The three musketeers
As soon as these studs shall be in your possession, inform me.
Chapter XV.
MEN OF THE ROBE AND MEN OF THE SWORD
On the day after these events had taken place, Athos not having
reappeared, M. de Tréville was informed by D’Artagnan and Porthos of
the circumstance. As to Aramis, he had asked for leave of absence for
five days, and was gone, it was said, to Rouen on family business.
M. de Tréville was the father of his soldiers. The lowest or the least
known of them, as soon as he assumed the uniform of the company, was as
sure of his aid and support as if he had been his own brother.
He repaired, then, instantly to the office of the
_lieutenant-criminel_. The officer who commanded the post of the Red
Cross was sent for, and by successive inquiries they learned that Athos
was then lodged in Fort l’Evêque.
Athos had passed through all the examinations we have seen Bonacieux
undergo.
We were present at the scene in which the two captives were confronted
with each other. Athos, who had till that time said nothing for fear
that D’Artagnan, interrupted in his turn, should not have the time
necessary, from this moment declared that his name was Athos, and not
D’Artagnan. He added that he did not know either M. or Mme. Bonacieux;
that he had never spoken to the one or the other; that he had come, at
about ten o’clock in the evening, to pay a visit to his friend M.
d’Artagnan, but that till that hour he had been at M. de Tréville’s,
where he had dined. “Twenty witnesses,” added he, “could attest the
fact”; and he named several distinguished gentlemen, and among them was
M. le Duc de la Trémouille.
The second commissary was as much bewildered as the first had been by
the simple and firm declaration of the Musketeer, upon whom he was
anxious to take the revenge which men of the robe like at all times to
gain over men of the sword; but the name of M. de Tréville, and that of
M. de la Trémouille, commanded a little reflection.
Athos was then sent to the cardinal; but unfortunately the cardinal was
at the Louvre with the king.
It was precisely at this moment that M. de Tréville, on leaving the
residence of the _lieutenant-criminel_ and the governor of Fort
l’Evêque without being able to find Athos, arrived at the palace.
As captain of the Musketeers, M. de Tréville had the right of entry at
all times.
It is well known how violent the king’s prejudices were against the
queen, and how carefully these prejudices were kept up by the cardinal,
who in affairs of intrigue mistrusted women infinitely more than men.
One of the grand causes of this prejudice was the friendship of Anne of
Austria for Mme. de Chevreuse. These two women gave him more uneasiness
than the war with Spain, the quarrel with England, or the embarrassment
of the finances. In his eyes and to his conviction, Mme. de Chevreuse
not only served the queen in her political intrigues, but, what
tormented him still more, in her amorous intrigues.
At the first word the cardinal spoke of Mme. de Chevreuse—who, though
exiled to Tours and believed to be in that city, had come to Paris,
remained there five days, and outwitted the police—the king flew into a
furious passion. Capricious and unfaithful, the king wished to be
called Louis the Just and Louis the Chaste. Posterity will find a
difficulty in understanding this character, which history explains only
by facts and never by reason.
But when the cardinal added that not only Mme. de Chevreuse had been in
Paris, but still further, that the queen had renewed with her one of
those mysterious correspondences which at that time was named a
_cabal;_ when he affirmed that he, the cardinal, was about to unravel
the most closely twisted thread of this intrigue; that at the moment of
arresting in the very act, with all the proofs about her, the queen’s
emissary to the exiled duchess, a Musketeer had dared to interrupt the
course of justice violently, by falling sword in hand upon the honest
men of the law, charged with investigating impartially the whole affair
in order to place it before the eyes of the king—Louis XIII. could not
contain himself, and he made a step toward the queen’s apartment with
that pale and mute indignation which, when it broke out, led this
prince to the commission of the most pitiless cruelty. And yet, in all
this, the cardinal had not yet said a word about the Duke of
Buckingham.
At this instant M. de Tréville entered, cool, polite, and in
irreproachable costume.
Informed of what had passed by the presence of the cardinal and the
alteration in the king’s countenance, M. de Tréville felt himself
something like Samson before the Philistines.
Louis XIII. had already placed his hand on the knob of the door; at the
noise of M. de Tréville’s entrance he turned round. “You arrive in good
time, monsieur,” said the king, who, when his passions were raised to a
certain point, could not dissemble; “I have learned some fine things
concerning your Musketeers.”
“And I,” said Tréville, coldly, “I have some pretty things to tell your
Majesty concerning these gownsmen.”
“What?” said the king, with hauteur.
“I have the honor to inform your Majesty,” continued M. de Tréville, in
the same tone, “that a party of _procureurs_, commissaries, and men of
the police—very estimable people, but very inveterate, as it appears,
against the uniform—have taken upon themselves to arrest in a house, to
lead away through the open street, and throw into Fort l’Evêque, all
upon an order which they have refused to show me, one of my, or rather
your Musketeers, sire, of irreproachable conduct, of an almost
illustrious reputation, and whom your Majesty knows favorably, Monsieur
Athos.”
“Athos,” said the king, mechanically; “yes, certainly I know that
name.”
“Let your Majesty remember,” said Tréville, “that Monsieur Athos is the
Musketeer who, in the annoying duel which you are acquainted with, had
the misfortune to wound Monsieur de Cahusac so seriously. _A propos_,
monseigneur,” continued Tréville, addressing the cardinal, “Monsieur de
Cahusac is quite recovered, is he not?”
“Thank you,” said the cardinal, biting his lips with anger.
“Athos, then, went to pay a visit to one of his friends absent at the
time,” continued Tréville, “to a young Béarnais, a cadet in his
Majesty’s Guards, the company of Monsieur Dessessart, but scarcely had
he arrived at his friend’s and taken up a book, while waiting his
return, when a mixed crowd of bailiffs and soldiers came and laid siege
to the house, broke open several doors—”
The cardinal made the king a sign, which signified, “That was on
account of the affair about which I spoke to you.”
“We all know that,” interrupted the king; “for all that was done for
our service.”
“Then,” said Tréville, “it was also for your Majesty’s service that one
of my Musketeers, who was innocent, has been seized, that he has been
placed between two guards like a malefactor, and that this gallant man,
who has ten times shed his blood in your Majesty’s service and is ready
to shed it again, has been paraded through the midst of an insolent
populace?”
“Bah!” said the king, who began to be shaken, “was it so managed?”
“Monsieur de Tréville,” said the cardinal, with the greatest phlegm,
“does not tell your Majesty that this innocent Musketeer, this gallant
man, had only an hour before attacked, sword in hand, four commissaries
of inquiry, who were delegated by myself to examine into an affair of
the highest importance.”
“I defy your Eminence to prove it,” cried Tréville, with his Gascon
freedom and military frankness; “for one hour before, Monsieur Athos,
who, I will confide it to your Majesty, is really a man of the highest
quality, did me the honor after having dined with me to be conversing
in the saloon of my hôtel, with the Duc de la Trémouille and the Comte
de Châlus, who happened to be there.”
The king looked at the cardinal.
“A written examination attests it,” said the cardinal, replying aloud
to the mute interrogation of his Majesty; “and the ill-treated people
have drawn up the following, which I have the honor to present to your
Majesty.”
“And is the written report of the gownsmen to be placed in comparison
with the word of honor of a swordsman?” replied Tréville haughtily.
“Come, come, Tréville, hold your tongue,” said the king.
“If his Eminence entertains any suspicion against one of my
Musketeers,” said Tréville, “the justice of Monsieur the Cardinal is so
well known that I demand an inquiry.”
“In the house in which the judicial inquiry was made,” continued the
impassive cardinal, “there lodges, I believe, a young Béarnais, a
friend of the Musketeer.”
“Your Eminence means Monsieur d’Artagnan.”
“I mean a young man whom you patronize, Monsieur de Tréville.”
“Yes, your Eminence, it is the same.”
“Do you not suspect this young man of having given bad counsel?”
“To Athos, to a man double his age?” interrupted Tréville. “No,
monseigneur. Besides, D’Artagnan passed the evening with me.”
“Well,” said the cardinal, “everybody seems to have passed the evening
with you.”
“Does your Eminence doubt my word?” said Tréville, with a brow flushed
with anger.
“No, God forbid,” said the cardinal; “only, at what hour was he with
you?”
“Oh, as to that I can speak positively, your Eminence; for as he came
in I remarked that it was but half past nine by the clock, although I
had believed it to be later.”
“At what hour did he leave your hôtel?”
“At half past ten—an hour after the event.”
“Well,” replied the cardinal, who could not for an instant suspect the
loyalty of Tréville, and who felt that the victory was escaping him,
“well, but Athos _was_ taken in the house in the Rue des Fossoyeurs.”
“Is one friend forbidden to visit another, or a Musketeer of my company
to fraternize with a Guard of Dessessart’s company?”
“Yes, when the house where he fraternizes is suspected.”
“That house is suspected, Tréville,” said the king; “perhaps you did
not know it?”
“Indeed, sire, I did not. The house may be suspected; but I deny that
it is so in the part of it inhabited by Monsieur d’Artagnan, for I can
affirm, sire, if I can believe what he says, that there does not exist
a more devoted servant of your Majesty, or a more profound admirer of
Monsieur the Cardinal.”
“Was it not this D’Artagnan who wounded Jussac one day, in that
unfortunate encounter which took place near the Convent of the
Carmes-Déchaussés?” asked the king, looking at the cardinal, who
colored with vexation.
“And the next day, Bernajoux. Yes, sire, yes, it is the same; and your
Majesty has a good memory.”
“Come, how shall we decide?” said the king.
“That concerns your Majesty more than me,” said the cardinal. “I should
affirm the culpability.”
“And I deny it,” said Tréville. “But his Majesty has judges, and these
judges will decide.”
“That is best,” said the king. “Send the case before the judges; it is
their business to judge, and they shall judge.”
“Only,” replied Tréville, “it is a sad thing that in the unfortunate
times in which we live, the purest life, the most incontestable virtue,
cannot exempt a man from infamy and persecution. The army, I will
answer for it, will be but little pleased at being exposed to rigorous
treatment on account of police affairs.”
The expression was imprudent; but M. de Tréville launched it with
knowledge of his cause. He was desirous of an explosion, because in
that case the mine throws forth fire, and fire enlightens.
“Police affairs!” cried the king, taking up Tréville’s words, “police
affairs! And what do you know about them, Monsieur? Meddle with your
Musketeers, and do not annoy me in this way. It appears, according to
your account, that if by mischance a Musketeer is arrested, France is