The three musketeers
campaign, will he not, Madame Coquenard?”
This time Porthos received the blow right in his stomach, and felt it.
It appeared likewise that Mme. Coquenard was not less affected by it on
her part, for she added, “My cousin will not return if he finds that we
do not treat him kindly; but otherwise he has so little time to pass in
Paris, and consequently to spare to us, that we must entreat him to
give us every instant he can call his own previous to his departure.”
“Oh, my legs, my poor legs! where are you?” murmured Coquenard, and he
tried to smile.
This succor, which came to Porthos at the moment in which he was
attacked in his gastronomic hopes, inspired much gratitude in the
Musketeer toward the procurator’s wife.
The hour of dinner soon arrived. They passed into the eating room—a
large dark room situated opposite the kitchen.
The clerks, who, as it appeared, had smelled unusual perfumes in the
house, were of military punctuality, and held their stools in hand
quite ready to sit down. Their jaws moved preliminarily with fearful
threatenings.
“Indeed!” thought Porthos, casting a glance at the three hungry
clerks—for the errand boy, as might be expected, was not admitted to
the honors of the magisterial table, “in my cousin’s place, I would not
keep such gourmands! They look like shipwrecked sailors who have not
eaten for six weeks.”
M. Coquenard entered, pushed along upon his armchair with casters by
Mme. Coquenard, whom Porthos assisted in rolling her husband up to the
table. He had scarcely entered when he began to agitate his nose and
his jaws after the example of his clerks.
“Oh, oh!” said he; “here is a soup which is rather inviting.”
“What the devil can they smell so extraordinary in this soup?” said
Porthos, at the sight of a pale liquid, abundant but entirely free from
meat, on the surface of which a few crusts swam about as rare as the
islands of an archipelago.
Mme. Coquenard smiled, and upon a sign from her everyone eagerly took
his seat.
M. Coquenard was served first, then Porthos. Afterward Mme. Coquenard
filled her own plate, and distributed the crusts without soup to the
impatient clerks. At this moment the door of the dining room unclosed
with a creak, and Porthos perceived through the half-open flap the
little clerk who, not being allowed to take part in the feast, ate his
dry bread in the passage with the double odor of the dining room and
kitchen.
After the soup the maid brought a boiled fowl—a piece of magnificence
which caused the eyes of the diners to dilate in such a manner that
they seemed ready to burst.
“One may see that you love your family, Madame Coquenard,” said the
procurator, with a smile that was almost tragic. “You are certainly
treating your cousin very handsomely!”
The poor fowl was thin, and covered with one of those thick, bristly
skins through which the teeth cannot penetrate with all their efforts.
The fowl must have been sought for a long time on the perch, to which
it had retired to die of old age.
“The devil!” thought Porthos, “this is poor work. I respect old age,
but I don’t much like it boiled or roasted.”
And he looked round to see if anybody partook of his opinion; but on
the contrary, he saw nothing but eager eyes which were devouring, in
anticipation, that sublime fowl which was the object of his contempt.
Mme. Coquenard drew the dish toward her, skillfully detached the two
great black feet, which she placed upon her husband’s plate, cut off
the neck, which with the head she put on one side for herself, raised
the wing for Porthos, and then returned the bird otherwise intact to
the servant who had brought it in, who disappeared with it before the
Musketeer had time to examine the variations which disappointment
produces upon faces, according to the characters and temperaments of
those who experience it.
In the place of the fowl a dish of haricot beans made its appearance—an
enormous dish in which some bones of mutton that at first sight one
might have believed to have some meat on them pretended to show
themselves.
But the clerks were not the dupes of this deceit, and their lugubrious
looks settled down into resigned countenances.
Mme. Coquenard distributed this dish to the young men with the
moderation of a good housewife.
The time for wine came. M. Coquenard poured from a very small stone
bottle the third of a glass for each of the young men, served himself
in about the same proportion, and passed the bottle to Porthos and Mme.
Coquenard.
The young men filled up their third of a glass with water; then, when
they had drunk half the glass, they filled it up again, and continued
to do so. This brought them, by the end of the repast, to swallowing a
drink which from the color of the ruby had passed to that of a pale
topaz.
Porthos ate his wing of the fowl timidly, and shuddered when he felt
the knee of the procurator’s wife under the table, as it came in search
of his. He also drank half a glass of this sparingly served wine, and
found it to be nothing but that horrible Montreuil—the terror of all
expert palates.
M. Coquenard saw him swallowing this wine undiluted, and sighed deeply.
“Will you eat any of these beans, Cousin Porthos?” said Mme. Coquenard,
in that tone which says, “Take my advice, don’t touch them.”
“Devil take me if I taste one of them!” murmured Porthos to himself,
and then said aloud, “Thank you, my cousin, I am no longer hungry.”
There was silence. Porthos could hardly keep his countenance.
The procurator repeated several times, “Ah, Madame Coquenard! Accept my
compliments; your dinner has been a real feast. Lord, how I have
eaten!”
M. Coquenard had eaten his soup, the black feet of the fowl, and the
only mutton bone on which there was the least appearance of meat.
Porthos fancied they were mystifying him, and began to curl his
mustache and knit his eyebrows; but the knee of Mme. Coquenard gently
advised him to be patient.
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, _epulœ 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. Molière 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.