Александр Дюма
The Man in the Iron Mask
Chapter XLIV. Result of the Ideas of the King, and the Ideas of D’Artagnan
The blow was direct. It was severe, mortal. D’Artagnan, furious at having been anticipated by an idea of the king’s, did not despair, however, even yet; and reflecting upon the idea he had brought back from Belle-Isle, he elicited therefrom novel means of safety for his friends.
“Gentlemen,” said he, suddenly, “since the king has charged some other than myself with his secret orders, it must be because I no longer possess his confidence, and I should really be unworthy of it if I had the courage to hold a command subject to so many injurious suspicions. Therefore I will go immediately and carry my resignation to the king. I tender it before you all, enjoining you all to fall back with me upon the coast of France, in such a way as not to compromise the safety of the forces his majesty has confided to me. For this purpose, return all to your posts; within an hour, we shall have the ebb of the tide. To your posts, gentlemen! I suppose,” added he, on seeing that all prepared to obey him, except the surveillant officer, “you have no orders to object, this time?”
And D’Artagnan almost triumphed while speaking these words. This plan would prove the safety of his friends. The blockade once raised, they might embark immediately, and set sail for England or Spain, without fear of being molested. Whilst they were making their escape, D’Artagnan would return to the king; would justify his return by the indignation which the mistrust of Colbert had raised in him; he would be sent back with full powers, and he would take Belle-Isle; that is to say, the cage, after the birds had flown. But to this plan the officer opposed a further order of the king’s. It was thus conceived:
“From the moment M. d’Artagnan shall have manifested the desire of giving in his resignation, he shall no longer be reckoned leader of the expedition, and every officer placed under his orders shall be held to no longer obey him. Moreover, the said Monsieur d’Artagnan, having lost that quality of leader of the army sent against Belle-Isle, shall set out immediately for France, accompanied by the officer who will have remitted the message to him, and who will consider him a prisoner for whom he is answerable.”
Brave and careless as he was, D’Artagnan turned pale. Everything had been calculated with a depth of precognition which, for the first time in thirty years, recalled to him the solid foresight and inflexible logic of the great cardinal. He leaned his head on his hand, thoughtful, scarcely breathing. “If I were to put this order in my pocket,” thought he, “who would know it, what would prevent my doing it? Before the king had had time to be informed, I should have saved those poor fellows yonder. Let us exercise some small audacity! My head is not one of those the executioner strikes off for disobedience. We will disobey!” But at the moment he was about to adopt this plan, he saw the officers around him reading similar orders, which the passive agent of the thoughts of that infernal Colbert had distributed to them. This contingency of his disobedience had been foreseen – as all the rest had been.
“Monsieur,” said the officer, coming up to him, “I await your good pleasure to depart.”
“I am ready, monsieur,” replied D’Artagnan, grinding his teeth.
The officer immediately ordered a canoe to receive M. d’Artagnan and himself. At sight of this he became almost distraught with rage.
“How,” stammered he, “will you carry on the directions of the different corps?”
“When you are gone, monsieur,” replied the commander of the fleet, “it is to me the command of the whole is committed.”
“Then, monsieur,” rejoined Colbert’s man, addressing the new leader, “it is for you that this last order remitted to me is intended. Let us see your powers.”
“Here they are,” said the officer, exhibiting the royal signature.
“Here are your instructions,” replied the officer, placing the folded paper in his hands; and turning round towards D’Artagnan, “Come, monsieur,” said he, in an agitated voice (such despair did he behold in that man of iron), “do me the favor to depart at once.”
“Immediately!” articulated D’Artagnan, feebly, subdued, crushed by implacable impossibility.
And he painfully subsided into the little boat, which started, favored by wind and tide, for the coast of France. The king’s guards embarked with him. The musketeer still preserved the hope of reaching Nantes quickly, and of pleading the cause of his friends eloquently enough to incline the king to mercy. The bark flew like a swallow. D’Artagnan distinctly saw the land of France profiled in black against the white clouds of night.
“Ah! monsieur,” said he, in a low voice, to the officer to whom, for an hour, he had ceased speaking, “what would I give to know the instructions for the new commander! They are all pacific, are they not? and – ”
He did not finish; the thunder of a distant cannon rolled athwart the waves, another, and two or three still louder. D’Artagnan shuddered.
“They have commenced the siege of Belle-Isle,” replied the officer. The canoe had just touched the soil of France.
Chapter XLV. The Ancestors of Porthos
When D’Artagnan left Aramis and Porthos, the latter returned to the principal fort, in order to converse with greater liberty. Porthos, still thoughtful, was a restraint on Aramis, whose mind had never felt itself more free.
“Dear Porthos,” said he, suddenly, “I will explain D’Artagnan’s idea to you.”
“What idea, Aramis?”
“An idea to which we shall owe our liberty within twelve hours.”
“Ah! indeed!” said Porthos, much astonished. “Let us hear it.”
“Did you remark, in the scene our friend had with the officer, that certain orders constrained him with regard to us?”
“Yes, I did notice that.”
“Well! D’Artagnan is going to give in his resignation to the king, and during the confusion that will result from his absence, we will get away, or rather you will get away, Porthos, if there is possibility of flight for only one.”
Here Porthos shook his head and replied: “We will escape together, Aramis, or we will stay together.”
“Thine is a right, a generous heart,” said Aramis, “only your melancholy uneasiness affects me.”
“I am not uneasy,” said Porthos.
“Then you are angry with me.”
“I am not angry with you.”
“Then why, my friend, do you put on such a dismal countenance?”
“I will tell you; I am making my will.” And while saying these words, the good Porthos looked sadly in the face of Aramis.
“Your will!” cried the bishop. “What, then! do you think yourself lost?”
“I feel fatigued. It is the first time, and there is a custom in our family.”
“What is it, my friend?”
“My grandfather was a man twice as strong as I am.”
“Indeed!” said Aramis; “then your grandfather must have been Samson himself.”
“No; his name was Antoine. Well! he was about my age, when, setting out one day for the chase, he felt his legs weak, the man who had never known what weakness was before.”
“What was the meaning of that fatigue, my friend?”
“Nothing good, as you will see; for having set out, complaining still of weakness of the legs, he met a wild boar, which made head against him; he missed him with his arquebuse, and was ripped up by the beast and died immediately.”
“There is no reason in that why you should alarm yourself, dear Porthos.”
“Oh! you will see. My father was as strong again as I am. He was a rough soldier, under Henry III. and Henry IV.; his name was not Antoine, but Gaspard, the same as M. de Coligny. Always on horseback, he had never known what lassitude was. One evening, as he rose from table, his legs failed him.”
“He had supped heartily, perhaps,” said Aramis, “and that was why he staggered.”
“Bah! A friend of M. de Bassompierre, nonsense! No, no, he was astonished at this lassitude, and said to my mother, who laughed at him, ‘Would not one believe I was going to meet with a wild boar, as the late M. du Vallon, my father did?’”
“Well?” said Aramis.
“Well, having this weakness, my father insisted upon going down into the garden, instead of going to bed; his foot slipped on the first stair, the staircase was steep; my father fell against a stone in which an iron hinge was fixed. The hinge gashed his temple; and he was stretched out dead upon the spot.”
Aramis raised his eyes to his friend: “These are two extraordinary circumstances,” said he; “let us not infer that there may succeed a third. It is not becoming in a man of your strength to be superstitious, my brave Porthos. Besides, when were your legs known to fail? Never have you stood so firm, so haughtily; why, you could carry a house on your shoulders.”
“At this moment,” said Porthos, “I feel myself pretty active; but at times I vacillate; I sink; and lately this phenomenon, as you say, has occurred four times. I will not say this frightens me, but it annoys me. Life is an agreeable thing. I have money; I have fine estates; I have horses that I love; I have also friends that I love: D’Artagnan, Athos, Raoul, and you.”
The admirable Porthos did not even take the trouble to dissimulate in the very presence of Aramis the rank he gave him in his friendship. Aramis pressed his hand: “We will still live many years,” said he, “to preserve to the world such specimens of its rarest men. Trust yourself to me, my friend; we have no reply from D’Artagnan, that is a good sign. He must have given orders to get the vessels together and clear the seas. On my part I have just issued directions that a bark should be rolled on rollers to the mouth of the great cavern of Locmaria, which you know, where we have so often lain in wait for the foxes.”
“Yes, and which terminates at the little creek by a trench where we discovered the day that splendid fox escaped that way.”
“Precisely. In case of misfortunes, a bark is to be concealed for us in that cavern; indeed, it must be there by this time. We will wait for a favorable moment, and during the night we will go to sea!”
“That is a grand idea. What shall we gain by it?”
“We shall gain this – nobody knows that grotto, or rather its issue, except ourselves and two or three hunters of the island; we shall gain this – that if the island is occupied, the scouts, seeing no bark upon the shore, will never imagine we can escape, and will cease to watch.”
“I understand.”
“Well! that weakness in the legs?”
“Oh! better, much, just now.”
“You see, then, plainly, that everything conspires to give us quietude and hope. D’Artagnan will sweep the sea and leave us free. No royal fleet or descent to be dreaded. Vive Dieu! Porthos, we have still half a century of magnificent adventure before us, and if I once touch Spanish ground, I swear to you,” added the bishop with terrible energy, “that your brevet of duke is not such a chance as it is said to be.”
“We live by hope,” said Porthos, enlivened by the warmth of his companion.
All at once a cry resounded in their ears: “To arms! to arms!”
This cry, repeated by a hundred throats, piercing the chamber where the two friends were conversing, carried surprise to one, and uneasiness to the other. Aramis opened the window; he saw a crowd of people running with flambeaux. Women were seeking places of safety, the armed population were hastening to their posts.
“The fleet! the fleet!” cried a soldier, who recognized Aramis.
“The fleet?” repeated the latter.
“Within half cannon-shot,” continued the soldier.
“To arms!” cried Aramis.
“To arms!” repeated Porthos, formidably. And both rushed forth towards the mole to place themselves within the shelter of the batteries. Boats, laden with soldiers, were seen approaching; and in three directions, for the purpose of landing at three points at once.
“What must be done?” said an officer of the guard.
“Stop them; and if they persist, fire!” said Aramis.
Five minutes later, the cannonade commenced. These were the shots that D’Artagnan had heard as he landed in France. But the boats were too near the mole to allow the cannon to aim correctly. They landed, and the combat commenced hand to hand.
“What’s the matter, Porthos?” said Aramis to his friend.
“Nothing! nothing! – only my legs; it is really incomprehensible! – they will be better when we charge.” In fact, Porthos and Aramis did charge with such vigor, and so thoroughly animated their men, that the royalists re-embarked precipitately, without gaining anything but the wounds they carried away.
“Eh! but Porthos,” cried Aramis, “we must have a prisoner, quick! quick!” Porthos bent over the stair of the mole, and seized by the nape of the neck one of the officers of the royal army who was waiting to embark till all his people should be in the boat. The arm of the giant lifted up his prey, which served him as a buckler, and he recovered himself without a shot being fired at him.
“Here is a prisoner for you,” said Porthos coolly to Aramis.
“Well!” cried the latter, laughing, “did you not calumniate your legs?”
“It was not with my legs I captured him,” said Porthos, “it was with my arms!”
Chapter XLVI. The Son of Biscarrat
The Bretons of the Isle were very proud of this victory; Aramis did not encourage them in the feeling.
“What will happen,” said he to Porthos, when everybody was gone home, “will be that the anger of the king will be roused by the account of the resistance; and that these brave people will be decimated or shot when they are taken, which cannot fail to take place.”
“From which it results, then,” said Porthos, “that what we have done is of not the slightest use.”
“For the moment it may be,” replied the bishop, “for we have a prisoner from whom we shall learn what our enemies are preparing to do.”
“Yes, let us interrogate the prisoner,” said Porthos, “and the means of making him speak are very simple. We are going to supper; we will invite him to join us; as he drinks he will talk.”
This was done. The officer was at first rather uneasy, but became reassured on seeing what sort of men he had to deal with. He gave, without having any fear of compromising himself, all the details imaginable of the resignation and departure of D’Artagnan. He explained how, after that departure, the new leader of the expedition had ordered a surprise upon Belle-Isle. There his explanations stopped. Aramis and Porthos exchanged a glance that evinced their despair. No more dependence to be placed now on D’Artagnan’s fertile imagination – no further resource in the event of defeat. Aramis, continuing his interrogations, asked the prisoner what the leaders of the expedition contemplated doing with the leaders of Belle-Isle.
“The orders are,” replied he, “to kill during combat, or hang afterwards.”
Porthos and Aramis looked at each other again, and the color mounted to their faces.
“I am too light for the gallows,” replied Aramis; “people like me are not hung.”
“And I am too heavy,” said Porthos; “people like me break the cord.”
“I am sure,” said the prisoner, gallantly, “that we could have guaranteed you the exact kind of death you preferred.”
“A thousand thanks!” said Aramis, seriously. Porthos bowed.
“One more cup of wine to your health,” said he, drinking himself. From one subject to another the chat with the officer was prolonged. He was an intelligent gentleman, and suffered himself to be led on by the charm of Aramis’s wit and Porthos’s cordial bonhomie.
“Pardon me,” said he, “if I address a question to you; but men who are in their sixth bottle have a clear right to forget themselves a little.”
“Address it!” cried Porthos; “address it!”
“Speak,” said Aramis.
“Were you not, gentlemen, both in the musketeers of the late king?”
“Yes, monsieur, and amongst the best of them, if you please,” said Porthos.
“That is true; I should say even the best of all soldiers, messieurs, if I did not fear to offend the memory of my father.”
“Of your father?” cried Aramis.
“Do you know what my name is?”
“Ma foi! no, monsieur; but you can tell us, and – ”
“I am called Georges de Biscarrat.”
“Oh!” cried Porthos, in his turn. “Biscarrat! Do you remember that name, Aramis?”
“Biscarrat!” reflected the bishop. “It seems to me – ”
“Try to recollect, monsieur,” said the officer.
“Pardieu! that won’t take me long,” said Porthos. “Biscarrat – called Cardinal – one of the four who interrupted us on the day on which we formed our friendship with D’Artagnan, sword in hand.”
“Precisely, gentlemen.”
“The only one,” cried Aramis, eagerly, “we could not scratch.”
“Consequently, a capital blade?” said the prisoner.
“That’s true! most true!” exclaimed both friends together. “Ma foi! Monsieur Biscarrat, we are delighted to make the acquaintance of such a brave man’s son.”
Biscarrat pressed the hands held out by the two musketeers. Aramis looked at Porthos as much as to say, “Here is a man who will help us,” and without delay, – “Confess, monsieur,” said he, “that it is good to have once been a good man.”
“My father always said so, monsieur.”
“Confess, likewise, that it is a sad circumstance in which you find yourself, of falling in with men destined to be shot or hung, and to learn that these men are old acquaintances, in fact, hereditary friends.”
“Oh! you are not reserved for such a frightful fate as that, messieurs and friends!” said the young man, warmly.
“Bah! you said so yourself.”
“I said so just now, when I did not know you; but now that I know you, I say – you will evade this dismal fate, if you wish!”
“How – if we wish?” echoed Aramis, whose eyes beamed with intelligence as he looked alternately at the prisoner and Porthos.
“Provided,” continued Porthos, looking, in his turn, with noble intrepidity, at M. Biscarrat and the bishop – “provided nothing disgraceful be required of us.”
“Nothing at all will be required of you, gentlemen,” replied the officer – “what should they ask of you? If they find you they will kill you, that is a predetermined thing; try, then, gentlemen, to prevent their finding you.”
“I don’t think I am mistaken,” said Porthos, with dignity; “but it appears evident to me that if they want to find us, they must come and seek us here.”
“In that you are perfectly right, my worthy friend,” replied Aramis, constantly consulting with his looks the countenance of Biscarrat, who had grown silent and constrained. “You wish, Monsieur de Biscarrat, to say something to us, to make us some overture, and you dare not – is that true?”
“Ah! gentlemen and friends! it is because by speaking I betray the watchword. But, hark! I hear a voice that frees mine by dominating it.”
“Cannon!” said Porthos.
“Cannon and musketry, too!” cried the bishop.
On hearing at a distance, among the rocks, these sinister reports of a combat which they thought had ceased:
“What can that be?” asked Porthos.
“Eh! Pardieu!” cried Aramis; “that is just what I expected.”
“What is that?”
“That the attack made by you was nothing but a feint; is not that true, monsieur? And whilst your companions allowed themselves to be repulsed, you were certain of effecting a landing on the other side of the island.”
“Oh! several, monsieur.”
“We are lost, then,” said the bishop of Vannes, quietly.
“Lost! that is possible,” replied the Seigneur de Pierrefonds, “but we are not taken or hung.” And so saying, he rose from the table, went to the wall, and coolly took down his sword and pistols, which he examined with the care of an old soldier who is preparing for battle, and who feels that life, in a great measure, depends upon the excellence and right conditions of his arms.
At the report of the cannon, at the news of the surprise which might deliver up the island to the royal troops, the terrified crowd rushed precipitately to the fort to demand assistance and advice from their leaders. Aramis, pale and downcast, between two flambeaux, showed himself at the window which looked into the principal court, full of soldiers waiting for orders and bewildered inhabitants imploring succor.
“My friends,” said D’Herblay, in a grave and sonorous voice, “M. Fouquet, your protector, your friend, you father, has been arrested by an order of the king, and thrown into the Bastile.” A sustained yell of vengeful fury came floating up to the window at which the bishop stood, and enveloped him in a magnetic field.
“Avenge Monsieur Fouquet!” cried the most excited of his hearers, “death to the royalists!”
“No, my friends,” replied Aramis, solemnly; “no, my friends; no resistance. The king is master in his kingdom. The king is the mandatory of God. The king and God have struck M. Fouquet. Humble yourselves before the hand of God. Love God and the king, who have struck M. Fouquet. But do not avenge your seigneur, do not think of avenging him. You would sacrifice yourselves in vain – you, your wives and children, your property, your liberty. Lay down your arms, my friends – lay down your arms! since the king commands you so to do – and retire peaceably to your dwellings. It is I who ask you to do so; it is I who beg you to do so; it is I who now, in the hour of need, command you to do so, in the name of M. Fouquet.”
The crowd collected under the window uttered a prolonged roar of anger and terror. “The soldiers of Louis XIV. have reached the island,” continued Aramis. “From this time it would no longer be a fight betwixt them and you – it would be a massacre. Begone, then, begone, and forget; this time I command you, in the name of the Lord of Hosts!”
The mutineers retired slowly, submissive, silent.
“Ah! what have you just been saying, my friend?” said Porthos.
“Monsieur,” said Biscarrat to the bishop, “you may save all these inhabitants, but thus you will neither save yourself nor your friend.”
“Monsieur de Biscarrat,” said the bishop of Vannes, with a singular accent of nobility and courtesy, “Monsieur de Biscarrat, be kind enough to resume your liberty.”
“I am very willing to do so, monsieur; but – ”
“That would render us a service, for when announcing to the king’s lieutenant the submission of the islanders, you will perhaps obtain some grace for us on informing him of the manner in which that submission has been effected.”
“Grace!” replied Porthos with flashing eyes, “what is the meaning of that word?”
Aramis touched the elbow of his friend roughly, as he had been accustomed to do in the days of their youth, when he wanted to warn Porthos that he had committed, or was about to commit, a blunder. Porthos understood him, and was silent immediately.
“I will go, messieurs,” replied Biscarrat, a little surprised likewise at the word “grace” pronounced by the haughty musketeer, of and to whom, but a few minutes before, he had related with so much enthusiasm the heroic exploits with which his father had delighted him.
“Go, then, Monsieur Biscarrat,” said Aramis, bowing to him, “and at parting receive the expression of our entire gratitude.”
“But you, messieurs, you whom I think it an honor to call my friends, since you have been willing to accept that title, what will become of you in the meantime?” replied the officer, very much agitated at taking leave of the two ancient adversaries of his father.
“We will wait here.”
“But, mon Dieu!– the order is precise and formal.”
“I am bishop of Vannes, Monsieur de Biscarrat; and they no more shoot a bishop than they hang a gentleman.”
“Ah! yes, monsieur – yes, monseigneur,” replied Biscarrat; “it is true, you are right, there is still that chance for you. Then, I will depart, I will repair to the commander of the expedition, the king’s lieutenant. Adieu! then, messieurs, or rather, to meet again, I hope.”
The worthy officer, jumping upon a horse given him by Aramis, departed in the direction of the sound of cannon, which, by surging the crowd into the fort, had interrupted the conversation of the two friends with their prisoner. Aramis watched the departure, and when left alone with Porthos:
“Well, do you comprehend?” said he.
“Ma foi! no.”
“Did not Biscarrat inconvenience you here?”
“No; he is a brave fellow.”
“Yes; but the grotto of Locmaria – is it necessary all the world should know it?”
“Ah! that is true, that is true; I comprehend. We are going to escape by the cavern.”
“If you please,” cried Aramis, gayly. “Forward, friend Porthos; our boat awaits us. King Louis has not caught us —yet.”
