himself with touching with his withered lips a
bouillon, served in a golden cup. The all-powerful minister, who had taken her
regency from the queen, and his royalty from the king, had not been able to
take a good stomach from nature.

Anne of Austria, already suffering from the cancer which six or eight years
after caused her death, ate very little more than the cardinal.

For Monsieur, already puffed up with the great event which had taken place in
his provincial life, he ate nothing whatever.

Madame alone, like a true Lorrainer, kept pace with his majesty; so that Louis
XIV., who, without this partner, might have eaten nearly alone, was at first
much pleased with his aunt, and afterwards with M. de Saint-Remy, her maitre
d’hotel, who had really distinguished himself.

The collation over, at a sign of approbation from M. de Mazarin, the king
arose, and, at the invitation of his aunt, walked about among the ranks of the
assembly.

The ladies then observed—there are certain things for which women are as
good observers at Blois as at Paris—the ladies then observed that Louis
XIV. had a prompt and bold look, which premised a distinguished appreciator of
beauty. The men, on their part, observed that the prince was proud and haughty,
that he loved to look down those who fixed their eyes upon him too long or too
earnestly, which gave presage of a master.

Louis XIV. had accomplished about a third of his review when his ears were
struck with a word which his eminence pronounced whilst conversing with
Monsieur.

This word was the name of a woman.

Scarcely had Louis XIV. heard this word than he heard, or rather listening to
nothing else; and neglecting the arc of the circle which awaited his visit, his
object seemed to be to come as quickly as possible to the extremity of the
curve.

Monsieur, like a good courtier, was inquiring of monsieur le cardinal after the
health of his nieces; he regretted, he said, not having the pleasure of
receiving them at the same time with their uncle; they must certainly have
grown in stature, beauty and grace, as they had promised to do the last time
Monsieur had seen them.

What had first struck the king was a certain constraint in the voices of the
two interlocutors. The voice of Monsieur was calm and natural when he spoke
thus; while that of M. de Mazarin jumped by a note and a half to reply above
the diapason of his usual voice. It might have been said that he wished that
voice to strike, at the end of the salon, any ear that was too distant.

“Monseigneur,” replied he, “Mesdemoiselles de Mazarin have
still to finish their education: they have duties to fulfill, and a position to
make. An abode in a young and brilliant court would dissipate them a
little.”

Louis, at this last sentence, smiled sadly. The court was young, it was true,
but the avarice of the cardinal had taken good care that it should not be
brilliant.

“You have nevertheless no intention,” replied Monsieur, “to
cloister them or make them borgeoises?”

“Not at all,” replied the cardinal, forcing his Italian
pronunciation in such a manner that, from soft and velvety as it was, it became
sharp and vibrating; “not at all: I have a full and fixed intention to
marry them, and that as well as I shall be able.”

“Parties will not be wanting, monsieur le cardinal,” replied
Monsieur, with a bonhomie worthy of one tradesman congratulating another.

“I hope not, monseigneur, and with reason, as God has been pleased to
give them grace, intelligence, and beauty.”

During this conversation, Louis XIV., conducted by Madame, accomplished, as we
have described, the circle of presentations.

“Mademoiselle Auricule,” said the princess, presenting to his
majesty a fat, fair girl of two-and-twenty, who at a village fete might have
been taken for a peasant in Sunday finery,—“the daughter of my
music-mistress.”

The king smiled. Madame had never been able to extract four correct notes from
either viol or harpsichord.

“Mademoiselle Aure de Montalais,” continued Madame; “a young
lady of rank, and my good attendant.”

This time it was not the king that smiled; it was the young lady presented,
because, for the first time in her life, she heard, given to her by Madame, who
generally showed no tendency to spoil her, such an honorable qualification.

Our old acquaintance Montalais, therefore, made his majesty a profound
courtesy, the more respectful from the necessity she was under of concealing
certain contractions of her laughing lips, which the king might not have
attributed to their real cause.

It was just at this moment that the king caught the word which startled him.

“And the name of the third?” asked Monsieur.

“Mary, monseigneur,” replied the cardinal.

There was doubtless some magical influence in that word, for, as we have said,
the king started in hearing it, and drew Madame towards the middle of the
circle, as if he wished to put some confidential question to her, but, in
reality, for the sake of getting nearer to the cardinal.

“Madame, my aunt,” said he, laughing, and in a suppressed voice,
“my geography-master did not teach me that Blois was at such an immense
distance from Paris.”

“What do you mean, nephew?” asked Madame.

“Why, because it would appear that it requires several years, as regards
fashion, to travel the distance!—Look at those young ladies!”

“Well; I know them all.”

“Some of them are pretty.”

“Don’t say that too loud, monsieur my nephew; you will drive them
wild.”

“Stop a bit, stop a bit, dear aunt!” said the king, smiling;
“for the second part of my sentence will serve as a corrective to the
first. Well, my dear aunt, some of them appear old and others ugly, thanks to
their ten-year-old fashions.”

“But, sire, Blois is only five days’ journey from Paris.”

“Yes, that is it,” said the king: “two years behind for each
day.”

“Indeed! do you really think so? Well, that is strange! It never struck
me.”

“Now, look, aunt,” said Louis XIV., drawing still nearer to
Mazarin, under the pretext of gaining a better point of view, “look at
that simple white dress by the side of those antiquated specimens of finery,
and those pretentious coiffures. She is probably one of my mother’s maids
of honor, though I don’t know her.”

“Ah! ah! my dear nephew!” replied Madame, laughing; “permit
me to tell you that your divinatory science is at fault for once. The young
lady you honor with your praise is not a Parisian, but a Blaisoise.”

“Oh, aunt!” replied the king with a look of doubt.

“Come here, Louise,” said Madame.

And the fair girl, already known to you under that name, approached them,
timid, blushing, and almost bent beneath the royal glance.

“Mademoiselle Louise Francoise de la Beaume le Blanc, the daughter of the
Marquise de la Valliere,” said Madame, ceremoniously.

The young girl bowed with so much grace, mingled with the profound timidity
inspired by the presence of the king, that the latter lost, while looking at
her, a few words of the conversation of Monsieur and the cardinal.

“Daughter-in-law,” continued Madame, “of M. de Saint-Remy, my
maitre d’hotel, who presided over the confection of that excellent daube
truffee which your majesty seemed so much to appreciate.”

No grace, no youth, no beauty, could stand out against such a presentation. The
king smiled. Whether the words of Madame were a pleasantry, or uttered in all
innocency, they proved the pitiless immolation of everything that Louis had
found charming or poetic in the young girl. Mademoiselle de la Valliere, for
Madame and, by rebound, for the king, was, for a moment, no more than the
daughter of a man of a superior talent over dindes truffees.

But princes are thus constituted. The gods, too, were just like this in
Olympus. Diana and Venus, no doubt, abused the beautiful Alcmena and poor Io,
when they condescended for distraction’s sake, to speak, amidst nectar
and ambrosia, of mortal beauties, at the table of Jupiter.

Fortunately, Louise was so bent in her reverential salute, that she did not
catch either Madame’s words or the king’s smile. In fact, if the
poor child, who had so much good taste as alone to have chosen to dress herself
in white amidst all her companions—if that dove’s heart, so easily
accessible to painful emotions, had been touched by the cruel words of Madame,
or the egotistical cold smile of the king, it would have annihilated her.

And Montalais herself, the girl of ingenious ideas, would not have attempted to
recall her to life; for ridicule kills beauty even.

But fortunately, as we have said, Louise, whose ears were buzzing, and her eyes
veiled by timidity,—Louise saw nothing and heard nothing; and the king,
who had still his attention directed to the conversation of the cardinal and
his uncle, hastened to return to them.

He came up just at the moment Mazarin terminated by saying: “Mary, as
well as her sisters, has just set off for Brouage. I make them follow the
opposite bank of the Loire to that along which we have traveled; and if I
calculate their progress correctly, according to the orders I have given, they
will to-morrow be opposite Blois.”

These words were pronounced with that tact—that measure, that
distinctness of tone, of intention, and reach—which made del Signor
Giulio Mazarini the first comedian in the world.

It resulted that they went straight to the heart of Louis XIV., and the
cardinal, on turning round at the simple noise of the approaching footsteps of
his majesty, saw the immediate effect of them upon the countenance of his
pupil, an effect betrayed to the keen eyes of his eminence by a slight increase
of color. But what was the ventilation of such a secret to him whose craft had
for twenty years deceived all the diplomatists of Europe?

From the moment the young king heard these last words, he appeared as if he had
received a poisoned arrow in his heart. He could not remain quiet in a place,
but cast around an uncertain, dead, and aimless look over the assembly. He with
his eyes interrogated his mother more than twenty times: but she, given up to
the pleasure of conversing with her sister-in-law, and likewise constrained by
the glance of Mazarin, did not appear to comprehend any of the supplications
conveyed by the looks of her son.

From this moment, music, lights, flowers, beauties, all became odious and
insipid to Louis XIV. After he had a hundred times bitten his lips, stretched
his legs and his arms like a well-brought-up child, who, without daring to
gape, exhausts all the modes of evincing his weariness—after having
uselessly again implored his mother and the minister, he turned a despairing
look towards the door, that is to say, towards liberty.

At this door, in the embrasure of which he was leaning, he saw, standing out
strongly, a figure with a brown and lofty countenance, an aquiline nose, a
stern but brilliant eye, gray and long hair, a black mustache, the true type of
military beauty, whose gorget, more sparkling than a mirror, broke all the
reflected lights which concentrated upon it, and sent them back as lightning.
This officer wore his gray hat with its long red plumes upon his head, a proof
that he was called there by his duty, and not by his pleasure. If he had been
brought thither by his pleasure—if he had been a courtier instead of a
soldier, as pleasure must always be paid for at the same price—he would
have held his hat in his hand.

That which proved still better that this officer was upon duty, and was
accomplishing a task to which he was accustomed, was, that he watched, with
folded arms, remarkable indifference, and supreme apathy, the joys and ennuis
of this fete. Above all, he appeared, like a philosopher, and all old soldiers
are philosophers,—he appeared above all to comprehend the ennuis
infinitely better than the joys; but in the one he took his part, knowing very
well how to do without the other.

Now, he was leaning, as we have said, against the carved door-frame when the
melancholy, weary eyes of the king, by chance, met his.

It was not the first time, as it appeared, that the eyes of the officer had met
those eyes, and he was perfectly acquainted with the expression of them; for,
as soon as he had cast his own look upon the countenance of Louis XIV., and had
read by it what was passing in his heart—that is to say, all the ennui
that oppressed him—all the timid desire to go out which agitated
him,—he perceived he must render the king a service without his
commanding it,—almost in spite of himself. Boldly, therefore, as if he
had given the word of command to cavalry in battle, “On the king’s
service!” cried he, in a clear, sonorous voice.

At these words, which produced the effect of a peal of thunder, prevailing over
the orchestra, the singing and the buzz of the promenaders, the cardinal and
the queen-mother looked at each other with surprise.

Louis XIV., pale, but resolved, supported as he was by that intuition of his
own thought which he had found in the mind of the officer of musketeers, and
which he had just manifested by the order given, arose from his chair, and took
a step towards the door.

“Are you going, my son?” said the queen, whilst Mazarin satisfied
himself with interrogating by a look which might have appeared mild if it had
not been so piercing.

“Yes, madame,” replied the king; “I am fatigued, and,
besides, wish to write this evening.”

A smile stole over the lips of the minister, who appeared, by a bend of the
head, to give the king permission.

Monsieur and Madame hastened to give orders to the officers who presented
themselves.

The king bowed, crossed the hall, and gained the door, where a hedge of twenty
musketeers awaited him. At the extremity of this hedge stood the officer,
impassible, with his drawn sword in his hand. The king passed, and all the
crowd stood on tip-toe, to have one more look at him.

Ten musketeers, opening the crowd of the ante-chambers and the steps, made way
for his majesty. The other ten surrounded the king and Monsieur, who had
insisted upon accompanying his majesty. The domestics walked behind. This
little cortege escorted the king to the chamber destined for him. The apartment
was the same that had been occupied by Henry III. during his sojourn in the
States.

Monsieur had given his orders. The musketeers, led by their officer, took
possession of the little passage by which one wing of the castle communicates
with the other. This passage was commenced by a small square ante-chamber, dark
even in the finest days. Monsieur stopped Louis XIV.

“You are passing now, sire,” said he, “the very spot where
the Duc de Guise received the first stab of the poniard.”

The king was ignorant of all historical matters; he had heard of the fact, but
he knew nothing of the localities or the details.

“Ah!” said he with a shudder.

And he stopped. The rest, both behind and before him, stopped likewise.

“The duc, sire,” continued Gaston, “was nearly were I stand:
he was walking in the same direction as your majesty; M. de Loignac was exactly
where your lieutenant of musketeers is; M. de Saint-Maline and his
majesty’s ordinaries were behind him and around him. It was here that he
was struck.”

The king turned towards his officer, and saw something like a cloud pass over
his martial and daring countenance.

“Yes, from behind!” murmured the lieutenant, with a gesture of
supreme disdain. And he endeavored to resume the march, as if ill at ease at
being between walls formerly defiled by treachery.

But the king, who appeared to wish to be informed, was disposed to give another
look at this dismal spot.

Gaston perceived his nephew’s desire.

“Look, sire,” said he, taking a flambeaux from the hands of M. de
Saint-Remy, “this is where he fell. There was a bed there, the curtains
of which he tore with catching at them.”

“Why does the floor seem hollowed out at this spot?” asked Louis.

“Because it was here the blood flowed,” replied Gaston; “the
blood penetrated deeply into the oak, and it was only by cutting it out that
they succeeded in making it disappear. And even then,” added Gaston,
pointing the flambeaux to the spot, “even then this red stain resisted
all the attempts made to destroy it.”

Louis XIV. raised his head. Perhaps he was thinking of that bloody trace that
had once been shown him at the Louvre, and which, as a pendant to that of
Blois, had been made there one day by the king his father with the blood of
Concini.

“Let us go on,” said he.

The march was resumed promptly; for emotion, no doubt, had given to the voice
of the young prince a tone of command which was not customary with him. When he
arrived at the apartment destined for the king, which communicated not only
with the little passage we have passed through, but further with the great
staircase leading to the court,—

“Will your majesty,” said Gaston, “condescend to occupy this
apartment, all unworthy as it is to receive you?”

“Uncle,” replied the young king, “I render you my thanks for
your cordial hospitality.”

Gaston bowed to his nephew, embraced him, and then went out.

Of the twenty musketeers who had accompanied the king, ten reconducted Monsieur
to the reception-rooms, which were not yet empty, notwithstanding the king had
retired.

The ten others were posted by their officer, who himself explored, in five
minutes, all the localities, with that cold and certain glance which not even
habit gives unless that glance belongs to genius.

Then, when all were placed, he chose as his headquarters the ante-chamber, in
which he found a large fauteuil, a lamp, some wine, some water, and some dry
bread.

He refreshed his lamp, drank half a glass of wine, curled his lip with a smile
full of expression, installed himself in his large armchair, and made
preparations for sleeping.

Chapter IX. In which the Unknown of the Hostelry of
Les Medici loses his Incognito.

This officer, who was sleeping, or preparing to sleep,
was, notwithstanding his careless air, charged with a serious responsibility.

Lieutenant of the king’s musketeers, he commanded all the company which
came from Paris, and that company consisted of a hundred and twenty men; but,
with the exception of the twenty of whom we have spoken, the other hundred were
engaged in guarding the queen-mother, and more particularly the cardinal.

Monsignor Giulio Mazarini economized the traveling expenses of his guards; he
consequently used the king’s, and that largely, since he took fifty of
them for himself—a peculiarity which would not have failed to strike any
one unacquainted with the usages of that court.

That which would still further have appeared, if not inconvenient, at least
extraordinary, to a stranger, was, that the side of the castle destined for
monsieur le cardinal was brilliant, light and cheerful. The musketeers there
mounted guard before every door, and allowed no one to enter, except the
couriers, who, even while he was traveling, followed the cardinal for the
carrying on of his correspondence.

Twenty men were on duty with the queen-mother; thirty rested, in order to
relieve their companions the next day.

On the king’s side, on the contrary, were darkness, silence, and
solitude. When once the doors were closed, there was no longer an appearance of
royalty. All the servitors had by degrees retired. Monsieur le Prince had sent
to know if his majesty required his attendance; and on the customary
“No” of the lieutenant of musketeers, who was habituated to the
question and the reply, all appeared to sink into the arms of sleep, as if in
the dwelling of a good citizen.

And yet it was possible to hear from the side of the house occupied by the
young king the music of the banquet, and to see the windows of the great hall
richly illuminated.

Ten minutes after his installation in his apartment, Louis XIV. had been able
to learn, by movement much more distinguished than marked his own leaving, the
departure of the cardinal, who, in his turn, sought his bedroom, accompanied by
a large escort of ladies and gentlemen.

Besides, to perceive this movement, he had nothing to do but look out at his
window, the shutters of which had not been closed.

His eminence crossed the court, conducted by Monsieur, who himself held a
flambeau; then followed the queen-mother, to whom Madame familiarly gave her
arm; and both walked chatting away, like two old friends.

Behind these two couples filed nobles, ladies, pages and officers; the
flambeaux gleamed over the whole court, like the moving reflections of a
conflagration. Then the noise of steps and voices became lost in the upper
floors of the castle.

No one was then thinking of the king, who, leaning on his elbow at his window,
had sadly seen pass away all that light, and heard that noise die off—no,
not one, if it was not that unknown of the hostelry des Medici, whom we have
seen go out, enveloped in his cloak.

He had come straight up to the castle, and had, with his melancholy
countenance, wandered round and round the palace, from which the people had not
yet departed; and finding that on one guarded the great entrance, or the porch,
seeing that the soldiers of Monsieur were fraternizing with the royal
soldiers—that is to say, swallowing Beaugency at discretion, or rather
indiscretion—the unknown penetrated through the crowd, then ascended to
the court, and came to the landing of the staircase leading to the
cardinal’s apartment.

What, according to all probability, induced him to direct his steps that way,
was the splendor of the flambeaux, and the busy air of the pages and domestics.
But he was stopped short by a presented musket and the cry of the sentinel.

“Where are you going, my friend?” asked the soldier.

“I am going to the king’s apartment,” replied the unknown,
haughtily, but tranquilly.

The soldier called one of his eminence’s officers, who, in the tone in
which a youth in office directs a solicitor to a minister, let fall these
words: “The other staircase, in front.”

And the officer, without further notice of the unknown, resumed his interrupted
conversation.

The stranger, without reply, directed his steps towards the staircase pointed
out to him. On this side there was no noise, there were no more flambeaux.

Obscurity, through which a sentinel glided like a shadow; silence, which
permitted him to hear the sound of his own footsteps, accompanied with the
jingling of his spurs upon the stone slabs.

This guard was one of the twenty musketeers appointed for attendance upon the
king, and who mounted guard with the stiffness and consciousness of a statue.

“Who goes there?” said the guard.

“A friend,” replied the unknown.

“What do you want?”

“To speak to the king.”

“Do you, my dear monsieur? That’s not very likely.”

“Why not?”

“Because the king has gone to bed.”

“Gone to bed already?”

“Yes.”

“No matter: I must speak to him.”

“And I tell you that is impossible.”

“And yet—”

“Go back!”

“Do you require the word?”

“I have no account to render to you. Stand back!”

And this time the soldier accompanied his word with a threatening gesture; but
the unknown stirred no more than if his feet had taken root.

“Monsieur le mousquetaire,” said he, “are you a
gentleman?”

“I have that honor.”

“Very well! I also am one; and between gentlemen some consideration ought
to be observed.”

The soldier lowered his arms, overcome by the dignity with which these words
were pronounced.

“Speak, monsieur,” said he; “and if you ask me anything in my
power—”

“Thank you. You have an officer, have you not?”

“Our lieutenant? Yes, monsieur.”

“Well, I wish to speak to him.”

“Oh, that’s a different thing. Come up, monsieur.”

The unknown saluted the soldier in a lofty fashion, and ascended the staircase;
whilst a cry, “Lieutenant, a visit!” transmitted from sentinel to
sentinel, preceded the unknown, and disturbed the slumbers of the officer.

Dragging on his boot, rubbing his eyes, and hooking his cloak, the lieutenant
made three steps towards the stranger.

“What can I do to serve you, monsieur?” asked he.

“You are the officer on duty, lieutenant of the musketeers, are
you?”

“I have that honor,” replied the officer.

“Monsieur, I must absolutely speak to the king.”

The lieutenant looked attentively at the unknown, and in that look, he saw all
he wished to see—that is to say, a person of high distinction in an
ordinary dress.

“I do not suppose you to be mad,” replied he; “and yet you
seem to me to be in a condition to know, monsieur, that people do not enter a
king’s apartments in this manner without his consent.”

“He will consent.”

“Monsieur, permit me to doubt that. The king has retired this quarter of
an hour; he must be now undressing. Besides, the word is given.”

“When he knows who I am, he will recall the word.”

The officer was more and more surprised, more and more subdued.

“If I consent to announce you, may I at least know whom to announce,
monsieur?”

“You will announce His Majesty Charles II., King of England, Scotland,
and Ireland.”

The officer uttered a cry of astonishment, drew back, and there might be seen
upon his pallid countenance one of the most poignant emotions that ever an
energetic man endeavored to drive back to his heart.

“Oh, yes, sire; in fact,” said he, “I ought to have
recognized you.”

“You have seen my portrait, then?”

“No, sire.”

“Or else you have seen me formerly at court, before I was driven from
France?”

“No, sire, it is not even that.”

“How then could you have recognized me, if you have never seen my
portrait or my person?”

“Sire, I saw his majesty your father at a terrible moment.”

“The day—”

“Yes.”

A dark cloud passed over the brow of the prince; then, dashing his hand across
it, “Do you see any difficulty in announcing me?” said he.

“Sire, pardon me,” replied the officer, “but I could not
imagine a king under so simple an exterior; and yet I had the honor to tell
your majesty just now that I had seen Charles I. But pardon me, monsieur; I
will go and inform the king.”

But returning after going a few steps, “Your majesty is desirous, without
doubt, that this interview should be a secret?” said he.

“I do not require it; but if it were possible to preserve
it—”

“It is possible, sire, for I can dispense with informing the first
gentleman on duty; but, for that, your majesty must please to consent to give
up your sword.”

“True, true; I had forgotten that no one armed is permitted to enter the
chamber of a king of France.”

“Your majesty will form an exception, if you wish it; but then I shall
avoid my responsibility by informing the king’s attendant.”

“Here is my sword, monsieur. Will you now please to announce me to his
majesty?”

“Instantly, sire.” And the officer immediately went and knocked at
the door of communication, which the valet opened to him.

“His Majesty the King of England!” said the officer.

“His Majesty the King of England!” replied the valet de chambre.

At these words a gentleman opened the folding-doors of the king’s
apartment, and Louis XIV. was seen, without hat or sword, and his pourpoint
open, advancing with signs of the greatest surprise.

“You, my brother—you at Blois!” cried Louis XIV., dismissing
with a gesture both the gentlemen and the valet de chambre, who passed out into
the next apartment.

“Sire,” replied Charles II., “I was going to Paris, in the
hope of seeing your majesty, when report informed me of your approaching
arrival in this city. I therefore prolonged my abode here, having something
very particular to communicate to you.”

“Will this closet suit you, my brother?”

“Perfectly well, sire; for I think no one can hear us here.”

“I have dismissed my gentleman and my watcher; they are in the next
chamber. There, behind that partition, is a solitary closet, looking into the
ante-chamber, and in that ante-chamber you found nobody but a solitary officer,
did you?”

“No, sire.”

“Well, then, speak, my brother; I listen to you.”

“Sire, I commence, and entreat your majesty to have pity on the
misfortunes of our house.”

The king of France colored, and drew his chair closer to that of the king of
England.

“Sire,” said Charles II., “I have no need to ask if your
majesty is acquainted with the details of my deplorable history.”

Louis XIV. blushed, this time more strongly than before; then, stretching forth
his hand to that of the king of England, “My brother,” said he,
“I am ashamed to say so, but the cardinal scarcely ever speaks of
political affairs before me. Still more, formerly I used to get Laporte, my
valet de chambre, to read historical subjects to me; but he put a stop to these
readings, and took away Laporte from me. So that I beg my brother Charles to
tell me all those matters as to a man who knows nothing.”

“Well, sire, I think that by taking things from the beginning I shall
have a better chance of touching the heart of your majesty.”

“Speak on, my brother—speak on.”

“You know, sire, that being called in 1650 to Edinburgh, during
Cromwell’s expedition into Ireland, I was crowned at Scone. A year after,
wounded in one of the provinces he had usurped, Cromwell returned upon us. To
meet him was my object; to leave Scotland was my wish.”

“And yet,” interrupted the young king, “Scotland is almost
your native country, is it not, my brother?”

“Yes, but the Scots were cruel compatriots for me, sire; they had forced
me to forsake the religion of my fathers; they had hung Lord Montrose, the most
devoted of my servants, because he was not a Covenanter; and as the poor
martyr, to whom they had offered a favor when dying, had asked that his body
might be cut into as many pieces as there are cities in Scotland, in order that
evidence of his fidelity might be met with everywhere, I could not leave one
city, or go into another, without passing under some fragments of a body which
had acted, fought, and breathed for me.

“By a bold, almost desperate march, I passed through Cromwell’s
army, and entered England. The Protector set out in pursuit of this strange
flight, which had a crown for its object. If I had been able to reach London
before him, without doubt the prize of the race would have been mine; but he
overtook me at Worcester.

“The genius of England was no longer with us, but with him. On the 3rd of
September, 1651, sire, the anniversary of the other battle of Dunbar, so fatal
to the Scots, I was conquered. Two thousand men fell around me before I thought
of retreating a step. At length I was obliged to fly.

“From that moment my history became a romance. Pursued with persistent
inveteracy, I cut off my hair, I disguised myself as a woodman. One day spent
amidst the branches of an oak gave to that tree the name of the royal oak,
which it bears to this day. My adventures in the county of Stafford, whence I
escaped with the daughter of my host on a pillion behind me, still fill the
tales of the country firesides, and would furnish matter for ballads. I will
some day write all this, sire, for the instruction of my brother kings.

“I will first tell how, on arriving at the residence of Mr. Norton, I met
with a court chaplain, who was looking on at a party playing at skittles, and
an old servant who named me, bursting into tears, and who was as near and as
certainly killing me by his fidelity as another might have been by treachery.
Then I will tell of my terrors—yes, sire, of my terrors—when, at
the house of Colonel Windham, a farrier who came to shoe our horses declared
they had been shod in the north.”

“How strange!” murmured Louis XIV. “I never heard anything of
all that; I was only told of your embarkation at Brighelmstone and your landing
in Normandy.”*

* The correct name of the city is Brighthelmstone. The mistake is
Dumas’s.

“Oh!” exclaimed Charles, “if Heaven permits kings to be thus
ignorant of the histories of each other, how can they render assistance to
their brothers who need it?”

“But tell me,” continued Louis XIV., “how, after being so
roughly received in England, you can still hope for anything from that unhappy
country and that rebellious people?”

“Oh, sire! since the battle of Worcester, everything is changed there.
Cromwell is dead, after having signed a treaty with France, in which his name
is placed above yours. He died on the 3rd of September, 1658, a fresh
anniversary of the battles of Dunbar and Worcester.”

“His son has succeeded him.”

“But certain men have a family, sire, and no heir. The inheritance of
Oliver was too heavy for Richard. Richard was neither a republican nor a
royalist; Richard allowed his guards to eat his dinner, and his generals to
govern the republic; Richard abdicated the protectorate on the 22nd of April,
1659, more than a year ago, sire.

“From that time England is nothing but a tennis-court, in which the
players throw dice for the crown of my father. The two most eager players are
Lambert and Monk. Well, sire, I, in my turn, wish to take part in this game,
where the stakes are thrown upon my royal mantle. Sire, it only requires a
million to corrupt one of these players and make an ally of him, or two hundred
of your gentlemen to drive them out of my palace at Whitehall, as Christ drove
the money-changers from the temple.”

“You come, then,” replied Louis XIV., “to ask
me—”

“For your assistance; that is to say, not only for that which kings owe
to each other, but that which simple Christians owe to each other—your
assistance, sire, either in money or men. Your assistance, sire, and within a
month, whether I oppose Lambert to Monk, or Monk to Lambert, I shall have
reconquered my paternal inheritance, without having cost my country a guinea,
or my subjects a drop of blood, for they are now all drunk with revolutions,
protectorates, and republics, and ask nothing better than to fall staggering to
sleep in the arms of royalty. Your assistance, sire, and I shall owe you more
than I owe my father,—my poor father, who bought at so dear a rate the
ruin of our house! You may judge, sire, whether I am unhappy, whether I am in
despair, for I accuse my own father!”

And the blood mounted to the pale face of Charles II., who remained for an
instant with his head between his hands, and as if blinded by that blood which
appeared to revolt against the filial blasphemy.

The young king was not less affected than his elder brother; he threw himself
about in his fauteuil, and could not find a single word of reply.

Charles II., to whom ten years in age gave a superior strength to master his
emotions, recovered his speech the first.

“Sire,” said he, “your reply? I wait for it as a criminal
waits for his sentence. Must I die?”

“My brother,” replied the French prince, “you ask of me for a
million—me, who was never possessed of a quarter of that sum! I possess
nothing. I am no more king of France than you are king of England. I am a name,
a cipher dressed in fleur-de-lised velvet,—that is all. I am upon a
visible throne; that is my only advantage over your majesty. I have
nothing—I can do nothing.”

“Can it be so?” exclaimed Charles II.

“My brother,” said Louis, sinking his voice, “I have
undergone miseries with which my poorest gentlemen are unacquainted. If my poor
Laporte were here, he would tell you that I have slept in ragged sheets,
through the holes of which my legs have passed; he would tell you that
afterwards, when I asked for carriages, they brought me conveyances
half-destroyed by the rats of the coach-houses; he would tell you that when I
asked for my dinner, the servants went to the cardinal’s kitchen to
inquire if there were any dinner for the king. And look! to-day, this very day
even, when I am twenty-two years of age,—to-day, when I have attained the
grade of the majority of kings,—to-day, when I ought to have the key of
the treasury, the direction of the policy, the supremacy in peace and
war,—cast your eyes around me, see how I am left! Look at this
abandonment—this disdain—this silence!—Whilst
yonder—look yonder! View the bustle, the lights, the homage!
There!—there you see the real king of France, my brother!”

“In the cardinal’s apartments?”

“Yes, in the cardinal’s apartments.”

“Then I am condemned, sire?”

Louis XIV. made no reply.

“Condemned is the word; for I will never solicit him who left my mother
and sister to die with cold and hunger—the daughter and grand-daughter of
Henry IV.—as surely they would have if M. de Retz and the parliament had
not sent them wood and bread.”

“To die?” murmured Louis XIV.

“Well!” continued the king of England, “poor Charles II.,
grandson of Henry IV., as you are, sire having neither parliament nor Cardinal
de Retz to apply to, will die of hunger, as his mother and sister had nearly
done.”

Louis knitted his brow, and twisted violently the lace of his ruffles.

This prostration, this immobility, serving as a mark to an emotion so visible,
struck Charles II., and he took the young man’s hand.

“Thanks!” said he, “my brother. You pity me, and that is all
I can require of you in your present situation.”

“Sire,” said Louis XIV., with a sudden impulse, and raising his
head, “it is a million you require, or two hundred gentlemen, I think you
say?”

“Sire, a million would be quite sufficient.”

“That is very little.”

“Offered to a single man it is a great deal. Convictions have been
purchased at a much lower price; and I should have nothing to do but with
venalities.”

“Two hundred gentlemen! Reflect!—that is little more than a single
company.”

“Sire, there is in our family a tradition, and that is, that four men,
four French gentlemen, devoted to my father, were near saving my father, though
condemned by a parliament, guarded by an army and surrounded by a
nation.”

“Then if I can procure you a million, or two hundred gentlemen, you will
be satisfied; and you will consider me your well-affectioned brother?”

“I shall consider you as my saviour; and if I recover the throne of my
father, England will be, as long as I reign it, a sister to France, as you will
have been a brother to me.”

“Well, my brother,” said Louis, rising, “what you hesitate to
ask for, I will myself demand; that which I have never done on my own account,
I will do on yours. I will go and find the king of France—the
other—the rich, the powerful one, I mean. I will myself solicit this
million, or these two hundred gentlemen; and—we will see.”

“Oh!” cried Charles; “you are a noble friend, sire—a
heart created by God! You save me, my brother; and if you should ever stand in
need of the life you restored me, demand it.”

“Silence, my brother,—silence!” said Louis, in a suppressed
voice. “Take care that no one hears you! We have not obtained our end
yet. To ask money of Mazarin—that is worse than traversing the enchanted
forest, each tree of which inclosed a demon. It is more than setting out to
conquer a world.”

“But yet, sire, when you ask it—”

“I have already told you that I never asked,” replied Louis with a
haughtiness that made the king of England turn pale.

And the latter, like a wounded man, made a retreating
movement—“Pardon me, my brother,” replied he. “I have
neither a mother nor a sister who are suffering. My throne is hard and naked,
but I am firmly seated on my throne. Pardon me that expression, my brother; it
was that of an egotist. I will retract it, therefore, by a sacrifice,—I
will go to monsieur le cardinal. Wait for me, if you please—I will
return.”

Chapter X. The Arithmetic of M. de Mazarin.

Whilst the king was directing his course rapidly towards
the wing of the castle occupied by the cardinal, taking nobody with him but his
valet de chambre, the officer of musketeers came out, breathing like a man who
has for a long time been forced to hold his breath, from the little cabinet of
which we have already spoken, and which the king believed to be quite solitary.
This little cabinet had formerly been part of the chamber, from which it was
only separated by a thin partition. It resulted that this partition, which was
only for the eye, permitted the ear the least indiscreet to hear every word
spoken in the chamber.

There was no doubt, then, that this lieutenant of musketeers had heard all that
passed in his majesty’s apartment.

Warned by the last words of the young king, he came out just in time to salute
him on his passage, and to follow him with his eyes till he had disappeared in
the corridor.

Then as soon as he had disappeared, he shook his head after a fashion
peculiarly his own, and in a voice which forty years’ absence from
Gascony had not deprived of its Gascon accent, “A melancholy
service,” said he, “and a melancholy master!”

These words pronounced, the lieutenant resumed his place in his fauteuil,
stretched his legs and closed his eyes, like a man who either sleeps or
meditates.

During this short monologue and the mise en scene that had accompanied it,
whilst the king, through the long corridors of the old castle, proceeded to the
apartment of M. de Mazarin, a scene of another sort was being enacted in those
apartments.

Mazarin was in bed, suffering a little from the gout. But as he was a man of
order, who utilized even pain, he forced his wakefulness to be the humble
servant of his labor. He had consequently ordered Bernouin, his valet de
chambre, to bring him a little traveling-desk, so that he might write in bed.
But the gout is not an adversary that allows itself to be conquered so easily;
therefore, at each movement he made, the pain from dull became sharp.

“Is Brienne there?” asked he of Bernouin.

“No, monseigneur,” replied the valet de chambre; “M. de
Brienne, with your permission, is gone to bed. But if it is the wish of your
eminence, he can speedily be called.”

“No, it is not worth while. Let us see, however. Cursed ciphers!”

And the cardinal began to think, counting on his fingers the while.

“Oh, ciphers is it?” said Bernouin. “Very well! if your
eminence attempts calculations, I will promise you a pretty headache to-morrow!
And with that please to remember M. Guenaud is not here.”

“You are right, Bernouin. You must take Brienne’s place, my friend.
Indeed, I ought to have brought M. Colbert with me. That young man goes on very
well, Bernouin, very well; a very orderly youth.”

“I do not know,” said the valet de chambre, “but I
don’t like the countenance of your young man who goes on so well.”

“Well, well, Bernouin! We don’t stand in need of your advice. Place
yourself there: take the pen and write.”

“I am ready, monseigneur; what am I to write?”

“There, that’s the place: after the two lines already
traced.”

“I am there.”

“Write seven hundred and sixty thousand livres.”

“That is written.”

“Upon Lyons—” The cardinal appeared to hesitate.

“Upon Lyons,” repeated Bernouin.

“Three millions nine hundred thousand livres.”

“Well, monseigneur?”

“Upon Bordeaux, seven millions.”

“Seven?” repeated Bernouin.

“Yes,” said the cardinal, pettishly, “seven.” Then,
recollecting himself, “You understand, Bernouin,” added he,
“that all this money is to be spent?”

“Eh! monseigneur; whether it be spent or put away is of very little
consequence to me, since none of these millions are mine.”

“These millions are the king’s; it is the king’s money I am
reckoning. Well, what were we saying? You always interrupt me!”

“Seven millions upon Bordeaux.”

“Ah! yes; that’s right. Upon Madrid four millions. I give you to
understand plainly to whom this money belongs, Bernouin, seeing that everybody
has the stupidity to believe me rich in millions. I repel the silly idea. A
minister, besides, has nothing of his own. Come, go on. Rentrees generales,
seven millions; properties, nine millions. Have you written that,
Bernouin?”

“Yes, monseigneur.”

“Bourse, six hundred thousand livres; various property, two millions. Ah!
I forgot—the furniture of the different chateaux—”

“Must I put of the crown?” asked Bernouin.

“No, no; it is of no use doing that—that is understood. Have you
written that, Bernouin?”

“Yes, monseigneur.”

“And the ciphers?”

“Stand straight under one another.”

“Cast them up, Bernouin.”

“Thirty-nine millions two hundred and sixty thousand livres,
monseigneur.”

“Ah!” cried the cardinal, in a tone of vexation; “there are
not yet forty millions!”

Bernouin recommenced the addition.

“No, monseigneur; there want seven hundred and forty thousand
livres.”

Mazarin asked for the account, and revised it carefully.

“Yes, but,” said Bernouin, “thirty-nine millions two hundred
and sixty thousand livres make a good round sum.”

“Ah, Bernouin; I wish the king had it.”

“Your eminence told me that this money was his majesty’s.”

“Doubtless, as clear, as transparent as possible. These thirty-nine
millions are bespoken, and much more.”

Bernouin smiled after his own fashion—that is, like a man who believes no
more than he is willing to believe—whilst preparing the cardinal’s
night draught, and putting his pillow to rights.

“Oh!” said Mazarin, when the valet had gone out; “not yet
forty millions! I must, however, attain that sum, which I had set down for
myself. But who knows whether I shall have time? I sink, I am going, I shall
never reach it! And yet, who knows that I may not find two or three millions in
the pockets of my good friends the Spaniards? They discovered Peru, those
people did, and—what the devil! they must have something left.”

As he was speaking thus, entirely occupied with his ciphers, and thinking no
more of his gout, repelled by a preoccupation which, with the cardinal, was the
most powerful of all preoccupations, Bernouin rushed into the chamber, quite in
a fright.

“Well!” asked the cardinal, “what is the matter now?”

“The king, monseigneur,—the king!”

“How?—the king!” said Mazarin, quickly concealing his paper.
“The king here! the king at this hour! I thought he was in bed long ago.
What is the matter, then?”

The king could hear these last words, and see the terrified gesture of the
cardinal rising up in his bed, for he entered the chamber at that moment.

“It is nothing, monsieur le cardinal, or at least nothing which can alarm
you. It is an important communication which I wish to make to your eminence
to-night,—that is all.”

Mazarin immediately thought of that marked attention which the king had given
to his words concerning Mademoiselle de Mancini, and the communication appeared
to him probably to refer to this source. He recovered his serenity then
instantly, and assumed his most agreeable air, a change of countenance which
inspired the king with the greatest joy; and when Louis was seated,—

“Sire,” said the cardinal, “I ought certainly to listen to
your majesty standing, but the violence of my complaint—”

“No ceremony between us, my dear monsieur le cardinal,” said Louis
kindly: “I am your pupil, and not the king, you know very well, and this
evening in particular, as I come to you as a petitioner, as a solicitor, and
one very humble, and desirous to be kindly received, too.”

Mazarin, seeing the heightened color of the king, was confirmed in his first
idea; that is to say, that love thoughts were hidden under all these fine
words. This time, political cunning, as keen as it was, made a mistake; this
color was not caused by the bashfulness of a juvenile passion, but only by the
painful contraction of the royal pride.

Like a good uncle, Mazarin felt disposed to facilitate the confidence.

“Speak, sire,” said he, “and since your majesty is willing
for an instant to forget that I am your subject, and call me your master and
instructor, I promise your majesty my most devoted and tender
consideration.”

“Thanks, monsieur le cardinal,” answered the king; “that
which I have to ask of your eminence has but little to do with myself.”

“So much the worse!” replied the cardinal; “so much the
worse! Sire, I should wish your majesty to ask of me something of importance,
even a sacrifice; but whatever it may be that you ask me, I am ready to set
your heart at rest by granting it, my dear sire.”

“Well, this is what brings me here,” said the king, with a beating
of the heart that had no equal except the beating of the heart of the minister;
“I have just received a visit from my brother, the king of
England.”

Mazarin bounded in his bed as if he had been put in relation with a Leyden jar
or a voltaic pile, at the same time that a surprise, or rather a manifest
disappointment, inflamed his features with such a blaze of anger, that Louis
XIV., little diplomatist as he was, saw that the minister had hoped to hear
something else.

“Charles II.?” exclaimed Mazarin, with a hoarse voice and a
disdainful movement of his lips. “You have received a visit from Charles
II.?”

“From King Charles II.,” replied Louis, according in a marked
manner to the grandson of Henry IV. the title which Mazarin had forgotten to
give him. “Yes, monsieur le cardinal, that unhappy prince has touched my
heart with the relation of his misfortunes. His distress is great, monsieur le
cardinal, and it has appeared painful to me, who have seen my own throne
disputed, who have been forced in times of commotion to quit my
capital,—to me, in short, who am acquainted with misfortune,—to
leave a deposed and fugitive brother without assistance.”

“Eh!” said the cardinal, sharply; “why had he not, as you
have, a Jules Mazarin by his side? His crown would then have remained
intact.”

“I know all that my house owes to your eminence,” replied the king,
haughtily, “and you may well believe that I, on my part, shall never
forget it. It is precisely because my brother, the king of England has not
about him the powerful genius who has saved me, it is for that, I say, that I
wish to conciliate the aid of that same genius, and beg you to extend your arm
over his head, well assured, monsieur le cardinal, that your hand, by touching
him only, would know how to replace upon his brow the crown which fell at the
foot of his father’s scaffold.”

“Sire,” replied Mazarin, “I thank you for your good opinion
with regard to myself, but we have nothing to do yonder: they are a set of
madmen who deny God, and cut off the heads of their kings. They are dangerous,
observe, sire, and filthy to the touch after having wallowed in royal blood and
covenantal murder. That policy has never suited me,—I scorn it and reject
it.”

“Therefore you ought to assist in establishing a better.”

“What is that?”

“The restoration of Charles II., for example.”

“Good heavens!” cried Mazarin, “does the poor prince flatter
himself with that chimera?”

“Yes, he does,” replied the young king, terrified at the
difficulties opposed to this project, which he fancied he could perceive in the
infallible eye of his minister; “he only asks for a million to carry out
his purpose.”

“Is that all—a little million, if you please!” said the
cardinal, ironically, with an effort to conquer his Italian accent. “A
little million, if you please, brother! Bah! a family of mendicants!”

“Cardinal,” said Louis, raising his head, “that family of
mendicants is a branch of my family.”

“Are you rich enough to give millions to other people, sire? Have you
millions to throw away?”

“Oh!” replied Louis XIV., with great pain, which he, however, by a
strong effort, prevented from appearing on his countenance;—“oh!
yes, monsieur le cardinal, I am well aware I am poor, and yet the crown of
France is worth a million, and to perform a good action I would pledge my crown
if it were necessary. I could find Jews who would be willing to lend me a
million.”

“So, sire, you say you want a million?” said Mazarin.

“Yes, monsieur, I say so.”

“You are mistaken, greatly mistaken, sire; you want much more than
that,—Bernouin!—you shall see, sire, how much you really
want.”

“What, cardinal!” said the king, “are you going to consult a
lackey about my affairs?”

“Bernouin!” cried the cardinal again, without appearing to remark
the humiliation of the young prince. “Come here, Bernouin, and tell me
the figures I gave you just now.”

“Cardinal, cardinal! did you not hear me?” said Louis, turning pale
with anger.

“Do not be angry, sire; I deal openly with the affairs of your majesty.
Every one in France knows that; my books are as open as day. What did I tell
you to do just now, Bernouin?”

“Your eminence commanded me to cast up an account.”

“You did it, did you not?”

“Yes, my lord.”

“To verify the amount of which his majesty, at this moment, stands in
need. Did I not tell you so? Be frank, my friend.”

“Your eminence said so.”

“Well, what sum did I say I wanted?”

“Forty-five millions, I think.”

“And what sum could we find, after collecting all our resources?”

“Thirty-nine millions two hundred and sixty thousand.”

“That is correct, Bernouin; that is all I wanted to know. Leave us
now,” said the cardinal, fixing his brilliant eye upon the young king,
who sat mute with stupefaction.

“However—” stammered the king.

“What, do you still doubt, sire?” said the cardinal. “Well,
here is a proof of what I said.”

And Mazarin drew from under his bolster the paper covered with figures, which
he presented to the king, who turned away his eyes, his vexation was so deep.

“Therefore, as it is a million you want, sire, and that million is not
set down here, it is forty-six millions your majesty stands in need of. Well, I
don’t think that any Jews in the world would lend such a sum, even upon
the crown of France.”

The king, clenching his hands beneath his ruffles, pushed away his chair.

“So it must be then!” said he; “my brother the king of
England will die of hunger.”

“Sire,” replied Mazarin, in the same tone, “remember this
proverb, which I give you as the expression of the soundest policy:
‘Rejoice at being poor when your neighbor is poor likewise.’”

Louis meditated this for a few moments, with an inquisitive glance directed to
the paper, one end of which remained under the bolster.

“Then,” said he, “it is impossible to comply with my demand
for money, my lord cardinal, is it?”

“Absolutely, sire.”

“Remember, this will secure me a future enemy, if he succeed in
recovering his crown without my assistance.”

“If your majesty only fears that, you may be quite at ease,”
replied Mazarin, eagerly.

“Very well, I say no more about it,” exclaimed Louis XIV.

“Have I at least convinced you, sire?” placing his hand upon that
of the young king.

“Perfectly.”

“If there be anything else, ask it, sire; I shall most happy to grant it
to you, having refused this.”

“Anything else, my lord?”

“Why yes; am I not devoted body and soul to your majesty? Hola!
Bernouin!—lights and guards for his majesty! His majesty is returning to
his own chamber.”

“Not yet, monsieur: since you place your good-will at my disposal, I will
take advantage of it.”

“For yourself, sire?” asked the cardinal, hoping that his niece was
at length about to be named.

“No, monsieur, not for myself,” replied Louis, “but still for
my brother Charles.”

The brow of Mazarin again became clouded, and he grumbled a few words that the
king could not catch.

Chapter XI. Mazarin’s Policy.

Instead of the hesitation with which he had accosted the
cardinal a quarter of an hour before, there might be read in the eyes of the
young king that will against which a struggle might be maintained, and which
might be crushed by its own impotence, but which, at least, would preserve,
like a wound in the depth of the heart, the remembrance of its defeat.

“This time, my lord cardinal, we have to deal with something more easily
found than a million.”

“Do you think so, sire?” said Mazarin, looking at the king with
that penetrating eye which was accustomed to read to the bottom of hearts.

“Yes, I think so; and when you know the object of my
request—”

“And do you think I do not know it, sire?”

“You know what remains for me to say to you?”

“Listen, sire; these are King Charles’s own words—”

“Oh, impossible!”

“Listen. ‘And if that miserly, beggarly Italian,’ said
he—”

“My lord cardinal!”

“That is the sense, if not the words. Eh! Good heavens! I wish him no ill
on that account; one is biased by his passions. He said to you: ‘If that
vile Italian refuses the million we ask of him, sire,—if we are forced,
for want of money, to renounce diplomacy, well, then, we will ask him to grant
us five hundred gentlemen.’”

The king started, for the cardinal was only mistaken in the number.

“Is not that it, sire?” cried the minister, with a triumphant
accent. “And then he added some fine words: he said, ‘I have
friends on the other side of the channel, and these friends only want a leader
and a banner. When they see me, when they behold the banner of France, they
will rally around me, for they will comprehend that I have your support. The
colors of the French uniform will be worth as much to me as the million M. de
Mazarin refuses us,’—for he was pretty well assured I should refuse
him that million.—‘I shall conquer with these five hundred
gentlemen, sire, and all the honor will be yours.’ Now, that is what he
said, or to that purpose, was it not?—turning those plain words into
brilliant metaphors and pompous images, for they are fine talkers in that
family! The father talked even on the scaffold.”

The perspiration of shame stood on the brow of Louis. He felt that it was
inconsistent with his dignity to hear his brother thus insulted, but he did not
yet know how to act with him to whom every one yielded, even his mother. At
last he made an effort.

“But,” said he, “my lord cardinal, it is not five hundred
men, it is only two hundred.”

“Well, but you see I guessed what he wanted.”

“I never denied that you had a penetrating eye, and that was why I
thought you would not refuse my brother Charles a thing so simple and so easy
to grant him as what I ask of you in his name, my lord cardinal, or rather in
my own.”

“Sire,” said Mazarin, “I have studied policy thirty years;
first, under the auspices of M. le Cardinal Richelieu; and then alone. This
policy has not always been over-honest, it must be allowed, but it has never
been unskillful. Now that which is proposed to your majesty is dishonest and
unskillful at the same time.”

“Dishonest, monsieur!”

“Sire, you entered into a treaty with Cromwell.”

“Yes, and in that very treaty Cromwell signed his name above mine.”

“Why did you sign yours so lo down, sire? Cromwell found a good place,
and he took it; that was his custom. I return, then, to M. Cromwell. You have a
treaty with him, that is to say, with England, since when you signed that
treaty M. Cromwell was England.”

“M. Cromwell is dead.”

“Do you think so, sire?”

“No doubt he is, since his son Richard has succeeded him, and has
abdicated.”

“Yes, that is it exactly. Richard inherited after the death of his
father, and England at the abdication of Richard. The treaty formed part of the
inheritance, whether in the hands of M. Richard or in the hands of England. The
treaty is, then, still as good, as valid as ever. Why should you evade it,
sire? What is changed? Charles wants to-day what we were not willing to grant
him ten years ago; but that was foreseen and provided against. You are the ally
of England, sire, and not of Charles II. It was doubtless wrong, from a family
point of view, to sign a treaty with a man who had cut off the head of the king
your father’s brother-in-law, and to contract an alliance with a
parliament which they call yonder the Rump Parliament; it was unbecoming, I
acknowledge, but it was not unskillful from a political point of view, since,
thanks to that treaty, I saved your majesty, then a minor, the trouble and
danger of a foreign war, which the Fronde—you remember the Fronde,
sire?”—the young king hung his head—“which the Fronde
might have fatally complicated. And thus I prove to your majesty that to change
our plan now, without warning our allies, would be at once unskillful and
dishonest. We should make war with the aggression on our side; we should make
it, deserving to have it made against us; and we should have the appearance of
fearing it whilst provoking it, for a permission granted to five hundred men,
to two hundred men, to fifty men, to ten men, is still a permission. One
Frenchman, that is the nation; one uniform, that is the army. Suppose, sire,
for example, that you should have war with Holland, which, sooner or later,
will certainly happen; or with Spain, which will perhaps ensue if your marriage
fails” (Mazarin stole a furtive glance at the king), “and there are
a thousand causes that might yet make your marriage fail,—well, would you
approve of England’s sending to the United Provinces or to Spain a
regiment, a company, a squadron even, of English gentlemen? Would you think
that they kept within the limits of their treaty of alliance?”

Louis listened; it seemed so strange to him that Mazarin should invoke good
faith, and he the author of so many political tricks, called Mazarinades.
“And yet,” said the king, “without manifest of my
authorization, I cannot prevent gentlemen of my states from passing over into
England, if such should be their good pleasure.”

“You should compel them to return, sire, or at least protest against
their presence as enemies in a allied country.”

“But come, my lord cardinal, you who are so profound a genius, try if you
cannot find a means to assist this poor king, without compromising
ourselves.”

“And that is exactly what I am not willing to do, my dear sire,”
said Mazarin. “If England were to act exactly according to my wishes, she
could not act better than she does; if I directed the policy of England from
this place, I should not direct it otherwise. Governed as she is governed,
England is an eternal nest of contention for all Europe. Holland protects
Charles II., let Holland do so; they will quarrel, they will fight. Let them
destroy each other’s navies, we can construct ours with the wrecks of
their vessels; when we shall save our money to buy nails.”

“Oh, how paltry and mean is all this that you are telling me, monsieur le
cardinal!”

“Yes, but nevertheless it is true, sire; you must confess that. Still
further. Suppose I admit, for a moment, the possibility of breaking your word,
and evading the treaty—such a thing as sometimes happens, but that is
when some great interest is to be promoted by it, or when the treaty is found
to be too troublesome—well, you will authorize the engagement asked of
you: France—her banner, which is the same thing—will cross the
Straits and will fight; France will be conquered.”

“Why so?”

“Ma foi! we have a pretty general to fight under—this Charles II.!
Worcester gave us proofs of that.”

“But he will no longer have to deal with Cromwell, monsieur.”

“But he will have to deal with Monk, who is quite as dangerous. The brave
brewer of whom we are speaking, was a visionary; he had moments of exaltation,
of inflation, during which he ran over like an over-filled cask; and from the
chinks there always escaped some drops of his thoughts, and by the sample the
whole of his thought was to be made out. Cromwell has thus allowed us more than
ten times to penetrate into his very soul, when one would have conceived that
soul to be enveloped in triple brass, as Horace had it. But Monk! Oh, sire, God
defend you from ever having anything to transact politically with Monk. It is
he who has given me, in one year, all the gray hairs I have. Monk is no
fanatic; unfortunately he is a politician; he does not overflow, he keeps close
together. For ten years he has had his eyes fixed upon one object, and nobody
has yet been able to ascertain what. Every morning, as Louis XI. advised, he
burns his nightcap. Therefore, on the day when this plan, slowly and solitarily
ripened, shall break forth, it will break forth with all the conditions of
success which always accompany an unforeseen event. That is Monk, sire, of
whom, perhaps, you have never even heard—of whom, perhaps, you did not
even know the name, before your brother, Charles II., who knows what he is,
pronounced it before you. He is a marvel of depth and tenacity, the two only
things against which intelligence and ardor are blunted. Sire, I had ardor when
I was young; I always was intelligent. I may safely boast of it, because I am
reproached with it. I have done very well with these two qualities, since, from
the son of a fisherman of Piscina, I have become prime minister to the king of
France; and in that position your majesty will perhaps acknowledge I have
rendered some service to the throne of your majesty. Well, sire, if I had met
with Monk on my way, instead of Monsieur de Beaufort, Monsieur de Retz, or
Monsieur le Prince—well, we should have been ruined. If you engage
yourself rashly, sire, you will fall into the talons of this politic soldier.
The casque of Monk, sire, is an iron coffer, and no one has the key of it.
Therefore, near him, or rather before him, I bow, sire, for I have nothing but
a velvet cap.”

“What do you think Monk wishes to do, then?”

“Eh! sire, if I knew that, I would not tell you to mistrust him, for I
should be stronger than he; but with him, I am afraid to guess—to
guess!—you understand my word?—for if I thought I had guessed, I
should stop at an idea, and, in spite of myself, should pursue that idea. Since
that man has been in power yonder, I am like one of the damned in Dante whose
neck Satan has twisted, and who walk forward looking around behind them. I am
traveling towards Madrid, but I never lose sight of London. To guess, with that
devil of a man, is to deceive one’s self and to deceive one’s self
is to ruin one’s self. God keep me from ever seeking to guess what he
aims at; I confine myself to watching what he does, and that is well enough.
Now I believe—you observe the meaning of the word I believe?—I
believe, with respect to Monk, ties one to nothing—I believe that he has
a strong inclination to succeed Cromwell. Your Charles II. has already caused
proposals to be made to him by ten persons; he has satisfied himself with
driving these ten meddlers from his presence, without saying anything to them
but, ‘Begone, or I will have you hung.’ That man is a sepulcher! At
this moment Monk is affecting devotion to the Rump Parliament; of this
devotion, I am not the dupe. Monk has no wish to be assassinated,—an
assassination would stop him in the middle of his operations; and his work must
be accomplished;—so I believe—but do not believe what I believe,
sire: for as I say I believe from habit—I believe that Monk is keeping on
friendly terms with the parliament till the day comes for dispersing it. You
are asked for swords, but they are to fight against Monk. God preserve you from
fighting against Monk, sire; for Monk would beat us, and I should never console
myself after being beaten by Monk. I should say to myself, Monk has foreseen
that victory ten years. For God’s sake, sire, out of friendship for you,
if not out of consideration for himself, let Charles II. keep quiet. Your
majesty will give him a little income here; give him one of your chateaux. Yes,
yes—wait awhile. But I forget the treaty—that famous treaty of
which we were just now speaking. Your majesty has not even the right to give
him a chateau.”

“How is that?”

“Yes, yes; your majesty is bound not to grant hospitality to King
Charles, and to compel him to leave France even. It was on this account we
forced him to quit you, and yet here he is again. Sire, I hope you will give
your brother to understand that he cannot remain with us; that it is impossible
he should be allowed to compromise us; or I myself—”

“Enough, my lord,” said Louis XIV., rising. “In refusing me a
million, perhaps you may be right; your millions are your own. In refusing me
two hundred gentlemen, you are still further in the right; for you are prime
minister, and you have, in the eyes of France, the responsibility of peace and
war. But that you should pretend to prevent me, who am king, from extending my
hospitality to the grandson of Henry IV., to my cousin-german, to the companion
of my childhood—there your power stops, and there begins my will.”

“Sire,” said Mazarin, delighted at being let off so cheaply, and
who had, besides, only fought so earnestly to arrive at
that,—“sire, I shall always bend before the will of my king. Let my
king, then, keep near him, or in one of his chateaux, the king of England; let
Mazarin know it, but let not the minister know it.”

“Good-night, my lord,” said Louis XIV., “I go away in
despair.”

“But convinced, and that is all I desire, sire,” replied Mazarin.

The king made no answer, and retired quite pensive, convinced, not of all
Mazarin had told him, but of one thing which he took care not to mention to
him; and that was, that it was necessary for him to study seriously both his
own affairs and those of Europe, for he found them very difficult and very
obscure. Louis found the king of England seated in the same place where he had
left him. On perceiving him, the English prince arose; but at the first glance
he saw discouragement written in dark letters upon his cousin’s brow.
Then, speaking first, as if to facilitate the painful avowal that Louis had to
make to him,—

“Whatever it may be,” said he, “I shall never forget all the
kindness, all the friendship you have exhibited towards me.”

“Alas!” replied Louis, in a melancholy tone, “only barren
good-will, my brother.”

Charles II. became extremely pale; he passed his cold hand over his brow, and
struggled for a few instants against a faintness that made him tremble.
“I understand,” said he at last; “no more hope!”

Louis seized the hand of Charles II. “Wait, my brother,” said he;
“precipitate nothing; everything may change; hasty resolutions ruin all
causes; add another year of trial, I implore you, to the years you have already
undergone. You have, to induce you to act now rather than at another time,
neither occasion nor opportunity. Come with me, my brother; I will give you one
of my residences, whichever you prefer, to inhabit. I, with you, will keep my
eyes upon events; we will prepare. Come, then, my brother, have courage!”

Charles II. withdrew his hand from that of the king, and drawing back, to
salute him with more ceremony, “With all my heart, thanks!” replied
he, “sire; but I have prayed without success to the greatest king on
earth; now I will go and ask a miracle of God.” And he went out without
being willing to hear any more, his head carried loftily, his hand trembling,
with a painful contraction of his noble countenance, and that profound gloom
which, finding no more hope in the world of men, appeared to go beyond it, and
ask it in worlds unknown. The officer of musketeers, on seeing him pass by thus
pale, bowed almost to his knees as he saluted him. He then took a flambeau,
called two musketeers, and descended the deserted staircase with the
unfortunate king, holding in his left hand his hat, the plume of which swept
the steps. Arrived at the door, the musketeer asked the king which way he was
going, that he might direct the musketeers.

“Monsieur,” replied Charles II., in a subdued voice, “you who
have known my father, say, did you ever pray for him? If you have done so, do
not forget me in your prayers. Now, I am going alone, and beg of you not to
accompany me, or have me accompanied any further.”

The officer bowed and sent away the musketeers into the interior of the palace.
But he himself remained an instant under the porch watching the departing
Charles II., till he was lost in the turn of the next street. “To him as
to his father formerly,” murmured he, “Athos, if he were here,
would say with reason,—‘Salute fallen majesty!’” Then,
reascending the staircase: “Oh! the vile service that I follow!”
said he at every step. “Oh! my pitiful master! Life thus carried on is no
longer tolerable, and it is at length time that I should do something! No more
generosity, no more energy! The master has succeeded, the pupil is starved
forever. Mordioux! I will not resist. Come, you men,” continued he,
entering the ante-chamber, “why are you all looking at me so? Extinguish
these torches and return to your posts. Ah! you were guarding me? Yes, you
watch over me, do you not, worthy fellows? Brave fools! I am not the Duc de
Guise. Begone! They will not assassinate me in the little passage.
Besides,” added he, in a low voice, “that would be a resolution,
and no resolutions have been formed since Monsieur le Cardinal Richelieu died.
Now, with all his faults, that was a man! It is settled: to-morrow I will throw
my cassock to the nettles.”

Then, reflecting: “No,” said he, “not yet! I have one great
trial to make and I will make it; but that, and I swear it, shall be the last,
Mordioux!”

He had not finished speaking when a voice issued from the king’s chamber.
“Monsieur le lieutenant!” said this voice.

“Here I am,” replied he.

“The king desires to speak to you.”

“Humph!” said the lieutenant; “perhaps of what I was thinking
about.” And he went into the king’s apartment.

Chapter XII. The King and the Lieutenant.

As soon as the king saw the officer enter, he dismissed
his valet de chambre and his gentleman.

“Who is on duty to-morrow, monsieur?” asked he.

The lieutenant bowed his head with military politeness, and replied, “I
am, sire.”

“What! still you?”

“Always I, sire.”

“How can that be, monsieur?”

“Sire, when traveling, the musketeers supply all the posts of your
majesty’s household; that is to say, yours, her majesty the
queen’s, and monsieur le cardinal’s, the latter of whom borrows of
the king the best part, or rather the numerous part, of the royal guard.”

“But in the interims?”

“There are no interims, sire, but for twenty or thirty men who rest out
of a hundred and twenty. At the Louvre it is very different, and if I were at
the Louvre I should rely upon my brigadier; but, when traveling, sire, no one
knows what may happen, and I prefer doing my duty myself.”

“Then you are on guard every day?”

“And every night. Yes, sire.”

“Monsieur, I cannot allow that—I will have you rest.”

“That is very kind, sire; but I will not.”

“What do you say?” said the king, who did not at first comprehend
the full meaning of this reply.

“I say, sire, that I will not expose myself to the chance of a fault. If
the devil had a trick to play on me, you understand, sire, as he knows the man
with whom he has to deal, he would chose the moment when I should not be there.
My duty and the peace of my conscience before everything, sire.”

“But such duty will kill you, monsieur.”

“Eh! sire, I have performed it for thirty years, and in all France and
Navarre there is not a man in better health than I am. Moreover, I entreat you,
sire, not to trouble yourself about me. That would appear very strange to me,
seeing that I am not accustomed to it.”

The king cut short the conversation by a fresh question. “Shall you be
here, then, to-morrow morning?”

“As at present? yes, sire.”

The king walked several times up and down his chamber; it was very plain that
he burned with a desire to speak, but that he was restrained by some fear or
other. The lieutenant, standing motionless, hat in hand, watched him making
these evolutions, and, whilst looking at him, grumbled to himself, biting his
mustache:

“He has not half a crown worth of resolution! Parole d’honneur! I
would lay a wager he does not speak at all!”

The king continued to walk about, casting from time to time a side glance at
the lieutenant. “He is the very image of his father,” continued the
latter, in is secret soliloquy, “he is at once proud, avaricious, and
timid. The devil take his master, say I.”

The king stopped. “Lieutenant,” said he.

“I am here, sire.”

“Why did you cry out this evening, down below in the
salons—‘The king’s service! His majesty’s
musketeers!’”

“Because you gave me the order, sire.”

“I?” “Yourself.”

“Indeed, I did not say a word, monsieur.”

“Sire, an order is given by a sign, by a gesture, by a glance, as
intelligibly, as freely, and as clearly as by word of mouth. A servant who has
nothing but ears is not half a good servant.”

“Your eyes are very penetrating, then, monsieur.”

“How is that, sire?”

“Because they see what is not.”

“My eyes are good, though, sire, although they have served their master
long and much: when they have anything to see, they seldom miss the
opportunity. Now, this evening, they saw that your majesty colored with
endeavoring to conceal the inclination to yawn, that your majesty looked with
eloquent supplications, first to his eminence, and then at her majesty, the
queen-mother, and at length to the entrance door, and they so thoroughly
remarked all I have said, that they saw your majesty’s lips articulate
these words: ‘Who will get me out of this?’”

“Monsieur!”

“Or something to this effect, sire—‘My musketeers!’ I
could then no longer hesitate. That look was for me. I cried out instantly,
‘His majesty’s musketeers!’ And, besides, that was shown to
be true, sire, not only by your majesty’s not saying I was wrong, but
proving I was right by going out at once.”

The king turned away to smile; then, after a few seconds, he again fixed his
limpid eye upon that countenance, so intelligent, so bold, and so firm, that it
might have been said to be the proud and energetic profile of the eagle facing
the sun. “That is all very well,” said he, after a short silence,
during which he endeavored, in vain, to make his officer lower his eyes.

But seeing the king said no more, the latter pirouetted on his heels, and took
three steps towards the door, muttering, “He will not speak! Mordioux! he
will not speak!”

“Thank you, monsieur,” said the king at last.

“Humph!” continued the lieutenant; “there was only wanting
that. Blamed for having been less of a fool than another might have
been.” And he went to the door, allowing his spurs to jingle in true
military style. But when he was on the threshold, feeling the king’s
desire drew him back, he returned.

“Has your majesty told me all?” asked he, in a tone we cannot
describe, but which, without appearing to solicit the royal confidence,
contained so much persuasive frankness, that the king immediately replied:

“Yes; but draw near, monsieur.”

“Now then,” murmured the officer, “he is coming to it at
last.”

“Listen to me.”

“I shall not lose a word, sire.”

“You will mount on horseback to-morrow, at about half-past four in the
morning, and you will have a horse saddled for me.”

“From your majesty’s stables?”

“No; one of your musketeers’ horses.”

“Very well, sire. Is that all?”

“And you will accompany me.”

“Alone?”

“Alone.”

“Shall I come to seek your majesty, or shall I wait?”

“You will wait for me.”

“Where, sire?”

“At the little park-gate.”

The lieutenant bowed, understanding that the king had told him all he had to
say. In fact, the king dismissed him with a gracious wave of the hand. The
officer left the chamber of the king, and returned to place himself
philosophically in his fauteuil, where, far from sleeping, as might have been
expected, considering how late it was, he began to reflect more deeply than he
had ever reflected before. The result of these reflections was not so
melancholy as the preceding ones had been.

“Come, he has begun,” said he. “Love urges him on, and he
goes forward—he goes forward! The king is nobody in his own palace; but
the man perhaps may prove to be worth something. Well, we shall see to-morrow
morning. Oh! oh!” cried he, all at once starting up, “that is a
gigantic idea, mordioux! and perhaps my fortune depends, at least, upon that
idea!” After this exclamation, the officer arose and marched, with his
hands in the pockets of his justaucorps, about the immense ante-chamber that
served him as an apartment. The wax-light flamed furiously under the effects of
a fresh breeze, which stole in through the chinks of the door and the window,
and cut the salle diagonally. It threw out a reddish, unequal light, sometimes
brilliant, sometimes dull, and the tall shadow of the lieutenant was seen
marching on the wall, in profile, like a figure by Callot, with his long sword
and feathered hat.

“Certainly!” said he, “I am mistaken if Mazarin is not laying
a snare for this amorous boy. Mazarin, this evening, gave an address, and made
an appointment as complacently as M. Daangeau himself could have done—I
heard him, and I know the meaning of his words. ‘To-morrow
morning,’ said he, ‘they will pass opposite the bridge of
Blois.’ Mordioux! that is clear enough, and particularly for a lover.
That is the cause of this embarrassment; that is the cause of this hesitation;
that is the cause of this order—‘Monsieur the lieutenant of my
musketeers, be on horseback to-morrow at four o’clock in the
morning.’ Which is as clear as if he had said,—‘Monsieur the
lieutenant of my musketeers, to-morrow, at four, at the bridge of
Blois,—do you understand?’ Here is a state secret, then, which I,
humble as I am, have in my possession, while it is in action. And how do I get
it? Because I have good eyes, as his majesty just now said. They say he loves
this little Italian doll furiously. They say he threw himself at his
mother’s feet, to beg her to allow him to marry her. They say the queen
went so far as to consult the court of Rome, whether such a marriage,
contracted against her will, would be valid. Oh, if I were but twenty-five! If
I had by my side those I no longer have! If I did not despise the whole world
most profoundly, I would embroil Mazarin with the queen-mother, France with
Spain, and I would make a queen after my own fashion. But let that pass.”
And the lieutenant snapped his fingers in disdain.

“This miserable Italian—this poor creature—this sordid
wretch—who has just refused the king of England a million, would not
perhaps give me a thousand pistoles for the news I would carry him. Mordioux! I
am falling into second childhood—I am becoming stupid indeed! The idea of
Mazarin giving anything! ha! ha! ha!” and he laughed in a subdued voice.

“Well, let us go to sleep—let us go to sleep; and the sooner the
better. My mind is wearied with my evening’s work, and will see things
to-morrow more clearly than to-day.”

And upon this recommendation, made to himself, he folded his cloak around him,
looking with contempt upon his royal neighbor. Five minutes after this he was
asleep, with his hands clenched and his lips apart, giving escape, not to his
secret, but to a sonorous sound, which rose and spread freely beneath the
majestic roof of the ante-chamber.

Chapter XIII. Mary de Mancini.

The sun had scarcely shed its first beams on the
majestic trees of the park and the lofty turrets of the castle, when the young
king, who had been awake more than two hours, possessed by the sleeplessness of
love, opened his shutters himself, and cast an inquiring look into the courts
of the sleeping palace. He saw that it was the hour agreed upon: the great
court clock pointed to a quarter past four. He did not disturb his valet de
chambre, who was sleeping soundly at some distance; he dressed himself, and the
valet, in a great fright, sprang up, thinking he had been deficient in his
duty; but the king sent him back again, commanding him to preserve the most
absolute silence. He then descended the little staircase, went out at a lateral
door, and perceived at the end of the wall a mounted horseman, holding another
horse by the bridle. This horseman could not be recognized in his cloak and
slouched hat. As to the horse, saddled like that of a rich citizen, it offered
nothing remarkable to the most experienced eye. Louis took the bridle: the
officer held the stirrup without dismounting, and asked his majesty’s
orders in a low voice.

“Follow me,” replied the king.

The officer put his horse to the trot, behind that of his master, and they
descended the hill towards the bridge. When they reached the other side of the
Loire,—

“Monsieur,” said the king, “you will please to ride on till
you see a carriage coming; then return and inform me. I will wait here.”

“Will your majesty deign to give me some description of the carriage I am
charged to discover?”

“A carriage in which you will see two ladies, and probably their
attendants likewise.”

“Sire, I should not wish to make a mistake; is there no other sign by
which I may know this carriage?”

“It will bear, in all probability, the arms of monsieur le
cardinal.”

“That is sufficient, sire,” replied the officer, fully instructed
in the object of his search. He put his horse to the trot, and rode sharply on
in the direction pointed out by the king. But he had scarcely gone five hundred
paces when he saw four mules, and then a carriage, loom up from behind a little
hill. Behind this carriage came another. It required only one glance to assure
him that these were the equipages he was in search of; he therefore turned his
bridle, and rode back to the king.

“Sire,” said he, “here are the carriages. The first, as you
said, contains two ladies with their femmes de chambre; the second contains the
footmen, provisions, and necessaries.”

“That is well,” replied the king in an agitated voice.
“Please to go and tell those ladies that a cavalier of the court wishes
to pay his respects to them alone.”

The officer set off at a gallop. “Mordioux!” said he, as he rode
on, “here is a new and honorable employment, I hope! I complained of
being nobody. I am the king’s confidant: that is enough to make a
musketeer burst with pride.”

He approached the carriage, and delivered his message gallantly and
intelligently. There were two ladies in the carriage: one of great beauty,
although rather thin; the other less favored by nature, but lively, graceful,
and uniting in the delicate lines of her brow all the signs of a strong will.
Her eyes, animated and piercing, in particular, spoke more eloquently than all
the amorous phrases in fashion in those days of gallantry. It was to her
D’Artagnan addressed himself, without fear of being mistaken, although
the other was, as we have said, the more handsome of the two.

“Madame,” said he, “I am the lieutenant of the musketeers,
and there is on the road a horseman who awaits you, and is desirous of paying
his respects to you.”

At these words, the effect of which he watched closely, the lady with the black
eyes uttered a cry of joy, leant out of the carriage window, and seeing the
cavalier approaching, held out her arms, exclaiming:

“Ah, my dear sire!” and the tears gushed from her eyes.

The coachman stopped his team; the women rose in confusion from the back of the
carriage, and the second lady made a slight curtsey, terminated by the most
ironical smile that jealousy ever imparted to the lips of woman.

“Marie, dear Marie,” cried the king, taking the hand of the
black-eyed lady in both his. And opening the heavy door himself, he drew her
out of the carriage with so much ardor, that she was in his arms before she
touched the ground. The lieutenant, posted on the other side of the carriage,
saw and heard all without being observed.

The king offered his arm to Mademoiselle de Mancini, and made a sign to the
coachman and lackeys to proceed. It was nearly six o’clock; the road was
fresh and pleasant; tall trees with their foliage still inclosed in the golden
down of their buds, let the dew of morning filter from their trembling
branches, like liquid diamonds; the grass was bursting at the foot of the
hedges; the swallows having returned only a few days since, described their
graceful curves between the heavens and the water; a breeze, laden with the
perfumes of the blossoming woods, sighed along the road, and wrinkled the
surface of the waters of the river; all these beauties of the day, all these
perfumes of the plants, all these aspirations of the earth towards heaven,
intoxicated the two lovers, walking side by side, leaning upon each other, eyes
fixed upon eyes, hand clasping hand, and who, lingering as by a common desire,
did not dare to speak, they had so much to say.

The officer saw that the king’s horse, in wandering this way and that,
annoyed Mademoiselle de Mancini. He took advantage of the pretext of securing
the horse to draw near them, and dismounting, walked between the two horses he
led; he did not lose a single word or gesture of the lovers. It was
Mademoiselle de Mancini who at length began.

“Ah, my dear sire!” said she, “you do not abandon me,
then?”

“No, Marie,” replied the king; “you see I do not.”

“I had so often been told, though, that as soon as we should be separated
you would no longer think of me.”

“Dear Marie, is it then to-day only that you have discovered we are
surrounded by people interested in deceiving us?”

“But then, sire, this journey, this alliance with Spain? They are going
to marry you off!”

Louis hung his head. At the same time the officer could see the eyes of Marie
de Mancini shine in the sun with the brilliancy of a dagger starting from its
sheath. “And you have done nothing in favor of our love?” asked the
girl, after a silence of a moment.

“Ah! mademoiselle, how could you believe that? I threw myself at the feet
of my mother; I begged her, I implored her; I told her all my hopes of
happiness were in you; I even threatened—”

“Well?” asked Marie, eagerly.

“Well, the queen-mother wrote to the court of Rome, and received as
answer, that a marriage between us would have no validity, and would be
dissolved by the holy father. At length, finding there was no hope for us, I
requested to have my marriage with the infanta at least delayed.”

“And yet that does not prevent your being on the road to meet her?”

“How can I help it? To my prayers, to my supplications, to my tears, I
received no answer but reasons of state.”

“Well, well?”

“Well, what is to be done, mademoiselle, when so many wills are leagued
against me?”

It was now Marie’s turn to hang her head. “Then I must bid you
adieu forever,” said she. “You know that I am being exiled; you
know that I am going to be buried alive; you know still more that they want to
marry me off, too.”

Louis became very pale, and placed his hand upon his heart.

“If I had thought that my life only had been at stake, I have been so
persecuted that I might have yielded; but I thought yours was concerned, my
dear sire, and I stood out for the sake of preserving your happiness.”

“Oh, yes! my happiness, my treasure!” murmured the king, more
gallantly than passionately, perhaps.

“The cardinal might have yielded,” said Marie, “if you had
addressed yourself to him, if you had pressed him. For the cardinal to call the
king of France his nephew! do you not perceive, sire? He would have made war
even for that honor; the cardinal, assured of governing alone, under the double
pretext of having brought up the king and given his niece to him in
marriage—the cardinal would have fought all antagonists, overcome all
obstacles. Oh, sire! I can answer for that. I am a woman, and I see clearly
into everything where love is concerned.”

These words produced a strange effect upon the king. Instead of heightening his
passion, they cooled it. He stopped, and said hastily,—

“What is to be said, mademoiselle? Everything has failed.”

“Except your will, I trust, my dear sire?”

“Alas!” said the king, coloring, “have I a will?”

“Oh!” said Mademoiselle de Mancini mournfully, wounded by that
expression.

“The king has no will but that which policy dictates, but that which
reasons of state impose upon him.”

“Oh! it is because you have no love,” cried Mary; “if you
loved, sire, you would have a will.”

On pronouncing these words, Mary raised her eyes to her lover, whom she saw
more pale and more cast down than an exile who is about to quit his native land
forever. “Accuse me,” murmured the king, “but do not say I do
not love you.”

A long silence followed these words, which the young king had pronounced with a
perfectly true and profound feeling. “I am unable to think that
to-morrow, and after to-morrow, I shall see you no more; I cannot think that I
am going to end my sad days at a distance from Paris; that the lips of an old
man, of an unknown, should touch that hand which you hold within yours; no, in
truth, I cannot think of all that, my dear sire, without having my poor heart
burst with despair.”

And Marie de Mancini did shed floods of tears. On his part, the king, much
affected, carried his handkerchief to his mouth, and stifled a sob.

“See,” said she, “the carriages have stopped, my sister waits
for me, the time is come; what you are about to decide upon will be decided for
life. Oh, sire! you are willing, then, that I should lose you? You are willing,
then, Louis, that she to whom you have said ‘I love you,’ should
belong to another than to her king, to her master, to her lover? Oh! courage,
Louis! courage! One word, a single word! Say ‘I will!’ and all my
life is enchained to yours, and all my heart is yours forever.”

The king made no reply. Mary then looked at him as Dido looked at Aeneas in the
Elysian fields, fierce and disdainful.

“Farewell, then,” said she; “farewell life! love!
heaven!”

And she took a step away. The king detained her, seizing her hand, which he
pressed to his lips, and despair prevailing over the resolution he appeared to
have inwardly formed, he let fall upon that beautiful hand a burning tear of
regret, which made Mary start, so really had that tear burnt her. She saw the
humid eyes of the king, his pale brow, his convulsed lips, and cried, with an
accent that cannot be described,—

“Oh, sire! you are a king, you weep, and yet I depart!”

As his sole reply, the king hid his face in his handkerchief. The officer
uttered something so like a roar that it frightened the horses. Mademoiselle de
Mancini, quite indignant, quitted the king’s arm, hastily entered the
carriage, crying to the coachman, “Go on, go on, and quick!”

The coachman obeyed, flogging his mules, and the heavy carriage rocked upon its
creaking axle, whilst the king of France, alone, cast down, annihilated, did
not dare to look either behind or before him.

Chapter XIV. In which the King and the Lieutenant each
give Proofs of Memory.

When the king, like all the people in the world who are
in love, had long and attentively watched disappear in the distance the
carriage which bore away his mistress; when he had turned and turned again a
hundred times to the same side and had at length succeeded in somewhat calming
the agitation of his heart and thoughts, he recollected that he was not alone.
The officer still held the horse by the bridle, and had not lost all hope of
seeing the king recover his resolution. He had still the resource of mounting
and riding after the carriage; they would have lost nothing by waiting a
little. But the imagination of the lieutenant of the musketeers was too rich
and too brilliant; it left far behind it that of the king, who took care not to
allow himself to be carried away to such excess. He contented himself with
approaching the officer, and in a doleful voice, “Come,” said he,
“let us be gone; all is ended. To horse!”

The officer imitated this carriage, this slowness, this sadness, and leisurely
mounted his horse. The king pushed on sharply, the lieutenant followed him. At
the bridge Louis turned around for the last time. The lieutenant, patient as a
god who has eternity behind and before him, still hoped for a return of energy.
But it was groundless, nothing appeared. Louis gained the street which led to
the castle, and entered as seven was striking. When the king had returned, and
the musketeer, who saw everything, had seen a corner of the tapestry over the
cardinal’s window lifted up, he breathed a profound sigh, like a man
unloosed from the tightest bonds, and said in a low voice:

“Now then, my officer, I hope that it is over.”

The king summoned his gentleman. “Please to understand I shall receive
nobody before two o’clock,” said he.

“Sire,” replied the gentleman, “there is, however, some one
who requests admittance.”

“Who is that?”

“Your lieutenant of musketeers.”

“He who accompanied me?”

“Yes, sire.”

“Ah,” said the king, “let him come in.”

The officer entered. The king made a sign, and the gentleman and the valet
retired. Louis followed them with his eyes until they had shut the door, and
when the tapestries had fallen behind them,—“You remind me by your
presence, monsieur, of something I had forgotten to recommend to you, that is
to say, the most absolute discretion.”

“Oh! sire, why does your majesty give yourself the trouble of making me
such a recommendation? It is plain you do not know me.”

“Yes, monsieur, that is true. I know that you are discreet; but as I had
prescribed nothing—”

The officer bowed. “Has your majesty nothing else to say to me?”

“No, monsieur; you may retire.”

“Shall I obtain permission not to do so till I have spoken to the king,
sire?”

“What do you have to say to me? Explain yourself, monsieur.”

“Sire, a thing without importance to you, but which interests me greatly.
Pardon me, then, for speaking of it. Without urgency, without necessity, I
never would have done it, and I would have disappeared, mute and insignificant
as I always have been.”

“How! Disappeared! I do not understand you, monsieur.”

“Sire, in a word,” said the officer, “I am come to ask for my
discharge from your majesty’s service.”

The king made a movement of surprise, but the officer remained as motionless as
a statue.

“Your discharge—yours, monsieur? and for how long a time, I
pray?”

“Why, forever, sire.”

“What, you are desirous of quitting my service, monsieur?” said
Louis, with an expression that revealed something more than surprise.

“Sire, I regret to say that I am.”

“Impossible!”

“It is so, however, sire. I am getting old; I have worn harness now
thirty-five years; my poor shoulders are tired; I feel that I must give place
to the young. I don’t belong to this age; I have still one foot in the
old one; it results that everything is strange in my eyes, everything
astonishes and bewilders me. In short, I have the honor to ask your majesty for
my discharge.”

“Monsieur,” said the king, looking at the officer, who wore his
uniform with an ease that would have caused envy in a young man, “you are
stronger and more vigorous than I am.”

“Oh!” replied the officer, with an air of false modesty,
“your majesty says so because I still have a good eye and a tolerably
firm foot—because I can still ride a horse, and my mustache is black;
but, sire, vanity of vanities all that—illusions all
that—appearance, smoke, sire! I have still a youthful air, it is true,
but I feel old, and within six months I am certain I shall be broken down,
gouty, impotent. Therefore, then, sire—”

“Monsieur,” interrupted the king, “remember your words of
yesterday. You said to me in this very place where you now are, that you were
endowed with the best health of any man in France; that fatigue was unknown to
you! that you did not mind spending whole days and nights at your post. Did you
tell me that, monsieur, or not? Try and recall, monsieur.”

The officer sighed. “Sire,” said he, “old age is boastful;
and it is pardonable for old men to praise themselves when others no longer do
it. It is very possible I said that; but the fact is, sire, I am very much
fatigued, an request permission to retire.”

“Monsieur,” said the king, advancing towards the officer with a
gesture full of majesty, “you are not assigning me the true reason. You
wish to quit my service, it may be true, but you disguise from me the motive of
your retreat.”

“Sire, believe that—”

“I believe what I see, monsieur; I see a vigorous, energetic man, full of
presence of mind, the best soldier in France, perhaps; and this personage
cannot persuade me the least in the world that he stands in need of
rest.”

“Ah! sire,” said the lieutenant, with bitterness, “what
praise! Indeed, your majesty confounds me! Energetic, vigorous, brave,
intelligent, the best soldier in the army! But, sire, your majesty exaggerates
my small portion of merit to such a point, that however good an opinion I may
have of myself, I do not recognize myself; in truth I do not. If I were vain
enough to believe only half of your majesty’s words, I should consider
myself a valuable, indispensable man. I should say that a servant possessed of
such brilliant qualities was a treasure beyond all price. Now, sire, I have
been all my life—I feel bound to say it—except at the present time,
appreciated, in my opinion, much below my value. I therefore repeat, your
majesty exaggerates.”

The king knitted his brow, for he saw a bitter raillery beneath the words of
the officer. “Come, monsieur,” said he, “let us meet the
question frankly. Are you dissatisfied with my service, say? No evasions; speak
boldly, frankly—I command you to do so.”

The officer, who had been twisting his hat about in his hands, with an
embarrassed air, for several minutes, raised his head at these words.
“Oh! sire,” said he, “that puts me a little more at my ease.
To a question put so frankly, I will reply frankly. To tell the truth is a good
thing, as much from the pleasure one feels in relieving one’s heart, as
on account of the rarity of the fact. I will speak the truth, then, to my king,
at the same time imploring him to excuse the frankness of an old
soldier.”

Louis looked at his officer with anxiety, which he manifested by the agitation
of his gesture. “Well, then, speak,” said he, “for I am
impatient to hear the truths you have to tell me.”

The officer threw his hat upon a table, and his countenance, always so
intelligent and martial, assumed, all at once, a strange character of grandeur
and solemnity. “Sire,” said he, “I quit the king’s
service because I am dissatisfied. The valet, in these times, can approach his
master as respectfully as I do, can give him an account of his labor, bring
back his tools, return the funds that have been intrusted to him, and say
‘Master, my day’s work is done. Pay me, if you please, and let us
part.’”

“Monsieur! monsieur!” exclaimed the king, crimson with rage.

“Ah! sire,” replied the officer, bending his knee for a moment,
“never was servant more respectful than I am before your majesty; only
you commanded me to tell the truth. Now I have begun to tell it, it must come
out, even if you command me to hold my tongue.”

There was so much resolution expressed in the deep-sunk muscles of the
officer’s countenance, that Louis XIV. had no occasion to tell him to
continue; he continued, therefore, whilst the king looked at him with a
curiosity mingled with admiration.

“Sire, I have, as I have said, now served the house of France thirty-five
years; few people have worn out so many swords in that service as I have, and
the swords I speak of were good swords, too, sire. I was a boy, ignorant of
everything except courage, when the king your father guessed that there was a
man in me. I was a man, sire, when the Cardinal de Richelieu, who was a judge
of manhood, discovered an enemy in me. Sire, the history of that enmity between
the ant and the lion may be read from the first to the last line, in the secret
archives of your family. If ever you feel an inclination to know it, do so,
sire; the history is worth the trouble—it is I who tell you so. You will
there read that the lion, fatigued, harassed, out of breath, at length cried
for quarter, and the justice must be rendered him to say, that he gave as much
as he required. Oh! those were glorious times, sire, strewed over with battles
like one of Tasso’s or Ariosto’s epics. The wonders of those times,
to which the people of ours would refuse belief, were every-day occurrences.
For five years together, I was a hero every day; at least, so I was told by
persons of judgment; and that is a long period for heroism, trust me, sire, a
period of five years. Nevertheless, I have faith in what these people told me,
for the were good judges. They were named M. de Richelieu, M. de Buckingham, M.
de Beaufort, M. de Retz, a mighty genius himself in street warfare,—in
short, the king, Louis XIII., and even the queen, your noble mother, who one
day condescended to say, ‘Thank you.’ I don’t know what
service I had had the good fortune to render her. Pardon me, sire, for speaking
so boldly; but what I relate to you, as I have already had the honor to tell
your majesty, is history.” The king bit his lips, and threw himself
violently on a chair.

“I appear importunate to your majesty,” said the lieutenant.
“Eh! sire, that is the fate of truth; she is a stern companion; she
bristles all over with steel; she wounds those whom she attacks, and sometimes
him who speaks her.”

“No, monsieur,” replied the king: “I bade you
speak—speak then.”

“After the service of the king and the cardinal, came the service of the
regency, sire; I fought pretty well in the Fronde—much less, though, than
the first time. The men began to diminish in stature. I have, nevertheless, led
your majesty’s musketeers on some perilous occasions, which stand upon
the orders of the day of the company. Mine was a beautiful luck at that time. I
was the favorite of M. de Mazarin. Lieutenant here! lieutenant there!
lieutenant to the right! lieutenant to the left! There was not a buffet dealt
in France, of which your humble servant did not have the dealing; but soon
France was not enough. The cardinal sent me to England on Cromwell’s
account; another gentleman who was not over gentle, I assure you, sire. I had
the honor of knowing him, and I was well able to appreciate him. A great deal
was promised me on account of that mission. So, as I did much more than I had
been bidden to do, I was generously paid, for I was at length appointed captain
of the musketeers; that is to say, the most envied position in court, which
takes precedence over the marshals of France, and justly; for who says captain
of the musketeers says the flower of chivalry and king of the brave.”

“Captain, monsieur!” interrupted the king; “you make a
mistake. Lieutenant, you mean.”

“Not at all, sire—I make no mistake; your majesty may rely upon me
in that respect. Monsieur le cardinal gave me the commission himself.”

“Well!”

“But M. de Mazarin, as you know better than anybody, does not often give,
and sometimes takes back what he has given; he took it back again as soon as
peace was made and he was no longer in want of me. Certainly I was not worthy
to replace M. de Treville, of illustrious memory; but they had promised me, and
they had given me; they ought to have stopped there.”

“Is that what dissatisfies you monsieur? Well, I shall make inquiries. I
love justice; and your claim, though made in military fashion, does not
displease me.”

“Oh, sire!” said the officer, “your majesty has ill
understood me; I no longer claim anything now.”

“Excess of delicacy, monsieur; but I will keep my eye upon your affairs,
and later—”

“Oh, sire! what a word!—later! Thirty years have I lived upon that
promising word, which has been pronounced by so many great personages, and
which your mouth has, in its turn, just pronounced. Later—that is how I
have received a score of wounds, and how I have reached fifty-four years of age
without ever having had a louis in my purse, and without ever having met with a
protector on my way,—I who have protected so many people! So I change my
formula, sire; and when any one says to me ‘Later,’ I reply
‘Now.’ It is rest that I solicit, sire. That may be easily granted
me. That will cost nobody anything.”

“I did not look for this language, monsieur, particularly from a man who
has always lived among the great. You forget you are speaking to the king, to a
gentleman who is, I suppose, as of good a house as yourself; and when I say
later, I mean a certainty.”

“I do not at all doubt it, sire; but this is the end of the terrible
truth I had to tell you. If I were to see upon that table a marshal’s
stick, the sword of constable, the crown of Poland, instead of later, I swear
to you, sire, that I should still say Now! Oh, excuse me, sire! I am from the
country of your grandfather, Henry IV. I do not speak often: but when I do
speak, I speak all.”

“The future of my reign has little temptation for you, monsieur, it
appears,” said Louis, haughtily.

“Forgetfulness, forgetfulness everywhere!” cried the officer, with
a noble air; “the master has forgotten the servant, so the servant is
reduced to forget his master. I live in unfortunate times, sire. I see youth
full of discouragement and fear, I see it timid and despoiled, when it ought to
be rich and powerful. I yesterday evening, for example, open the door to a king
of England, whose father, humble as I am, I was near saving, if God had not
been against me—God, who inspired His elect, Cromwell! I open, I said,
the door, that is to say, the palace of one brother to another brother, and I
see—stop, sire, that is a load on my heart!—I see the minister of
that king drive away the proscribed prince, and humiliate his master by
condemning to want another king, his equal. Then I see my prince, who is young,
handsome and brave, who has courage in his heart and lightening in his
eye,—I see him tremble before a priest, who laughs at him behind the
curtain of his alcove, where he digests all the gold of France, which he
afterwards stuffs into secret coffers. Yes—I understand your looks, sire.
I am bold to madness; but what is to be said? I am an old man, and I tell you
here, sire, to you, my king, things which I would cram down the throat of any
one who should dare to pronounce them before me. You have commanded me, to pour
out the bottom of my heart before you, sire, and I cast at the feet of your
majesty the pent-up indignation of thirty years, as I would pour out all my
blood, if your majesty commanded me to do so.”

The king, without speaking a word, wiped the drops of cold and abundant
perspiration which trickled from his temples. The moment of silence which
followed this vehement outbreak represented for him who had spoken, and for him
who had listened, ages of suffering.

“Monsieur,” said the king at length, “you spoke the word
forgetfulness. I have heard nothing but that word; I will reply, then, to it
alone. Others have perhaps been able to forget, but I have not, and the proof
is, that I remember that one day of riot, that one day when the furious people,
raging and roaring as the sea, invaded the royal palace; that one day when I
feigned sleep in my bed, one man alone, naked sword in hand, concealed behind
my curtain, watched over my life, ready to risk his own for me, as he had
before risked it twenty times for the lives of my family. Was not the
gentleman, whose name I then demanded, called M. d’Artagnan? say,
monsieur.”

“Your majesty has a good memory,” replied the officer, coldly.

“You see, then,” continued the king, “if I have such
remembrances of my childhood, what an amount I may gather in the age of
reason.”

“Your majesty has been richly endowed by God,” said the officer, in
the same tone.

“Come, Monsieur d’Artagnan,” continued Louis, with feverish
agitation, “ought you not to be patient as I am? Ought you not to do as I
do? Come!”

“And what do you do, sire?”

“I wait.”

“Your majesty may do so, because you are young; but I, sire, have not
time to wait; old age is at my door, and death is behind it, looking into the
very depths of my house. Your majesty is beginning life, its future is full of
hope and fortune; but I, sire, I am on the other side of the horizon, and we
are so far from each other, that I should never have time to wait till your
majesty came up to me.”

Louis made another turn in his apartment, still wiping the moisture from his
brow, in a manner that would have terrified his physicians, if his physicians
had witnessed the state his majesty was in.

“It is very well, monsieur,” said Louis XIV., in a sharp voice;
“you are desirous of having your discharge, and you shall have it. You
offer me your resignation of the rank of lieutenant of the musketeers?”

“I deposit it humbly at your majesty’s feet, sire.”

“That is sufficient. I will order your pension.”

“I shall have a thousand obligations to your majesty.”

“Monsieur,” said the king, with a violent effort, “I think
you are losing a good master.”

“And I am sure of it, sire.”

“Shall you ever find such another?”

“Oh, sire! I know that your majesty is alone in the world; therefore will
I never again take service with any other king upon earth, and will never again
have other master than myself.”

“You say so?”

“I swear so, your majesty.”

“I shall remember that word, monsieur.”

D’Artagnan bowed.

“And you know I have a good memory,” said the king.

“Yes, sire; and yet I should desire that that memory should fail your
majesty in this instance, in order that you might forget all the miseries I
have been forced to spread before your eyes. Your majesty is so much above the
poor and the mean, that I hope—”

“My majesty, monsieur, will act like the sun, which looks upon all, great
and small, rich and poor, giving luster to some, warmth to others, and life to
all. Adieu, Monsieur d’Artagnan—adieu: you are free.”

And the king, with a hoarse sob, which was lost in his throat, passed quickly
into the next room. D’Artagnan took up his hat from the table on which he
had thrown in, and went out.

Chapter XV. The Proscribed.

D’Artagnan had not reached the bottom of the
staircase, when the king called his gentleman. “I have a commission to
give you, monsieur,” said he.

“I am at your majesty’s commands.”

“Wait, then.” And the young king began to write the following
letter, which cost him more than one sigh, although, at the same time,
something like a feeling of triumph glittered in his eyes:

“MY LORD CARDINAL,—Thanks to your good counsels, and, above all,
thanks to your firmness, I have succeeded in overcoming a weakness unworthy of
a king. You have too ably arranged my destiny to allow gratitude not to stop me
at the moment when I was about to destroy your work. I felt I was wrong to wish
to make my life turn from the course you had marked out for it. Certainly it
would have been a misfortune to France and my family if a misunderstanding had
taken place between me and my minister. This, however, would certainly have
happened if I had made your niece my wife. I am perfectly aware of this, and
will henceforth oppose nothing to the accomplishment of my destiny. I am
prepared, then, to wed the infanta, Maria Theresa. You may at once open the
conference.—Your affectionate LOUIS.”

The king, after reperusing the letter, sealed it himself.

“This letter for my lord cardinal,” said he.

The gentleman took it. At Mazarin’s door he found Bernouin waiting with
anxiety.

“Well?” asked the minister’s valet de chambre.

“Monsieur,” said the gentleman, “here is a letter for his
eminence.”

“A letter! Ah! we expected one after the little journey of the
morning.”

“Oh! you know, then, that his majesty—”

“As first minister, it belongs to the duties of our charge to know
everything. And his majesty prays and implores, I presume.”

“I don’t know, but he sighed frequently whilst he was
writing.”

“Yes, yes, yes; we understand all that; people sigh sometimes from
happiness as well as from grief, monsieur.”

“And yet the king did not look very happy when he returned,
monsieur.”

“You did not see clearly. Besides, you only saw his majesty on his
return, for he was only accompanied by the lieutenant of the guards. But I had
his eminence’s telescope; I looked through it when he was tired, and I am
sure they both wept.”

“Well! was it for happiness they wept?”

“No, but for love, and they vowed to each other a thousand tendernesses,
which the king asks no better to keep. Now this letter is a beginning of the
execution.”

“And what does his eminence think of this love, which is, by the bye, no
secret to anybody?”

Bernouin took the gentleman by the arm, and whilst ascending the
staircase,—“In confidence,” said he, in a low voice,
“his eminence looks for success in the affair. I know very well we shall
have war with Spain; but, bah! war will please the nobles. My lord cardinal,
besides, can endow his niece royally, nay, more than royally. There will be
money, festivities, and fire-works—everybody will be delighted.”

“Well, for my part,” replied the gentleman, shaking his head,
“it appears to me that this letter is very light to contain all
that.”

“My friend,” replied Bernouin, “I am certain of what I tell
you. M. d’Artagnan related all that passed to me.”

“Ay, ay! and what did he tell you? Let us hear.”

“I accosted him by asking him, on the part of the cardinal, if there were
any news, without discovering my designs, observe, for M. d’Artagnan is a
cunning hand. ‘My dear Monsieur Bernouin,’ he replied, ‘the
king is madly in love with Mademoiselle de Mancini, that is all I have to tell
you.’ And then I asked him: ‘Do you think, to such a degree that it
will urge him to act contrary to the designs of his eminence?’ ‘Ah!
don’t ask me,’ said he; ‘I think the king capable of
anything; he has a will of iron, and what he wills he wills in earnest. If he
takes it into his head to marry Mademoiselle de Mancini, he will marry her,
depend upon it.’ And thereupon he left me and went straight to the
stables, took a horse, saddled it himself, jumped upon its back, and set off as
if the devil were at his heels.”

“So that you believe, then—”

“I believe that monsieur the lieutenant of the guards knew more than he
was willing to say.”

“In you opinion, then, M. d’Artagnan—”

“Is gone, according to all probability, after the exiles, to carry out
all that can facilitate the success of the king’s love.”

Chatting thus, the two confidants arrived at the door of his eminence’s
apartment. His eminence’s gout had left him; he was walking about his
chamber in a state of great anxiety, listening at doors and looking out of
windows. Bernouin entered, followed by the gentleman, who had orders from the
king to place the letter in the hands of the cardinal himself. Mazarin took the
letter, but before opening it, he got up a ready smile, a smile of
circumstance, able to throw a veil over emotions of whatever sort they might
be. So prepared, whatever was the impression received from the letter, no
reflection of that impression was allowed to transpire upon his countenance.

“Well,” said he, when he had read and reread the letter,
“very well, monsieur. Inform the king that I thank him for his obedience
to the wishes of the queen-mother, and that I will do everything for the
accomplishment of his will.”

The gentleman left the room. The door had scarcely closed before the cardinal,
who had no mask for Bernouin, took off that which had so recently covered his
face, and with a most dismal expression,—“Call M. de
Brienne,” said he. Five minutes afterward the secretary entered.

“Monsieur,” said Mazarin, “I have just rendered a great
service to the monarchy, the greatest I have ever rendered it. You will carry
this letter, which proves it, to her majesty the queen-mother, and when she
shall have returned it to you, you will lodge it in portfolio B., which is
filed with documents and papers relative to my ministry.”

Brienne went as desired, and, as the letter was unsealed, did not fail to read
it on his way. There is likewise no doubt that Bernouin, who was on good terms
with everybody, approached so near to the secretary as to be able to read the
letter over his shoulder; so that the news spread with such activity through
the castle, that Mazarin might have feared it would reach the ears of the
queen-mother before M. de Brienne could convey Louis XIV.’s letter to
her. A moment after orders were given for departure, and M. de Conde having
been to pay his respects to the king on his pretended rising, inscribed the
city of Poitiers upon his tablets, as the place of sojourn and rest for their
majesties.

Thus in a few instants was unraveled an intrigue which had covertly occupied
all the diplomacies of Europe. It had nothing, however, very clear as a result,
but to make a poor lieutenant of musketeers lose his commission and his
fortune. It is true, that in exchange he gained his liberty. We shall soon know
how M. d’Artagnan profited by this. For the moment, if the reader will
permit us, we shall return to the hostelry of les Medici, of which one of the
windows opened at the very moment the orders were given for the departure of
the king.

The window that opened was that of one of the rooms of Charles II. The
unfortunate prince had passed the night in bitter reflections, his head resting
on his hands, and his elbows on the table, whilst Parry, infirm and old,
wearied in body and in mind, had fallen asleep in a corner. A singular fortune
was that of this faithful servant, who saw beginning for the second generation
the fearful series of misfortunes which had weighed so heavily on the first.
When Charles II. had well thought over the fresh defeat he had experienced,
when he perfectly comprehended the complete isolation into which he had just
fallen, on seeing his fresh hope left behind him, he was seized as with a
vertigo, and sank back into the large armchair in which he was seated. Then God
took pity on the unhappy prince, and sent to console him sleep, the innocent
brother of death. He did not wake till half-past six, that is to say, till the
sun shone brightly into his chamber, and Parry, motionless with fear of waking
him, was observing with profound grief the eyes of the young man already red
with wakefulness, and his cheeks pale with suffering and privations.

At length the noise of some heavy carts descending towards the Loire awakened
Charles. He arose, looked around him like a man who has forgotten everything,
perceived Parry, shook him by the hand, and commanded him to settle the
reckoning with Master Cropole. Master Cropole, being called upon to settle his
account with Parry, acquitted himself, it must be allowed, like an honest man;
he only made his customary remark, that the two travelers had eaten nothing,
which had the double disadvantage of being humiliating for his kitchen, and of
forcing him to ask payment for a repast not consumed, but not the less lost.
Parry had nothing to say to the contrary, and paid.

“I hope,” said the king, “it has not been the same with the
horses. I don’t see that they have eaten at your expense, and it would be
a misfortune for travelers like us, who have a long journey to make, to have
our horses fail us.”

But Cropole, at this doubt, assumed his majestic air, and replied that the
stables of les Medici were not less hospitable than its refectory.

The king mounted his horse; his old servant did the same, and both set out
towards Paris, without meeting a single person on their road, in the streets or
the faubourgs of the city. For the prince the blow was the more severe, as it
was a fresh exile. The unfortunates cling to the smallest hopes, as the happy
do to the greatest good; and when they are obliged to quit the place where that
hope has soothed their hearts, they experience the mortal regret which the
banished man feels when he places his foot upon the vessel which is to bear him
into exile. It appears that the heart already wounded so many times suffers
from the least scratch; it appears that it considers as a good the momentary
absence of evil, which is nothing but the absence of pain; and that God, into
the most terrible misfortunes, has thrown hope as the drop of water which the
rich sinner in hell entreated of Lazarus.

For one instant even the hope of Charles II. had been more than a fugitive
joy;—that was when he found himself so kindly welcomed by his brother
king; then it had taken a form that had become a reality; then, all at once,
the refusal of Mazarin had reduced the fictitious reality to the state of a
dream. This promise of Louis XIV., so soon retracted, had been nothing but a
mockery; a mockery like his crown—like his scepter—like his
friends—like all that had surrounded his royal childhood, and which had
abandoned his proscribed youth. Mockery! everything was a mockery for Charles
II. except the cold, black repose promised by death.

Such were the ideas of the unfortunate prince while sitting listlessly upon his
horse, to which he abandoned the reins: he rode slowly along beneath the warm
May sun, in which the somber misanthropy of the exile perceived a last insult
to his grief.

Chapter XVI. “Remember!”

A horseman going rapidly along the road leading towards
Blois, which he had left nearly half an hour before, passed the two travelers,
and, though apparently in haste, raised his hat as he passed them. The king
scarcely observed this young man, who was about twenty-five years of age, and
who, turning round several times, made friendly signals to a man standing
before the gate of a handsome white-and-red house; that is to say, built of
brick and stone, with a slated roof, situated on the left hand of the road the
prince was traveling.

This man, old, tall, and thin, with white hair,—we speak of the one
standing by the gate;—this man replied to the farewell signals of the
young one by signs of parting as tender as could have been made by a father.
The young man disappeared at the first turn of the road, bordered by fine
trees, and the old man was preparing to return to the house, when the two
travelers, arriving in front of the gate, attracted his attention.

The king, as we have said, was riding with his head cast down, his arms inert,
leaving his horse to go what pace he liked, whilst Parry, behind him, the
better to imbibe the genial influence of the sun, had taken off his hat, and
was looking about right and left. His eyes encountered those of the old man
leaning against the gate; the latter, as if struck by some strange spectacle,
uttered an exclamation, and made one step towards the two travelers. From Parry
his eyes immediately turned towards the king, upon whom they rested for an
instant. This examination, however rapid, was instantly reflected in a visible
manner upon the features of the tall old man. For scarcely had he recognized
the younger of the travelers—and we said recognized, for nothing but a
perfect recognition could have explained such an act—scarcely, we say,
had he recognized the younger of the two travelers, than he clapped his hands
together, with respectful surprise, and, raising his hat from his head, bowed
so profoundly that it might have been said he was kneeling. This demonstration,
however absent, or rather, however absorbed was the king in his reflections,
attracted his attention instantly; and checking his horse and turning towards
Parry, he exclaimed, “Good God, Parry, who is that man who salutes me in
such a marked manner? Can he know me, think you?”

Parry, much agitated and very pale, had already turned his horse towards the
gate. “Ah, sire!” said he, stopping suddenly at five or six
paces’ distance from the still bending old man: “sire, I am seized
with astonishment, for I think I recognize that brave man. Yes, it must be he!
Will your majesty permit me to speak to him?”

“Certainly.”

“Can it be you, Monsieur Grimaud?” asked Parry.

“Yes, it is I,” replied the tall old man, drawing himself up, but
without losing his respectful demeanor.

“Sire,” then said Parry, “I was not deceived. This good man
is the servant of the Comte de la Fere, and the Comte de la Fere, if you
remember, is the worthy gentleman of whom I have so often spoken to your
majesty that the remembrance of him must remain, not only in your mind, but in
your heart.”

“He who assisted my father at his last moments?” asked Charles,
evidently affected at the remembrance.

“The same, sire.”

“Alas!” said Charles; and then addressing Grimaud, whose
penetrating and intelligent eyes seemed to search and divine his
thoughts.—“My friend,” said he, “does your master,
Monsieur le Comte de la Fere, live in this neighborhood?”

“There,” replied Grimaud, pointing with his outstretched arm to the
white-and-red house behind the gate.

“And is Monsieur le Comte de la Fere at home at present?”

“At the back, under the chestnut trees.”

“Parry,” said the king, “I will not miss this opportunity, so
precious for me, to thank the gentleman to whom our house is indebted for such
a noble example of devotedness and generosity. Hold my horse, my friend, if you
please.” And, throwing the bridle to Grimaud, the king entered the abode
of Athos, quite alone, as one equal enters the dwelling of another. Charles had
been informed by the concise explanation of Grimaud,—“At the back,
under the chestnut trees;” he left, therefore, the house on the left, and
went straight down the path indicated. The thing was easy; the tops of those
noble trees, already covered with leaves and flowers, rose above all the rest.

On arriving under the lozenges, by turns luminous and dark, which checkered the
ground of this path according as the trees were more or less in leaf, the young
prince perceived a gentleman walking with his arms behind him, apparently
plunged in a deep meditation. Without doubt, he had often had this gentleman
described to himself, for, without hesitating, Charles II. walked straight up
to him. At the sound of his footsteps, the Comte de la Fere raised his head,
and seeing an unknown man of noble and elegant carriage coming towards him, he
raised his hat and waited. At some paces from him, Charles II. likewise took
off his hat. Then, as if in reply to the comte’s mute
interrogation,—

“Monsieur le Comte,” said he, “I come to discharge a debt
towards you. I have, for a long time, had the expression of a profound
gratitude to bring you. I am Charles II., son of Charles Stuart, who reigned in
England, and died on the scaffold.”

On hearing this illustrious name, Athos felt a kind of shudder creep through
his veins, but at the sight of the young prince standing uncovered before him,
and stretching out his hand towards him, two tears, for an instant, dimmed his
brilliant eyes. He bent respectfully, but the prince took him by the hand.

“See how unfortunate I am, my lord count; it is only due to chance that I
have met with you. Alas! I ought to have people around me whom I love and
honor, whereas I am reduced to preserve their services in my heart, and their
names in my memory: so that if your servant had not recognized mine, I should
have passed by your door as by that of a stranger.”

“It is but too true,” said Athos, replying with his voice to the
first part of the king’s speech, and with a bow to the second; “it
is but too true, indeed, that your majesty has seen many evil days.”

“And the worst, alas!” replied Charles, “are perhaps still to
come.”

“Sire, let us hope.”

“Count, count,” continued Charles, shaking his head, “I
entertained hope till last night, and that of a good Christian, I swear.”

Athos looked at the king as if to interrogate him.

“Oh, the history is soon related,” said Charles. “Proscribed,
despoiled, disdained, I resolved, in spite of all my repugnance, to tempt
fortune one last time. Is it not written above, that, for our family, all good
fortune and all bad fortune shall eternally come from France? You know
something of that, monsieur,—you, who are one of the Frenchmen whom my
unfortunate father found at the foot of his scaffold, on the day of his death,
after having found them at his right hand on the day of battle.”

“Sire,” said Athos modestly, “I was not alone. My companions
and I did, under the circumstances, our duty as gentlemen, and that was all.
Your majesty was about to do me the honor to relate—”

“That is true, I had the protection,—pardon my hesitation, count,
but, for a Stuart, you, who understand everything, you will comprehend that the
word is hard to pronounce;—I had, I say, the protection of my cousin the
stadtholder of Holland; but without the intervention, or at least without the
authorization of France, the stadtholder would not take the initiative. I came,
then, to ask this authorization of the king of France, who has refused
me.”

“The king has refused you, sire!”

“Oh, not he; all justice must be rendered to my younger brother Louis;
but Monsieur de Mazarin—”

Athos bit his lips.

“You perhaps think I should have expected this refusal?” said the
king, who had noticed the movement.

“That was, in truth, my thought, sire,” replied Athos,
respectfully; “I know that Italian of old.”

“Then I determined to come to the test, and know at once the last word of
my destiny. I told my brother Louis, that, not to compromise either France or
Holland, I would tempt fortune myself in person, as I had already done, with
two hundred gentlemen, if he would give them to me; and a million, if he would
lend it me.”

“Well, sire?”

“Well, monsieur, I am suffering at this moment something strange, and
that is, the satisfaction of despair. There is in certain souls,—and I
have just discovered that mine is of the number,—a real satisfaction in
the assurance that all is lost, and the time is come to yield.”

“Oh, I hope,” said Athos, “that your majesty is not come to
that extremity.”

“To say so, my lord count, to endeavor to revive hope in my heart, you
must have ill understood what I have just told you. I came to Blois to ask of
my brother Louis the alms of a million, with which I had the hopes of
re-establishing my affairs; and my brother Louis has refused me. You see, then,
plainly, that all is lost.”

“Will your majesty permit me to express a contrary opinion?”

“How is that, count? Do you think my heart of so low an order that I do
not know how to face my position?”

“Sire, I have always seen that it was in desperate positions that
suddenly the great turns of fortune have taken place.”

“Thank you, count: it is some comfort to meet with a heart like yours;
that is to say, sufficiently trustful in God and in monarchy, never to despair
of a royal fortune, however low it may be fallen. Unfortunately, my dear count,
your words are like those remedies they call ‘sovereign,’ and
which, though able to cure curable wounds or diseases, fail against death.
Thank you for your perseverance in consoling me, count, thanks for your devoted
remembrance, but I know in what I must trust—nothing will save me now.
And see, my friend, I was so convinced, that I was taking the route of exile,
with my old Parry; I was returning to devour my poignant griefs in the little
hermitage offered me by Holland. There, believe me, count, all will soon be
over, and death will come quickly; it is called so often by this body, eaten up
by its soul, and by this soul, which aspires to heaven.”

“Your majesty has a mother, a sister, and brothers; your majesty is the
head of the family, and ought, therefore, to ask a long life of God, instead of
imploring Him for a prompt death. Your majesty is an exile, a fugitive, but you
have right on your side; you ought to aspire to combats, dangers, business, and
not to rest in heavens.”

“Count,” said Charles II., with a smile of indescribable sadness,
“have you ever heard of a king who reconquered his kingdom with one
servant the age of Parry, and with three hundred crowns which that servant
carried in his purse?”

“No, sire; but I have heard—and that more than once—that a
dethroned king has recovered his kingdom with a firm will, perseverance, some
friends, and a million skillfully employed.”

“But you cannot have understood me. The million I asked of my brother
Louis was refused me.”

“Sire,” said Athos, “will your majesty grant me a few
minutes, and listen attentively to what remains for me to say to you?”

Charles II. looked earnestly at Athos. “Willingly, monsieur,” said
he.

“Then I will show your majesty the way,” resumed the count,
directing his steps towards the house. He then conducted the king to his study,
and begged him to be seated. “Sire,” said he, “your majesty
just now told me that, in the present state of England, a million would suffice
for the recovery of your kingdom.”

“To attempt it at least, monsieur; and to die as a king if I should not
succeed.”

“Well, then, sire, let your majesty, according to the promise you have
made me, have the goodness to listen to what I have to say.” Charles made
an affirmative sign with his head. Athos walked straight up to the door, the
bolts of which he drew, after looking to see if anybody was near, and then
returned. “Sire,” said he, “your majesty has kindly
remembered that I lent assistance to the very noble and very unfortunate
Charles I., when his executioners conducted him from St. James’s to
Whitehall.”

“Yes, certainly I do remember it, and always shall remember it.”

“Sire, it is a dismal history to be heard by a son who no doubt has had
it related to him many times; and yet I ought to repeat it to your majesty
without omitting one detail.”

“Speak on, monsieur.”

“When the king your father ascended the scaffold, or rather when he
passed from his chamber to the scaffold, on a level with his window, everything
was prepared for his escape. The executioner was got out of the way; a hole
contrived under the floor of his apartment; I myself was beneath the funeral
vault, which I heard all at once creak beneath his feet.”

“Parry has related to me all these terrible details, monsieur.”

Athos bowed and resumed. “But here is something he had not related to
you, sire, for what follows passed between God, your father, and myself; and
never has the revelation of it been made even to my dearest friends. ‘Go
a little further off,’ said the august prisoner to the executioner;
‘it is but for an instant, and I know that I belong to you; but remember
not to strike till I give the signal. I wish to offer up my prayers in
freedom.”

“Pardon me,” said Charles II., turning very pale, “but you,
count, who know so many details of this melancholy event,—details which,
as you said just now, have never been revealed to any one,—do you know
the name of that infernal executioner, of that base wretch who concealed his
face that he might assassinate a king with impunity?”

Athos became slightly pale. “His name?” said he, “yes, I know
it, but cannot tell it.”

“And what is become of him, for nobody in England knows his
destiny?”

“He is dead.”

“But he did not die in his bed; he did not die a calm and peaceful death;
he did not die the death of the good?”

“He died a violent death, in a terrible night, rendered so by the
passions of man and a tempest from God. His body, pierced by a dagger, sank to
the depths of the ocean. God pardon his murderer!”

“Proceed, then,” said Charles II., seeing that the count was
unwilling to say more.

“The king of England, after having, as I have said, spoken thus to the
masked executioner, added,—‘Observe, you will not strike till I
shall stretch out my arms, saying—REMEMBER!’”

“I was aware,” said Charles, in an agitated voice, “that that
was the last word pronounced by my unfortunate father. But why and for
whom?”

“For the French gentleman placed beneath his scaffold.”

“For you, then, monsieur?”

“Yes, sire; and every one of the words which he spoke to me, through the
planks of the scaffold covered with a black cloth, still sounds in my ears. The
king knelt down on one knee: ‘Comte de la Fere,’ said he,
‘are you there?’ ‘Yes, sire,’ replied I. Then the king
stooped towards the boards.”

Charles II., also palpitating with interest, burning with grief, stooped
towards Athos, to catch, one by one, every word that escaped from him. His head
touched that of the comte.

“Then,” continued Athos, “the king stooped. ‘Comte de
la Fere,’ said he, ‘I could not be saved by you: it was not to be.
Now, even though I commit a sacrilege, I must speak to you. Yes, I have spoken
to men—yes, I have spoken to God, and I speak to you the last. To sustain
a cause which I thought sacred, I have lost the throne of my fathers and the
heritage of my children.’”

Charles II. concealed his face in his hands, and a bitter tear glided between
his white and slender fingers.

“‘I have still a million in gold,’ continued the king.
‘I buried it in the vaults of the castle of Newcastle, a moment before I
left that city.’” Charles raised his head with an expression of
such painful joy that it would have drawn tears from any one acquainted with
his misfortunes.

“A million!” murmured he, “Oh, count!”

“‘You alone know that this money exists: employ it when you think
it can be of the greatest service to my eldest son. And now, Comte de la Fere,
bid me adieu!’

“‘Adieu, adieu, sire!’ cried I.”

Charles arose, and went and leant his burning brow against the window.

“It was then,” continued Athos, “that the king pronounced the
word ‘REMEMBER!’ addressed to me. You see, sire, that I have
remembered.”

The king could not resist or conceal his emotion. Athos beheld the movement of
his shoulders, which undulated convulsively; he heard the sobs which burst from
his over-charged breast. He was silent himself, suffocated by the flood of
bitter remembrances he had just poured upon that royal head. Charles II., with
a violent effort, left the window, devoured his tears, and came and sat by
Athos. “Sire,” said the latter, “I thought till to-day that
the time had not yet arrived for the employment of that last resource; but,
with my eyes fixed upon England, I felt it was approaching. To-morrow I meant
to go and inquire in what part of the world your majesty was, and then I
purposed going to you. You come to me, sire; that is an indication that God is
with us.”

“My lord,” said Charles, in a voice choked by emotion, “you
are, for me, what an angel sent from heaven would be,—you are a preserver
sent to me from the tomb of my father himself; but, believe me, for ten
years’ civil war has passed over my country, striking down men, tearing
up soil, it is no more probable that gold should remain in the entrails of the
earth, than love in the hearts of my subjects.”

“Sire, the spot in which his majesty buried the million is well known to
me, and no one, I am sure, has been able to discover it. Besides, is the castle
of Newcastle quite destroyed? Have they demolished it stone by stone, and
uprooted the soil to the last tree?”

“No, it is still standing: but at this moment General Monk occupies it
and is encamped there. The only spot from which I could look for succor, where
I possess a single resource, you see, is invaded by my enemies.”

“General Monk, sire, cannot have discovered the treasure which I speak
of.”

“Yes, but can I go and deliver myself up to Monk, in order to recover
this treasure? Ah! count, you see plainly I must yield to destiny, since it
strikes me to the earth every time I rise. What can I do with Parry as my only
servant, with Parry, whom Monk has already driven from his presence? No, no,
no, count, we must yield to this last blow.”

“But what your majesty cannot do, and what Parry can no more attempt, do
you not believe that I could succeed in accomplishing?”

“You—you, count—you would go?”

“If it please your majesty,” said Athos, bowing to the king,
“yes, I will go, sire.”

“What! you so happy here, count?”

“I am never happy when I have a duty left to accomplish, and it is an
imperative duty which the king your father left me to watch over your fortunes,
and make a royal use of his money. So, if your majesty honors me with a sign, I
will go with you.”

“Ah, monsieur!” said the king, forgetting all royal etiquette and
throwing his arms around the neck of Athos, “you prove to me that there
is a God in heaven, and that this God sometimes sends messengers to the
unfortunate who groan on the earth.”

Athos, exceedingly moved by this burst of feeling of the young man, thanked him
with profound respect, and approached the window. “Grimaud!” cried
he, “bring out my horses.”

“What, now—immediately!” said the king. “Ah, monsieur,
you are indeed a wonderful man!”

“Sire,” said Athos, “I know nothing more pressing than your
majesty’s service. Besides,” added he, smiling, “it is a
habit contracted long since, in the service of the queen your aunt, and of the
king your father. How is it possible for me to lose it at the moment your
majesty’s service calls for it?”

“What a man!” murmured the king.

Then, after a moment’s reflection,—“But no, count, I cannot
expose you to such privations. I have no means of rewarding such
services.”

“Bah!” said Athos, laughing. “Your majesty is joking; have
you not a million? Ah! why am I not possessed of half such a sum! I would
already have raised a regiment. But, thank God! I have still a few rolls of
gold and some family diamonds left. Your majesty will, I hope, deign to share
with a devoted servant.”

“With a friend—yes, count, but on condition that, in his turn, that
friend will share with me hereafter!”

“Sire!” said Athos, opening a casket, form which he drew both gold
and jewels, “you see, sire, we are too rich. Fortunately, there are four
of us, in the event of our meeting with thieves.”

Joy made the blood rush to the pale cheeks of Charles II., as he saw
Athos’s two horses, led by Grimaud, already booted for the journey,
advance towards the porch.

“Blaisois, this letter for the Vicomte de Bragelonne. For everybody else
I am gone to Paris. I confide the house to you, Blaisois.” Blaisois
bowed, shook hands with Grimaud, and shut the gate.

Chapter XVII. In which Aramis is sought, and only
Bazin is found.

Two hours had scarcely elapsed since the departure of
the master of the house, who, in Blaisois’s sight, had taken the road to
Paris, when a horseman, mounted on a good pied horse, stopped before the gate,
and with a sonorous “hola!” called the stable-boys, who, with the
gardeners, had formed a circle round Blaisois, the historian-in-ordinary to the
household of the chateau. This “hola,” doubtless well known to
Master Blaisois, made him turn his head and exclaim—“Monsieur
d’Artagnan! run quickly, you chaps, and open the gate.”

A swarm of eight brisk lads flew to the gate, which was opened as if it had
been made of feathers; and every one loaded him with attentions, for they knew
the welcome this friend was accustomed to receive from their master; and for
such remarks the eye of the valet may always be depended upon.

“Ah!” said M. d’Artagnan, with an agreeable smile, balancing
himself upon his stirrup to jump to the ground, “where is that dear
count?”

“Ah! how unfortunate you are, monsieur!” said Blaisois: “and
how unfortunate will monsieur le comte, our master, think himself when he hears
of your coming! As ill luck will have it, monsieur le comte left home two hours
ago.”

D’Artagnan did not trouble himself about such trifles. “Very
good!” said he. “You always speak the best French in the world; you
shall give me a lesson in grammar and correct language, whilst I wait the
return of your master.”

“That is impossible, monsieur,” said Blaisois; “you would
have to wait too long.”

“Will he not come back to-day, then?”

“No, nor to-morrow, nor the day after to-morrow. Monsieur le comte has
gone on a journey.”

“A journey!” said D’Artagnan, surprised; “that’s
a fable, Master Blaisois.”

“Monsieur, it is no more than the truth. Monsieur has done me the honor
to give me the house in charge; and he added, with his voice so full of
authority and kindness—that is all one to me: ‘You will say I have
gone to Paris.’”

“Well!” cried D’Artagnan, “since he is gone towards
Paris, that is all I wanted to know! you should have told me so at first,
booby! He is then two hours in advance?”

“Yes, monsieur.”

“I shall soon overtake him. Is he alone?”

“No, monsieur.”

“Who is with him, then?”

“A gentleman whom I don’t know, an old man, and M. Grimaud.”

“Such a party cannot travel as fast as I can—I will start.”

“Will monsieur listen to me an instant?” said Blaisois, laying his
hand gently on the reins of the horse.

“Yes, if you don’t favor me with fine speeches, and make
haste.”

“Well, then, monsieur, that word Paris appears to me to be only an
excuse.”

“Oh, oh!” said D’Artagnan, seriously, “an excuse,
eh?”

“Yes, monsieur: and monsieur le comte is not going to Paris, I will
swear.”

“What makes you think so?”

“This,—M. Grimaud always knows where our master is going; and he
had promised me that the first time he went to Paris, he would take a little
money for me to my wife.”

“What, have you a wife, then?”

“I had one—she was of this country; but monsieur thought her a
noisy scold, and I sent her to Paris; it is sometimes inconvenient, but very
agreeable at others.”

“I understand; but go on. You do not believe the count gone to
Paris?”

“No, monsieur; for then M. Grimaud would have broken his word; he would
have perjured himself, and that is impossible.”

“That is impossible,” repeated D’Artagnan, quite in a study,
because he was quite convinced. “Well, my brave Blaisois, many thanks to
you.”

Blaisois bowed.

“Come, you know I am not curious—I have serious business with your
master. Could you not, by a little bit of a word—you who speak so
well—give me to understand—one syllable only—I will guess the
rest.”

“Upon my word, monsieur, I cannot. I am quite ignorant where monsieur le
comte is gone. As to listening at doors, that is contrary to my nature; and
besides, it is forbidden here.”

“My dear fellow,” said D’Artagnan, “this is a very bad
beginning for me. Never mind; you know when monsieur le comte will return, at
least?”

“As little, monsieur, as the place of his destination.”

“Come, Blaisois, come, search.”

“Monsieur doubts my sincerity? Ah, monsieur, that grieves me much.”

“The devil take his gilded tongue!” grumbled D’Artagnan.
“A clown with a word would be worth a dozen of him. Adieu!”

“Monsieur, I have the honor to present you my respects.”

“Cuistre!” said D’Artagnan to himself, “the fellow is
unbearable.” He gave another look up to the house, turned his
horse’s head, and set off like a man who has nothing either annoying or
embarrassing in his mind. When he was at the end of the wall, and out of
sight,—“Well, now, I wonder,” said he, breathing quickly,
“whether Athos was at home. No; all those idlers, standing with their
arms crossed, would have been at work if the eye of the master was near. Athos
gone on a journey?—that is incomprehensible. Bah! it is all devilish
mysterious! And then—no—he is not the man I want. I want one of a
cunning, patient mind. My business is at Melun, in a certain presbytery I am
acquainted with. Forty-five leagues—four days and a half! Well, it is
fine weather, and I am free. Never mind the distance!”

And he put his horse into a trot, directing his course towards Paris. On the
fourth day he alighted at Melun, as he had intended.

D’Artagnan was never in the habit of asking any one on the road for any
common information. For these sorts of details, unless in very serious
circumstances, he confided in his perspicacity, which was so seldom at fault,
in his experience of thirty years, and in a great habit of reading the
physiognomies of houses, as well as those of men. At Melun, D’Artagnan
immediately found the presbytery—a charming house, plastered over red
brick, with vines climbing along the gutters, and a cross, in carved stone,
surmounting the ridge of the roof. From the ground-floor of this house came a
noise, or rather a confusion of voices, like the chirping of young birds when
the brood is just hatched under the down. One of these voices was spelling the
alphabet distinctly. A voice thick, yet pleasant, at the same time scolded the
talkers and corrected the faults of the reader. D’Artagnan recognized
that voice, and as the window of the ground-floor was open, he leant down from
his horse under the branches and red fibers of the vine and cried,
“Bazin, my dear Bazin! good-day to you.”

A short, fat man, with a flat face, a cranium ornamented with a crown of gray
hairs, cut short, in imitation of a tonsure, and covered with an old black
velvet cap, arose as soon as he heard D’Artagnan—we ought not to
say arose, but bounded up. In fact, Bazin bounded up, carrying with him his
little low chair, which the children tried to take away, with battles more
fierce than those of the Greeks endeavoring to recover the body of Patroclus
from the hands of the Trojans. Bazin did more than bound; he let fall both his
alphabet and his ferule. “You!” said he; “you, Monsieur
D’Artagnan?”

“Yes, myself! Where is Aramis—no, M. le Chevalier
d’Herblay—no, I am still mistaken—Monsieur le
Vicaire-General?”

“Ah, monsieur,” said Bazin, with dignity, “monseigneur is at
his diocese.”

“What did you say?” said D’Artagnan. Bazin repeated the
sentence.

“Ah, ah! but has Aramis a diocese?”

“Yes, monsieur. Why not?”

“Is he a bishop, then?”

“Why, where can you come from,” said Bazin, rather irreverently,
“that you don’t know that?”

“My dear Bazin, we pagans, we men of the sword, know very well when a man
is made a colonel, or maitre-de-camp, or marshal of France; but if he be made a
bishop, arch-bishop, or pope—devil take me if the news reaches us before
the three quarters of the earth have had the advantage of it!”

“Hush! hush!” said Bazin, opening his eyes: “do not spoil
these poor children, in whom I am endeavoring to inculcate such good
principles.” In fact, the children had surrounded D’Artagnan, whose
horse, long sword, spurs, and martial air they very much admired. But above
all, they admired his strong voice; so that, when he uttered his oath, the
whole school cried out, “The devil take me!” with fearful bursts of
laughter, shouts, and bounds, which delighted the musketeer, and bewildered the
old pedagogue.

“There!” said he, “hold your tongues, you brats! You have
come, M. d’Artagnan, and all my good principles fly away. With you, as
usual, comes disorder. Babel is revived. Ah! Good Lord! Ah! the wild little
wretches!” And the worthy Bazin distributed right and left blows which
increased the cries of his scholars by changing the nature of them.

“At least,” said he, “you will no longer decoy any one
here.”

“Do you think so?” said D’Artagnan, with a smile which made a
shudder creep over the shoulders of Bazin.

“He is capable of it,” murmured he.

“Where is your master’s diocese?”

“Monseigneur Rene is bishop of Vannes.”

“Who had him nominated?”

“Why, monsieur le surintendant, our neighbor.”

“What! Monsieur Fouquet?”

“To be sure he did.”

“Is Aramis on good terms with him, then?”

“Monseigneur preached every Sunday at the house of monsieur le
surintendant at Vaux; then they hunted together.”

“Ah!”

“And monseigneur composed his homilies—no, I mean his
sermons—with monsieur le surintendant.”

“Bah! he preached in verse, then, this worthy bishop?”

“Monsieur, for the love of heaven, do not jest with sacred things.”

“There, Bazin, there! So, then, Aramis is at Vannes?”

“At Vannes, in Bretagne.”

“You are a deceitful old hunks, Bazin; that is not true.”

“See, monsieur, if you please; the apartments of the presbytery are
empty.”

“He is right there,” said D’Artagnan, looking attentively at
the house, the aspect of which announced solitude.

“But monseigneur must have written you an account of his
promotion.”

“When did it take place?”

“A month back.”

“Oh! then there is no time lost. Aramis cannot yet have wanted me. But
how is it, Bazin, you do not follow your master?”

“Monsieur, I cannot; I have occupations.”

“Your alphabet?”

“And my penitents.”

“What, do you confess, then? Are you a priest?”

“The same as one. I have such a call.”

“But the orders?”

“Oh,” said Bazin, without hesitation, “now that monseigneur
is a bishop, I shall soon have my orders, or at least my dispensations.”
And he rubbed his hands.

“Decidedly,” said D’Artagnan to himself, “there will be
no means of uprooting these people. Get me some supper, Bazin.”

“With pleasure, monsieur.”

“A fowl, a bouillon, and a bottle of wine.”

“This is Saturday night, monsieur—it is a day of abstinence.”

“I have a dispensation,” said D’Artagnan.

Bazin looked at him suspiciously.

“Ah, ah, master hypocrite!” said the musketeer, “for whom do
you take me? If you, who are the valet, hope for dispensation to commit a
crime, shall not I, the friend of your bishop, have dispensation for eating
meat at the call of my stomach? Make yourself agreeable with me, Bazin, or by
heavens! I will complain to the king, and you shall never confess. Now you know
that the nomination of bishops rests with the king,—I have the king, I am
the stronger.”

Bazin smiled hypocritically. “Ah, but we have monsieur le
surintendant,” said he.

“And you laugh at the king, then?”

Bazin made no reply; his smile was sufficiently eloquent.

“My supper,” said D’Artagnan, “it is getting towards
seven o’clock.”

Bazin turned round and ordered the eldest of the pupils to inform the cook. In
the meantime, D’Artagnan surveyed the presbytery.

“Phew!” said he, disdainfully, “monseigneur lodged his
grandeur very meanly here.”

“We have the Chateau de Vaux,” said Bazin.

“Which is perhaps equal to the Louvre?” said D’Artagnan,
jeeringly.

“Which is better,” replied Bazin, with the greatest coolness
imaginable.

“Ah, ah!” said D’Artagnan.

He would perhaps have prolonged the discussion, and maintained the superiority
of the Louvre, but the lieutenant perceived that his horse remained fastened to
the bars of a gate.

“The devil!” said he. “Get my horse looked after; your master
the bishop has none like him in his stables.”

Bazin cast a sidelong glance at the horse, and replied, “Monsieur le
surintendant gave him four from his own stables; and each of the four is worth
four of yours.”

The blood mounted to the face of D’Artagnan. His hand itched and his eye
glanced over the head of Bazin, to select the place upon which he should
discharge his anger. But it passed away; reflection came, and D’Artagnan
contented himself with saying,—

“The devil! the devil! I have done well to quit the service of the king.
Tell me, worthy Master Bazin,” added he, “how many musketeers does
monsieur le surintendant retain in his service?”

“He could have all there are in the kingdom with his money,”
replied Bazin, closing his book, and dismissing the boys with some kindly blows
of his cane.

“The devil! the devil!” repeated D’Artagnan, once more, as if
to annoy the pedagogue. But as supper was now announced, he followed the cook,
who introduced him into the refectory, where it awaited him. D’Artagnan
placed himself at the table, and began a hearty attack upon his fowl.

“It appears to me,” said D’Artagnan, biting with all his
might at the tough fowl they had served up to him, and which they had evidently
forgotten to fatten,—“it appears that I have done wrong in not
seeking service with that master yonder. A powerful noble this intendant,
seemingly! In good truth, we poor fellows know nothing at the court, and the
rays of the sun prevent our seeing the large stars, which are also suns, at a
little greater distance from our earth,—that is all.”

As D’Artagnan delighted, both from pleasure and system, in making people
talk about things which interested him, he fenced in his best style with Master
Bazin, but it was pure loss of time; beyond the tiresome and hyperbolical
praises of monsieur le surintendant of the finances, Bazin, who, on his side,
was on his guard, afforded nothing but platitudes to the curiosity of
D’Artagnan, so that our musketeer, in a tolerably bad humor, desired to
go to bed as soon as he had supped. D’Artagnan was introduced by Bazin
into a mean chamber, in which there was a poor bed; but D’Artagnan was
not fastidious in that respect. He had been told that Aramis had taken away the
key of his own private apartment, and as he knew Aramis was a very particular
man, and had generally many things to conceal in his apartment, he had not been
surprised. He, therefore, although it seemed comparatively even harder,
attacked the bed as bravely as he had done the fowl; and, as he had as good an
inclination to sleep as he had had to eat, he took scarcely longer time to be
snoring harmoniously than he had employed in picking the last bones of the
bird.

Since he was no longer in the service of any one, D’Artagnan had promised
himself to indulge in sleeping as soundly as he had formerly slept lightly; but
with whatever good faith D’Artagnan had made himself this promise, and
whatever desire he might have to keep it religiously, he was awakened in the
middle of the night by a loud noise of carriages, and servants on horseback. A
sudden illumination flashed over the walls of his chamber; he jumped out of bed
and ran to the window in his shirt. “Can the king be coming this
way?” he thought, rubbing his eyes; “in truth, such a suite can
only be attached to royalty.”

“Vive le monsieur le surintendant!” cried, or rather vociferated,
from a window on the ground-floor, a voice which he recognized as
Bazin’s, who at the same time waved a handkerchief with one hand, and
held a large candle in the other. D’Artagnan then saw something like a
brilliant human form leaning out of the principal carriage; at the same time
loud bursts of laughter, caused, no doubt, by the strange figure of Bazin, and
issuing from the same carriage, left, as it were, a train of joy upon the
passage of the rapid cortege.

“I might easily see it was not the king,” said D’Artagnan;
“people don’t laugh so heartily when the king passes. Hola,
Bazin!” cried he to his neighbor, three-quarters of whose body still hung
out of the window, to follow the carriage with his eyes as long as he could.
“What is all that about?”

“It is M. Fouquet,” said Bazin, in a patronizing tone.

“And all those people?”

“That is the court of M. Fouquet.”

“Oh, oh!” said D’Artagnan; “what would M. de Mazarin
say to that if he heard it?” And he returned to his bed, asking himself
how Aramis always contrived to be protected by the most powerful personages in
the kingdom. “Is it that he has more luck than I, or that I am a greater
fool than he? Bah!” That was the concluding word by the aid of which
D’Artagnan, having become wise, now terminated every thought and every
period of his style. Formerly he said, “Mordioux!” which was a
prick of the spur, but now he had become older, and he murmured that
philosophical “Bah!” which served as a bridle to all the passions.

Chapter XVIII. In which D’Artagnan seeks
Porthos, and only finds Mousqueton.

When D’Artagnan had perfectly convinced himself
that the absence of the Vicar-General d’Herblay was real, and that his
friend was not to be found at Melun or in its vicinity, he left Bazin without
regret, cast an ill-natured glance at the magnificent Chateau de Vaux, which
was beginning to shine with that splendor which brought on its ruin, and,
compressing his lips like a man full of mistrust and suspicion, he put spurs to
his pied horse, saying, “Well, well! I have still Pierrefonds left, and
there I shall find the best man and the best filled coffer. And that is all I
want, for I have an idea of my own.”

We will spare our readers the prosaic incidents of D’Artagnan’s
journey, which terminated on the morning of the third day within sight of
Pierrefonds. D’Artagnan came by the way of Nanteuil-le-Haudouin and
Crepy. At a distance he perceived the Castle of Louis of Orleans, which, having
become part of the crown domain, was kept by an old concierge. This was one of
those marvelous manors of the middle ages, with walls twenty feet in thickness,
and a hundred in height.

D’Artagnan rode slowly past its walls, measured its towers with his eye
and descended into the valley. From afar he looked down upon the chateau of
Porthos, situated on the shores of a small lake, and contiguous to a
magnificent forest. It was the same place we have already had the honor of
describing to our readers; we shall therefore satisfy ourselves with naming it.
The first thing D’Artagnan perceived after the fine trees, the May sun
gilding the sides of the green hills, the long rows of feather-topped trees
which stretched out towards Compiegne, was a large rolling box, pushed forward
by two servants and dragged by two others. In this box there was an enormous
green-and-gold thing, which went along the smiling glades of the park, thus
dragged and pushed. This thing, at a distance, could not be distinguished, and
signified absolutely nothing; nearer, it was a hogshead muffled in gold-bound
green cloth; when close, it was a man, or rather a poussa, the inferior
extremity of whom, spreading over the interior of the box, entirely filled it;
when still closer, the man was Mousqueton—Mousqueton, with gray hair and
a face as red as Punchinello’s.

“Pardieu!” cried D’Artagnan; “why, that’s my dear
Monsieur Mousqueton!”

“Ah!” cried the fat man—“ah! what happiness! what joy!
There’s M. d’Artagnan. Stop, you rascals!” These last words
were addressed to the lackeys who pushed and dragged him. The box stopped, and
the four lackeys, with a precision quite military, took off their laced hats
and ranged themselves behind it.

“Oh, Monsieur d’Artagnan!” said Mousqueton, “why can I
not embrace your knees? But I have become impotent, as you see.”

“Dame! my dear Mousqueton, it is age.”

“No, monsieur, it is not age; it is infirmities—troubles.”

“Troubles! you, Mousqueton?” said D’Artagnan, making the tour
of the box; “are you out of your mind, my dear friend? Thank God! you are
as hearty as a three-hundred-year-old oak.”

“Ah! but my legs, monsieur, my legs!” groaned the faithful servant.

“What’s the matter with your legs?”

“Oh, they will no longer bear me!”

“Ah, the ungrateful things! And yet you feed them well, Mousqueton,
apparently.”

“Alas, yes! They can reproach me with nothing in that respect,”
said Mousqueton, with a sigh; “I have always done what I could for my
poor body; I am not selfish.” And Mousqueton sighed afresh.

“I wonder whether Mousqueton wants to be a baron, too, as he sighs after
that fashion?” thought D’Artagnan.

“Mon Dieu, monsieur!” said Mousqueton, as if rousing himself from a
painful reverie; “how happy monseigneur will be that you have thought of
him!”

“Kind Porthos!” cried D’Artagnan, “I am anxious to
embrace him.”

“Oh!” said Mousqueton, much affected, “I shall certainly
write to him.”

“What!” cried D’Artagnan, “you will write to
him?”

“This very day; I shall not delay it an hour.”

“Is he not here, then?”

“No, monsieur.”

“But is he near at hand?—is he far off?”

“Oh, can I tell, monsieur, can I tell?”

“Mordioux!” cried the musketeer, stamping with his foot, “I
am unfortunate. Porthos is such a stay-at-home!”

“Monsieur, there is not a more sedentary man that monseigneur,
but—”

“But what?”

“When a friend presses you—”

“A friend?”

“Doubtless—the worthy M. d’Herblay.”

“What, has Aramis pressed Porthos?”

“This is how the thing happened, Monsieur d’Artagnan. M.
d’Herblay wrote to monseigneur—”

“Indeed!”

“A letter, monsieur, such a pressing letter that it threw us all into a
bustle.”

“Tell me all about it, my dear friend,” said D’Artagnan;
“but remove these people a little further off first.”

Mousqueton shouted, “Fall back, you fellows,” with such powerful
lungs that the breath, without the words, would have been sufficient to
disperse the four lackeys. D’Artagnan seated himself on the shaft of the
box and opened his ears. “Monsieur,” said Mousqueton,
“monseigneur, then, received a letter from M. le Vicaire-General
d’Herblay, eight or nine days ago; it was the day of the rustic
pleasures, yes, it must have been Wednesday.”

“What do you mean?” said D’Artagnan. “The day of rustic
pleasures?”

“Yes, monsieur; we have so many pleasures to take in this delightful
country, that we were encumbered by them; so much so, that we have been forced
to regulate the distribution of them.”

“How easily do I recognize Porthos’s love of order in that! Now,
that idea would never have occurred to me; but then I am not encumbered with
pleasures.”

“We were, though,” said Mousqueton.

“And how did you regulate the matter, let me know?” said
D’Artagnan.

“It is rather long, monsieur.”

“Never mind, we have plenty of time; and you speak so well, my dear
Mousqueton, that it is really a pleasure to hear you.”

“It is true,” said Mousqueton, with a sigh of satisfaction, which
emanated evidently from the justice which had been rendered him, “it is
true I have made great progress in the company of monseigneur.”

“I am waiting for the distribution of the pleasures, Mousqueton, and with
impatience. I want to know if I have arrived on a lucky day.”

“Oh, Monsieur d’Artagnan,” said Mousqueton in a melancholy
tone, “since monseigneur’s departure all the pleasures have gone
too!”

“Well, my dear Mousqueton, refresh your memory.”

“With what day shall I begin?”

“Eh, pardieux! begin with Sunday; that is the Lord’s day.”

“Sunday, monsieur?”

“Yes.”

“Sunday pleasures are religious: monseigneur goes to mass, makes the
bread-offering, and has discourses and instructions made to him by his
almoner-in-ordinary. That is not very amusing, but we expect a Carmelite from
Paris who will do the duty of our almonry, and who, we are assured, speaks very
well, which will keep us awake, whereas our present almoner always sends us to
sleep. These are Sunday religious pleasures. On Monday, worldly
pleasures.”

“Ah, ah!” said D’Artagnan, “what do you mean by that?
Let us have a glimpse at your worldly pleasures.”

“Monsieur, on Monday we go into the world; we pay and receive visits, we
play on the lute, we dance, we make verses, and burn a little incense in honor
of the ladies.”

“Peste! that is the height of gallantry,” said the musketeer, who
was obliged to call to his aid all the strength of his facial muscles to
suppress an enormous inclination to laugh.

“Tuesday, learned pleasures.”

“Good!” cried D’Artagnan. “What are they? Detail them,
my dear Mousqueton.”

“Monseigneur has bought a sphere or globe, which I shall show you; it
fills all the perimeter of the great tower, except a gallery which he has had
built over the sphere: there are little strings and brass wires to which the
sun and moon are hooked. It all turns; and that is very beautiful. Monseigneur
points out to me the seas and distant countries. We don’t intend to visit
them, but it is very interesting.”

“Interesting! yes, that’s the word,” repeated
D’Artagnan. “And Wednesday?”

“Rustic pleasures, as I have had the honor to tell you, monsieur le
chevalier. We look over monseigneur’s sheep and goats; we make the
shepherds dance to pipes and reeds, as is written in a book monseigneur has in
his library, which is called ‘Bergeries.’ The author died about a
month ago.”

“Monsieur Racan, perhaps,” said D’Artagnan.

“Yes, that was his name—M. Racan. But that is not all: we angle in
the little canal, after which we dine, crowned with flowers. That is
Wednesday.”

“Peste!” said D’Artagnan; “you don’t divide your
pleasures badly. And Thursday?—what can be left for poor Thursday?”

“It is not very unfortunate, monsieur,” said Mousqueton, smiling.
“Thursday, Olympian pleasures. Ah, monsieur, that is superb! We get
together all monseigneur’s young vassals, and we make them throw the
disc, wrestle, and run races. Monseigneur can’t run now, no more can I;
but monseigneur throws the disc as nobody else can throw it. And when he does
deal a blow, oh, that proves a misfortune!”

“How so?”

“Yes, monsieur, we were obliged to renounce the cestus. He cracked heads;
he broke jaws—beat in ribs. It was charming sport; but nobody was willing
to play with him.”

“Then his wrist—”

“Oh, monsieur, firmer than ever. Monseigneur gets a trifle weaker in his
legs,—he confesses that himself; but his strength has all taken refuge in
his arms, so that—”

“So that he can knock down bullocks, as he used to formerly.”

“Monsieur, better than that—he beats in walls. Lately, after having
supped with one of our farmers—you know how popular and kind monseigneur
is—after supper, as a joke, he struck the wall a blow. The wall crumbled
away beneath his hand, the roof fell in, and three men and an old woman were
stifled.”

“Good God, Mousqueton! And your master?”

“Oh, monseigneur, a little skin was rubbed off his head. We bathed the
wounds with some water which the monks gave us. But there was nothing the
matter with his hand.”

“Nothing?”

“No, nothing, monsieur.”

“Deuce take the Olympic pleasures! They must cost your master too dear;
for widows and orphans—”

“They all had pensions, monsieur; a tenth of monseigneur’s revenue
was spent in that way.”

“Then pass on to Friday,” said D’Artagnan.

“Friday, noble and warlike pleasures. We hunt, we fence, we dress falcons
and break horses. Then, Saturday is the day for intellectual pleasures: we
adorn our minds; we look at monseigneur’s pictures and statues; we write,
even, and trace plans: and then we fire monseigneur’s cannon.”

“You draw plans, and fire cannon?”

“Yes, monsieur.”

“Why, my friend,” said D’Artagnan, “M. du Vallon, in
truth, possesses the most subtle and amiable mind that I know. But there is one
kind of pleasure you have forgotten, it appears to me.”

“What is that, monsieur?” asked Mousqueton, with anxiety.

“The material pleasures.”

Mousqueton colored. “What do you mean by that, monsieur?” said he,
casting down his eyes.

“I mean the table—good wine—evenings occupied in passing the
bottle.”

“Ah, monsieur, we don’t reckon those pleasures,—we practice
them every day.”

“My brave Mousqueton,” resumed D’Artagnan, “pardon me,
but I was so absorbed in your charming recital that I have forgotten the
principal object of our conversation, which was to learn what M. le
Vicaire-General d’Herblay could have to write to your master
about.”

“That is true, monsieur,” said Mousqueton; “the pleasures
have misled us. Well, monsieur, this is the whole affair.”

“I am all attention, Mousqueton.”

“On Wednesday—”

“The day of the rustic pleasures?”

“Yes—a letter arrived; he received it from my hands. I had
recognized the writing.”

“Well?”

Monseigneur read it and cried out, “Quick, my horses! my
arms!’”

“Oh, good Lord! then it was for some duel?” said D’Artagnan.

“No, monsieur, there were only these words: ‘Dear Porthos, set out,
if you would wish to arrive before the Equinox. I expect you.’”

“Mordioux!” said D’Artagnan, thoughtfully, “that was
pressing, apparently.”

“I think so; therefore,” continued Mousqueton, “monseigneur
set out the very same day with his secretary, in order to endeavor to arrive in
time.”

“And did he arrive in time?”

“I hope so. Monseigneur, who is hasty, as you know, monsieur, repeated
incessantly, ‘Tonne Dieu! What can this mean? The Equinox? Never mind, a
fellow must be well mounted to arrive before I do.’”

“And you think Porthos will have arrived first, do you?” asked
D’Artagnan.

“I am sure of it. This Equinox, however rich he may be, has certainly no
horses so good as monseigneur’s.”

D’Artagnan repressed his inclination to laugh, because the brevity of
Aramis’s letter gave rise to reflection. He followed Mousqueton, or
rather Mousqueton’s chariot, to the castle. He sat down to a sumptuous
table, of which they did him the honors as to a king. But he could draw nothing
from Mousqueton,—the faithful servant seemed to shed tears at will, but
that was all.

D’Artagnan, after a night passed in an excellent bed, reflected much upon
the meaning of Aramis’s letter; puzzled himself as to the relation of the
Equinox with the affairs of Porthos; and being unable to make anything out
unless it concerned some amour of the bishopp’s, for which it was
necessary that the days and nights should be equal, D’Artagnan left
Pierrefonds as he had left Melun, as he had left the chateau of the Comte de la
Fere. It was not, however, without a melancholy, which might in good sooth pass
for one of the most dismal of D’Artagnan’s moods. His head cast
down, his eyes fixed, he suffered his legs to hang on each side of his horse,
and said to himself, in that vague sort of reverie which ascends sometimes to
the sublimest eloquence:

“No more friends! no more future! no more anything! My energies are
broken like the bonds of our ancient friendship. Oh, old age is coming, cold
and inexorable; it envelopes in its funeral crepe all that was brilliant, all
that was embalming in my youth; then it throws that sweet burthen on its
shoulders and carries it away with the rest into the fathomless gulf of
death.”

A shudder crept through the heart of the Gascon, so brave and so strong against
all the misfortunes of life; and during some moments the clouds appeared black
to him, the earth slippery and full of pits as that of cemeteries.

“Whither am I going?” said he to himself. “What am I going to
do! Alone, quite alone—without family, without friends! Bah!” cried
he all at once. And he clapped spurs to his horse, who, having found nothing
melancholy in the heavy oats of Pierrefonds, profited by this permission to
show his gayety in a gallop which absorbed two leagues. “To Paris!”
said D’Artagnan to himself. And on the morrow he alighted in Paris. He
had devoted ten days to this journey.

Chapter XIX. What D’Artagnan went to Paris
for.

The lieutenant dismounted before a shop in the Rue des
Lombards, at the sign of the Pilon d’Or. A man of good appearance,
wearing a white apron, and stroking his gray mustache with a large hand,
uttered a cry of joy on perceiving the pied horse. “Monsieur le
chevalier,” said he, “ah, is that you?”

“Bon jour, Planchet,” replied D’Artagnan, stooping to enter
the shop.

“Quick, somebody,” cried Planchet, “to look after Monsieur
d’Artagnan’s horse,—somebody to get ready his
room,—somebody to prepare his supper.”

“Thanks, Planchet. Good-day, my children!” said D’Artagnan to
the eager boys.

“Allow me to send off this coffee, this treacle, and these
raisins,” said Planchet; “they are for the store-room of monsieur
le surintendant.”

“Send them off, send them off!”

“That is only the affair of a moment, then we shall sup.”

“Arrange it that we may sup alone; I want to speak to you.”

Planchet looked at his old master in a significant manner.

“Oh, don’t be uneasy, it is nothing unpleasant,” said
D’Artagnan.

“So much the better—so much the better!” And Planchet
breathed freely again, whilst D’Artagnan seated himself quietly down in
the shop, upon a bale of corks, and made a survey of the premises. The shop was
well stocked; there was a mingled perfume of ginger, cinnamon, and ground
pepper, which made D’Artagnan sneeze. The shop-boy, proud of being in
company with so renowned a warrior, of a lieutenant of musketeers, who
approached the person of the king, began to work with an enthusiasm which was
something like delirium, and to serve the customers with a disdainful haste
that was noticed by several.

Planchet put away his money, and made up his accounts, amidst civilities
addressed to his former master. Planchet had with his equals the short speech
and haughty familiarity of the rich shopkeeper who serves everybody and waits
for nobody. D’Artagnan observed this habit with a pleasure which we shall
analyze presently. He saw night come on by degrees, and at length Planchet
conducted him to a chamber on the first story, where, amidst bales and chests,
a table very nicely set out awaited the two guests.

D’Artagnan took advantage of a moment’s pause to examine the
countenance of Planchet, whom he had not seen for a year. The shrewd Planchet
had acquired a slight protuberance in front, but his countenance was not
puffed. His keen eye still played with facility in its deep-sunk orbit; and
fat, which levels all the characteristic saliences of the human face, had not
yet touched either his high cheek-bones, the sign of cunning and cupidity, or
his pointed chin, the sign of acuteness and perseverance. Planchet reigned with
as much majesty in his dining-room as in his shop. He set before his master a
frugal, but perfectly Parisian repast: roast meat, cooked at the baker’s,
with vegetables, salad, and a dessert borrowed from the shop itself.
D’Artagnan was pleased that the grocer had drawn from behind the fagots a
bottle of that Anjou wine which during all his life had been
D’Artagnan’s favorite wine.

“Formerly, monsieur,” said Planchet, with a smile full of bonhomie,
“it was I who drank your wine; now you do me the honor to drink
mine.”

“And, thank God, friend Planchet, I shall drink it for a long time to
come, I hope; for at present I am free.”

“Free? You have a leave of absence, monsieur?”

“Unlimited.”

“You are leaving the service?” said Planchet, stupefied.

“Yes, I am resting.”

“And the king?” cried Planchet, who could not suppose it possible
that the king could do without the services of such a man as D’Artagnan.

“The king will try his fortune elsewhere. But we have supped well, you
are disposed to enjoy yourself; you invite me to confide in you. Open your
ears, then.”

“They are open.” And Planchet, with a laugh more frank than
cunning, opened a bottle of white wine.

“Leave me my reason, at least.”

“Oh, as to you losing your head—you, monsieur!”

“Now my head is my own, and I mean to take better care of it than ever.
In the first place we shall talk business. How fares our money-box?”

“Wonderfully well, monsieur. The twenty thousand livres I had of you are
still employed in my trade, in which they bring me nine per cent. I give you
seven, so I gain two by you.”

“And you are still satisfied?”

“Delighted. Have you brought me any more?”

“Better than that. But do you want any?”

“Oh! not at all. Every one is willing to trust me now. I am extending my
business.”

“That was your intention.”

“I play the banker a little. I buy goods of my needy brethren; I lend
money to those who are not ready for their payments.”

“Without usury?”

“Oh! monsieur, in the course of the last week I have had two meetings on
the boulevards, on account of the word you have just pronounced.”

“What?”

“You shall see: it concerned a loan. The borrower gives me in pledge some
raw sugars, on condition that I should sell if repayment were not made within a
fixed period. I lend a thousand livres. He does not pay me, and I sell the
sugars for thirteen hundred livres. He learns this and claims a hundred crowns.
Ma foi! I refused, pretending that I could not sell them for more than nine
hundred livres. He accused me of usury. I begged him to repeat that word to me
behind the boulevards. He was an old guard, and he came: and I passed your
sword through his left thigh.”

“Tu dieu! what a pretty sort of banker you make!” said
D’Artagnan.

“For above thirteen per cent I fight,” replied Planchet;
“that is my character.”

“Take only twelve,” said D’Artagnan, “and call the rest
premium and brokerage.”

“You are right, monsieur; but to your business.”

“Ah! Planchet, it is very long and very hard to speak.”

“Do speak it, nevertheless.”

D’Artagnan twisted his mustache like a man embarrassed with the
confidence he is about to make and mistrustful of his confidant.

“Is it an investment?” asked Planchet.

“Why, yes.”

“At good profit?”

“A capital profit,—four hundred per cent, Planchet.”

Planchet gave such a blow with his fist upon the table, that the bottles
bounded as if they had been frightened.

“Good heavens! is that possible?”

“I think it will be more,” replied D’Artagnan coolly;
“but I like to lay it at the lowest!”

“The devil!” said Planchet, drawing nearer. “Why, monsieur,
that is magnificent! Can one put much money in it?”

“Twenty thousand livres each, Planchet.”

“Why, that is all you have, monsieur. For how long a time?”

“For a month.”

“And that will give us—”

“Fifty thousand livres each, profit.”

“It is monstrous! It is worth while to fight for such interest as
that!”

“In fact, I believe it will be necessary to fight not a little,”
said D’Artagnan, with the same tranquillity; “but this time there
are two of us, Planchet, and I shall take all the blows to myself.”

“Oh! monsieur, I will not allow that.”

“Planchet, you cannot be concerned in it; you would be obliged to leave
your business and your family.”

“The affair is not in Paris, then.”

“No.”

“Abroad?”

“In England.”

“A speculative country, that is true,” said
Planchet,—“a country that I know well. What sort of an affair,
monsieur, without too much curiosity?”

“Planchet, it is a restoration.”

“Of monuments?”

“Yes, of monuments; we shall restore Whitehall.”

“That is important. And in a month, you think?”

“I shall undertake it.”

“That concerns you, monsieur, and when once you are engaged—”

“Yes, that concerns me. I know what I am about; nevertheless, I will
freely consult with you.”

“You do me great honor; but I know very little about architecture.”

“Planchet, you are wrong; you are an excellent architect, quite as good
as I am, for the case in question.”

“Thanks, monsieur. But your old friends of the musketeers?”

“I have been, I confess, tempted to speak of the thing to those
gentlemen, but they are all absent from their houses. It is vexatious, for I
know none more bold or able.”

“Ah! then it appears there will be an opposition, and the enterprise will
be disputed?”

“Oh, yes, Planchet, yes.”

“I burn to know the details, monsieur.”

“Here they are, Planchet—close all the doors tight.”

“Yes, monsieur.” And Planchet double-locked them.

“That is well; now draw near.” Planchet obeyed.

“And open the window, because the noise of the passers-by and the carts
will deafen all who might hear us.” Planchet opened the window as
desired, and the gust of tumult which filled the chamber with cries, wheels,
barkings, and steps deafened D’Artagnan himself, as he had wished. He
then swallowed a glass of white wine, and began in these terms:
“Planchet, I have an idea.”

“Ah! monsieur, I recognize you so well in that!” replied Planchet,
panting with emotion.

Chapter XX. Of the Society which was formed in the Rue
des Lombards.

After a moment’s silence, in which
D’Artagnan appeared to be collecting, not one idea but all his
ideas,—“It cannot be, my dear Planchet,” said he, “that
you have not heard of his majesty Charles I. of England?”

“Alas! yes, monsieur, since you left France in order to assist him, and
that, in spite of that assistance, he fell, and was near dragging you down in
his fall.”

“Exactly so; I see you have a good memory, Planchet.”

“Peste! the astonishing thing would be, if I could have lost that memory,
however bad it might have been. When one has heard Grimaud, who, you know, is
not given to talking, relate how the head of King Charles fell, how you sailed
the half of a night in a scuttled vessel, and saw floating on the water that
good M. Mordaunt with a certain gold-hafted dagger buried in his breast, one is
not very likely to forget such things.”

“And yet there are people who forget them, Planchet.”

“Yes, such as have not seen them, or have not heard Grimaud relate
them.”

“Well, it is all the better that you recollect all that; I shall only
have to remind you of one thing, and that is that Charles I. had a son.”

“Without contradicting you, monsieur, he had two,” said Planchet;
“for I saw the second one in Paris, M. le Duke of York, one day, as he
was going to the Palais Royal, and I was told that he was not the eldest son of
Charles I. As to the eldest, I have the honor of knowing him by name, but not
personally.”

“That is exactly the point, Planchet, we must come to: it is to this
eldest son, formerly called the Prince of Wales, and who is now styled Charles
II., king of England.”

“A king without a kingdom, monsieur,” replied Planchet,
sententiously.

“Yes, Planchet, and you may add an unfortunate prince, more unfortunate
than the poorest man of the people lost in the worst quarter of Paris.”

Planchet made a gesture full of that sort of compassion which we grant to
strangers with whom we think we can never possibly find ourselves in contact.
Besides, he did not see in this politico-sentimental operation any sign of the
commercial idea of M. d’Artagnan, and it was in this idea that
D’Artagnan, who was, from habit, pretty well acquainted with men and
things, had principally interested Planchet.

“I am come to our business. This young Prince of Wales, a king without a
kingdom, as you have so well said, Planchet, has interested me. I,
D’Artagnan, have seen him begging assistance of Mazarin, who is a miser,
and the aid of Louis, who is a child, and it appeared to me, who am acquainted
with such things, that in the intelligent eye of the fallen king, in the
nobility of his whole person, a nobility apparent above all his miseries, I
could discern the stuff of a man and the heart of a king.”

Planchet tacitly approved of all this; but it did not at all, in his eyes at
least, throw any light upon D’Artagnan’s idea. The latter
continued: “This, then, is the reasoning which I made with myself. Listen
attentively, Planchet, for we are coming to the conclusion.”

“I am listening.”

“Kings are not so thickly sown upon the earth, that people can find them
whenever they want them. Now, this king without a kingdom is, in my opinion, a
grain of seed which will blossom in some season or other, provided a skillful,
discreet, and vigorous hand sow it duly and truly, selecting soil, sky, and
time.”

Planchet still approved by a nod of his head, which showed that he did not
perfectly comprehend all that was said.

“‘Poor little seed of a king,’ said I to myself, and really I
was affected, Planchet, which leads me to think I am entering upon a foolish
business. And that is why I wished to consult you, my friend.”

Planchet colored with pleasure and pride.

“‘Poor little seed of a king! I will pick you up and cast you into
good ground.’”

“Good God!” said Planchet, looking earnestly at his old master, as
if in doubt as to the state of his reason.

“Well, what is it?” said D’Artagnan; “who hurts
you?”

“Me! nothing, monsieur.”

“You said, ‘Good God!’”

“Did I?”

“I am sure you did. Can you already understand?”

“I confess, M. d’Artagnan, that I am afraid—”

“To understand?”

“Yes.”

“To understand that I wish to replace upon his throne this King Charles
II., who has no throne? Is that it?”

Planchet made a prodigious bound in his chair. “Ah, ah!” said he,
in evident terror, “that is what you call a restoration!”

“Yes, Planchet; is it not the proper term for it?”

“Oh, no doubt, no doubt! But have you reflected seriously?”

“Upon what?”

“Upon what is going on yonder.”

“Where?”

“In England.”

“And what is that? Let us see, Planchet.”

“In the first place, monsieur, I ask you pardon for meddling in these
things, which have nothing to do with my trade; but since it is an affair that
you propose to me—for you are proposing an affair, are you
not?—”

“A superb one, Planchet.”

“But as it is business you propose to me, I have the right to discuss
it.”

“Discuss it, Planchet; out of discussion is born light.”

“Well, then, since I have monsieur’s permission, I will tell him
that there is yonder, in the first place, the parliament.”

“Well, next?”

“And then the army.”

“Good! Do you see anything else?”

“Why, then the nation.”

“Is that all?”

“The nation which consented to the overthrow and death of the late king,
the father of this one, and which will not be willing to belie its acts.”

“Planchet,” said D’Artagnan, “you argue like a cheese!
The nation—the nation is tired of these gentlemen who give themselves
such barbarous names, and who sing songs to it. Chanting for chanting, my dear
Planchet; I have remarked that nations prefer singing a merry chant to the
plain chant. Remember the Fronde; what did they sing in those times? Well,
those were good times.”

“Not too good, not too good! I was near being hung in those times.”

“Well, but you were not.”

“No.”

“And you laid the foundations of your fortune in the midst of all those
songs?”

“That is true.”

“Then you have nothing to say against them.”

“Well, I return, then, to the army and parliament.”

“I say that I borrow twenty thousand livres of M. Planchet, and that I
put twenty thousand livres of my own to it; and with these forty thousand
livres I raise an army.”

Planchet clasped his hands; he saw that D’Artagnan was in earnest, and,
in good truth, he believed his master had lost his senses.

“An army!—ah, monsieur,” said he, with his most agreeable
smile, for fear of irritating the madman, and rendering him
furious,—“an army!—how many?”

“Of forty men,” said D’Artagnan.

“Forty against forty thousand! that is not enough. I know very well that
you, M. d’Artagnan, alone, are equal to a thousand men; but where are we
to find thirty-nine men equal to you? Or, if we could find them, who would
furnish you with money to pay them?”

“Not bad, Planchet. Ah, the devil! you play the courtier.”

“No, monsieur, I speak what I think, and that is exactly why I say that,
in the first pitched battle you fight with your forty men, I am very much
afraid—”

“Therefore I shall fight no pitched battles, my dear Planchet,”
said the Gascon, laughing. “We have very fine examples in antiquity of
skillful retreats and marches, which consisted in avoiding the enemy instead of
attacking them. You should know that, Planchet, you who commanded the Parisians
the day on which they ought to have fought against the musketeers, and who so
well calculated marches and countermarches, that you never left the Palais
Royal.”

Planchet could not help laughing. “It is plain,” replied he,
“that if your forty men conceal themselves, and are not unskillful, they
may hope not to be beaten: but you propose obtaining some result, do you
not?”

“No doubt. This, then, in my opinion, is the plan to be proceeded upon in
order quickly to replace his majesty Charles II. on his throne.”

“Good!” said Planchet, increasing his attention; “let us see
your plan. But in the first place it seems to me we are forgetting
something.”

“What is that?”

“We have set aside the nation, which prefers singing merry songs to
psalms, and the army, which we will not fight; but the parliament remains, and
that seldom sings.”

“Nor does it fight. How is it, Planchet, that an intelligent man like
yourself should take any heed of a set of brawlers who call themselves Rumps
and Barebones? The parliament does not trouble me at all, Planchet.”

“As soon as it ceases to trouble you, monsieur, let us pass on.”

“Yes, and arrive at the result. You remember Cromwell, Planchet?”

“I have heard a great deal of talk about him.

“He was a rough soldier.”

“And a terrible eater, moreover.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Why, at one gulp he swallowed all England.”

“Well, Planchet, the evening before the day on which he swallowed
England, if any one had swallowed M. Cromwell?”

“Oh, monsieur, it is one of the axioms of mathematics that the container
must be greater than the contained.”

“Very well! That is our affair, Planchet.”

“But M. Cromwell is dead, and his container is now the tomb.”

“My dear Planchet, I see with pleasure that you have not only become a
mathematician, but a philosopher.”

“Monsieur, in my grocery business I use much printed paper, and that
instructs me.”

“Bravo! You know then, in that case—for you have not learnt
mathematics and philosophy without a little history—that after this
Cromwell so great, there came one who was very little.”

“Yes; he was named Richard, and he as done as you have, M.
d’Artagnan—he has tendered his resignation.”

“Very well said—very well! After the great man who is dead, after
the little one who tendered his resignation, there came a third. This one is
named Monk; he is an able general, considering he has never fought a battle; he
is a skillful diplomatist, considering that he never speaks in public, and that
having to say ‘good-day’ to a man, he meditates twelve hours, and
ends by saying ‘good night;’ which makes people exclaim
‘miracle!’ seeing that it falls out correctly.”

“That is rather strong,” said Planchet; “but I know another
political man who resembles him very much.”

“M. Mazarin you mean?”

“Himself.”

“You are right, Planchet; only M. Mazarin does not aspire to the throne
of France; and that changes everything. Do you see? Well, this M. Monk, who has
England ready-roasted in his plate, and who is already opening his mouth to
swallow it—this M. Monk, who says to the people of Charles II., and to
Charles II. himself, ‘Nescio vos’—”

“I don’t understand English,” said Planchet.

“Yes, but I understand it,” said D’Artagnan.
“‘Nescio vos’ means ‘I do not know you.’ This M.
Monk, the most important man in England, when he shall have swallowed
it—”

“Well?” asked Planchet.

“Well, my friend, I shall go over yonder, and with my forty men I shall
carry him off, pack him up, and bring him into France, where two modes of
proceeding present themselves to my dazzled eyes.”

“Oh! and to mine too,” cried Planchet, transported with enthusiasm.
“We will put him in a cage and show him for money.”

“Well, Planchet, that is a third plan, of which I had not thought.”

“Do you think it a good one?”

“Yes, certainly, but I think mine better.”

“Let us see yours, then.”

“In the first place, I shall set a ransom on him.”

“Of how much?”

“Peste! a fellow like that must be well worth a hundred thousand
crowns.”

“Yes, yes!”

“You see, then—in the first place, a ransom of a hundred thousand
crowns.”

“Or else—”

“Or else, what is much better, I deliver him up to King Charles, who,
having no longer either a general or an army to fear, nor a diplomatist to
trick him, will restore himself, and when once restored, will pay down to me
the hundred thousand crowns in question. That is the idea I have formed; what
do you say to it, Planchet?”

“Magnificent, monsieur!” cried Planchet, trembling with emotion.
“How did you conceive that idea?”

“It came to me one morning on the banks of the Loire, whilst our beloved
king, Louis XIV., was pretending to weep upon the hand of Mademoiselle de
Mancini.”

“Monsieur, I declare the idea is sublime. But—”

“Ah! is there a but?”

“Permit me! But this is a little like the skin of that fine
bear—you know—that they were about to sell, but which it was
necessary to take from the back of the living bear. Now, to take M. Monk, there
will be a bit of a scuffle, I should think.”

“No doubt; but as I shall raise an army to—”

“Yes, yes—I understand, parbleu!—a coup-de-main. Yes, then,
monsieur, you will triumph, for no one equals you in such sorts of
encounters.”

“I certainly am lucky in them,” said D’Artagnan, with a proud
simplicity. “You know that if for this affair I had my dear Athos, my
brave Porthos, and my cunning Aramis, the business would be settled; but they
are all lost, as it appears, and nobody knows where to find them. I will do it,
then, alone. Now, do you find the business good, and the investment
advantageous?”

“Too much so—too much so.”

“How can that be?”

“Because fine things never reach the expected point.”

“This is infallible, Planchet, and the proof is that I undertake it. It
will be for you a tolerably pretty gain, and for me a very interesting stroke.
It will be said, ‘Such was the old age of M. d’Artagnan,’ and
I shall hold a place in tales and even in history itself, Planchet. I am greedy
of honor.”

“Monsieur,” cried Planchet, “when I think that it is here, in
my home, in the midst of my sugar, my prunes, and my cinnamon, that this
gigantic project is ripened, my shop seems a palace to me.”

“Beware, beware, Planchet! If the least report of this escapes, there is
the Bastile for both of us. Beware, my friend, for this is a plot we are
hatching. M. Monk is the ally of M. Mazarin—beware!”

“Monsieur, when a man has had the honor to belong to you, he knows
nothing of fear; and when he has had the advantage of being bound up in
interests with you, he holds his tongue.”

“Very well; that is more your affair than mine, seeing that in a week I
shall be in England.”

“Depart, monsieur, depart—the sooner the better.”

“Is the money, then, ready?”

“It will be to-morrow; to-morrow you shall receive it from my own hands.
Will you have gold or silver?”

“Gold; that is most convenient. But how are we going to arrange this? Let
us see.”

“Oh, good Lord! in the simplest way possible. You shall give me a
receipt, that is all.”

“No, no,” said D’Artagnan, warmly; “we must preserve
order in all things.”

“That is likewise my opinion; but with you, M.
d’Artagnan—”

“And if I should die yonder—if I should be killed by a
musket-ball—if I should burst from drinking beer?”

“Monsieur, I beg you to believe that in that case I should be so much
afflicted at your death, that I should not think about the money.”

“Thank you, Planchet; but no matter. We shall, like two lawyers’
clerks, draw up together an agreement, a sort of act, which may be called a
deed of company.”

“Willingly, monsieur.”

“I know it is difficult to draw such a thing up, but we can try.”

“Let us try, then.” And Planchet went in search of pens, ink, and
paper. D’Artagnan took the pen and wrote:—“Between Messire
d’Artagnan, ex-lieutenant of the king’s musketeers, at present
residing in the Rue Tiquetonne, Hotel de la Chevrette; and the Sieur Planchet,
grocer, residing in the Rue des Lombards, at the sign of the Pilon d’Or,
it has been agreed as follows:—A company, with a capital of forty
thousand livres, and formed for the purpose of carrying out an idea conceived
by M. d’Artagnan, and the said Planchet approving of it in all points,
will place twenty thousand livres in the hands of M. d’Artagnan. He will
require neither repayment nor interest before the return of M. d’Artagnan
from a journey he is about to take into England. On his part, M.
d’Artagnan undertakes it to find twenty thousand livres, which he will
join to the twenty thousand already laid down by the Sieur Planchet. He will
employ the said sum of forty thousand livres according to his judgment in an
undertaking which is described below. On the day when M. d’Artagnan shall
have re-established, by whatever means, his majesty King Charles II. upon the
throne of England, he will pay into the hands of M. Planchet the sum
of—”

“The sum of a hundred and fifty thousand livres,” said Planchet,
innocently, perceiving that D’Artagnan hesitated.

“Oh, the devil, no!” said D’Artagnan, “the division
cannot be made by half; that would not be just.”

“And yet, monsieur, we each lay down half,” objected Planchet,
timidly.

“Yes; but listen to this clause, my dear Planchet, and if you do not find
if equitable in every respect when it is written, well, we can scratch it out
again:—‘Nevertheless, as M. d’Artagnan brings to the
association, besides his capital of twenty thousand livres, his time, his idea,
his industry, and his skin,—things which he appreciates strongly,
particularly the last,—M. d’Artagnan will keep, of the three
hundred thousand livres, two hundred thousand livres for himself, which will
make his share two-thirds.”

“Very well,” said Planchet.

“Is it just?” asked D’Artagnan.

“Perfectly just, monsieur.”

“And you will be contented with a hundred thousand livres?”

“Peste! I think so. A hundred thousand for twenty thousand!”

“And in a month, understand.”

“How, in a month?”

“Yes, I only ask one month.”

“Monsieur,” said Planchet, generously, “I give you six
weeks.”

“Thank you,” replied the musketeer, politely; after which the two
partners reperused their deed.

“That is perfect, monsieur,” said Planchet; “and the late M.
Coquenard, the first husband of Madame la Baronne du Vallon, could not have
done it better.”

“Do you find it so? Let us sign it then.” And both affixed their
signatures.

“In this fashion,” said D’Artagnan, “I shall be under
obligations to no one.”

“But I shall be under obligations to you,” said Planchet.

“No; for whatever store I set by it, Planchet, I may lose my skin yonder,
and you will lose all. A propos—peste!—that makes me think of the
principal, an indispensable clause. I shall write it:—‘In case of
M. d’Artagnan dying in this enterprise, liquidation will be considered
made, and the Sieur Planchet will give quittance from that moment to the shade
of Messire d’Artagnan for the twenty thousand livres paid by him into the
hands of the said company.’”

This last clause made Planchet knit his brows a little, but when he saw the
brilliant eye, the muscular hand, the supple and strong back of his associate,
he regained his courage, and, without regret, he at once added another stroke
to his signature. D’Artagnan did the same. Thus was drawn the first known
company contract; perhaps such things have been abused a little since, both in
form and principle.

“Now,” said Planchet, pouring out the last glass of Anjou wine for
D’Artagnan,—“now go to sleep, my dear master.”

“No,” replied D’Artagnan; “for the most difficult part
now remains to be done, and I will think over that difficult part.”

“Bah!” said Planchet; “I have such great confidence in you,
M. d’Artagnan, that I would not give my hundred thousand livres for
ninety thousand livres down.”

“And devil take me if I don’t think you are right!” Upon
which D’Artagnan took a candle and went up to his bedroom.

Chapter XXI. In which D’Artagnan prepares to
travel.

D’Artagnan reflected to such good purpose during
the night that his plan was settled by morning. “This is it,” said
he, sitting up in bed, supporting his elbow on his knee, and his chin in his
hand;—“this is it. I shall seek out forty steady, firm men,
recruited among people a little compromised, but having habits of discipline. I
shall promise them five hundred livres for a month if they return; nothing if
they do not return, or half for their kindred. As to food and lodging, that
concerns the English, who have cattle in their pastures, bacon in their
bacon-racks, fowls in their poultry-yards, and corn in their barns. I will
present myself to General Monk with my little body of troops. He will receive
me. I shall win his confidence, and take advantage of it, as soon as
possible.”

But without going further, D’Artagnan shook his head and interrupted
himself. “No,” said he; “I should not dare to relate this to
Athos; the way is therefore not honorable. I must use violence,”
continued he,—“very certainly I must, but without compromising my
loyalty. With forty men I will traverse the country as a partisan. But if I
fall in with, not forty thousand English, as Planchet said, but purely and
simply with four hundred, I shall be beaten. Supposing that among my forty
warriors there should be found at least ten stupid ones—ten who will
allow themselves to be killed one after the other, from mere folly? No; it is,
in fact, impossible to find forty men to be depended upon—they do not
exist. I must learn how to be contented with thirty. With ten men less I should
have the right of avoiding any armed encounter, on account of the small number
of my people; and if the encounter should take place, my chance is better with
thirty men than forty. Besides, I should save five thousand francs; that is to
say, the eighth of my capital; that is worth the trial. This being so, I should
have thirty men. I shall divide them into three bands,—we will spread
ourselves about over the country, with an injunction to reunite at a given
moment; in this fashion, ten by ten, we should excite no suspicion—we
should pass unperceived. Yes, yes, thirty—that is a magic number. There
are three tens—three, that divine number! And then, truly, a company of
thirty men, when all together, will look rather imposing. Ah! stupid wretch
that I am!” continued D’Artagnan, “I want thirty horses. That
is ruinous. Where the devil was my head when I forgot the horses? We cannot,
however, think of striking such a blow without horses. Well, so be it, that
sacrifice must be made; we can get the horses in the country—they are not
bad, besides. But I forgot—peste! Three bands—that necessitates
three leaders; there is the difficulty. Of the three commanders I have already
one—that is myself;—yes, but the two others will of themselves cost
almost as much money as all the rest of the troop. No; positively I must have
but one lieutenant. In that case, then, I should reduce my troop to twenty men.
I know very well that twenty men is but very little; but since with thirty I
was determined not to seek to come to blows, I should do so more carefully
still with twenty. Twenty—that is a round number; that, besides, reduces
the number of the horses by ten, which is a consideration; and then, with a
good lieutenant—Mordioux! what things patience and calculation are! Was I
not going to embark with forty men, and I have now reduced them to twenty for
an equal success? Ten thousand livres saved at one stroke, and more safety;
that is well! Now, then, let us see; we have nothing to do but to find this
lieutenant—let him be found, then; and after—That is not so easy;
he must be brave and good, a second myself. Yes, but a lieutenant must have my
secret, and as that secret is worth a million, and I shall only pay my man a
thousand livres, fifteen hundred at the most, my man will sell the secret to
Monk. Mordioux! no lieutenant. Besides, this man, were he as mute as a disciple
of Pythagoras,—this man would be sure to have in the troop some favorite
soldier, whom he would make his sergeant; the sergeant would penetrate the
secret of the lieutenant, in case the latter should be honest and unwilling to
sell it. Then the sergeant, less honest and less ambitious, will give up the
whole for fifty thousand livres. Come, come! that is impossible. The lieutenant
is impossible. But then I must have no fractions; I cannot divide my troop in
two, and act upon two points, at once, without another self, who—But what
is the use of acting upon two points, as we have only one man to take? What can
be the use of weakening a corps by placing the right here, and the left there?
A single corps—Mordioux! a single one, and that commanded by
D’Artagnan. Very well. But twenty men marching in one band are suspected
by everybody; twenty horsemen must not be seen marching together, or a company
will be detached against them and the password will be required; the which
company, upon seeing them embarrassed to give it, would shoot M.
d’Artagnan and his men like so many rabbits. I reduce myself then to ten
men; in this fashion I shall act simply and with unity; I shall be forced to be
prudent, which is half the success in an affair of the kind I am undertaking; a
greater number might, perhaps, have drawn me into some folly. Ten horses are
not many, either, to buy or take. A capital idea; what tranquillity it infuses
into my mind! no more suspicions—no passwords—no more dangers! Ten
men, they are valets or clerks. Ten men, leading ten horses laden with
merchandise of whatever kind, are tolerated, well received everywhere. Ten men
travel on account of the house of Planchet & Co., of France,—nothing
can be said against that. These ten men, clothed like manufacturers, have a
good cutlass or a good musket at their saddle-bow, and a good pistol in the
holster. They never allow themselves to be uneasy, because they have no evil
designs. They are, perhaps, in truth, a little disposed to be smugglers, but
what harm is in that? Smuggling is not, like polygamy, a hanging offense. The
worst that can happen to us is the confiscation of our merchandise. Our
merchandise confiscated—a fine affair that! Come, come! it is a superb
plan. Ten men only—ten men, whom I will engage for my service; ten men
who shall be as resolute as forty, who would cost me four times as much, and to
whom, for greater security, I will never open my mouth as to my designs, and to
whom I shall only say ‘My friends, there is a blow to be struck.’
Things being after this fashion, Satan will be very malicious if he plays me
one of his tricks. Fifteen thousand livres saved—that’s
superb—out of twenty!”

Thus fortified by his laborious calculations, D’Artagnan stopped at this
plan, and determined to change nothing in it. He had already on a list
furnished by his inexhaustible memory, ten men illustrious amongst the seekers
of adventure, ill-treated by fortune, and not on good terms with justice. Upon
this D’Artagnan rose, and instantly set off on the search, telling
Planchet not to expect him to breakfast, and perhaps not to dinner. A day and a
half spent in rummaging amongst certain dens of Paris sufficed for his
recruiting; and, without allowing his adventurers to communicate with each
other, he had picked up and got together, in less than thirty hours, a charming
collection of ill-looking faces, speaking a French less pure than the English
they were about to attempt. These men were, for the most part, guards, whose
merit D’Artagnan had had an opportunity of appreciating in various
encounters, whom drunkenness, unlucky sword-thrusts, unexpected winnings at
play, or the economical reforms of Mazarin, had forced to seek shade and
solitude, those two great consolers of irritated and chafing spirits. They bore
upon their countenances and in their vestments the traces of the heartaches
they had undergone. Some had their visages scarred,—all had their clothes
in rags. D’Artagnan comforted the most needy of these brotherly miseries
by a prudent distribution of the crowns of the company; then, having taken care
that these crowns should be employed in the physical improvement of the troop,
he appointed a trysting place in the north of France, between Bergues and Saint
Omer. Six days were allowed as the utmost term, and D’Artagnan was
sufficiently acquainted with the good-will, the good-humor, and the relative
probity of these illustrious recruits, to be certain that not one of them would
fail in his appointment. These orders given, this rendezvous fixed, he went to
bid farewell to Planchet, who asked news of his army. D’Artagnan did not
think it proper to inform him of the reduction he had made in his personnel. He
feared that the confidence of his associate would be abated by such an avowal.
Planchet was delighted to learn that the army was levied, and that he
(Planchet) found himself a kind of half king, who from his throne-counter kept
in pay a body of troops destined to make war against perfidious Albion, that
enemy of all true French hearts. Planchet paid down in double louis, twenty
thousand livres to D’Artagnan, on the part of himself (Planchet), and
twenty thousand livres, still in double louis, in account with
D’Artagnan. D’Artagnan placed each of the twenty thousand francs in
a bag, and weighing a bag in each hand,—“This money is very
embarrassing, my dear Planchet,” said he. “Do you know this weighs
thirty pounds?”

“Bah! your horse will carry that like a feather.”

D’Artagnan shook his head. “Don’t tell me such things,
Planchet: a horse overloaded with thirty pounds, in addition to the rider and
his portmanteau, cannot cross a river so easily—cannot leap over a wall
or ditch so lightly; and the horse failing, the horseman fails. It is true that
you, Planchet, who have served in the infantry, may not be aware of all
that.”

“Then what is to be done, monsieur?” said Planchet, greatly
embarrassed.

“Listen to me,” said D’Artagnan. “I will pay my army on
its return home. Keep my half of twenty thousand livres, which you can use
during that time.”

“And my half?” said Planchet.

“I shall take that with me.”

“Your confidence does me honor,” said Planchet: “but
supposing you should not return?”

“That is possible, though not very probable. Then, Planchet, in case I
should not return—give me a pen; I will make my will.”
D’Artagnan took a pen and some paper, and wrote upon a plain
sheet,—“I, D’Artagnan, possess twenty thousand livres, laid
up cent per cent during thirty years that I have been in the service of his
majesty the king of France. I leave five thousand to Athos, five thousand to
Porthos, and five thousand to Aramis, that they may give the said sums in my
name and their own to my young friend Raoul, Vicomte de Bragelonne. I give the
remaining five thousand to Planchet, that he may distribute the fifteen
thousand with less regret among my friends. With which purpose I sign these
presents.—D’ARTAGNAN.”

Planchet appeared very curious to know what D’Artagnan had written.

“Here,” said the musketeer, “read it.”

On reading the last lines the tears came into Planchet’s eyes. “You
think, then, that I would not have given the money without that? Then I will
have none of your five thousand francs.”

D’Artagnan smiled. “Accept it, accept it, Planchet; and in that way
you will only lose fifteen thousand francs instead of twenty thousand, and you
will not be tempted to disregard the signature of your master and friend, by
losing nothing at all.”

How well that dear Monsieur d’Artagnan knew the hearts of men and
grocers! They who have pronounced Don Quixote mad because he rode out to the
conquest of an empire with nobody but Sancho his squire, and they who have
pronounced Sancho mad because he accompanied his master in his attempt to
conquer the said empire,—they certainly will have no hesitation in
extending the same judgment to D’Artagnan and Planchet. And yet the first
passed for one of the most subtle spirits among the astute spirits of the court
of France. As to the second, he had acquired by good right the reputation of
having one of the longest heads among the grocers of the Rue des Lombards;
consequently of Paris, and consequently of France. Now, to consider these two
men from the point of view from which you would consider other men, and the
means by the aid of which they contemplated to restore a monarch to his throne,
compared with other means, the shallowest brains of the country where brains
are most shallow must have revolted against the presumptuous madness of the
lieutenant and the stupidity of his associate. Fortunately, D’Artagnan
was not a man to listen to the idle talk of those around him, or to the
comments that were made on himself. He had adopted the motto, “Act well,
and let people talk.” Planchet, on his part had adopted this, “Act
and say nothing.” It resulted from this, that, according to the custom of
all superior geniuses, these two men flattered themselves, intra pectus, with
being in the right against all who found fault with them.

As a beginning, D’Artagnan set out in the finest of possible weather,
without a cloud in the heavens—without a cloud on his mind, joyous and
strong, calm and decided, great in his resolution, and consequently carrying
with him a tenfold dose of that potent fluid which the shocks of mind cause to
spring from the nerves, and which procure for the human machine a force and an
influence of which future ages will render, according to all probability, a
more arithmetical account than we can possibly do at present. He was again, as
in times past, on that same road of adventures which had led him to Boulogne,
and which he was now traveling for the fourth time. It appeared to him that he
could almost recognize the trace of his own steps upon the road, and that of
his fist upon the doors of the hostelries;—his memory, always active and
present, brought back that youth which neither thirty years later his great
heart nor his wrist of steel would have belied. What a rich nature was that of
this man! He had all the passions, all the defects, all the weaknesses, and the
spirit of contradiction familiar to his understanding changed all these
imperfections into corresponding qualities. D’Artagnan, thanks to his
ever active imagination, was afraid of a shadow, and ashamed of being afraid,
he marched straight up to that shadow, and then became extravagant in his
bravery, if the danger proved to be real. Thus everything in him was emotion,
and therefore enjoyment. He loved the society of others, but never became tired
of his own; and more than once, if he could have been heard when he was alone,
he might have been seen laughing at the jokes he related to himself or the
tricks his imagination created just five minutes before ennui might have been
looked for. D’Artagnan was not perhaps so gay this time as he would have
been with the prospect of finding some good friends at Calais, instead of
joining the ten scamps there; melancholy, however, did not visit him more than
once a day, and it was about five visits that he received from that somber
deity before he got sight of the sea at Boulogne, and then these visits were
indeed but short. But when once D’Artagnan found himself near the field
of action, all other feelings but that of confidence disappeared never to
return. From Boulogne he followed the coast to Calais. Calais was the place of
general rendezvous, and at Calais he had named to each of his recruits the
hostelry of “Le Grande Monarque,” where living was not extravagant,
where sailors messed, and where men of the sword, with sheath of leather, be it
understood, found lodging, table, food, and all the comforts of life, for
thirty sous per diem. D’Artagnan proposed to himself to take them by
surprise in flagrante delicto of wandering life, and to judge by the first
appearance if he could count on them as trusty companions.

He arrived at Calais at half past four in the afternoon.

Chapter XXII. D’Artagnan travels for the House
of Planchet and Company.

The hostelry of “Le Grand Monarque” was
situated in a little street parallel to the port without looking out upon the
port itself. Some lanes cut—as steps cut the two parallels of the
ladder—the two great straight lines of the port and the street. By these
lanes passengers came suddenly from the port into the street, or from the
street on to the port. D’Artagnan, arrived at the port, took one of these
lanes, and came out in front of the hostelry of “Le Grand
Monarque.” The moment was well chosen and might remind D’Artagnan
of his start in life at the hostelry of the “Franc-Meunier” at
Meung. Some sailors who had been playing at dice had started a quarrel, and
were threatening each other furiously. The host, hostess, and two lads were
watching with anxiety the circle of these angry gamblers, from the midst of
which war seemed ready to break forth, bristling with knives and hatchets. The
play, nevertheless, was continued. A stone bench was occupied by two men, who
appeared thence to watch the door; four tables, placed at the back of the
common chamber, were occupied by eight other individuals. Neither the men at
the door, nor those at the tables took any part in the play or the quarrel.
D’Artagnan recognized his ten men in these cold, indifferent spectators.
The quarrel went on increasing. Every passion has, like the sea, its tide which
ascends and descends. Reaching the climax of passion, one sailor overturned the
table and the money which was upon it. The table fell, and the money rolled
about. In an instant all belonging to the hostelry threw themselves upon the
stakes, and many a piece of silver was picked up by people who stole away
whilst the sailors were scuffling with each other.

The two men on the bench and the eight at the tables, although they seemed
perfect strangers to each other, these ten men alone, we say, appeared to have
agreed to remain impassible amidst the cries of fury and the chinking of money.
Two only contented themselves with pushing with their feet combatants who came
under their table. Two others, rather than take part in this disturbance,
buried their hands in their pockets; and another two jumped upon the table they
occupied, as people do to avoid being submerged by overflowing water.

“Come, come,” said D’Artagnan to himself, not having lost one
of the details we have related, “this is a very fair
gathering—circumspect, calm, accustomed to disturbance, acquainted with
blows! Peste! I have been lucky.”

All at once his attention was called to a particular part of the room. The two
men who had pushed the strugglers with their feet, were assailed with abuse by
the sailors, who had become reconciled. One of them, half drunk with passion,
and quite drunk with beer, came, in a menacing manner, to demand of the shorter
of these two sages by what right he had touched with his foot creatures of the
good God, who were not dogs. And whilst putting this question, in order to make
it more direct, he applied his great fist to the nose of
D’Artagnan’s recruit.

This man became pale, without its being to be discerned whether his pallor
arose from anger or fear; seeing which, the sailor concluded it was from fear,
and raised his fist with the manifest intention of letting it fall upon the
head of the stranger. But though the threatened man did not appear to move, he
dealt the sailor such a severe blow in the stomach that he sent him rolling and
howling to the other side of the room. At the same instant, rallied by the
espirit de corps, all the comrades of the conquered man fell upon the
conqueror.

The latter, with the same coolness of which he had given proof, without
committing the imprudence of touching his weapons, took up a beer-pot with a
pewter-lid, and knocked down two or three of his assailants; then, as he was
about to yield to numbers, the seven other silent men at the tables, who had
not yet stirred, perceived that their cause was at stake, and came to the
rescue. At the same time, the two indifferent spectators at the door turned
round with frowning bows, indicating their evident intention of taking the
enemy in the rear, if the enemy did not cease their aggressions.

The host, his helpers, and two watchmen who were passing, and who from the
curiosity had penetrated too far into the room, were mixed up in the tumult and
showered with blows. The Parisians hit like Cyclops, with an ensemble and a
tactic delightful to behold. At length, obliged to beat a retreat before
superior numbers, they formed an intrenchment behind the large table, which
they raised by main force; whilst the two others, arming themselves each with a
trestle, and using it like a great sledge-hammer, knocked down at a blow eight
sailors upon whose heads they had brought their monstrous catapult in play. The
floor was already strewn with wounded, and the room filled with cries and dust,
when D’Artagnan, satisfied with the test, advanced, sword in hand, and
striking with the pommel every head that came in his way, he uttered a vigorous
hola! which put an instantaneous end to the conflict. A great back-flood
directly took place from the center to the sides of the room, so that
D’Artagnan found himself isolated and dominator.

“What is this all about?” then demanded he of the assembly, with
the majestic tone of Neptune pronouncing the Quos ego.

At the very instant, at the first sound of his voice, to carry on the Virgilian
metaphor, D’Artagnan’s recruits, recognizing each his sovereign
lord, discontinued their plank-fighting and trestle blows. On their side, the
sailors, seeing that long naked sword, that martial air, and the agile arm
which came to the rescue of their enemies, in the person of a man who seemed
accustomed to command, the sailors picked up their wounded and their pitchers.
The Parisians wiped their brows, and viewed their leader with respect.
D’Artagnan was loaded with thanks by the host of “Le Grand
Monarque.” He received them like a man who knows that nothing is being
offered that does not belong to him, and then said he would go and walk upon
the port till supper was ready. Immediately each of the recruits, who
understood the summons, took his hat, brushed the dust off his clothes, and
followed D’Artagnan. But D’Artagnan, whilst walking and observing,
took care not to stop; he directed his course towards the downs, and the ten
men—surprised at finding themselves going in the track of each other,
uneasy at seeing on their right, on their left, and behind them, companions
upon whom they had not reckoned—followed him, casting furtive glances at
each other. It was not till he had arrived at the hollow part of the deepest
down that D’Artagnan, smiling to see them outdone, turned towards them,
making a friendly sign with his hand.

“Eh! come, come, gentlemen,” said he, “let us not devour each
other; you are made to live together, to understand each other in all respects,
and not to devour one another.”

Instantly all hesitation ceased; the men breathed as if they had been taken out
of a coffin, and examined each other complacently. After this examination they
turned their eyes towards their leader, who had long been acquainted with the
art of speaking to men of that class, and who improvised the following little
speech, pronounced with an energy truly Gascon:

“Gentlemen, you all know who I am. I have engaged you from knowing you to
be brave, and willing to associate you with me in a glorious enterprise.
Imagine that in laboring for me you labor for the king. I only warn you that if
you allow anything of this supposition to appear, I shall be forced to crack
your skulls immediately, in the manner most convenient to me. You are not
ignorant, gentlemen, that state secrets are like a mortal poison: as long as
that poison is in its box and the box is closed, it is not injurious; out of
the box, it kills. Now draw near, and you shall know as much of this secret as
I am able to tell you.” All drew close to him with an expression of
curiosity. “Approach,” continued D’Artagnan, “and let
not the bird which passes over our heads, the rabbit which sports on the downs,
the fish which bounds from the waters, hear us. Our business is to learn and to
report to monsieur le surintendant of the finances to what extent English
smuggling is injurious to the French merchants. I shall enter every place, and
see everything. We are poor Picard fishermen, thrown upon the coast by a storm.
It is certain that we must sell fish, neither more nor less, like true
fishermen. Only people might guess who we are, and might molest us; it is
therefore necessary that we should be in a condition to defend ourselves. And
this is why I have selected men of spirit and courage. We shall lead a steady
life, and not incur much danger, seeing that we have behind us a powerful
protector, thanks to whom no embarrassment is possible. One thing alone puzzles
me; but I hope that after a short explanation, you will relieve me from that
difficulty. The thing which puzzles me is taking with me a crew of stupid
fishermen, which crew will annoy me immensely, whilst if, by chance, there were
among you any who have seen the sea—”

“Oh! don’t let that trouble you,” said one of the recruits;
“I was a prisoner among the pirates of Tunis three years, and can
maneuver a boat like an admiral.”

“See,” said D’Artagnan, “what an admirable thing chance
is!” D’Artagnan pronounced these words with an indefinable tone of
feigned bonhomie, for he knew very well that the victim of the pirates was an
old corsair, and had engaged him in consequence of that knowledge. But
D’Artagnan never said more than there was need to say, in order to leave
people in doubt. He paid himself with the explanation, and welcomed the effect,
without appearing to be preoccupied with the cause.

“And I,” said a second, “I, by chance, had an uncle who
directed the works of the port of La Rochelle. When quite a child, I played
about the boats, and I know how to handle an oar or a sail as well as the best
Ponantais sailor.” The latter did not lie much more than the first, for
he had rowed on board his majesty’s galleys six years, at Ciotat. Two
others were more frank: they confessed honestly that they had served on board a
vessel as soldiers as punishment, and did not blush for it. D’Artagnan
found himself, then, the leader of ten men of war and four sailors, having at
once an land army and a sea force, which would have carried the pride of
Planchet to its height, if Planchet had known the details.

Nothing was now left but arranging the general orders, and D’Artagnan
gave them with precision. He enjoined his men to be ready to set out for the
Hague, some following the coast which leads to Breskens, others the road to
Antwerp. The rendezvous was given, by calculating each day’s march, a
fortnight from that time, upon the chief place at the Hague. D’Artagnan
recommended his men to go in couples, as they liked best, from sympathy. He
himself selected from among those with the least disreputable look, two guards
whom he had formerly known, and whose only faults were being drunkards and
gamblers. These men had not entirely lost all ideas of civilization, and under
proper garments their hearts would beat again. D’Artagnan, not to create
any jealousy with the others, made the rest go forward. He kept his two
selected ones, clothed them from his own wardrobe, and set out with them.

It was to these two, whom he seemed to honor with an absolute confidence, that
D’Artagnan imparted a false secret, destined to secure the success of the
expedition. He confessed to them that the object was not to learn to what
extent French merchants were injured by English smuggling, but to learn how far
French smuggling could annoy English trade. These men appeared convinced; they
were effectively so. D’Artagnan was quite sure that at the first debauch,
when thoroughly drunk, one of the two would divulge the secret to the whole
band. His game appeared infallible.

A fortnight after all we have said had taken place at Calais, the whole troop
assembled at the Hague.

Then D’Artagnan perceived that all his men, with remarkable intelligence,
had already travestied themselves into sailors, more or less ill-treated by the
sea. D’Artagnan left them to sleep in a den in Newkerke street, whilst he
lodged comfortably upon the Grand Canal. He learned that the king of England
had come back to his old ally, William II. of Nassau, stadtholder of Holland.
He learned also that the refusal of Louis XIV. had a little cooled the
protection afforded him up to that time, and in consequence he had gone to
reside in a little village house at Scheveningen, situated in the downs, on the
sea-shore, about a league from the Hague.

There, it was said, the unfortunate banished king consoled himself in his
exile, by looking, with the melancholy peculiar to the princes of his race, at
that immense North Sea, which separated him from his England, as it had
formerly separated Mary Stuart from France. There, behind the trees of the
beautiful wood of Scheveningen, on the fine sand upon which grows the golden
broom of the down, Charles II. vegetated as it did, more unfortunate, for he
had life and thought, and he hoped and despaired by turns.

D’Artagnan went once as far as Scheveningen, in order to be certain that
all was true that was said of the king. He beheld Charles II., pensive and
alone, coming out of a little door opening into the wood, and walking on the
beach in the setting sun, without even attracting the attention of the
fishermen, who, on their return in the evening, drew, like the ancient mariners
of the Archipelago, their barks up upon the sand of the shore.

D’Artagnan recognized the king; he saw him fix his melancholy look upon
the immense extent of the waters, and absorb upon his pale countenance the red
rays of the sun already cut by the black line of the horizon. Then Charles
returned to his isolated abode, always alone, slow and sad, amusing himself
with making the friable and moving sand creak beneath his feet.

That very evening D’Artagnan hired for a thousand livres a fishing-boat
worth four thousand. He paid a thousand livres down, and deposited the three
thousand with a Burgomaster, after which he brought on board, without their
being seen, the six men who formed his land army; and with the rising tide, at
three o’clock in the morning, he got into the open sea, maneuvering
ostensibly with the four others, and depending upon the science of his galley
slave as upon that of the first pilot of the port.

Chapter XXIII. In which the Author is forced to write
a Little History.

While kings and men were thus occupied with England,
which governed itself quite alone, and which, it must be said in its praise,
had never been so badly governed, a man upon whom God had fixed his eye, and
placed his finger, a man predestined to write his name in brilliant letters
upon the page of history, was pursuing in the face of the world a work full of
mystery and audacity. He went on, and no one knew whither he meant to go,
although not only England, but France, and Europe, watched him marching with a
firm step and head held high. All that was known of this man we are about to
tell.

Monk had just declared himself in favor of the liberty of the Rump Parliament,
a parliament which General Lambert, imitating Cromwell, whose lieutenant he had
been, had just blocked up so closely, in order to bring it to his will, that no
member, during all the blockade, was able to go out, and only one, Peter
Wentworth, had been able to get in.

Lambert and Monk—everything was summed up in these two men; the first
representing military despotism, the second pure republicanism. These men were
the two sole political representatives of that revolution in which Charles I.
had first lost his crown, and afterwards his head. As regarded Lambert, he did
not dissemble his views; he sought to establish a military government, and to
be himself the head of that government.

Monk, a rigid republican, some said, wished to maintain the Rump Parliament,
that visible though degenerated representative of the republic. Monk, artful
and ambitious, said others, wished simply to make of this parliament, which he
affected to protect, a solid step by which to mount the throne which Cromwell
had left empty, but upon which he had never dared to take his seat.

Thus Lambert by persecuting the parliament, and Monk by declaring for it, had
mutually proclaimed themselves enemies of each other. Monk and Lambert,
therefore, had at first thought of creating an army each for himself: Monk in
Scotland, where were the Presbyterians and the royalists, that is to say, the
malcontents; Lambert in London, where was found, as is always the case, the
strongest opposition to the existing power which it had beneath its eyes.

Monk had pacified Scotland, he had there formed for himself an army, and found
an asylum. The one watched the other. Monk knew that the day was not yet come,
the day marked by the Lord for a great change; his sword, therefore, appeared
glued to the sheath. Inexpugnable in his wild and mountainous Scotland, an
absolute general, king of an army of eleven thousand old soldiers, whom he had
more than once led on to victory; as well informed, nay, even better, of the
affairs of London, than Lambert, who held garrison in the city,—such was
the position of Monk, when, at a hundred leagues from London, he declared
himself for the parliament. Lambert, on the contrary, as we have said, lived in
the capital. That was the center of all his operations, and he there collected
all around him all his friends, and all the people of the lower class,
eternally inclined to cherish the enemies of constituted power.

It was then in London that Lambert learnt the support that, from the frontiers
of Scotland, Monk lent to the parliament. He judged there was no time to be
lost, and that the Tweed was not so far distant from the Thames that an army
could not march from one river to the other, particularly when it was well
commanded. He knew, besides, that as fast as the soldiers of Monk penetrated
into England, they would form on their route that ball of snow, the emblem of
the globe of fortune, which is for the ambitious nothing but a step growing
unceasingly higher to conduct him to his object. He got together, therefore,
his army, formidable at the same time for its composition and its numbers, and
hastened to meet Monk, who, on his part, like a prudent navigator sailing
amidst rocks, advanced by very short marches, listening to the reports which
came from London.

The two armies came in sight of each other near Newcastle; Lambert, arriving
first, encamped in the city itself. Monk, always circumspect, stopped where he
was, and placed his general quarters at Coldstream, on the Tweed. The sight of
Lambert spread joy through Monk’s army, whilst, on the contrary, the
sight of Monk threw disorder into Lambert’s army. It might have been
thought that these intrepid warriors, who had made such a noise in the streets
of London, had set out with the hopes of meeting no one, and that now seeing
that they had met an army, and that that army hoisted before them not only a
standard, but still further, a cause and a principle,—it might have been
believed, we say, that these intrepid warriors had begun to reflect that they
were less good republicans than the soldiers of Monk, since the latter
supported the parliament; whilst Lambert supported nothing, not even himself.

As to Monk, if he had had to reflect, or if he did reflect, it must have been
after a sad fashion, for history relates—and that modest dame, it is well
known, never lies—history relates, that the day of his arrival at
Coldstream search was made in vain throughout the place for a single sheep.

If Monk had commanded an English army, that was enough to have brought about a
general desertion. But it is not with the Scots as it is with the English, to
whom that fluid flesh which is called blood is a paramount necessity; the
Scots, a poor and sober race, live upon a little barley crushed between two
stones, diluted with the water of the fountain, and cooked upon another stone,
heated.

The Scots, their distribution of barley being made, cared very little whether
there was or was not any meat in Coldstream. Monk, little accustomed to
barley-cakes, was hungry, and his staff, at least as hungry as himself, looked
with anxiety right and left, to know what was being prepared for supper.

Monk ordered search to be made; his scouts had on arriving in the place found
it deserted and the cupboards empty; upon butchers and bakers it was of no use
depending in Coldstream. The smallest morsel of bread, then, could not be found
for the general’s table.

As accounts succeeded each other, all equally unsatisfactory, Monk, seeing
terror and discouragement upon every face, declared that he was not hungry;
besides, they should eat on the morrow, since Lambert was there probably with
the intention of giving battle, and consequently would give up his provisions,
if he were forced from Newcastle, or forever to relieve Monk’s soldiers
from hunger if he conquered.

This consolation was only efficacious upon a very small number; but of what
importance was it to Monk? for Monk was very absolute, under the appearance of
the most perfect mildness. Every one, therefore, was obliged to be satisfied,
or at least to appear so. Monk, quite as hungry as his people, but affecting
perfect indifference for the absent mutton, cut a fragment of tobacco, half an
inch long, from the carotte of a sergeant who formed part of his suite, and
began to masticate the said fragment, assuring his lieutenant that hunger was a
chimera, and that, besides, people were never hungry when they had anything to
chew.

This joke satisfied some of those who had resisted Monk’s first deduction
drawn from the neighborhood of Lambert’s army; the number of the
dissentients diminished greatly; the guard took their posts, the patrols began,
and the general continued his frugal repast beneath his open tent.

Between his camp and that of the enemy stood an old abbey, of which, at the
present day, there only remain some ruins, but which then was in existence, and
was called Newcastle Abbey. It was built upon a vast site, independent at once
of the plain and of the river, because it was almost a marsh fed by springs and
kept up by rains. Nevertheless, in the midst of these pools of water, covered
with long grass, rushes, and reeds, were seen solid spots of ground, formerly
used as the kitchen-garden, the park, the pleasure-gardens, and other
dependencies of the abbey, looking like one of those great sea-spiders, whose
body is round, whilst the claws go diverging round from this circumference.

The kitchen-garden, one of the longest claws of the abbey, extended to
Monk’s camp. Unfortunately it was, as we have said, early in June, and
the kitchen-garden, being abandoned, offered no resources.

Monk had ordered this spot to be guarded, as most subject to surprises. The
fires of the enemy’s general were plainly to be perceived on the other
side of the abbey. But between these fires and the abbey extended the Tweed,
unfolding its luminous scales beneath the thick shade of tall green oaks. Monk
was perfectly well acquainted with this position, Newcastle and its environs
having already more than once been his headquarters. He knew that by this day
his enemy might without doubt throw a few scouts into these ruins and promote a
skirmish, but that by night he would take care to abstain from such a risk. He
felt himself, therefore, in security.

Thus his soldiers saw him, after what he boastingly called his
supper—that is to say, after the exercise of mastication reported by us
at the commencement of this chapter—like Napoleon on the eve of
Austerlitz, seated asleep in his rush chair, half beneath the light of his
lamp, half beneath the reflection of the moon, commencing its ascent in the
heavens, which denoted that it was nearly half past nine in the evening. All at
once Monk was roused from his half sleep, fictitious perhaps, by a troop of
soldiers, who came with joyous cries, and kicked the poles of his tent with a
humming noise as if on purpose to wake him. There was no need of so much noise;
the general opened his eyes quickly.

“Well, my children, what is going on now?” asked the general.

“General!” replied several voices at once, “General! you
shall have some supper.”

“I have had my supper, gentlemen,” replied he quietly, “and
was comfortably digesting it, as you see. But come in, and tell me what brings
you hither.”

“Good news, general.”

“Bah! Has Lambert sent us word that he will fight to-morrow?”

“No; but we have just captured a fishing-boat conveying fish to
Newcastle.”

“And you have done very wrong, my friends. These gentlemen from London
are delicate, must have their first course; you will put them sadly out of
humor this evening, and to-morrow they will be pitiless. It would really be in
good taste to send back to Lambert both his fish and his fishermen,
unless—” and the general reflected an instant.

“Tell me,” continued he, “what are these fishermen, if you
please?”

“Some Picard seamen who were fishing on the coasts of France or Holland,
and who have been thrown upon ours by a gale of wind.”

“Do any among them speak our language?”

“The leader spoke some few words of English.”

The mistrust of the general was awakened in proportion as fresh information
reached him. “That is well,” said he. “I wish to see these
men; bring them to me.”

An officer immediately went to fetch them.

“How many are there of them?” continued Monk; “and what is
their vessel?”

“There are ten or twelve of them, general, and they were aboard of a kind
of chasse-maree, as it is called—Dutch-built, apparently.”

“And you say they were carrying fish to Lambert’s camp?”

“Yes, general, and they seem to have had good luck in their
fishing.”

“Humph! We shall see that,” said Monk.

At this moment the officer returned, bringing the leader of the fishermen with
him. He was a man from fifty to fifty-five years old, but good-looking for his
age. He was of middle height, and wore a justaucorps of coarse wool, a cap
pulled down over his eyes, a cutlass hung from his belt, and he walked with the
hesitation peculiar to sailors, who, never knowing, thanks to the movement of
the vessel, whether their foot will be placed upon the plank or upon nothing,
give to every one of their steps a fall as firm as if they were driving a pile.
Monk, with an acute and penetrating look, examined the fisherman for some time,
while the latter smiled, with that smile, half cunning, half silly, peculiar to
French peasants.

“Do you speak English?” asked Monk, in excellent French.

“Ah! but badly, my lord,” replied the fisherman.

This reply was made much more with the lively and sharp accentuation of the
people beyond the Loire, than with the slightly-drawling accent of the
countries of the west and north of France.

“But you do speak it?” persisted Monk, in order to examine his
accent once more.

“Eh! we men of the sea,” replied the fisherman, “speak a
little of all languages.”

“Then you are a sea fisherman?”

“I am at present, my lord—a fisherman, and a famous fisherman, too.
I have taken a barbel that weighs at least thirty pounds, and more than fifty
mullets; I have also some little whitings that will fry beautifully.”

“You appear to me to have fished more frequently in the Gulf of Gascony
than in the Channel,” said Monk, smiling.

“Well, I am from the south; but does that prevent me from being a good
fisherman, my lord?”

“Oh! not at all; I shall buy your fish. And now speak frankly; for whom
did you destine them?”

“My lord, I will conceal nothing from you. I was going to Newcastle,
following the coast, when a party of horsemen who were passing along in an
opposite direction made a sign to my bark to turn back to your honor’s
camp, under penalty of a discharge of musketry. As I was not armed for
fighting,” added the fisherman, smiling, “I was forced to
submit.”

“And why did you go to Lambert’s camp in preference to mine?”

“My lord, I will be frank; will your lordship permit me?”

“Yes, and even if need be shall command you to be so.”

“Well, my lord, I was going to M. Lambert’s camp because those
gentlemen from the city pay well—whilst your Scotchmen, Puritans,
Presbyterians, Covenanters, or whatever you chose to call them, eat but little,
and pay for nothing.”

Monk shrugged his shoulders, without, however, being able to refrain from
smiling at the same time. “How is it that, being from the south, you come
to fish on our coasts?”

“Because I have been fool enough to marry in Picardy.”

“Yes; but even Picardy is not England.”

“My lord, man shoves his boat into the sea, but God and the wind do the
rest, and drive the boat where they please.”

“You had, then, no intention of landing on our coasts?”

“Never.”

“And what route were you steering?”

“We were returning from Ostend, where some mackerel had already been
seen, when a sharp wind from the south drove us from our course; then, seeing
that it was useless to struggle against it, we let it drive us. It then became
necessary, not to lose our fish, which were good, to go and sell them at the
nearest English port, and that was Newcastle. We were told the opportunity was
good, as there was an increase of population in the camp, an increase of
population in the city; both, we were told, were full of gentlemen, very rich
and very hungry. So we steered our course towards Newcastle.”

“And your companions, where are they?”

“Oh, my companions have remained on board; they are sailors without the
least instruction.”

“Whilst you—” said Monk.

“Who, I?” said the patron, laughing; “I have sailed about
with my father; and I know what is called a sou, a crown, a pistole, a louis,
and a double louis, in all the languages of Europe; my crew, therefore, listen
to me as they would to an oracle, and obey me as if I were an admiral.”

“Then it was you who preferred M. Lambert as the best customer?”

“Yes, certainly. And, to be frank, my lord, was I wrong?”

“You will see that by and by.”

“At all events, my lord, if there is a fault, the fault is mine; and my
comrades should not be dealt hardly with on that account.”

“This is decidedly an intelligent, sharp fellow,” thought Monk.
Then, after a few minutes’ silence employed in scrutinizing the
fisherman,—“You come from Ostend, did you not say?” asked the
general.

“Yes, my lord, in a straight line.”

“You have then heard of the affairs of the day; for I have no doubt that
both in France and Holland they excite interest. What is he doing who calls
himself king of England?”

“Oh, my lord!” cried the fisherman, with loud and expansive
frankness, “that is a lucky question, and you could not put it to anybody
better than to me, for in truth I can make you a famous reply. Imagine, my
lord, that when putting into Ostend to sell the few mackerel we had caught, I
saw the ex-king walking on the downs waiting for his horses, which were to take
him to the Hague. He is a rather tall, pale man, with black hair, and somewhat
hard-featured. He looks ill, and I don’t think the air of Holland agrees
with him.”

Monk followed with the greatest attention the rapid, heightened, and diffuse
conversation of the fisherman, in a language which was not his own, but which,
as we have said, he spoke with great facility. The fisherman, on his part,
employed sometimes a French word, sometimes an English word, and sometimes a
word which appeared not to belong to any language, but was, in truth, pure
Gascon. Fortunately his eyes spoke for him, and that so eloquently, that it was
possible to lose a word from his mouth, but not a single intention from his
eyes. The general appeared more and more satisfied with his examination.
“You must have heard that this ex-king, as you call him, was going to the
Hague for some purpose?”

“Oh, yes,” said the fisherman, “I heard that.”

“And what was his purpose?”

“Always the same,” said the fisherman. “Must he not always
entertain the fixed idea of returning to England?”

“That is true,” said Monk, pensively.

“Without reckoning,” added the fisherman, “that the
stadtholder—you know, my lord, William II.?—”

“Well?”

“He will assist him with all his power.”

“Ah! did you hear that said?”

“No, but I think so.”

“You are quite a politician, apparently,” said Monk.

“Why, we sailors, my lord, who are accustomed to study the water and the
air—that is to say, the two most changeable things in the world—are
seldom deceived as to the rest.”

“Now, then,” said Monk, changing the conversation, “I am told
you are going to provision us.”

“I shall do my best, my lord.”

“How much do you ask for your fish in the first place?”

“Not such a fool as to name a price, my lord.”

“Why not?”

“Because my fish is yours.”

“By what right?”

“By that of the strongest.”

“But my intention is to pay you for it.”

“That is very generous of you, my lord.”

“And the worth of it—”

“My lord, I fix no price.”

“What do you ask, then?”

“I only ask to be permitted to go away.”

“Where?—to General Lambert’s camp?”

“I!” cried the fisherman; “what should I go to Newcastle for,
now I have no longer any fish?”

“At all events, listen to me.”

“I do, my lord.”

“I shall give you some advice.”

“How, my lord!—pay me and give me good advice likewise! You
overwhelm me, my lord.”

Monk looked more earnestly than ever at the fisherman, about whom he still
appeared to entertain some suspicion. “Yes, I shall pay you, and give you
a piece of advice; for the two things are connected. If you return, then, to
General Lambert—”

The fisherman made a movement of his head and shoulders, which signified,
“If he persists in it, I won’t contradict him.”

“Do not cross the marsh,” continued Monk: “you will have
money in your pocket, and there are in the marsh some Scottish ambuscaders I
have placed there. Those people are very intractable; they understand but very
little of the language which you speak, although it appears to me to be
composed of three languages. They might take from you what I have given you,
and, on your return to your country, you would not fail to say that General
Monk has two hands, the one Scottish, and the other English; and that he takes
back with the Scottish hand what he has given with the English hand.”

“Oh! general, I shall go where you like, be sure of that,” said the
fisherman, with a fear too expressive not to be exaggerated. “I only wish
to remain here, if you will allow me to remain.”

“I readily believe you,” said Monk, with an imperceptible smile,
“but I cannot, nevertheless, keep you in my tent.”

“I have no such wish, my lord, and desire only that your lordship should
point out where you will have me posted. Do not trouble yourself about
us—with us a night soon passes away.”

“You shall be conducted to your bark.”

“As your lordship pleases. Only, if your lordship would allow me to be
taken back by a carpenter, I should be extremely grateful.”

“Why so?”

“Because the gentlemen of your army, in dragging my boat up the river
with a cable pulled by their horses, have battered it a little upon the rocks
of the shore, so that I have at least two feet of water in my hold, my
lord.”

“The greater reason why you should watch your boat, I think.”

“My lord, I am quite at your orders,” said the fisherman; “I
shall empty my baskets where you wish; then you will pay me, if you please to
do so; and you will send me away, if it appears right to you. You see I am very
easily managed and pleased, my lord.”

“Come, come, you are a very good sort of fellow,” said Monk, whose
scrutinizing glance had not been able to find a single shade in the clear eye
of the fisherman. “Holloa, Digby!” An aid-de-camp appeared.
“You will conduct this good fellow and his companions to the little tents
of the canteens, in front of the marshes, so that they will be near their bark,
and yet will not sleep on board to-night. What is the matter, Spithead?”

Spithead was the sergeant from whom Monk had borrowed a piece of tobacco for
his supper. Spithead having entered the general’s tent without being sent
for, had drawn this question from Monk.

“My lord,” said he, “a French gentleman has just presented
himself at the outposts and wishes to speak to your honor.”

All this was said, be it understood, in English; but, notwithstanding, it
produced a slight emotion in the fisherman, which Monk, occupied with his
sergeant, did not remark.

“Who is the gentleman?” asked Monk.

“My lord,” replied Spithead, “he told it me; but those devils
of French names are so difficult to pronounce for a Scottish throat, that I
could not retain it. I believe, however, from what the guards say, that it is
the same gentleman who presented himself yesterday at the halt, and whom your
honor would not receive.”

“That is true; I was holding a council of officers.”

“Will your honor give any orders respecting this gentleman?”

“Yes, let him be brought here.”

“Must we take any precautions?”

“Such as what?”

“Blinding his eyes, for instance?”

“To what purpose? He can only see what I desire should be seen; that is
to say, that I have around me eleven thousand brave men, who ask no better than
to have their throats cut in honor of the parliament of Scotland and
England.”

“And this man, my lord?” said Spithead, pointing to the fisherman,
who, during this conversation, had remained standing and motionless, like a man
who sees but does not understand.

“Ah, that is true,” said Monk. Then turning towards the
fisherman,—“I shall see you again, my brave fellow,” said he;
“I have selected a lodging for you. Digby, take him to it. Fear nothing;
your money shall be sent to you presently.”

“Thank you, my lord,” said the fisherman, and after having bowed,
he left the tent, accompanied by Digby. Before he had gone a hundred paces he
found his companions, who were whispering with a volubility which did not
appear exempt from uneasiness, but he made them a sign which seemed to reassure
them. “Hola, you fellows!” said the patron, “come this way.
His lordship, General Monk, has the generosity to pay us for our fish, and the
goodness to give us hospitality for to-night.”

The fishermen gathered round their leader, and, conducted by Digby, the little
troop proceeded towards the canteens, the post, as may be remembered, which had
been assigned them. As they went along in the dark, the fishermen passed close
to the guards who were conducting the French gentleman to General Monk. This
gentleman was on horseback and enveloped in a large cloak, which prevented the
patron from seeing him, however great his curiosity might be. As to the
gentleman, ignorant that he was elbowing compatriots, he did not pay any
attention to the little troop.

The aid-de-camp settled his guests in a tolerably comfortable tent, from which
was dislodged an Irish canteen woman, who went, with her six children, to sleep
where she could. A large fire was burning in front of this tent, and threw its
purple light over the grassy pools of the marsh, rippled by a fresh breeze. The
arrangements made, the aid-de-camp wished the fishermen good-night, calling to
their notice that they might see from the door of the tent the masts of their
bark, which was tossing gently on the Tweed, a proof that it had not yet sunk.
The sight of this appeared to delight the leader of the fishermen infinitely.

Chapter XXIV. The Treasure.

The French gentleman whom Spithead had announced to
Monk, and who, closely wrapped in his cloak, had passed by the fishermen who
left the general’s tent five minutes before he entered it,—the
French gentleman went through the various posts without even casting his eyes
around him, for fear of appearing indiscreet. As the order had been given, he
was conducted to the tent of the general. The gentleman was left alone in the
sort of ante-chamber in front of the principal body of the tent, where he
awaited Monk, who only delayed till he had heard the report of his people, and
observed through the opening of the canvas the countenance of the person who
solicited an audience.

Without doubt, the report of those who had accompanied the French gentleman
established the discretion with which he had behaved, for the first impression
the stranger received of the welcome made him by the general was more favorable
than he could have expected at such a moment, and on the part of so suspicious
a man. Nevertheless, according to his custom, when Monk found himself in the
presence of a stranger, he fixed upon him his penetrating eyes, which scrutiny,
the stranger, on his part, sustained without embarrassment or notice. At the
end of a few seconds, the general made a gesture with his hand and head in sign
of attention.

“My lord,” said the gentleman, in excellent English, “I have
requested an interview with your honor, for an affair of importance.”

“Monsieur,” replied Monk, in French, “you speak our language
well for a son of the continent. I ask your pardon—for doubtless the
question is indiscreet—do you speak French with the same purity?”

“There is nothing surprising, my lord, in my speaking English tolerably;
I resided for some time in England in my youth, and since then I have made two
voyages to this country.” These words were spoken in French, and with a
purity of accent that bespoke not only a Frenchman, but a Frenchman from the
vicinity of Tours.

“And what part of England have you resided in, monsieur?”

“In my youth, London, my lord; then, about 1635, I made a pleasure trip
to Scotland; and lastly, in 1648, I lived for some time at Newcastle,
particularly in the convent, the gardens of which are now occupied by your
army.”

“Excuse me, monsieur; but you must comprehend that these questions are
necessary on my part—do you not?”

“It would astonish me, my lord, if they were not asked.”

“Now, then, monsieur, what can I do to serve you? What do you
wish?”

“This, my lord;—but, in the first place, are we alone?”

“Perfectly so, monsieur, except, of course, the post which guards
us.” So saying, Monk pulled open the canvas with his hand, and pointed to
the soldier placed at ten paces from the tent, and who, at the first call,
could have rendered assistance in a second.

“In that case, my lord,” said the gentleman, in as calm a tone as
if he had been for a length of time in habits of intimacy with his
interlocutor, “I have made up my mind to address myself to you, because I
believe you to be an honest man. Indeed, the communication I am about to make
to you will prove to you the esteem in which I hold you.”

Monk, astonished at this language, which established between him and the French
gentleman equality at least, raised his piercing eye to the stranger’s
face, and with a sensible irony conveyed by the inflection of his voice alone,
for not a muscle of his face moved,—“I thank you, monsieur,”
said he; “but, in the first place, to whom have I the honor of
speaking?”

“I sent you my name by your sergeant, my lord.”

“Excuse him, monsieur, he is a Scotsman,—he could not retain
it.”

“I am called the Comte de la Fere, monsieur,” said Athos, bowing.

“The Comte de la Fere?” said Monk, endeavoring to recollect the
name. “Pardon me, monsieur, but this appears to be the first time I have
ever heard that name. Do you fill any post at the court of France?”

“None; I am a simple gentleman.”

“What dignity?”

“King Charles I. made me a knight of the Garter, and Queen Anne of
Austria has given me the cordon of the Holy Ghost. These are my only
dignities.”

“The Garter! the Holy Ghost! Are you a knight of those two orders,
monsieur?”

“Yes.”

“And on what occasions have such favors been bestowed upon you?”

“For services rendered to their majesties.”

Monk looked with astonishment at this man, who appeared to him so simple and so
great at the same time. Then, as if he had renounced endeavoring to penetrate
this mystery of a simplicity and grandeur upon which the stranger did not seem
disposed to give him any other information than that which he had already
received,—“Did you present yourself yesterday at our advanced
posts?”

“And was sent back? Yes, my lord.”

“Many officers, monsieur, would permit no one to enter their camp,
particularly on the eve of a probable battle. But I differ from my colleagues,
and like to leave nothing behind me. Every advice is good to me; all danger is
sent to me by God, and I weigh it in my hand with the energy He has given me.
So, yesterday, you were only sent back on account of the council I was holding.
To-day I am at liberty,—speak.”

“My lord, you have done much better in receiving me, for what I have to
say has nothing to do with the battle you are about to fight with General
Lambert, or with your camp; and the proof is, that I turned away my head that I
might not see your men, and closed my eyes that I might not count your tents.
No, I came to speak to you, my lord, on my own account.”

“Speak then, monsieur,” said Monk.

“Just now,” continued Athos, “I had the honor of telling your
lordship that for a long time I lived in Newcastle; it was in the time of
Charles I., and when the king was given up to Cromwell by the Scots.”

“I know,” said Monk, coldly.

“I had at that time a large sum in gold, and on the eve of the battle,
from a presentiment perhaps of the turn which things would take on the morrow,
I concealed it in the principal vault of the covenant of Newcastle, in the
tower whose summit you now see silvered by the moonbeams. My treasure has then
remained interred there, and I have come to entreat your honor to permit me to
withdraw it before, perhaps, the battle turning that way, a mine or some other
war engine has destroyed the building and scattered my gold, or rendered it so
apparent that the soldiers will take possession of it.”

Monk was well acquainted with mankind; he saw in the physiognomy of this
gentleman all the energy, all the reason, all the circumspection possible; he
could therefore only attribute to a magnanimous confidence the revelation the
Frenchman had made him, and he showed himself profoundly touched by it.

“Monsieur,” said he, “you have augured well of me. But is the
sum worth the trouble to which you expose yourself? Do you even believe that it
can be in the same place where you left it?”

“It is there monsieur, I do not doubt.”

“That is a reply to one question; but to the other. I asked you if the
sum was so large as to warrant your exposing yourself thus.”

“It is really large; yes, my lord, for it is a million I inclosed in two
barrels.”

“A million!” cried Monk, at whom this time, in turn, Athos looked
earnestly and long. Monk perceived this, and his mistrust returned.

“Here is a man,” said he to himself, “who is laying a snare
for me. So you wish to withdraw this money, monsieur,” replied he,
“as I understand?”

“If you please, my lord.”

“To-day?”

“This very evening, and that on account of the circumstances I have
named.”

“But, monsieur,” objected Monk, “General Lambert is as near
the abbey where you have to act as I am. Why, then, have you not addressed
yourself to him?”

“Because, my lord, when one acts in important matters, it is best to
consult one’s instinct before everything. Well, General Lambert does not
inspire with me so much confidence as you do.”

“Be it so, monsieur. I shall assist you in recovering your money, if,
however, it can still be there; for that is far from likely. Since 1648 twelve
years have rolled away, and many events have taken place.” Monk dwelt
upon this point to see if the French gentleman would seize the evasions that
were open to him, but Athos did not hesitate.

“I assure you, my lord,” he said firmly, “that my conviction
is, that the two barrels have neither changed place nor master.” This
reply had removed one suspicion from the mind of Monk, but it had suggested
another. Without doubt this Frenchman was some emissary sent to entice into
error the protector of the parliament; the gold was nothing but a lure; and by
the help of this lure they thought to excite the cupidity of the general. This
gold might not exist. It was Monk’s business, then, to seize the
Frenchman in the act of falsehood and trick, and to draw from the false step
itself in which his enemies wished to entrap him, a triumph for his renown.
When Monk was determined how to act,—

“Monsieur,” said he to Athos, “without doubt you will do me
the honor to share my supper this evening?”

“Yes, my lord,” replied Athos, bowing; “for you do me an
honor of which I feel myself worthy, by the inclination which drew me towards
you.”

“It is so much the more gracious on your part to accept my invitation
with such frankness, as my cooks are but few and inexperienced, and my
providers have returned this evening empty-handed; so that if it had not been
for a fisherman of your nation who strayed into our camp, General Monk would
have gone to bed without his supper to-day; I have, then, some fresh fish to
offer you, as the vendor assures me.”

“My lord, it is principally for the sake of having the honor to pass an
hour with you.”

After this exchange of civilities, during which Monk had lost nothing of his
circumspection, the supper, or what was to serve for one, had been laid upon a
deal table. Monk invited the Comte de la Fere to be seated at this table, and
took his place opposite to him. A single dish of boiled fish, set before the
two illustrious guests, was more tempting to hungry stomachs than to delicate
palates.

Whilst supping, that is, while eating the fish, washed down with bad ale, Monk
got Athos to relate to him the last events of the Fronde, the reconciliation of
M. de Conde with the king, and the probable marriage of the infanta of Spain;
but he avoided, as Athos himself avoided it, all allusion to the political
interests which united, or rather which disunited at this time, England, France
and Holland.

Monk, in this conversation, convinced himself of one thing, which he must have
remarked after the first words exchanged: that was, that he had to deal with a
man of high distinction. He could not be an assassin, and it was repugnant to
Monk to believe him to be a spy; but there was sufficient finesse and at the
same time firmness in Athos to lead Monk to fancy he was a conspirator. When
they had quitted the table, “You still believe in your treasure, then,
monsieur?” asked Monk.

“Yes, my lord.”

“Quite seriously?”

“Seriously.”

“And you think you can find the place again where it was buried?”

“At the first inspection.”

“Well, monsieur, from curiosity I shall accompany you. And it is so much
the more necessary that I should accompany you, that you would find great
difficulties in passing through the camp without me or one of my
lieutenants.”

“General, I would not suffer you to inconvenience yourself if I did not,
in fact, stand in need of your company; but as I recognize that this company is
not only honorable, but necessary, I accept it.”

“Do you desire we should take any people with us?” asked Monk.

“General, I believe that would be useless, if you yourself do not see the
necessity for it. Two men and a horse will suffice to transport the two casks
on board the felucca which brought me hither.”

“But it will be necessary to pick, dig, and remove the earth, and split
stones; you don’t intend doing this work yourself, monsieur, do
you?”

“General, there is no picking or digging required. The treasure is buried
in the sepulchral vault of the convent, under a stone in which is fixed a large
iron ring, and under which there are four steps leading down. The two casks are
there, placed end to end, covered with a coat of plaster in the form of a bier.
There is, besides, an inscription, which will enable me to recognize the stone;
and as I am not willing, in an affair of delicacy and confidence, to keep the
secret from your honor, here is the inscription:—‘Hic jacet
venerabilis, Petrus Gulielmus Scott, Canon Honorab. Conventus Novi Castelli.
Obiit quarta et decima Feb. ann. Dom. MCCVIII. Requiescat in
pace.’”

Monk did not lose a single word. He was astonished either at the marvelous
duplicity of this man and the superior style in which he played his part, or at
the good loyal faith with which he presented his request, in a situation in
which concerning a million of money, risked against the blow from a dagger,
amidst an army that would have looked upon the theft as a restitution.

“Very well,” said he; “I shall accompany you; and the
adventure appears to me so wonderful, that I shall carry the torch
myself.” And saying these words, he girded on a short sword, placed a
pistol in his belt, disclosing in this movement, which opened his doublet a
little, the fine rings of a coat of mail, destined to protect him from the
first dagger-thrust of an assassin. After which he took a Scottish dirk in his
left hand, and then turning to Athos, “Are you ready, monsieur?”
said he.

“I am.”

Athos, as if in opposition to what Monk had done, unfastened his poniard, which
he placed upon the table; unhooked his sword-belt, which he laid close to his
poniard; and, without affectation, opening his doublet as if to look for his
handkerchief, showed beneath his fine cambric shirt his naked breast, without
weapons either offensive or defensive.

“This is truly a singular man,” said Monk; “he is without any
arms; he has an ambuscade placed somewhere yonder.”

“General,” said he, as if he had divined Monk’s thought,
“you wish we should be alone; that is very right, but a great captain
ought never to expose himself with temerity. It is night, the passage of the
marsh may present dangers; be accompanied.”

“You are right,” replied he, calling Digby. The aid-de-camp
appeared. “Fifty men with swords and muskets,” said he, looking at
Athos.

“That is too few if there is danger, too many if there is not.”

“I will go alone,” said Monk; “I want nobody. Come,
monsieur.”

Chapter XXV. The Marsh.

Athos and Monk passed over, in going from the camp
towards the Tweed, that part of the ground which Digby had traversed with the
fishermen coming from the Tweed to the camp. The aspect of this place, the
aspect of the changes man had wrought in it, was of a nature to produce a great
effect upon a lively and delicate imagination like that of Athos. Athos looked
at nothing but these desolate spots; Monk looked at nothing but Athos—at
Athos, who, with his eyes sometimes directed towards heaven, and sometimes
towards the earth, sought, thought, and sighed.

Digby, whom the last orders of the general, and particularly the accent with
which he had given them, had at first a little excited, Digby followed the pair
at about twenty paces, but the general having turned round as if astonished to
find his orders had not been obeyed, the aid-de-camp perceived his
indiscretion, and returned to his tent.

He supposed that the general wished to make, incognito, one of those reviews of
vigilance which every experienced captain never fails to make on the eve of a
decisive engagement: he explained to himself the presence of Athos in this case
as an inferior explains all that is mysterious on the part of his leader. Athos
might be, and, indeed, in the eyes of Digby, must be, a spy, whose information
was to enlighten the general.

At the end of a walk of about ten minutes among the tents and posts, which were
closer together near the headquarters, Monk entered upon a little causeway
which diverged into three branches. That on the left led to the river, that in
the middle to Newcastle Abbey on the marsh, that on the right crossed the first
lines of Monk’s camp; that is to say, the lines nearest to
Lambert’s army. Beyond the river was an advanced post, belonging to
Monk’s army, which watched the enemy; it was composed of one hundred and
fifty Scots. They had swum across the Tweed, and, in case of attack, were to
recross it in the same manner, giving the alarm; but as there was no post at
that spot, and as Lambert’s soldiers were not so prompt at taking to the
water as Monk’s were, the latter appeared not to have as much uneasiness
on that side. On this side of the river, at about five hundred paces from the
old abbey, the fishermen had taken up their abode amidst a crowd of small tents
raised by soldiers of the neighboring clans, who had with them their wives and
children. All this confusion, seen by the moon’s light, presented a
striking coup d’oeil; the half shadow enlarged every detail, and the
light, that flatterer which only attaches itself to the polished side of
things, courted upon each rusty musket the point still left intact, and upon
every rag of canvas the whitest and least sullied part.

Monk arrived then with Athos, crossing this spot, illumined with a double
light, the silver splendor of the moon, and the red blaze of the fires at the
meeting of these three causeways; there he stopped, and addressing his
companion,—“Monsieur,” said he, “do you know your
road?”

“General, if I am not mistaken, the middle causeway leads straight to the
abbey.”

“That is right; but we shall want lights to guide us in the
vaults.” Monk turned round.

“Ah! I thought Digby was following us!” said he. “So much the
better; he will procure us what we want.”

“Yes, general, there is a man yonder who has been walking behind us for
some time.”

“Digby!” cried Monk. “Digby! come here, if you please.”

But instead of obeying, the shadow made a motion of surprise, and, retreating
instead of advancing, it bent down and disappeared along the jetty on the left,
directing its course towards the lodging of the fishermen.

“It appears not to be Digby,” said Monk.

Both had followed the shadow which had vanished. But it was not so rare a thing
for a man to be wandering about at eleven o’clock at night, in a camp in
which are reposing ten or eleven thousand men, as to give Monk and Athos any
alarm at his disappearance.

“As it is so,” said Monk, “and we must have a light, a
lantern, a torch, or something by which we may see where to see our feet; let
us seek this light.”

“General, the first soldier we meet will light us.”

“No,” said Monk, in order to discover if there were not any
connivance between the Comte de la Fere and the fisherman. “No, I should
prefer one of these French sailors who came this evening to sell me their fish.
They leave to-morrow, and the secret will be better kept by them; whereas, if a
report should be spread in the Scottish army, that treasures are to be found in
the abbey of Newcastle, my Highlanders will believe there is a million
concealed beneath every slab, and they will not leave stone upon stone in the
building.”

“Do as you think best, general,” replied Athos, in a natural tone
of voice, making evident that soldier or fisherman was the same to him, and
that he had no preference.

Monk approached the causeway behind which had disappeared the person he had
taken for Digby, and met a patrol who, making the tour of the tents, was going
towards headquarters; he was stopped with his companion, gave the password, and
went on. A soldier, roused by the noise, unrolled his plaid, and looked up to
see what was going forward. “Ask him,” said Monk to Athos,
“where the fishermen are; if I were to speak to him, he would know
me.”

Athos went up to the soldier, who pointed out the tent to him; immediately Monk
and Athos turned towards it. It appeared to the general that at the moment they
came up, a shadow like that they had already seen, glided into this tent; but
on drawing nearer he perceived he must have been mistaken, for all of them were
asleep pele mele, and nothing was seen but arms and legs joined, crossed, and
mixed. Athos, fearing lest he should be suspected of connivance with some of
his compatriots, remained outside the tent.

“Hola!” said Monk, in French, “wake up here.” Two or
three of the sleepers got up.

“I want a man to light me,” continued Monk.

“Your honor may depend on us,” said a voice which made Athos start.
“Where do you wish us to go?”

“You shall see. A light! come, quickly!”

“Yes, your honor. Does it please your honor that I should accompany
you?”

“You or another; it is of very little consequence, provided I have a
light.”

“It is strange!” thought Athos; “what a singular voice that
man has!”

“Some fire, you fellows!” cried the fisherman; “come, make
haste!”

Then addressing his companion nearest to him in a low voice:—“Get
ready a light, Menneville,” said he, “and hold yourself ready for
anything.”

One of the fishermen struck light from a stone, set fire to some tinder, and by
the aid of a match lit a lantern. The light immediately spread all over the
tent.

“Are you ready, monsieur?” said Monk to Athos, who had turned away,
not to expose his face to the light.

“Yes, general,” replied he.

“Ah! the French gentleman!” said the leader of the fishermen to
himself. “Peste! I have a great mind to charge you with the commission,
Menneville; he may know me. Light! light!” This dialogue was pronounced
at the back of the tent, and in so low a voice that Monk could not hear a
syllable of it; he was, besides, talking with Athos. Menneville got himself
ready in the meantime, or rather received the orders of his leader.

“Well?” said Monk.

“I am ready, general,” said the fisherman.

Monk, Athos, and the fisherman left the tent.

“It is impossible!” thought Athos. “What dream could put that
into my head?”

“Go forward; follow the middle causeway, and stretch out your
legs,” said Monk to the fisherman.

They were not twenty paces on their way when the same shadow that had appeared
to enter the tent came out of it again, crawled along as far as the piles, and,
protected by that sort of parapet placed along the causeway, carefully observed
the march of the general. All three disappeared in the night haze. They were
walking towards Newcastle, the white stones of which appeared to them like
sepulchers. After standing for a few seconds under the porch, they penetrated
into the interior. The door had been broken open by hatchets. A post of four
men slept in safety in a corner, so certain were they that the attack would not
take place on that side.

“Will not these men be in your way?” said Monk to Athos.

“On the contrary, monsieur, they will assist in rolling out the barrels,
if your honor will permit them.”

“You are right.”

The post, though fast asleep, roused up at the first steps of the three
visitors amongst the briars and grass that invaded the porch. Monk gave the
password, and penetrated into the interior of the convent, preceded by the
light. He walked last, watching the least movement of Athos, his naked dirk in
his sleeve, and ready to plunge it into the back of the gentleman at the first
suspicious gesture he should see him make. But Athos, with a firm and sure
step, crossed the chambers and courts.

Not a door, not a window was left in the building. The doors had been burnt,
some on the spot, and the charcoal of them was still jagged with the action of
the fire, which had gone out of itself, powerless, no doubt, to get to the
heart of those massive joints of oak fastened together with iron nails. As to
the windows, all the panes having been broken, night birds, alarmed by the
torch, flew away through their holes. At the same time, gigantic bats began to
trace their vast, silent circles around the intruders, whilst the light of the
torch made their shadows tremble on the high stone walls. Monk concluded that
there could be no man in the convent, since wild beasts and birds were there
still, and fled away at his approach.

After having passed the rubbish, and torn away more than one branch of ivy that
had made itself a guardian of the solitude, Athos arrived at the vaults
situated beneath the great hall, but the entrance of which was from the chapel.
There he stopped. “Here we are, general,” said he.

“This, then, is the slab?”

“Yes.”

“Ay, and here is the ring—but the ring is sealed into the
stone.”

“We must have a lever.”

“That’s a very easy thing to find.”

Whilst looking around them, Athos and Monk perceived a little ash of about
three inches in diameter, which had shot up in an angle of the wall, reaching a
window, concealed by its branches.

“Have you a knife?” said Monk to the fisherman.

“Yes, monsieur.”

“Cut down this tree, then.”

The fisherman obeyed, but not without notching his cutlass. When the ash was
cut and fashioned into the shape of a lever, the three men penetrated into the
vault.

“Stop where you are,” said Monk to the fisherman. “We are
going to dig up some powder; your light may be dangerous.”

The man drew back in a sort of terror, and faithfully kept to the post assigned
him, whilst Monk and Athos turned behind a column at the foot of which,
penetrating through a crack, was a moonbeam, reflected exactly on the stone
which the Comte de la Fere had come so far in search.

“This is it,” said Athos, pointing out to the general the Latin
inscription.

“Yes,” said Monk.

Then, as if still willing to leave the Frenchman one means of evasion,—

“Do you not observe that this vault has already been broken into,”
continued he, “and that several statues have already been knocked
down?”

“My lord, you have, without doubt, heard that the religious respect of
your Scots loves to confide to the statues of the dead the valuable objects
they have possessed during their lives. Therefore, the soldiers had reason to
think that under the pedestals of the statues which ornament most of these
tombs, a treasure was hidden. They have consequently broken down pedestal and
statue: but the tomb of the venerable cannon, with which we have to do, is not
distinguished by any monument. It is simple, therefore it has been protected by
the superstitious fear which your Puritans have always had of sacrilege. Not a
morsel of the masonry of this tomb has been chipped off.”

“That is true,” said Monk.

Athos seized the lever.

“Shall I help you?” said Monk.

“Thank you, my lord; but I am not willing that your honor should lend
your hand to a work of which, perhaps, you would not take the responsibility if
you knew the probable consequences of it.”

Monk raised his head.

“What do you mean by that, monsieur?”

“I mean—but that man—”

“Stop,” said Monk; “I perceive what you are afraid of. I
shall make a trial.” Monk turned towards the fisherman, the whole of
whose profile was thrown upon the wall.

“Come here, friend!” said he in English, and in a tone of command.

The fisherman did not stir.

“That is well,” continued he: “he does not know English.
Speak to me, then, in English, if you please, monsieur.”

“My lord,” replied Athos, “I have frequently seen men in
certain circumstances have sufficient command over themselves not to reply to a
question put to them in a language they understood. The fisherman is perhaps
more learned than we believe him to be. Send him away, my lord, I beg
you.”

“Decidedly,” said Monk, “he wishes to have me alone in this
vault. Never mind, we shall go through with it; one man is as good as another
man; and we are alone. My friend,” said Monk to the fisherman, “go
back up the stairs we have just descended, and watch that nobody comes to
disturb us.” The fisherman made a sign of obedience. “Leave your
torch,” said Monk; “it would betray your presence, and might
procure you a musket-ball.”

The fisherman appeared to appreciate the counsel; he laid down the light, and
disappeared under the vault of the stairs. Monk took up the torch, and brought
it to the foot of the column.

“Ah, ah!” said he; “money, then, is concealed under this
tomb?”

“Yes, my lord; and in five minutes you will no longer doubt it.”

At the same time Athos struck a violent blow upon the plaster, which split,
presenting a chink for the point of the lever. Athos introduced the bar into
this crack, and soon large pieces of plaster yielded, rising up like rounded
slabs. Then the Comte de la Fere seized the stones and threw them away with a
force that hands so delicate as his might not have been supposed capable of
having.

“My lord,” said Athos, “this is plainly the masonry of which
I told your honor.”

“Yes; but I do not yet see the casks,” said Monk.

“If I had a dagger,” said Athos, looking round him, “you
should soon see them, monsieur. Unfortunately, I left mine in your tent.”

“I would willingly offer you mine,” said Monk, “but the blade
is too thin for such work.”

Athos appeared to look around him for a thing of some kind that might serve as
a substitute for the weapon he desired. Monk did not lose one of the movements
of his hands, or one of the expressions of his eyes. “Why do you not ask
the fisherman for his cutlass?” said Monk; “he has a
cutlass.”

“Ah! that is true,” said Athos; “for he cut the tree down
with it.” And he advanced towards the stairs.

“Friend,” said he to the fisherman, “throw me down your
cutlass, if you please; I want it.”

The noise of the falling weapon sounded on the steps.

“Take it,” said Monk; “it is a solid instrument, as I have
seen, and a strong hand might make good use of it.”

Athos appeared only to give to the words of Monk the natural and simple sense
under which they were to be heard and understood. Nor did he remark, or at
least appear to remark, that when he returned with the weapon, Monk drew back,
placing his left hand on the stock of his pistol; in the right he already held
his dirk. He went to work then, turning his back to Monk, placing his life in
his hands, without possible defense. He then struck, during several seconds, so
skillfully and sharply upon the intermediary plaster, that it separated into
two parts, and Monk was able to discern two barrels placed end to end, and
which their weight maintained motionless in their chalky envelope.

“My lord,” said Athos, “you see that my presentiments have
not been disappointed.”

“Yes, monsieur,” said Monk, “and I have good reason to
believe you are satisfied; are you not?”

“Doubtless I am; the loss of this money would have been inexpressibly
great to me: but I was certain that God, who protects the good cause, would not
have permitted this gold, which should procure its triumph, to be diverted to
baser purposes.

“You are, upon my honor, as mysterious in your words as in your actions,
monsieur,” said Monk. “Just now as I did not perfectly understand
you when you said that you were not willing to throw upon me the responsibility
of the work we were accomplishing.”

“I had reason to say so, my lord.”

“And now you speak to me of the good cause. What do you mean by the words
‘the good cause?’ We are defending at this moment, in England, five
or six causes, which does not prevent every one from considering his own not
only as the good cause, but as the best. What is yours, monsieur? Speak boldly,
that we may see if, upon this point, to which you appear to attach a great
importance, we are of the same opinion.”

Athos fixed upon Monk one of those penetrating looks which seemed to convey to
him to whom they are directed a challenge to conceal a single one of his
thoughts; then, taking off his hat, he began in a solemn voice, while his
interlocutor, with one hand upon his visage, allowed that long and nervous hand
to compress his mustache and beard, while his vague and melancholy eye wandered
about the recesses of the vaults.

Chapter XXVI. Heart and Mind.

My lord,” said the Comte de la Fere, “you
are an noble Englishman, you are a loyal man; you are speaking to a noble
Frenchman, to a man of heart. The gold contained in these two casks before us,
I have told you was mine. I was wrong—it is the first lie I have
pronounced in my life, a temporary lie, it is true. This gold is the property
of King Charles II., exiled from his country, driven from his palaces, the
orphan at once of his father and his throne, and deprived of everything, even
of the melancholy happiness of kissing on his knees the stone upon which the
hands of his murderers have written that simple epitaph which will eternally
cry out for vengeance upon them:—‘HERE LIES CHARLES
I.’”

Monk grew slightly pale, and an imperceptible shudder crept over his skin and
raised his gray mustache.

“I,” continued Athos, “I, Comte de la Fere, the last, only
faithful friend the poor abandoned prince has left, I have offered him to come
hither to find the man upon whom now depends the fate of royalty and of
England; and I have come, and placed myself under the eye of this man, and have
placed myself naked and unarmed in his hands, saying:—‘My lord,
here are the last resources of a prince whom God made your master, whom his
birth made your king; upon you, and you alone, depend his life and future. Will
you employ this money in consoling England for the evils it must have suffered
from anarchy; that is to say, will you aid, and if not aid, will you allow King
Charles II. to act? You are master, you are king, all-powerful master and king,
for chance sometimes defeats the work of time and God. I am here alone with
you, my lord: if divided success alarms you, if my complicity annoys you, you
are armed, my lord, and here is a grave ready dug; if, on the contrary, the
enthusiasm of your cause carries you away, if you are what you appear to be, if
your hand in what it undertakes obeys your mind, and your mind your heart, here
are the means of ruining forever the cause of your enemy, Charles Stuart. Kill,
then, the man you have before you, for that man will never return to him who
has sent him without bearing with him the deposit which Charles I., his father,
confided to him, and keep the gold which may assist in carrying on the civil
war. Alas! my lord, it is the fate of this unfortunate prince. He must either
corrupt or kill, for everything resists him, everything repulses him,
everything is hostile to him; and yet he is marked with divine seal, and he
must, not to belie his blood, reascend the throne, or die upon the sacred soil
of his country.’

“My lord, you have heard me. To any other but the illustrious man who
listens to me, I would have said: ‘My lord, you are poor; my lord, the
king offers you this million as an earnest of an immense bargain; take it, and
serve Charles II. as I served Charles I., and I feel assured that God, who
listens to us, who sees us, who alone reads in your heart, shut up from all
human eyes,—I am assured God will give you a happy eternal life after
death.’ But to General Monk, to the illustrious man of whose standard I
believe I have taken measure, I say: ‘My lord, there is for you in the
history of peoples and kings a brilliant place, an immortal, imperishable
glory, if alone, without any other interest but the good of your country and
the interests of justice, you become the supporter of your king. Many others
have been conquerors and glorious usurpers; you, my lord, you will be content
with being the most virtuous, the most honest, and the most incorruptible of
men: you will have held a crown in your hand, and instead of placing it upon
your own brow, you will have deposited it upon the head of him for whom it was
made. Oh, my lord, act thus, and you will leave to posterity the most enviable
of names, in which no human creature can rival you.’”

Athos stopped. During the whole time that the noble gentleman was speaking,
Monk had not given one sign of either approbation or disapprobation; scarcely
even, during this vehement appeal, had his eyes been animated with that fire
which bespeaks intelligence. The Comte de la Fere looked at him sorrowfully,
and on seeing that melancholy countenance, felt discouragement penetrate to his
very heart. At length Monk appeared to recover, and broke the silence.

“Monsieur,” said he, in a mild, calm tone, “in reply to you,
I will make use of your own words. To any other but yourself I would reply by
expulsion, imprisonment, or still worse, for, in fact, you tempt me and you
force me at the same time. But you are one of those men, monsieur, to whom it
is impossible to refuse the attention and respect they merit; you are a brave
gentleman, monsieur—I say so, and I am a judge. You just now spoke of a
deposit which the late king transmitted through you to his son—are you,
then, one of those Frenchmen who, as I have heard, endeavored to carry off
Charles I. from Whitehall?”

“Yes, my lord; it was I who was beneath the scaffold during the
execution; I, who had not been able to redeem it, received upon my brow the
blood of the martyred king. I received, at the same time, the last word of
Charles I.; it was to me he said, ‘REMEMBER!’ and in saying,
‘Remember!’ he alluded to the money at your feet, my lord.”

“I have heard much of you, monsieur,” said Monk, “but I am
happy to have, in the first place, appreciated you by my own observations, and
not by my remembrances. I will give you, then, explanations that I have given
to no other, and you will appreciate what a distinction I make between you and
the persons who have hitherto been sent to me.”

Athos bowed and prepared to absorb greedily the words which fell, one by one,
from the mouth of Monk,—those words rare and precious as the dew in the
desert.

“You spoke to me,” said Monk, “of Charles II.; but pray,
monsieur, of what consequence to me is that phantom of a king? I have grown old
in a war and in a policy which are nowadays so closely linked together, that
every man of the sword must fight in virtue of his rights or his ambition with
a personal interest, and not blindly behind an officer, as in ordinary wars.
For myself, I perhaps desire nothing, but I fear much. In the war of to-day
rests the liberty of England, and, perhaps, that of every Englishman. How can
you expect that I, free in the position I have made for myself, should go
willingly and hold out my hands to the shackles of a stranger? That is all
Charles is to me. He has fought battles here which he has lost, he is therefore
a bad captain; he has succeeded in no negotiation, he is therefore a bad
diplomatist; he has paraded his wants and his miseries in all the courts of
Europe, he has therefore a weak and pusillanimous heart. Nothing noble, nothing
great, nothing strong has hitherto emanated from that genius which aspires to
govern one of the greatest kingdoms of the earth. I know this Charles, then,
under none but bad aspects, and you would wish me, a man of good sense, to go
and make myself gratuitously the slave of a creature who is inferior to me in
military capacity, in politics, and in dignity! No, monsieur. When some great
and noble action shall have taught me to value Charles, I shall perhaps
recognize his rights to a throne from which we cast the father because he
wanted the virtues which his son has hitherto lacked, but, in fact of rights, I
only recognize my own; the revolution made me a general, my sword will make me
protector, if I wish it. Let Charles show himself, let him present himself, let
him enter the competition open to genius, and, above all, let him remember that
he is of a race from whom more will be expected than from any other. Therefore,
monsieur, say no more about him. I neither refuse nor accept: I reserve
myself—I wait.”

Athos knew Monk to be too well informed of all concerning Charles to venture to
urge the discussion further; it was neither the time nor the place. “My
lord,” then said he, “I have nothing to do but thank you.”

“And why, monsieur? Because you have formed a correct opinion of me, or
because I have acted according to your judgment? Is that, in truth, worthy of
thanks? This gold which you are about to carry to Charles will serve me as a
test for him, by seeing the use he will make of it. I shall have an opinion
which now I have not.”

“And yet does not your honor fear to compromise yourself by allowing such
a sum to be carried away for the service of your enemy?”

“My enemy, say you? Eh, monsieur, I have no enemies. I am in the service
of the parliament, which orders me to fight General Lambert and Charles
Stuart—its enemies, and not mine. I fight them. If the parliament, on the
contrary, ordered me to unfurl my standards on the port of London, and to
assemble my soldiers on the banks to receive Charles II.—”

“You would obey?” cried Athos, joyfully.

“Pardon me,” said Monk, smiling, “I was going on—I, a
gray-headed man—in truth, how could I forget myself? was going to speak
like a foolish young man.”

“Then you would not obey?” said Athos.

“I do not say that either, monsieur. The welfare of my country before
everything. God, who has given me the power, has, no doubt, willed that I
should have that power for the good of all, and He has given me, at the same
time, discernment. If the parliament were to order such a thing, I should
reflect.”

The brow of Athos became clouded. “Then I may positively say that your
honor is not inclined to favor King Charles II.?”

“You continue to question me, monsieur le comte; allow me to do so in
turn, if you please.”

“Do, monsieur; and may God inspire you with the idea of replying to me as
frankly as I shall reply to you.”

“When you shall have taken this money back to your prince, what advice
will you give him?”

Athos fixed upon Monk a proud and resolute look.

“My lord,” said he, “with this million, which others would
perhaps employ in negotiating, I would advise the king to rise two regiments,
to enter Scotland, which you have just pacified: to give to the people the
franchises which the revolution promised them, and in which it has not, in all
cases, kept its word. I should advise him to command in person this little
army, which would, believe me, increase, and to die, standard in hand, and
sword in sheath, saying, ‘Englishmen! I am the third king of my race you
have killed; beware of the justice of God!’”

Monk hung down his head, and mused for an instant. “If he
succeeded,” said he, “which is very improbable, but not
impossible—for everything is possible in this world—what would you
advise him to do?”

“To think that by the will of God he lost his crown, by the good will of
men he recovered it.”

An ironical smile passed over the lips of Monk.

“Unfortunately, monsieur,” said he, “kings do not know how to
follow good advice.”

“Ah, my lord, Charles II. is not a king,” replied Athos, smiling in
his turn, but with a very different expression from Monk.

“Let us terminate this, monsieur le comte,—that is your desire, is
it not?”

Athos bowed.

“I shall give orders to have these two casks transported whither you
please. Where are you lodging, monsieur?”

“In a little hamlet at the mouth of the river, your honor.”

“Oh, I know the hamlet; it consists of five or six houses, does it
not?”

“Exactly. Well, I inhabit the first,—two net-makers occupy it with
me; it is their bark which brought me ashore.”

“But your own vessel, monsieur?”

“My vessel is at anchor, a quarter of a mile at sea, and waits for
me.”

“You do not think, however, of setting out immediately?”

“My lord, I shall try once more to convince your honor.”

“You will not succeed,” replied Monk; “but it is of
consequence that you should depart from Newcastle without leaving of your
passage the least suspicion that might prove injurious to me or you. To-morrow
my officers think Lambert will attack me. I, on the contrary, am convinced he
will not stir; it is in my opinion impossible. Lambert leads an army devoid of
homogeneous principles, and there is no possible army with such elements. I
have taught my soldiers to consider my authority subordinate to another,
therefore, after me, round me, and beneath me, they still look for something.
It would result that if I were dead, whatever might happen, my army would not
be demoralized all at once; it results, that if I choose to absent myself, for
instance, as it does please me to do sometimes, there would not be in the camp
the shadow of uneasiness or disorder. I am the magnet—the sympathetic and
natural strength of the English. All those scattered irons that will be sent
against me I shall attract to myself. Lambert, at this moment, commands
eighteen thousand deserters; but I have never mentioned that to my officers,
you may easily suppose. Nothing is more useful to an army than the expectation
of a coming battle; everybody is awake—everybody is on guard. I tell you
this that you may live in perfect security. Do not be in a hurry, then, to
cross the seas; within a week there will be something fresh, either a battle or
an accommodation. Then, as you have judged me to be an honorable man, and
confided your secret to me, I have to thank you for this confidence, and I
shall come and pay you a visit or send for you. Do not go before I send word. I
repeat the request.”

“I promise you, general,” cried Athos, with a joy so great, that in
spite of all his circumspection, he could not prevent its sparkling in his
eyes.

Monk surprised this flash, and immediately extinguished it by one of those
silent smiles which always caused his interlocutors to know they had made no
inroad on his mind.

“Then, my lord, it is a week that you desire me to wait?”

“A week? yes, monsieur.”

“And during those days what shall I do?”

“If there should be a battle, keep at a distance from it, I beseech you.
I know the French delight in such amusements;—you might take a fancy to
see how we fight, and you might receive some chance shot. Our Scotsmen are very
bad marksmen, and I do not wish that a worthy gentleman like you should return
to France wounded. Nor should I like to be obliged, myself, to send to your
prince his million left here by you; for then it would be said, and with some
reason, that I paid the Pretender to enable him to make war against the
parliament. Go, then, monsieur, and let it be done as has been agreed
upon.”

“Ah, my lord,” said Athos, “what joy it would give me to be
the first that penetrated to the noble heart which beats beneath that
cloak!”

“You think, then, that I have secrets,” said Monk, without changing
the half cheerful expression of his countenance. “Why, monsieur, what
secret can you expect to find in the hollow head of a soldier? But it is
getting late, and our torch is almost out; let us call our man.”

“Hola!” cried Monk in French, approaching the stairs; “hola!
fisherman!”

The fisherman, benumbed by the cold night air, replied in a hoarse voice,
asking what they wanted of him.

“Go to the post,” said Monk, “and order a sergeant, in the
name of General Monk, to come here immediately.”

This was a commission easily performed; for the sergeant, uneasy at the
general’s being in that desolate abbey, had drawn nearer by degrees, and
was not much further off than the fisherman. The general’s order was
therefore heard by him, and he hastened to obey it.

“Get a horse and two men,” said Monk.

“A horse and two men?” repeated the sergeant.

“Yes,” replied Monk. “Have you got any means of getting a
horse with a pack-saddle or two panniers?”

“No doubt, at a hundred paces off, in the Scottish camp.”

“Very well.”

“What shall I do with the horse, general.”

“Look here.”

The sergeant descended the three steps which separated him from Monk, and came
into the vault.

“You see,” said Monk, “that gentleman yonder?”

“Yes, general.”

“And you see these two casks?”

“Perfectly.”

“They are two casks, one containing powder, and the other balls; I wish
these casks to be transported to the little hamlet at the mouth of the river,
and which I intend to occupy to-morrow with two hundred muskets. You understand
that the commission is a secret one, for it is a movement that may decide the
fate of the battle.”

“Oh, general!” murmured the sergeant.

“Mind, then! Let these casks be fastened on to the horse, and let them be
escorted by two men and you to the residence of this gentleman, who is my
friend. But take care that nobody knows it.”

“I would go by the marsh if I knew the road,” said the sergeant.

“I know one myself,” said Athos; “it is not wide, but it is
solid, having been made upon piles; and with care we shall get over safely
enough.”

“Do everything this gentleman shall order you to do.”

“Oh! oh! the casks are heavy,” said the sergeant, trying to lift
one.

“They weigh four hundred pounds each, if they contain what they ought to
contain, do they not, monsieur.”

“Thereabouts,” said Athos.

The sergeant went in search of the two men and the horse. Monk, left alone with
Athos, affected to speak to him on nothing but indifferent subjects while
examining the vault in a cursory manner. Then, hearing the horse’s
steps,—

“I leave you with your men, monsieur,” said he, “and return
to the camp. You are perfectly safe.”

“I shall see you again, then, my lord?” asked Athos.

“That is agreed upon, monsieur, and with much pleasure.”

Monk held out his hand to Athos.

“Ah! my lord, if you would!” murmured Athos.

“Hush! monsieur, it is agreed that we shall speak no more of that.”
And bowing to Athos, he went up the stairs, meeting about half-way his men, who
were coming down. He had not gone twenty paces, when a faint but prolonged
whistle was heard at a distance. Monk listened, but seeing nothing and hearing
nothing, he continued his route. Then he remembered the fisherman, and looked
about for him; but the fisherman had disappeared. If he had, however, looked
with more attention, he might have seen that man, bent double, gliding like a
serpent along the stones and losing himself in the mist that floated over the
surface of the marsh. He might equally have seen, had he attempted to pierce
that mist, a spectacle that might have attracted his attention; and that was
the rigging of the vessel, which had changed place, and was now nearer the
shore. But Monk saw nothing; and thinking he had nothing to fear, he entered
the deserted causeway which led to his camp. It was then that the disappearance
of the fisherman appeared strange, and that a real suspicion began to take
possession of his mind. He had just placed at the orders of Athos the only post
that could protect him. He had a mile of causeway to traverse before he could
regain his camp. The fog increased with such intensity that he could scarcely
distinguish objects at ten paces’ distance. Monk then thought he heard
the sound of an oar over the marsh on the right. “Who goes there?”
said he.

But nobody answered; then he cocked his pistol, took his sword in his hand, and
quickened his pace, without, however, being willing to call anybody. Such a
summons, for which there was no absolute necessity, appeared unworthy of him.

Chapter XXVII. The Next Day.

It was seven o’clock in the morning, the first
rays of day lightened the pools of the marsh, in which the sun was reflected
like a red ball, when Athos, awakening and opening the window of his
bed-chamber, which looked out upon the banks of the river, perceived, at
fifteen paces’ distance from him, the sergeant and the men who had
accompanied him the evening before, and who, after having deposited the casks
at his house, had returned to the camp by the causeway on the right.

Why had these men come back after having returned to the camp? That was the
question which first presented itself to Athos. The sergeant, with his head
raised, appeared to be watching the moment when the gentleman should appear to
address him. Athos, surprised to see these men, whom he had seen depart the
night before, could not refrain from expressing his astonishment to them.

“There is nothing surprising in that, monsieur,” said the sergeant;
“for yesterday the general commanded me to watch over your safety, and I
thought it right to obey that order.”

“Is the general at the camp?” asked Athos.

“No doubt he is, monsieur; as when he left you he was going back.”

“Well, wait for me a moment; I am going thither to render an account of
the fidelity with which you fulfilled your duty, and to get my sword, which I
left upon the table in the tent.”

“This happens very well,” said the sergeant, “for we were
about to request you to do so.”

Athos fancied he could detect an air of equivocal bonhomie upon the countenance
of the sergeant; but the adventure of the vault might have excited the
curiosity of the man, and it was not surprising that he allowed some of the
feelings which agitated his mind to appear in his face. Athos closed the doors
carefully, confiding the keys to Grimaud, who had chosen his domicile beneath
the shed itself, which led to the cellar where the casks had been deposited.
The sergeant escorted the Comte de la Fere to the camp. There a fresh guard
awaited him, and relieved the four men who had conducted Athos.

This fresh guard was commanded by the aid-de-camp Digby, who, on their way,
fixed upon Athos looks so little encouraging, that the Frenchman asked himself
whence arose, with regard to him, this vigilance and this severity, when the
evening before he had been left perfectly free. He nevertheless continued his
way to the headquarters, keeping to himself the observations which men and
things forced him to make. He found in the general’s tent, to which he
had been introduced the evening before, three superior officers: these were
Monk’s lieutenant and two colonels. Athos perceived his sword; it was
still on the table where he left it. Neither of the officers had seen Athos,
consequently neither of them knew him. Monk’s lieutenant asked, at the
appearance of Athos, if that were the same gentleman with whom the general had
left the tent.

“Yes, your honor,” said the sergeant; “it is the same.”

“But,” said Athos, haughtily, “I do not deny it, I think; and
now, gentlemen, in turn, permit me to ask you to what purpose these questions
are asked, and particularly some explanations upon the tone in which you ask
them?”

“Monsieur,” said the lieutenant, “if we address these
questions to you, it is because we have a right to do so, and if we make them
in a particular tone, it is because that tone, believe me, agrees with the
circumstances.”

“Gentlemen,” said Athos, “you do not know who I am; but I
must tell you that I acknowledge no one here but General Monk as my equal.
Where is he? Let me be conducted to him, and if he has any questions to put to
me, I will answer him and to his satisfaction, I hope. I repeat, gentlemen,
where is the general?”

“Eh! good God! you know better than we do where he is,” said the
lieutenant.

“I?” “Yes, you.”

“Monsieur,” said Athos; “I do not understand you.”

“You will understand me—and, in the first place, do not speak so
loudly.”

Athos smiled disdainfully.

“We don’t ask you to smile,” said one of the colonels warmly;
“we require you to answer.”

“And I, gentlemen, declare to you that I will not reply until I am in the
presence of the general.”

“But,” replied the same colonel who had already spoken, “you
know very well that is impossible.”

“This is the second time I have received this strange reply to the wish I
express,” said Athos. “Is the general absent?”

This question was made with such apparent good faith, and the gentleman wore an
air of such natural surprise, that the three officers exchanged a meaning look.
The lieutenant, by a tacit convention with the other two, was spokesman.

“Monsieur, the general left you last night on the borders of the
monastery.”

“Yes, monsieur.”

“And you went—”

“It is not for me to answer you, but for those who have accompanied me.
They were your soldiers, ask them.”

“But if we please to question you?”

“Then it will please me to reply, monsieur, that I do not recognize any
one here, that I know no one here but the general, and that it is to him alone
I will reply.”

“So be it, monsieur; but as we are the masters, we constitute ourselves a
council of war, and when you are before judges you must reply.”

The countenance of Athos expressed nothing but astonishment and disdain,
instead of the terror the officers expected to read in it at this threat.

“Scottish or English judges upon me, a subject of the king of France;
upon me, placed under the safeguard of British honor! You are mad,
gentlemen!” said Athos, shrugging his shoulders.

The officers looked at each other. “Then, monsieur,” said one of
them, “do you pretend not to know where the general is?”

“To that, monsieur, I have already replied.”

“Yes, but you have already replied an incredible thing.”

“It is true, nevertheless, gentlemen. Men of my rank are not generally
liars. I am a gentleman, I have told you, and when I have at my side the sword
which, by an excess of delicacy, I left last night upon the table whereon it
still lies, believe me, no man says that to me which I am unwilling to hear. I
am at this moment disarmed; if you pretend to be my judges, try me; if you are
but my executioners, kill me.”

“But, monsieur—” asked the lieutenant, in a more courteous
voice, struck with the lofty coolness of Athos.

“Sir, I came to speak confidentially with your general about affairs of
importance. It was not an ordinary welcome that he gave me. The accounts your
soldiers can give you may convince you of that. If, then, the general received
me in that manner, he knew my titles to his esteem. Now, you do not suspect, I
should think, that I should reveal my secrets to you, and still less
his.”

“But these casks, what do they contain?”

“Have you not put that question to your soldiers? What was their
reply?”

“That they contained powder and ball.”

“From whom had they that information? They must have told you
that.”

“From the general; but we are not dupes.”

“Beware, gentlemen; it is not to me you are now giving the lie, it is to
your leader.”

The officers again looked at each other. Athos continued: “Before your
soldiers the general told me to wait a week, and at the expiration of that week
he would give me the answer he had to make me. Have I fled away? No; I
wait.”

“He told you to wait a week!” cried the lieutenant.

“He told me that so clearly, sir, that I have a sloop at the mouth of the
river, which I could with ease have joined yesterday, and embarked. Now, if I
have remained, it was only in compliance with the desire of your general; his
honor having requested me not to depart without a last audience, which he fixed
at a week hence. I repeat to you, then, I am waiting.”

The lieutenant turned towards the other officers, and said, in a low voice:
“If this gentleman speaks truth, there may still be some hope. The
general may be carrying out some negotiations so secret, that he thought it
imprudent to inform even us. Then the time limited for his absence would be a
week.” Then, turning towards Athos: “Monsieur,” said he,
“your declaration is of the most serious importance; are you willing to
repeat it under the seal of an oath?”

“Sir,” replied Athos, “I have always lived in a world where
my simple word was regarded as the most sacred of oaths.”

“This time, however, monsieur, the circumstance is more grave than any
you may have been placed in. The safety of the whole army is at stake. Reflect;
the general has disappeared, and our search for him has been in vain. Is this
disappearance natural? Has a crime been committed? Are we not bound to carry
our investigations to extremity? Have we any right to wait with patience? At
this moment, everything, monsieur, depends upon the words you are about to
pronounce.”

“Thus questioned, gentlemen, I no longer hesitate,” said Athos.
“Yes, I came hither to converse confidentially with General Monk, and ask
him for an answer regarding certain interests; yes, the general being,
doubtless, unable to pronounce before the expected battle, begged me to remain
a week in the house I inhabit, promising me that in a week I should see him
again. Yes, all this is true, and I swear it by God who is the absolute master
of my life and yours.” Athos pronounced these words with so much grandeur
and solemnity, that the three officers were almost convinced. Nevertheless, one
of the colonels made a last attempt.

“Monsieur,” said he, “although we may now be persuaded of the
truth of what you say, there is yet a strange mystery in all this. The general
is too prudent a man to have thus abandoned his army on the eve of a battle
without having at least given notice of it to one of us. As for myself, I
cannot believe but some strange event has been the cause of this disappearance.
Yesterday some foreign fishermen came to sell their fish here; they were lodged
yonder among the Scots; that is to say, on the road the general took with this
gentleman, to go to the abbey, and to return from it. It was one of these
fishermen that accompanied the general with a light. And this morning, bark and
fishermen have all disappeared, carried away by the night’s tide.”

“For my part,” said the lieutenant, “I see nothing in that
that is not quite natural, for these people were not prisoners.”

“No; but I repeat it was one of them who lighted the general and this
gentleman to the abbey, and Digby assures us that the general had strong
suspicions concerning those people. Now, who can say whether these people were
not connected with this gentleman; and that, the blow being struck, the
gentleman, who is evidently brave, did not remain to reassure us by his
presence, and to prevent our researches being made in a right direction?”

This speech made an impression upon the other two officers.

“Sir,” said Athos, “permit me to tell you, that your
reasoning, though specious in appearance, nevertheless wants consistency, as
regards me. I have remained, you say, to divert suspicion. Well! on the
contrary, suspicions arise in me as well as in you; and I say, it is
impossible, gentlemen, that the general, on the eve of a battle, should leave
his army without saying anything to at least one of his officers. Yes, there is
some strange event connected with this; instead of being idle and waiting, you
must display all the activity and all the vigilance possible. I am your
prisoner, gentlemen, upon parole or otherwise. My honor is concerned in
ascertaining what has become of General Monk, and to such a point, that if you
were to say to me, ‘Depart!’ I should reply: ‘No, I will
remain!’ And if you were to ask my opinion, I should add: ‘Yes, the
general is the victim of some conspiracy, for, if he had intended to leave the
camp he would have told me so.’ Seek, then, search the land, search the
sea; the general has not gone of his own good will.”

The lieutenant made a sign to the two other officers.

“No, monsieur,” said he, “no; in your turn you go too far.
The general has nothing to suffer from these events, and, no doubt, has
directed them. What Monk is now doing he has often done before. We are wrong in
alarming ourselves; his absence will, doubtless, be of short duration;
therefore, let us beware, lest by a pusillanimity which the general would
consider a crime, of making his absence public, and by that means demoralize
the army. The general gives a striking proof of his confidence in us; let us
show ourselves worthy of it. Gentlemen, let the most profound silence cover all
this with an impenetrable veil; we will detain this gentleman, not from
mistrust of him with regard to the crime, but to assure more effectively the
secret of the general’s absence by keeping among ourselves; therefore,
until fresh orders, the gentleman will remain at headquarters.”

“Gentlemen,” said Athos, “you forget that last night the
general confided to me a deposit over which I am bound to watch. Give me
whatever guard you like, chain me if you like, but leave me the house I inhabit
for my prison. The general, on his return, would reproach you, I swear on the
honor of a gentleman, for having displeased him in this.”

“So be it, monsieur,” said the lieutenant; “return to your
abode.”

Then they placed over Athos a guard of fifty men, who surrounded his house,
without losing sight of him for a minute.

The secret remained secure, but hours, days passed away without the
general’s returning, or without anything being heard of him.

Chapter XXVIII. Smuggling.

Two days after the events we have just related, and
while General Monk was expected every minute in the camp to which he did not
return, a little Dutch felucca, manned by eleven men, cast anchor upon the
coast of Scheveningen, nearly within cannon-shot of the port. It was night, the
darkness was great, the tide rose in the darkness; it was a capital time to
land passengers and merchandise.

The road of Scheveningen forms a vast crescent; it is not very deep and not
very safe; therefore, nothing is seen stationed there but large Flemish hoys,
or some of those Dutch barks which fishermen draw up on the sand on rollers, as
the ancients did, according to Virgil. When the tide is rising, and advancing
on land, it is not prudent to bring the vessels too close in shore, for, if the
wind is fresh, the prows are buried in the sand; and the sand of that coast is
spongy; it receives easily, but does not yield so well. It was on this account,
no doubt, that a boat was detached from the bark, as soon as the latter had
cast anchor, and came with eight sailors, amidst whom was to be seen an object
of an oblong form, a sort of large pannier or bale.

The shore was deserted; the few fishermen inhabiting the down were gone to bed.
The only sentinel that guarded the coast (a coast very badly guarded, seeing
that a landing from large ships was impossible), without having been able to
follow the example of the fishermen, who were gone to bed, imitated them so
far, that he slept at the back of his watch-box as soundly as they slept in
their beds. The only noise to be heard, then, was the whistling of the night
breeze among the bushes and the brambles of the downs. But the people who were
approaching were doubtless mistrustful people, for this real silence and
apparent solitude did not satisfy them. Their boat, therefore, scarcely as
visible as a dark speck upon the ocean, gilded along noiselessly, avoiding the
use of their oars for fear of being heard, and gained the nearest land.

Scarcely had it touched the ground when a single man jumped out of the boat,
after having given a brief order, in a manner which denoted the habit of
commanding. In consequence of this order, several muskets immediately glittered
in the feeble light reflected from that mirror of the heavens, the sea; and the
oblong bale of which we spoke, containing no doubt some contraband object, was
transported to land, with infinite precautions. Immediately after that, the man
who had landed first, set off at a rapid pace diagonally towards the village of
Scheveningen, directing his course to the nearest point of the wood. When
there, he sought for that house already described as the temporary
residence—and a very humble residence—of him who was styled by
courtesy king of England.

All were asleep there, as everywhere else, only a large dog, of the race of
those which the fishermen of Scheveningen harness to little carts to carry fish
to the Hague, began to bark formidably as soon as the stranger’s steps
were audible beneath the windows. But the watchfulness, instead of alarming the
newly-landed man, appeared, on the contrary, to give him great joy, for his
voice might perhaps have proved insufficient to rouse the people of the house,
whilst, with an auxiliary of that sort, his voice became almost useless. The
stranger waited, then, till these reiterated and sonorous barkings should,
according to all probability, have produced their effect, and then he ventured
a summons. On hearing his voice, the dog began to roar with such violence that
another voice was soon heard from the interior, quieting the dog. With that the
dog was quieted.

“What do you want?” asked that voice, at the same time weak,
broken, and civil.

“I want his majesty King Charles II., king of England,” said the
stranger.

“What do you want with him?”

“I want to speak with him.”

“Who are you?”

“Ah! Mordioux! you ask too much; I don’t like talking through
doors.”

“Only tell me your name.”

“I don’t like to declare my name in the open air, either; besides,
you may be sure I shall not eat your dog, and I hope to God he will be as
reserved with respect to me.”

“You bring news, perhaps, monsieur, do you not?” replied the voice,
patient and querulous as that of an old man.

“I will answer for it, I bring you news you little expect. Open the door,
then, if you please, hein!”

“Monsieur,” persisted the old man, “do you believe, upon your
soul and conscience, that your news is worth waking the king?”

“For God’s sake, my dear monsieur, draw your bolts; you will not be
sorry, I swear, for the trouble it will give you. I am worth my weight in gold,
parole d’honneur!”

“Monsieur, I cannot open the door till you have told me your name.”

“Must I, then?”

“It is by the order of my master, monsieur.”

“Well, my name is—but, I warn you, my name will tell you absolutely
nothing.”

“Never mind, tell it, notwithstanding.”

“Well, I am the Chevalier d’Artagnan.”

The voice uttered an exclamation.

“Oh! good heavens!” said a voice on the other side of the door.
“Monsieur d’Artagnan. What happiness! I could not help thinking I
knew that voice.”

“Humph!” said D’Artagnan. “My voice is known here!
That’s flattering.”

“Oh! yes, we know it,” said the old man, drawing the bolts;
“and here is the proof.” And at these words he let in
D’Artagnan, who, by the light of the lantern he carried in his hand,
recognized his obstinate interlocutor.

“Ah! Mordioux!” cried he: “why, it is Parry! I ought to have
known that.”

“Parry, yes, my dear Monsieur d’Artagnan, it is I. What joy to see
you once again!”

“You are right there, what joy!” said D’Artagnan, pressing
the old man’s hand. “There, now you’ll go and inform the
king, will you not?”

“But the king is asleep, my dear monsieur.”

“Mordioux! then wake him. He won’t scold you for having disturbed
him, I will promise you.”

“You come on the part of the count, do you not?”

“The Comte de la Fere?”

“From Athos?”

“Ma foi! no; I come on my own part. Come, Parry, quick! The king—I
want the king.”

Parry did not think it his duty to resist any longer; he knew D’Artagnan
of old; he knew that, although a Gascon, his words never promised more than
they could stand to. He crossed a court and a little garden, appeased the dog,
that seemed most anxious to taste of the musketeer’s flesh, and went to
knock at the window of a chamber forming the ground-floor of a little pavilion.
Immediately a little dog inhabiting that chamber replied to the great dog
inhabiting the court.

“Poor king!” said D’Artagnan to himself, “these are his
body-guards. It is true he is not the worse guarded on that account.”

“What is wanted with me?” asked the king, from the back of the
chamber.

“Sire, it is M. le Chevalier d’Artagnan, who brings you some
news.”

A noise was immediately heard in the chamber, a door was opened, and a flood of
light inundated the corridor and the garden. The king was working by the light
of a lamp. Papers were lying about upon his desk, and he had commenced the
first copy of a letter which showed, by the numerous erasures, the trouble he
had had in writing it.

“Come in, monsieur le chevalier,” said he, turning around. Then
perceiving the fisherman, “What do you mean, Parry? Where is M. le
Chevalier d’Artagnan?” asked Charles.

“He is before you, sire,” said M. d’Artagnan.

“What, in that costume?”

“Yes; look at me, sire; do you not remember having seen me at Blois, in
the ante-chamber of King Louis XIV.?”

“Yes, monsieur, and I remember I was much pleased with you.”

D’Artagnan bowed. “It was my duty to behave as I did, the moment I
knew that I had the honor of being near your majesty.”

“You bring me news, do you say?”

“Yes, sire.”

“From the king of France?”

“Ma foi! no, sire,” replied D’Artagnan. “Your majesty
must have seen yonder that the king of France is only occupied with his own
majesty.”

Charles raised his eyes towards heaven.

“No, sire, no,” continued D’Artagnan. “I bring news
entirely composed of personal facts. Nevertheless, I hope that your majesty
will listen to the facts and news with some favor.”

“Speak, monsieur.”

“If I am not mistaken, sire, your majesty spoke a great deal at Blois, of
the embarrassed state in which the affairs of England are.”

Charles colored. “Monsieur,” said he, “it was to the king of
France I related—”

“Oh! your majesty is mistaken,” said the musketeer, coolly;
“I know how to speak to kings in misfortune. It is only when they are in
misfortune that they speak to me; once fortunate, they look upon me no more. I
have, then, for your majesty, not only the greatest respect, but, still more,
the most absolute devotion; and that, believe me, with me, sire, means
something. Now, hearing your majesty complain of fate, I found that you were
noble and generous, and bore misfortune well.”

“In truth!” said Charles, much astonished, “I do not know
which I ought to prefer, your freedoms or your respects.”

“You will choose presently, sire,” said D’Artagnan.
“Then your majesty complained to your brother, Louis XIV., of the
difficulty you experienced in returning to England and regaining your throne
for want of men and money.”

Charles allowed a movement of impatience to escape him.

“And the principal object your majesty found in your way,”
continued D’Artagnan, “was a certain general commanding the armies
of the parliament, and who was playing yonder the part of another Cromwell. Did
not your majesty say so?”

“Yes; but I repeat to you, monsieur, those words were for the
king’s ears alone.”

“And you will see, sire, that it is very fortunate that they fell into
those of his lieutenant of musketeers. That man so troublesome to your majesty
was one General Monk, I believe; did I not hear his name correctly,
sire?”

“Yes, monsieur, but once more, to what purpose are all these
questions.”

“Oh! I know very well, sire, that etiquette will not allow kings to be
questioned. I hope, however, presently you will pardon my want of etiquette.
Your majesty added that, notwithstanding, if you could see him, confer with
him, and meet him face to face, you would triumph, either by force or
persuasion, over that obstacle—the only serious one, the only
insurmountable one, the only real one you met with on your road.”

“All that is true, monsieur: my destiny, my future, my obscurity, or my
glory depend upon that man; but what do you draw from that?”

“One thing alone, that if this General Monk is troublesome to the point
your majesty describes, it would be expedient to get rid of him or make an ally
of him.”

“Monsieur, a king who has neither army nor money, as you have heard my
conversation with my brother Louis, has no means of acting against a man like
Monk.”

“Yes, sire, that was your opinion, I know very well: but, fortunately for
you, it was not mine.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“That, without an army and without a million, I have done—I,
myself—what your majesty thought could alone be done with an army and a
million.”

“How! What do you say? What have you done?”

“What have I done? Eh! well, sire, I went yonder to take this man who is
so troublesome to your majesty.”

“In England?”

“Exactly, sire.”

“You went to take Monk in England?”

“Should I by chance have done wrong, sire?”

“In truth, you are mad, monsieur!”

“Not the least in the world, sire.”

“You have taken Monk?”

“Yes, sire.”

“Where?”

“In the midst of his camp.”

The king trembled with impatience.

“And having taken him on the causeway of Newcastle, I bring him to your
majesty,” said D’Artagnan, simply.

“You bring him to me!” cried the king, almost indignant at what he
considered a mystification.

“Yes, sire,” replied D’Artagnan, in the same tone, “I
bring him to you; he is down below yonder, in a large chest pierced with holes,
so as to allow him to breathe.”

“Good God!”

“Oh! don’t be uneasy, sire, we have taken the greatest possible
care of him. He comes in good state, and in perfect condition. Would your
majesty please to see him, to talk with him, or to have him thrown into the
sea?”

“Oh, heavens!” repeated Charles, “oh, heavens! do you speak
the truth, monsieur? Are you not insulting me with some unworthy joke? You have
accomplished this unheard-of act of audacity and
genius—impossible!”

“Will your majesty permit me to open the window?” said
D’Artagnan, opening it.

The king had not time to reply yes or no. D’Artagnan gave a shrill and
prolonged whistle, which he repeated three times through the silence of the
night.

“There!” said he, “he will be brought to your majesty.”

Chapter XXIX. Fear he has placed his Money and that of
Planchet in the Sinking Fund.

The king could not overcome his surprise, and looked
sometimes at the smiling face of the musketeer, and sometimes at the dark
window which opened into the night. But before he had fixed his ideas, eight of
D’Artagnan’s men, for two had remained to take care of the bark,
brought to the house, where Parry received him, that object of an oblong form,
which, for the moment, inclosed the destinies of England. Before he left
Calais, D’Artagnan had had made in that city a sort of coffin, large and
deep enough for a man to turn in it at his ease. The bottom and sides, properly
upholstered, formed a bed sufficiently soft to prevent the rolling of the ship
turning this kind of cage into a rat-trap. The little grating, of which
D’Artagnan had spoken to the king, like the visor of the helmet, was
placed opposite to the man’s face. It was so constructed that, at the
least cry, a sudden pressure would stifle that cry, and, if necessary, him who
had uttered that cry.

D’Artagnan was so well acquainted with his crew and his prisoner, that
during the whole voyage he had been in dread of two things: either that the
general would prefer death to this sort of imprisonment, and would smother
himself by endeavoring to speak, or that his guards would allow themselves to
be tempted by the offers of the prisoner, and put him, D’Artagnan, into
the box instead of Monk.

D’Artagnan, therefore, had passed the two days and the two nights of the
voyage close to the coffin, alone with the general, offering him wine and food,
which the latter had refused, and constantly endeavoring to reassure him upon
the destiny which awaited him at the end of this singular captivity. Two
pistols on the table and his naked sword made D’Artagnan easy with regard
to indiscretions from without.

When once at Scheveningen he had felt completely reassured. His men greatly
dreaded any conflict with the lords of the soil. He had, besides, interested in
his cause him who had morally served him as lieutenant, and whom we have seen
reply to the name of Menneville. The latter, not being a vulgar spirit, had
more to risk than the others, because he had more conscience. He believed in a
future in the service of D’Artagnan, and consequently would have allowed
himself to be cut to pieces, rather than violate the order given by his leader.
Thus it was that, once landed, it was to him that D’Artagnan had confided
the care of the chest and the general’s breathing. It was he, too, he had
ordered to have the chest brought by the seven men as soon as he should hear
the triple whistle. We have seen that the lieutenant obeyed. The coffer once in
the house, D’Artagnan dismissed his men with a gracious smile, saying,
“Messieurs, you have rendered a great service to King Charles II., who in
less than six weeks will be king of England. Your gratification will then be
doubled. Return to the boat and wait for me.” Upon which they departed
with such shouts of joy as terrified even the dog himself.

D’Artagnan had caused the coffer to be brought as far as the king’s
ante-chamber. He then, with great care, closed the door of this ante-chamber,
after which he opened the coffer, and said to the general:

“General, I have a thousand excuses to make to you; my manner of acting
has not been worthy of such a man as you, I know very well; but I wished you to
take me for the captain of a bark. And then England is a very inconvenient
country for transports. I hope, therefore, you will take all that into
consideration. But now, general, you are at liberty to get up and walk.”
This said, he cut the bonds which fastened the arms and hands of the general.
The latter got up, and then sat down with the countenance of a man who expects
death. D’Artagnan opened the door of Charles’s study, and said,
“Sire, here is your enemy, M. Monk; I promised myself to perform this
service for your majesty. It is done; now order as you please. M. Monk,”
added he, turning towards the prisoner, “you are in the presence of his
majesty Charles II., sovereign lord of Great Britain.”

Monk raised towards the prince his coldly stoical look, and replied: “I
know no king of Great Britain; I recognize even here no one worthy of bearing
the name of gentleman: for it is in the name of King Charles II. that an
emissary, whom I took for an honest man, came and laid an infamous snare for
me. I have fallen into that snare; so much the worse for me. Now, you the
tempter,” said he to the king; “you the executor,” said he to
D’Artagnan; “remember what I am about to say to you: you have my
body, you may kill it, and I advise you to do so, for you shall never have my
mind or my will. And now, ask me not a single word, as from this moment I will
not open my mouth even to cry out. I have said.”

And he pronounced these words with the savage, invincible resolution of the
most mortified Puritan. D’Artagnan looked at his prisoner like a man who
knows the value of every word, and who fixes that value according to the accent
with which it has been pronounced.

“The fact is,” said he, in a whisper to the king, “the
general is an obstinate man; he would not take a mouthful of bread, nor swallow
a drop of wine, during the two days of our voyage. But as from this moment it
is your majesty who must decide his fate, I wash my hands of him.”

Monk, erect, pale, and resigned, waited with his eyes fixed and his arms
folded. D’Artagnan turned towards him. “You will please to
understand perfectly,” said he, “that your speech, otherwise very
fine, does not suit anybody, not even yourself. His majesty wished to speak to
you, you refused an interview; why, now that you are face to face, that you are
here by a force independent of your will, why do you confine yourself to the
rigors which I consider useless and absurd? Speak! what the devil! speak, if
only to say ‘No.’”

Monk did not unclose his lips; Monk did not turn his eyes; Monk stroked his
mustache with a thoughtful air, which announced that matters were going on
badly.

During all this time Charles II. had fallen into a profound reverie. For the
first time he found himself face to face with Monk; with the man he had so much
desired to see; and, with that peculiar glance which God has given to eagles
and kings, he had fathomed the abyss of his heart. He beheld Monk, then,
resolved positively to die rather than speak, which was not to be wondered at
in so considerable a man, the wound in whose mind must at the moment have been
cruel. Charles II. formed, on the instant, one of those resolutions upon which
an ordinary man risks his life, a general his fortune, and a king his kingdom.
“Monsieur,” said he to Monk, “you are perfectly right upon
certain points; I do not, therefore, ask you to answer me, but to listen to
me.”

There was a moment’s silence, during which the king looked at Monk, who
remained impassible.

“You have made me just now a painful reproach, monsieur,” continued
the king; “you said that one of my emissaries had been to Newcastle to
lay a snare for you, and that, parenthetically, cannot be understood by M.
d’Artagnan here, and to whom, before everything, I owe sincere thanks for
his generous, his heroic devotion.”

D’Artagnan bowed with respect; Monk took no notice.

“For M. d’Artagnan—and observe, M. Monk, I do not say this to
excuse myself—for M. d’Artagnan,” continued the king,
“went to England of his free will, without interest, without orders,
without hope, like a true gentleman as he is, to render a service to an
unfortunate king, and to add to the illustrious actions of an existence,
already so well filled, one glorious deed more.”

D’Artagnan colored a little, and coughed to keep his countenance. Monk
did not stir.

“You do not believe what I tell you, M. Monk,” continued the king.
“I can understand that,—such proofs of devotion are so rare, that
their reality may well be put in doubt.”

“Monsieur would do wrong not to believe you, sire,” cried
D’Artagnan: “for that which your majesty has said is the exact
truth, and the truth so exact that it seems, in going to fetch the general, I
have done something which sets everything wrong. In truth, if it be so, I am in
despair.”

“Monsieur d’Artagnan,” said the king, pressing the hand of
the musketeer, “you have obliged me as much as if you had promoted the
success of my cause, for you have revealed to me an unknown friend, to whom I
shall ever be grateful, and whom I shall always love.” And the king
pressed his hand cordially. “And,” continued he, bowing to Monk,
“an enemy whom I shall henceforth esteem at his proper value.”

The eyes of the Puritan flashed, but only once, and his countenance, for an
instant, illuminated by that flash, resumed its somber impassibility.

“Then, Monsieur d’Artagnan,” continued Charles, “this
is what was about to happen: M. le Comte de la Fere, who you know, I believe,
has set out for Newcastle.”

“What, Athos!” exclaimed D’Artagnan.

“Yes, that was his nom de guerre, I believe. The Comte de la Fere had
then set out for Newcastle, and was going, perhaps, to bring the general to
hold a conference with me or with those of my party, when you violently, as it
appears, interfered with the negotiation.”

“Mordioux!” replied D’Artagnan, “he entered the camp
the very evening in which I succeeded in getting into it with my
fishermen—”

An almost imperceptible frown on the brow of Monk told D’Artagnan that he
had surmised rightly.

“Yes, yes,” muttered he; “I thought I knew his person; I even
fancied I knew his voice. Unlucky wretch that I am! Oh! sire, pardon me! I
thought I had so successfully steered my bark.”

“There is nothing ill in it, sir,” said the king, “except
that the general accuses me of having laid a snare for him, which is not the
case. No, general, those are not the arms which I contemplated employing with
you, as you will soon see. In the meanwhile, when I give you my word upon the
honor of a gentleman, believe me, sir, believe me! Now, Monsieur
d’Artagnan, a word with you, if you please.”

“I listen on my knees, sire.”

“You are truly at my service, are you not?”

“Your majesty has seen that I am, too much so.”

“That is well; from a man like you one word suffices. In addition to that
word you bring actions. General, have the goodness to follow me. Come with us,
M. d’Artagnan.”

D’Artagnan, considerably surprised, prepared to obey. Charles II. went
out, Monk followed him, D’Artagnan followed Monk. Charles took the path
by which D’Artagnan had come to his abode; the fresh sea breezes soon
caressed the faces of the three nocturnal travelers, and, at fifty paces from
the little gate which Charles opened, they found themselves upon the down in
the face of the ocean, which, having ceased to rise, reposed upon the shore
like a wearied monster. Charles II. walked pensively along, his head hanging
down and his hand beneath his cloak. Monk followed him, with crossed arms and
an uneasy look. D’Artagnan came last, with his hand on the hilt of his
sword.

“Where is the boat in which you came, gentlemen?” said Charles to
the musketeer.

“Yonder, sire; I have seven men and an officer waiting me in that little
bark which is lighted by a fire.”

“Yes, I see; the boat is drawn upon the sand; but you certainly did not
come from Newcastle in that frail bark?”

“No, sire; I freighted a felucca, at my own expense, which is at anchor
within cannon-shot of the downs. It was in that felucca we made the
voyage.”

“Sir,” said the king to Monk, “you are free.”

However firm his will, Monk could not suppress an exclamation. The king added
an affirmative motion of his head, and continued: “We shall waken a
fisherman of the village, who will put his boat to sea immediately, and will
take you back to any place you may command him. M. d’Artagnan here will
escort your honor. I place M. d’Artagnan under the safeguard of your
loyalty, M. Monk.”

Monk allowed a murmur of surprise to escape him, and D’Artagnan a
profound sigh. The king, without appearing to notice either, knocked against
the deal trellis which inclosed the cabin of the principal fisherman inhabiting
the down.

“Hey! Keyser!” cried he, “awake!”

“Who calls me?” asked the fisherman.

“I, Charles the king.”

“Ah, my lord!” cried Keyser, rising ready dressed from the sail in
which he slept, as people sleep in a hammock. “What can I do to serve
you?”

“Captain Keyser,” said Charles, “you must set sail
immediately. Here is a traveler who wishes to freight your bark, and will pay
you well; serve him well.” And the king drew back a few steps to allow
Monk to speak to the fisherman.

“I wish to cross over into England,” said Monk, who spoke Dutch
enough to make himself understood.

“This minute,” said the patron, “this very minute, if you
wish it.”

“But will that be long?” said Monk.

“Not half an hour, your honor. My eldest son is at this moment preparing
the boat, as we were going out fishing at three o’clock in the
morning.”

“Well, is all arranged?” asked the king, drawing near.

“All but the price,” said the fisherman; “yes, sire.”

“That is my affair,” said Charles, “the gentleman is my
friend.”

Monk started and looked at Charles on hearing this word.

“Very well, my lord,” replied Keyser. And at that moment they heard
Keyser’s son, signaling form the shore with the blast of a bull’s
horn.

“Now, gentlemen,” said the king, “depart.”

“Sire,” said D’Artagnan, “will it please your majesty
to grant me a few minutes? I have engaged men, and I am going without them; I
must give them notice.”

“Whistle to them,” said Charles, smiling.

D’Artagnan, accordingly, whistled, whilst the patron Keyser replied to
his son; and four men, led by Menneville, attended the first summons.

“Here is some money in account,” said D’Artagnan, putting
into their hands a purse containing two thousand five hundred livres in gold.
“Go and wait for me at Calais, you know where.” And
D’Artagnan heaved a profound sigh, as he let the purse fall into the
hands of Menneville.

“What, are you leaving us?” cried the men.

“For a short time,” said D’Artagnan, “or for a long
time, who knows? But with 2,500 livres, and the 2,500 you have already
received, you are paid according to our agreement. We are quits, then, my
friend.”

“But the boat?”

“Do not trouble yourself about that.”

“Our things are on board the felucca.”

“Go and seek them, and then set off immediately.”

“Yes, captain.”

D’Artagnan returned to Monk, saying,—“Monsieur, I await your
orders, for I understand we are to go together, unless my company be
disagreeable to you.”

“On the contrary, monsieur,” said Monk.

“Come, gentlemen, on board,” cried Keyser’s son.

Charles bowed to the general with grace and dignity, saying,—“You
will pardon me this unfortunate accident, and the violence to which you have
been subjected, when you are convinced that I was not the cause of them.”

Monk bowed profoundly without replying. On his side, Charles affected not to
say a word to D’Artagnan in private, but aloud,—“Once more,
thanks, monsieur le chevalier,” said he, “thanks for your services.
They will be repaid you by the Lord God, who, I hope, reserves trials and
troubles for me alone.”

Monk followed Keyser and his son embarked with them. D’Artagnan came
after, muttering to himself,—“Poor Planchet! poor Planchet! I am
very much afraid we have made a bad speculation.”

Chapter XXX. The Shares of Planchet and Company rise
again to Par.

During the passage, Monk only spoke to D’Artagnan
in cases of urgent necessity. Thus, when the Frenchman hesitated to come and
take his meals, poor meals, composed of salt fish, biscuit, and Hollands gin,
Monk called him, saying,—“To table, monsieur, to table!”

This was all. D’Artagnan, from being himself on all great occasions,
extremely concise, did not draw from the general’s conciseness a
favorable augury of the result of his mission. Now, as D’Artagnan had
plenty of time for reflection, he battered his brains during this time in
endeavoring to find out how Athos had seen King Charles, how he had conspired
his departure with him, and lastly, how he had entered Monk’s camp; and
the poor lieutenant of musketeers plucked a hair from his mustache every time
that he reflected that the horseman who accompanied Monk on the night of the
famous abduction must have been Athos.

At length, after a passage of two nights and two days, the patron Keyser
touched at the point where Monk, who had given all the orders during the
voyage, had commanded they should land. It was exactly at the mouth of the
little river, near where Athos had chosen his abode.

Daylight was waning, a splendid sun, like a red steel buckler, was plunging the
lower extremity of its disc beneath the blue line of the sea. The felucca was
making fair way up the river, tolerably wide in that part, but Monk, in his
impatience, desired to be landed, and Keyser’s boat set him and
D’Artagnan upon the muddy bank, amidst the reeds. D’Artagnan,
resigned to obedience, followed Monk exactly as a chained bear follows his
master; but the position humiliated him not a little, and he grumbled to
himself that the service of kings was a bitter one, and that the best of them
was good for nothing. Monk walked with long and hasty strides; it might be
thought that he did not yet feel certain of having reached English land. They
had already begun to perceive distinctly a few of the cottages of the sailors
and fishermen spread over the little quay of this humble port, when, all at
once, D’Artagnan cried out,—“God pardon me, there is a house
on fire!”

Monk raised his eyes, and perceived there was, in fact, a house which the
flames were beginning to devour. It had begun at a little shed belonging to the
house, the roof of which had caught. The fresh evening breeze agitated the
fire. The two travelers quickened their steps, hearing loud cries, and seeing,
as they drew nearer, soldiers with their glittering arms pointed towards the
house on fire. It was doubtless this menacing occupation which had made them
neglect to signal the felucca. Monk stopped short for an instant, and, for the
first time, formulated his thoughts into words. “Eh! but,” said he,
“perhaps they are not my soldiers but Lambert’s.”

These words contained at once a sorrow, and apprehension, and a reproach
perfectly intelligible to D’Artagnan. In fact, during the general’s
absence, Lambert might have given battle, conquered, and dispersed the
parliament’s army, and taken with his own the place of Monk’s army,
deprived of its strongest support. At this doubt, which passed from the mind of
Monk to his own, D’Artagnan reasoned in this manner:—“One of
two things is going to happen; either Monk has spoken correctly, and there are
no longer any but Lambertists in the country—that is to say, enemies, who
would receive me wonderfully well, since it is to me they owe their victory; or
nothing is changed, and Monk, transported with joy at finding his camp still in
the same place, will not prove too severe in his settlement with me.”
Whilst thinking thus, the two travelers advanced, and began to mingle with a
little knot of sailors, who looked on with sorrow at the burning house, but did
not dare to say anything on account of the threats of the soldiers. Monk
addressed one of these sailors:—“What is going on here?”
asked he.

“Sir,” replied the man, not recognizing Monk as an officer, under
the thick cloak which enveloped him, “that house was inhabited by a
foreign gentleman, and this foreigner became suspected by the soldiers. They
wanted to get into his house under pretense of taking him to the camp; but he,
without being frightened by their number, threatened death to the first who
should cross the threshold of his door; and as there was one who did venture,
the Frenchman stretched him on the earth with a pistol-shot.”