Александр Дюма
Twenty Years After
(At the first words of this address D’Artagnan had seized Porthos’s arm, which he pressed with gradually increasing force. When Mazarin ceased speaking he said to Porthos in a low tone:
“Never tell Mazarin that I understand Spanish, or I am a lost man and you are also.”
“All right,” said Porthos.)
This rough appeal, marked by the eloquence which characterized Mazarin when he spoke in Italian or Spanish and which he lost entirely in speaking French, was uttered with such impenetrable expression that Gondy, clever physiognomist as he was, had no suspicion of its being more than a simple warning to be more subdued.
The queen, on her part, thus chided, softened immediately and sat down, and in an almost weeping voice, letting her arms fall by her side, said:
“Pardon me, sir, and attribute this violence to what I suffer. A woman, and consequently subject to the weaknesses of my sex, I am alarmed at the idea of civil war; a queen, accustomed to be obeyed, I am excited at the first opposition.”
“Madame,” replied Gondy, bowing, “your majesty is mistaken in qualifying my sincere advice as opposition. Your majesty has none but submissive and respectful subjects. It is not the queen with whom the people are displeased; they ask for Broussel and are only too happy, if you release him to them, to live under your government.”
Mazarin, who at the words, “It is not the queen with whom the people are displeased,” had pricked up his ears, thinking that the coadjutor was about to speak of the cries, “Down with Mazarin,” and pleased with Gondy’s suppression of this fact, he said with his sweetest voice and his most gracious expression:
“Madame, credit the coadjutor, who is one of the most able politicians we have; the first available cardinal’s hat seems to belong already to his noble brow.”
“Ah! how much you have need of me, cunning rogue!” thought Gondy.
(“And what will he promise us?” said D’Artagnan. “Peste, if he is giving away hats like that, Porthos, let us look out and both demand a regiment to-morrow. Corbleu! let the civil war last but one year and I will have a constable’s sword gilt for me.”
“And for me?” put in Porthos.
“For you? I will give you the baton of the Marechal de la Meilleraie, who does not seem to be much in favor just now.”)
“And so, sir,” said the queen, “you are seriously afraid of a public tumult.”
“Seriously,” said Gondy, astonished at not having further advanced; “I fear that when the torrent has broken its embankment it will cause fearful destruction.”
“And I,” said the queen, “think that in such a case other embankments should be raised to oppose it. Go; I will reflect.”
Gondy looked at Mazarin, astonished, and Mazarin approached the queen to speak to her, but at this moment a frightful tumult arose from the square of the Palais Royal.
Gondy smiled, the queen’s color rose and Mazarin grew even paler.
“What is that again?” he asked.
At this moment Comminges rushed into the room.
“Pardon, your majesty,” he cried, “but the people have dashed the sentinels against the gates and they are now forcing the doors; what are your commands?”
“Listen, madame,” said Gondy.
The moaning of waves, the noise of thunder, the roaring of a volcano, cannot be compared with the tempest of cries heard at that moment.
“What are my commands?” said the queen.
“Yes, for time presses.”
“How many men have you about the Palais Royal?”
“Six hundred.”
“Place a hundred around the king and with the remainder sweep away this mob for me.”
“Madame,” cried Mazarin, “what are you about?”
“Go!” said the queen.
Comminges went out with a soldier’s passive obedience.
At this moment a monstrous battering was heard. One of the gates began to yield.
“Oh! madame,” cried Mazarin, “you have ruined us all-the king, yourself and me.”
At this cry from the soul of the frightened cardinal, Anne became alarmed in her turn and would have recalled Comminges.
“It is too late,” said Mazarin, tearing his hair, “too late!”
The gale had given way. Hoarse shouts were heard from the excited mob. D’Artagnan put his hand to his sword, motioning to Porthos to follow his example.
“Save the queen!” cried Mazarin to the coadjutor.
Gondy sprang to the window and threw it open; he recognized Louvieres at the head of a troop of about three or four thousand men.
“Not a step further,” he shouted, “the queen is signing!”
“What are you saying?” asked the queen.
“The truth, madame,” said Mazarin, placing a pen and a paper before her, “you must;” then he added: “Sign, Anne, I implore you-I command you.”
The queen fell into a chair, took the pen and signed.
The people, kept back by Louvieres, had not made another step forward; but the awful murmuring, which indicates an angry people, continued.
The queen had written, “The keeper of the prison at Saint Germain will set Councillor Broussel at liberty;” and she had signed it.
The coadjutor, whose eyes devoured her slightest movements, seized the paper immediately the signature had been affixed to it, returned to the window and waved it in his hand.
“This is the order,” he said.
All Paris seemed to shout with joy, and then the air resounded with the cries of “Long live Broussel!” “Long live the coadjutor!”
“Long live the queen!” cried De Gondy; but the cries which replied to his were poor and few, and perhaps he had but uttered it to make Anne of Austria sensible of her weakness.
“And now that you have obtained what you want, go,” said she, “Monsieur de Gondy.”
“Whenever her majesty has need of me,” replied the coadjutor, bowing, “her majesty knows I am at her command.”
“Ah, cursed priest!” cried Anne, when he had retired, stretching out her arm to the scarcely closed door, “one day I will make you drink the dregs of the atrocious gall you have poured out on me to-day.”
Mazarin wished to approach her. “Leave me!” she exclaimed; “you are not a man!” and she went out of the room.
“It is you who are not a woman,” muttered Mazarin.
Then, after a moment of reverie, he remembered where he had left D’Artagnan and Porthos and that they must have overheard everything. He knit his brows and went direct to the tapestry, which he pushed aside. The closet was empty.
At the queen’s last word, D’Artagnan had dragged Porthos into the gallery. Thither Mazarin went in his turn and found the two friends walking up and down.
“Why did you leave the closet, Monsieur d’Artagnan?” asked the cardinal.
“Because,” replied D’Artagnan, “the queen desired every one to leave and I thought that this command was intended for us as well as for the rest.”
“And you have been here since-”
“About a quarter of an hour,” said D’Artagnan, motioning to Porthos not to contradict him.
Mazarin saw the sign and remained convinced that D’Artagnan had seen and heard everything; but he was pleased with his falsehood.
“Decidedly, Monsieur d’Artagnan, you are the man I have been seeking. You may reckon upon me and so may your friend.” Then bowing to the two musketeers with his most gracious smile, he re-entered his closet more calmly, for on the departure of De Gondy the uproar had ceased as though by enchantment.
49. Misfortune refreshes the Memory
Anne of Austria returned to her oratory, furious.
“What!” she cried, wringing her beautiful hands, “What! the people have seen Monsieur de Conde, a prince of the blood royal, arrested by my mother-in-law, Maria de Medicis; they saw my mother-in-law, their former regent, expelled by the cardinal; they saw Monsieur de Vendome, that is to say, the son of Henry IV., a prisoner at Vincennes; and whilst these great personages were imprisoned, insulted and threatened, they said nothing; and now for a Broussel-good God! what, then, is to become of royalty?”
The queen unconsciously touched here upon the exciting question. The people had made no demonstration for the princes, but they had risen for Broussel; they were taking the part of a plebeian and in defending Broussel they instinctively felt they were defending themselves.
During this time Mazarin walked up and down the study, glancing from time to time at his beautiful Venetian mirror, starred in every direction. “Ah!” he said, “it is sad, I know well, to be forced to yield thus; but, pshaw! we shall have our revenge. What matters it about Broussel-it is a name, not a thing.”
Mazarin, clever politician as he was, was for once mistaken; Broussel was a thing, not a name.
The next morning, therefore, when Broussel made his entrance into Paris in a large carriage, having his son Louvieres at his side and Friquet behind the vehicle, the people threw themselves in his way and cries of “Long live Broussel!” “Long live our father!” resounded from all parts and was death to Mazarin’s ears; and the cardinal’s spies brought bad news from every direction, which greatly agitated the minister, but was calmly received by the queen. The latter seemed to be maturing in her mind some great stroke, a fact which increased the uneasiness of the cardinal, who knew the proud princess and dreaded much the determination of Anne of Austria.
The coadjutor returned to parliament more a monarch than king, queen, and cardinal, all three together. By his advice a decree from parliament summoned the citizens to lay down their arms and demolish the barricades. They now knew that it required but one hour to take up arms again and one night to reconstruct the barricades.
Rochefort had returned to the Chevalier d’Humieres his fifty horsemen, less two, missing at roll call. But the chevalier was himself at heart a Frondist and would hear nothing said of compensation.
The mendicant had gone to his old place on the steps of Saint Eustache and was again distributing holy water with one hand and asking alms with the other. No one could suspect that those two hands had been engaged with others in drawing out from the social edifice the keystone of royalty.
Louvieres was proud and satisfied; he had taken revenge on Mazarin and had aided in his father’s deliverance from prison. His name had been mentioned as a name of terror at the Palais Royal. Laughingly he said to the councillor, restored to his family:
“Do you think, father, that if now I should ask for a company the queen would give it to me?”
D’Artagnan profited by this interval of calm to send away Raoul, whom he had great difficulty in keeping shut up during the riot, and who wished positively to strike a blow for one party or the other. Raoul had offered some opposition at first; but D’Artagnan made use of the Comte de la Fere’s name, and after paying a visit to Madame de Chevreuse, Raoul started to rejoin the army.
Rochefort alone was dissatisfied with the termination of affairs. He had written to the Duc de Beaufort to come and the duke was about to arrive, and he would find Paris tranquil. He went to the coadjutor to consult with him whether it would not be better to send word to the duke to stop on the road, but Gondy reflected for a moment, and then said:
“Let him continue his journey.”
“All is not then over?” asked Rochefort.
“My dear count, we have only just begun.”
“What induces you to think so?”
“The knowledge that I have of the queen’s heart; she will not rest contented beaten.”
“Is she, then, preparing for a stroke?”
“I hope so.”
“Come, let us see what you know.”
“I know that she has written to the prince to return in haste from the army.”
“Ah! ha!” said Rochefort, “you are right. We must let Monsieur de Beaufort come.”
In fact, the evening after this conversation the report was circulated that the Prince de Conde had arrived. It was a very simple, natural circumstance and yet it created a profound sensation. It was said that Madame de Longueville, for whom the prince had more than a brother’s affection and in whom he had confided, had been indiscreet. His confidence had unveiled the sinister project of the queen.
Even on the night of the prince’s return, some citizens, bolder than the rest, such as the sheriffs, captains and the quartermaster, went from house to house among their friends, saying:
“Why do we not take the king and place him in the Hotel de Ville? It is a shame to leave him to be educated by our enemies, who will give him evil counsel; whereas, brought up by the coadjutor, for instance, he would imbibe national principles and love his people.”
That night the question was secretly agitated and on the morrow the gray and black cloaks, the patrols of armed shop-people, and the bands of mendicants reappeared.
The queen had passed the night in lonely conference with the prince, who had entered the oratory at midnight and did not leave till five o’clock in the morning.
At five o’clock Anne went to the cardinal’s room. If she had not yet taken any repose, he at least was already up. Six days had already passed out of the ten he had asked from Mordaunt; he was therefore occupied in revising his reply to Cromwell, when some one knocked gently at the door of communication with the queen’s apartments. Anne of Austria alone was permitted to enter by that door. The cardinal therefore rose to open it.
The queen was in a morning gown, but it became her still; for, like Diana of Poictiers and Ninon, Anne of Austria enjoyed the privilege of remaining ever beautiful; nevertheless, this morning she looked handsomer than usual, for her eyes had all the sparkle inward satisfaction adds to expression.
“What is the matter, madame?” said Mazarin, uneasily. “You seem secretly elated.”
“Yes, Giulio,” she said, “proud and happy; for I have found the means of strangling this hydra.”
“You are a great politician, my queen,” said Mazarin; “let us hear the means.” And he hid what he had written by sliding the letter under a folio of blank paper.
“You know,” said the queen, “that they want to take the king away from me?”
“Alas! yes, and to hang me.”
“They shall not have the king.”
“Nor hang me.”
“Listen. I want to carry off my son from them, with yourself. I wish that this event, which on the day it is known will completely change the aspect of affairs, should be accomplished without the knowledge of any others but yourself, myself, and a third person.”
“And who is this third person?”
“Monsieur le Prince.”
“He has come, then, as they told me?”
“Last evening.”
“And you have seen him?”
“He has just left me.”
“And will he aid this project?”
“The plan is his own.”
“And Paris?”
“He will starve it out and force it to surrender at discretion.”
“The plan is not wanting in grandeur; I see but one impediment.”
“What is it?”
“Impossibility.”
“A senseless word. Nothing is impossible.”
“On paper.”
“In execution. We have money?”
“A little,” said Mazarin, trembling, lest Anne should ask to draw upon his purse.
“Troops?”
“Five or six thousand men.”
“Courage?”
“Plenty.”
“Then the thing is easy. Oh! do think of it, Giulio! Paris, this odious Paris, waking up one morning without queen or king, surrounded, besieged, famished-having for its sole resource its stupid parliament and their coadjutor with crooked limbs!”
“Charming! charming!” said Mazarin. “I can imagine the effect, I do not see the means.”
“I will find the means myself.”
“You are aware it will be war, civil war, furious, devouring, implacable?”
“Oh! yes, yes, war,” said Anne of Austria. “Yes, I will reduce this rebellious city to ashes. I will extinguish the fire with blood! I will perpetuate the crime and punishment by making a frightful example. Paris!; I-I detest, I loathe it!”
“Very fine, Anne. You are now sanguinary; but take care. We are not in the time of Malatesta and Castruccio Castracani. You will get yourself decapitated, my beautiful queen, and that would be a pity.”
“You laugh.”
“Faintly. It is dangerous to go to war with a nation. Look at your brother monarch, Charles I. He is badly off, very badly.”
“We are in France, and I am Spanish.”
“So much the worse; I had much rather you were French and myself also; they would hate us both less.”
“Nevertheless, you consent?”
“Yes, if the thing be possible.”
“It is; it is I who tell you so; make preparations for departure.”
“I! I am always prepared to go, only, as you know, I never do go, and perhaps shall go this time as little as before.”
“In short, if I go, will you go too?”
“I will try.”
“You torment me, Giulio, with your fears; and what are you afraid of, then?”
“Of many things.”
“What are they?”
Mazarin’s face, smiling as it was, became clouded.
“Anne,” said he, “you are but a woman and as a woman you may insult men at your ease, knowing that you can do it with impunity. You accuse me of fear; I have not so much as you have, since I do not fly as you do. Against whom do they cry out? is it against you or against myself? Whom would they hang, yourself or me? Well, I can weather the storm-I, whom, notwithstanding, you tax with fear-not with bravado, that is not my way; but I am firm. Imitate me. Make less hubbub and think more deeply. You cry very loud, you end by doing nothing; you talk of flying-”
Mazarin shrugged his shoulders and taking the queen’s hand led her to the window.
“Look!” he said.
“Well?” said the queen, blinded by her obstinacy.
“Well, what do you see from this window? If I am not mistaken those are citizens, helmeted and mailed, armed with good muskets, as in the time of the League, and whose eyes are so intently fixed on this window that they will see you if you raise that curtain much; and now come to the other side-what do you see? Creatures of the people, armed with halberds, guarding your doors. You will see the same at every opening from this palace to which I should lead you. Your doors are guarded, the airholes of your cellars are guarded, and I could say to you, as that good La Ramee said to me of the Duc de Beaufort, you must be either bird or mouse to get out.”
“He did get out, nevertheless.”
“Do you think of escaping in the same way?”
“I am a prisoner, then?”
“Parbleu!” said Mazarin, “I have been proving it to you this last hour.”
And he quietly resumed his dispatch at the place where he had been interrupted.
Anne, trembling with anger and scarlet with humiliation, left the room, shutting the door violently after her. Mazarin did not even turn around. When once more in her own apartment Anne fell into a chair and wept; then suddenly struck with an idea:
“I am saved!” she exclaimed, rising; “oh, yes! yes! I know a man who will find the means of taking me from Paris, a man I have too long forgotten.” Then falling into a reverie, she added, however, with an expression of joy, “Ungrateful woman that I am, for twenty years I have forgotten this man, whom I ought to have made a marechal of France. My mother-in-law expended gold, caresses, dignities on Concini, who ruined her; the king made Vitry marechal of France for an assassination: while I have left in obscurity, in poverty, the noble D’Artagnan, who saved me!”
And running to a table, on which were paper, pens and ink, she hastily began to write.
50. The Interview
It had been D’Artagnan’s practice, ever since the riots, to sleep in the same room as Porthos, and on this eventful morning he was still there, sleeping, and dreaming that a yellow cloud had overspread the sky and was raining gold pieces into his hat, which he held out till it was overflowing with pistoles. As for Porthos, he dreamed that the panels of his carriage were not capacious enough to contain the armorial bearings he had ordered to be painted on them. They were both aroused at seven o’clock by the entrance of an unliveried servant, who brought a letter for D’Artagnan.
“From whom?” asked the Gascon.
“From the queen,” replied the servant.
“Ho!” said Porthos, raising himself in his bed; “what does she say?”
D’Artagnan requested the servant to wait in the next room and when the door was closed he sprang up from his bed and read rapidly, whilst Porthos looked at him with starting eyes, not daring to ask a single question.
“Friend Porthos,” said D’Artagnan, handing the letter to him, “this time, at least, you are sure of your title of baron, and I of my captaincy. Read for yourself and judge.”
Porthos took the letter and with a trembling voice read the following words:
“The queen wishes to speak to Monsieur d’Artagnan, who must follow the bearer.”
“Well!” exclaimed Porthos; “I see nothing in that very extraordinary.”
“But I see much that is very extraordinary in it,” replied D’Artagnan. “It is evident, by their sending for me, that matters are becoming complicated. Just reflect a little what an agitation the queen’s mind must be in for her to have remembered me after twenty years.”
“It is true,” said Porthos.
“Sharpen your sword, baron, load your pistols, and give some corn to the horses, for I will answer for it, something lightning-like will happen ere to-morrow.”
“But, stop; do you think it can be a trap that they are laying for us?” suggested Porthos, incessantly thinking how his greatness must be irksome to inferior people.
“If it is a snare,” replied D’Artagnan, “I shall scent it out, be assured. If Mazarin is an Italian, I am a Gascon.”
And D’Artagnan dressed himself in an instant.
Whilst Porthos, still in bed, was hooking on his cloak for him, a second knock at the door was heard.
“Come in,” exclaimed D’Artagnan; and another servant entered.
“From His Eminence, Cardinal Mazarin,” presenting a letter.
D’Artagnan looked at Porthos.
“A complicated affair,” said Porthos; “where will you begin?”
“It is arranged capitally; his eminence expects me in half an hour.”
“Good.”
“My friend,” said D’Artagnan, turning to the servant, “tell his eminence that in half an hour I shall be at his command.”
“It is very fortunate,” resumed the Gascon, when the valet had retired, “that he did not meet the other one.”
“Do you not think that they have sent for you, both for the same thing?”
“I do not think it, I am certain of it.”
“Quick, quick, D’Artagnan. Remember that the queen awaits you, and after the queen, the cardinal, and after the cardinal, myself.”
D’Artagnan summoned Anne of Austria’s servant and signified that he was ready to follow him into the queen’s presence.
The servant conducted him by the Rue des Petits Champs and turning to the left entered the little garden gate leading into the Rue Richelieu; then they gained the private staircase and D’Artagnan was ushered into the oratory. A certain emotion, for which he could not account, made the lieutenant’s heart beat: he had no longer the assurance of youth; experience had taught him the importance of past events. Formerly he would have approached the queen as a young man who bends before a woman; but now it was a different thing; he answered her summons as an humble soldier obeys an illustrious general.
The silence of the oratory was at last disturbed by the slight rustling of silk, and D’Artagnan started when he perceived the tapestry raised by a white hand, which, by its form, its color and its beauty he recognized as that royal hand which had one day been presented to him to kiss. The queen entered.
“It is you, Monsieur d’Artagnan,” she said, fixing a gaze full of melancholy interest on the countenance of the officer, “and I know you well. Look at me well in your turn. I am the queen; do you recognize me?”
“No, madame,” replied D’Artagnan.
“But are you no longer aware,” continued Anne, giving that sweet expression to her voice which she could do at will, “that in former days the queen had once need of a young, brave and devoted cavalier-that she found this cavalier-and that, although he might have thought that she had forgotten him, she had kept a place for him in the depths of her heart?”
“No, madame, I was ignorant of that,” said the musketeer.
“So much the worse, sir,” said Anne of Austria; “so much the worse, at least for the queen, for to-day she has need of the same courage and the same devotion.”
“What!” exclaimed D’Artagnan, “does the queen, surrounded as she is by such devoted servants, such wise counselors, men, in short, so great by merit or position-does she deign to cast her eyes on an obscure soldier?”
Anne understood this covert reproach and was more moved than irritated by it. She had many a time felt humiliated by the self-sacrifice and disinterestedness shown by the Gascon gentleman. She had allowed herself to be exceeded in generosity.
“All that you tell me of those by whom I am surrounded, Monsieur d’Artagnan, is doubtless true,” said the queen, “but I have confidence in you alone. I know that you belong to the cardinal, but belong to me as well, and I will take upon myself the making of your fortune. Come, will you do to-day what formerly the gentleman you do not know did for the queen?”
“I will do everything your majesty commands,” replied D’Artagnan.
The queen reflected for a moment and then, seeing the cautious demeanor of the musketeer:
“Perhaps you like repose?” she said.
“I do not know, for I have never had it, madame.”
“Have you any friends?”
“I had three, two of whom have left Paris, to go I know not where. One alone is left to me, but he is one of those known, I believe, to the cavalier of whom your majesty did me the honor to speak.”
“Very good,” said the queen; “you and your friend are worth an army.”
“What am I to do, madame?”
“Return at five o’clock and I will tell you; but do not breathe to a living soul, sir, the rendezvous which I give you.”
“No, madame.”
“Swear it upon the cross.”
“Madame, I have never been false to my word; when I say I will not do a thing, I mean it.”
The queen, although astonished at this language, to which she was not accustomed from her courtiers, argued from it a happy omen of the zeal with which D’Artagnan would serve her in the accomplishment of her project. It was one of the Gascon’s artifices to hide his deep cunning occasionally under an appearance of rough loyalty.
“Has the queen any further commands for me now?” asked D’Artagnan.
“No, sir,” replied Anne of Austria, “and you may retire until the time that I mentioned to you.”
D’Artagnan bowed and went out.
“Diable!” he exclaimed when the door was shut, “they seem to have the greatest need of me just now.”
Then, as the half hour had already glided by, he crossed the gallery and knocked at the cardinal’s door.
Bernouin introduced him.
“I come for your commands, my lord,” he said.
And according to his custom D’Artagnan glanced rapidly around and remarked that Mazarin had a sealed letter before him. But it was so placed on the desk that he could not see to whom it was addressed.
“You come from the queen?” said Mazarin, looking fixedly at D’Artagnan.
“I! my lord-who told you that?”
“Nobody, but I know it.”
“I regret infinitely to tell you, my lord, that you are mistaken,” replied the Gascon, impudently, firm to the promise he had just made to Anne of Austria.
“I opened the door of the ante-room myself and I saw you enter at the end of the corridor.”
“Because I was shown up the private stairs.”
“How so?”
“I know not; it must have been a mistake.”
Mazarin was aware that it was not easy to make D’Artagnan reveal anything he was desirous of hiding, so he gave up, for the time, the discovery of the mystery the Gascon was concealing.
“Let us speak of my affairs,” said Mazarin, “since you will tell me naught of yours. Are you fond of traveling?”
“My life has been passed on the high road.”
“Would anything retain you particularly in Paris?”
“Nothing but an order from a superior would retain me in Paris.”
“Very well. Here is a letter, which must be taken to its address.”
“To its address, my lord? But it has none.”
In fact, the side of the letter opposite the seal was blank.
“I must tell you,” resumed Mazarin, “that it is in a double envelope.”
“I understand; and I am to take off the first one when I have reached a certain place?”
“Just so, take it and go. You have a friend, Monsieur du Vallon, whom I like much; let him accompany you.”
“The devil!” said D’Artagnan to himself. “He knows that we overheard his conversation yesterday and he wants to get us away from Paris.”
“Do you hesitate?” asked Mazarin.
“No, my lord, and I will set out at once. There is one thing only which I must request.”
“What is it? Speak.”
“That your eminence will go at once to the queen.”
“What for?”
“Merely to say these words: ‘I am going to send Monsieur d’Artagnan away and I wish him to set out directly.’”
“I told you,” said Mazarin, “that you had seen the queen.”
“I had the honor of saying to your eminence that there had been some mistake.”
“What is the meaning of that?”
“May I venture to repeat my prayer to your eminence?”
“Very well; I will go. Wait here for me.” And looking attentively around him, to see if he had left any of his keys in his closets, Mazarin went out. Ten minutes elapsed, during which D’Artagnan made every effort to read through the first envelope what was written on the second. But he did not succeed.
Mazarin returned, pale, and evidently thoughtful. He seated himself at his desk and D’Artagnan proceeded to examine his face, as he had just examined the letter he held, but the envelope which covered his countenance appeared as impenetrable as that which covered the letter.
“Ah!” thought the Gascon; “he looks displeased. Can it be with me? He meditates. Is it about sending me to the Bastile? All very fine, my lord, but at the very first hint you give of such a thing I will strangle you and become Frondist. I should be carried home in triumph like Monsieur Broussel and Athos would proclaim me the French Brutus. It would be exceedingly droll.”
The Gascon, with his vivid imagination, had already seen the advantage to be derived from his situation. Mazarin gave, however, no order of the kind, but on the contrary began to be insinuating.
“You were right,” he said, “my dear Monsieur d’Artagnan, and you cannot set out yet. I beg you to return me that dispatch.”
D’Artagnan obeyed, and Mazarin ascertained that the seal was intact.
“I shall want you this evening,” he said “Return in two hours.”
“My lord,” said D’Artagnan, “I have an appointment in two hours which I cannot miss.”
“Do not be uneasy,” said Mazarin; “it is the same.”
“Good!” thought D’Artagnan; “I fancied it was so.”
“Return, then, at five o’clock and bring that worthy Monsieur du Vallon with you. Only, leave him in the ante-room, as I wish to speak to you alone.”
