The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas (free biff chip and kipper ebooks .txt) 📕
- Author: Alexandre Dumas
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This silence and this interruption in serving, which were unintelligible to Porthos, had, on the contrary, a terrible meaning for the clerks. Upon a look from the procurator, accompanied by a smile from Mme. Coquenard, they arose slowly from the table, folded their napkins more slowly still, bowed, and retired.
“Go, young men! go and promote digestion by working,” said the procurator, gravely.
The clerks gone, Mme. Coquenard rose and took from a buffet a piece of cheese, some preserved quinces, and a cake which she had herself made of almonds and honey.
M Coquenard knit his eyebrows because there were too many good things. Porthos bit his lips because he saw not the wherewithal to dine. He looked to see if the dish of beans was still there; the dish of beans had disappeared.
“A positive feast!” cried M. Coquenard, turning about in his chair, “a real feast, EPULCE EPULORUM. Lucullus dines with Lucullus.”
Porthos looked at the bottle, which was near him, and hoped that with wine, bread, and cheese, he might make a dinner; but wine was wanting, the bottle was empty. M. and Mme. Coquenard did not seem to observe it.
“This is fine!” said Porthos to himself; “I am prettily caught!”
He passed his tongue over a spoonful of preserves, and stuck his teeth into the sticky pastry of Mme. Coquenard.
“Now,” said he, “the sacrifice is consummated! Ah! if I had not the hope of peeping with Madame Coquenard into her husband’s chest!”
M Coquenard, after the luxuries of such a repast, which he called an excess, felt the want of a siesta. Porthos began to hope that the thing would take place at the present sitting, and in that same locality; but the procurator would listen to nothing, he would be taken to his room, and was not satisfied till he was close to his chest, upon the edge of which, for still greater precaution, he placed his feet.
The procurator’s wife took Porthos into an adjoining room, and they began to lay the basis of a reconciliation.
“You can come and dine three times a week,” said Mme. Coquenard.
“Thanks, madame!” said Porthos, “but I don’t like to abuse your kindness; besides, I must think of my outfit!”
“That’s true,” said the procurator’s wife, groaning, “that unfortunate outfit!”
“Alas, yes,” said Porthos, “it is so.”
“But of what, then, does the equipment of your company consist, Monsieur Porthos?”
“Oh, of many things!” said Porthos. “The Musketeers are, as you know, picked soldiers, and they require many things useless to the Guardsmen or the Swiss.”
“But yet, detail them to me.”
“Why, they may amount to--“, said Porthos, who preferred discussing the total to taking them one by one.
The procurator’s wife waited tremblingly.
“To how much?” said she. “I hope it does not exceed--” She stopped; speech failed her.
“Oh, no,” said Porthos, “it does not exceed two thousand five hundred livres! I even think that with economy I could manage it with two thousand livres.”
“Good God!” cried she, “two thousand livres! Why, that is a fortune!”
Porthos made a most significant grimace; Mme. Coquenard understood it.
“I wished to know the detail,” said she, “because, having many relatives in business, I was almost sure of obtaining things at a hundred per cent less than you would pay yourself.”
“Ah, ah!” said Porthos, “that is what you meant to say!”
“Yes, dear Monsieur Porthos. Thus, for instance, don’t you in the first place want a horse?”
“Yes, a horse.”
“Well, then! I can just suit you.”
“Ah!” said Porthos, brightening, “that’s well as regards my horse; but I must have the appointments complete, as they include objects which a Musketeer alone can purchase, and which will not amount, besides, to more than three hundred livres.”
“Three hundred livres? Then put down three hundred livres,” said the procurator’s wife, with a sigh.
Porthos smiled. It may be remembered that he had the saddle which came from Buckingham. These three hundred livres he reckoned upon putting snugly into his pocket.
“Then,” continued he, “there is a horse for my lackey, and my valise. As to my arms, it is useless to trouble you about them; I have them.”
“A horse for your lackey?” resumed the procurator’s wife, hesitatingly; “but that is doing things in lordly style, my friend.”
“Ah, madame!” said Porthos, haughtily; “do you take me for a beggar?”
“No; I only thought that a pretty mule makes sometimes as good an appearance as a horse, and it seemed to me that by getting a pretty mule for Mousqueton--”
“Well, agreed for a pretty mule,” said Porthos; “you are right, I have seen very great Spanish nobles whose whole suite were mounted on mules. But then you understand, Madame Coquenard, a mule with feathers and bells.”
“Be satisfied,” said the procurator’s wife.
“There remains the valise,” added Porthos.
“Oh, don’t let that disturb you,” cried Mme. Coquenard. “My husband has five or six valises; you shall choose the best. There is one in particular which he prefers in his journeys, large enough to hold all the world.”
“Your valise is then empty?” asked Porthos, with simplicity.
“Certainly it is empty,” replied the procurator’s wife, in real innocence.
“Ah, but the valise I want,” cried Porthos, “is a well-filled one, my dear.”
Madame uttered fresh sighs. Moliere had not written his scene in “L’Avare” then. Mme. Coquenard was in the dilemma of Harpagan.
Finally, the rest of the equipment was successively debated in the same manner; and the result of the sitting was that the procurator’s wife should give eight hundred livres in money, and should furnish the horse and the mule which should have the honor of carrying Porthos and Mousqueton to glory.
These conditions being agreed to, Porthos took leave of Mme. Coquenard. The latter wished to detain him by darting certain tender glances; but Porthos urged the commands of duty, and the procurator’s wife was obliged to give place to the king.
The Musketeer returned home hungry and in bad humor.
Meantime, as we have said, despite the cries of his conscience and the wise counsels of Athos, d’Artagnan became hourly more in love with Milady. Thus he never failed to pay his diurnal court to her; and the self-satisfied Gascon was convinced that sooner or later she could not fail to respond.
One day, when he arrived with his head in the air, and as light at heart as a man who awaits a shower of gold, he found the SOUBRETTE under the gateway of the hotel; but this time the pretty Kitty was not contented with touching him as he passed, she took him gently by the hand.
“Good!” thought d’Artagnan, “She is charged with some message for me from her mistress; she is about to appoint some rendezvous of which she had not courage to speak.” And he looked down at the pretty girl with the most triumphant air imaginable.
“I wish to say three words to you, Monsieur Chevalier,” stammered the SOUBRETTE.
“Speak, my child, speak,” said d’Artagnan; “I listen.”
“Here? Impossible! That which I have to say is too long, and above all, too secret.”
“Well, what is to be done?”
“If Monsieur Chevalier would follow me?” said Kitty, timidly.
“Where you please, my dear child.”
“Come, then.”
And Kitty, who had not let go the hand of d’Artagnan, led him up a little dark, winding staircase, and after ascending about fifteen steps, opened a door.
“Come in here, Monsieur Chevalier,” said she; “here we shall be alone, and can talk.”
“And whose room is this, my dear child?”
“It is mine, Monsieur Chevalier; it communicates with my mistress’s by that door. But you need not fear. She will not hear what we say; she never goes to bed before midnight.”
D’Artagnan cast a glance around him. The little apartment was charming for its taste and neatness; but in spite of himself, his eyes were directed to that door which Kitty said led to Milady’s chamber.
Kitty guessed what was passing in the mind of the young man, and heaved a deep sigh.
“You love my mistress, then, very dearly, Monsieur Chevalier?” said she.
“Oh, more than I can say, Kitty! I am mad for her!”
Kitty breathed a second sigh.
“Alas, monsieur,” said she, “that is too bad.”
“What the devil do you see so bad in it?” said d’Artagnan.
“Because, monsieur,” replied Kitty, “my mistress loves you not at all.”
“HEIN!” said d’Artagnan, “can she have charged you to tell me so?”
“Oh, no, monsieur; but out of the regard I have for you, I have taken the resolution to tell you so.”
“Much obliged, my dear Kitty; but for the intention only--for the information, you must agree, is not likely to be at all agreeable.”
“That is to say, you don’t believe what I have told you; is it not so?”
“We have always some difficulty in believing such things, my pretty dear, were it only from self-love.”
“Then you don’t believe me?”
“I confess that unless you deign to give me some proof of what you advance--”
“What do you think of this?”
Kitty drew a little note from her bosom.
“For me?” said d’Artagnan, seizing the letter.
“No; for another.”
“For another?”
“Yes.”
“His name; his name!” cried d’Artagnan.
“Read the address.”
“Monsieur El Comte de Wardes.”
The remembrance of the scene at St. Germain presented itself to the mind of the presumptuous Gascon. As quick as thought, he tore open the letter, in spite of the cry which Kitty uttered on seeing what he was going to do, or rather, what he was doing.
“Oh, good Lord, Monsieur Chevalier,” said she, “what are you doing?”
“I?” said d’Artagnan; “nothing,” and he read,
“You have not answered my first note. Are you indisposed, or have you forgotten the glances you favored me with at the ball of Mme. de Guise? You have an opportunity now, Count; do not allow it to escape.”
d’Artagnan became very pale; he was wounded in his SELF-love: he thought that it was in his LOVE.
“Poor dear Monsieur d’Artagnan,” said Kitty, in a voice full of compassion, and pressing anew the young man’s hand.
“You pity me, little one?” said d’Artagnan.
“Oh, yes, and with all my heart; for I know what it is to be in love.”
“You know what it is to be in love?” said d’Artagnan, looking at her for the first time with much attention.
“Alas, yes.”
“Well, then, instead of pitying me, you would do much better to assist me in avenging myself on your mistress.”
“And what sort of revenge would you take?”
“I would triumph over her, and supplant my rival.”
“I will never help you in that, Monsieur Chevalier,” said Kitty, warmly.
“And why not?” demanded d’Artagnan.
“For two reasons.”
“What ones?”
“The first is that my mistress will never love you.”
“How do you know that?”
“You have cut her to the heart.”
“I? In what can I have offended her--I who ever since I have known her have lived at her feet like a slave? Speak, I beg you!”
“I will never confess that but to the man--who should read to the bottom of my soul!”
D’Artagnan looked at Kitty for the second time. The young girl had freshness and beauty which many duchesses would have purchased with their coronets.
“Kitty,” said he, “I will read to the bottom of your soul when-ever you like; don’t let that disturb you.” And he gave her a kiss at which the poor girl became as red as a cherry.
“Oh, no,” said Kitty, “it is not me you love! It is my mistress
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