Twenty years after
Nevertheless, they were still in a state of uncertainty. Several inns
were visited by them, several innkeepers questioned, without a single
clew being given to guide their inquiries, when at Montreuil Athos felt
upon the table that something rough was touching his delicate fingers.
He turned up the cloth and found these hieroglyphics carved upon the
wood with a knife:
“Port.... D’Art.... 2d February.”
“This is capital!” said Athos to Aramis, “we were to have slept here,
but we cannot—we must push on.” They rode forward and reached
Abbeville. There the great number of inns puzzled them; they could not
go to all; how could they guess in which those whom they were seeking
had stayed?
“Trust me,” said Aramis, “do not expect to find anything in Abbeville.
If we had only been looking for Porthos, Porthos would have stationed
himself in one of the finest hotels and we could easily have traced
him. But D’Artagnan is devoid of such weaknesses. Porthos would have
found it very difficult even to make him see that he was dying of
hunger; he has gone on his road as inexorable as fate and we must seek
him somewhere else.”
They continued their route. It had now become a weary and almost
hopeless task, and had it not been for the threefold motives of honor,
friendship and gratitude, implanted in their hearts, our two travelers
would have given up many a time their rides over the sand, their
interrogatories of the peasantry and their close inspection of faces.
They proceeded thus to Péronne.
Athos began to despair. His noble nature felt that their ignorance was
a sort of reflection upon them. They had not looked carefully enough
for their lost friends. They had not shown sufficient pertinacity in
their inquiries. They were willing and ready to retrace their steps,
when, in crossing the suburb which leads to the gates of the town, upon
a white wall which was at the corner of a street turning around the
rampart, Athos cast his eyes upon a drawing in black chalk, which
represented, with the awkwardness of a first attempt, two cavaliers
riding furiously; one of them carried a roll of paper on which were
written these words: “They are following us.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Athos, “here it is, as clear as day; pursued as he was,
D’Artagnan would not have tarried here five minutes had he been pressed
very closely, which gives us hopes that he may have succeeded in
escaping.”
Aramis shook his head.
“Had he escaped we should either have seen him or have heard him spoken
of.”
“You are right, Aramis, let us travel on.”
To describe the impatience and anxiety of these two friends would be
impossible. Uneasiness took possession of the tender, constant heart of
Athos, and fearful forecasts were the torment of the impulsive Aramis.
They galloped on for two or three hours as furiously as the cavaliers
on the wall. All at once, in a narrow pass, they perceived that the
road was partially barricaded by an enormous stone. It had evidently
been rolled across the pass by some arm of giant strength.
Aramis stopped.
“Oh!” he said, looking at the stone, “this is the work of either
Hercules or Porthos. Let us get down, count, and examine this rock.”
They both alighted. The stone had been brought with the evident
intention of barricading the road, but some one having perceived the
obstacle had partially turned it aside.
With the assistance of Blaisois and Grimaud the friends succeeded in
turning the stone over. Upon the side next the ground were scratched
the following words:
“Eight of the light dragoons are pursuing us. If we reach Compiègne we
shall stop at the Peacock. It is kept by a friend of ours.”
“At last we have something definite,” said Athos; “let us go to the
Peacock.”
“Yes,” answered Aramis, “but if we are to get there we must rest our
horses, for they are almost broken-winded.”
Aramis was right; they stopped at the first tavern and made each horse
swallow a double quantity of corn steeped in wine; they gave them three
hours’ rest and then set off again. The men themselves were almost dead
with fatigue, but hope supported them.
In six hours they reached Compiègne and alighted at the Peacock. The
host proved to be a worthy man, as bald as a Chinaman. They asked him
if some time ago he had not received in his house two gentlemen who
were pursued by dragoons; without answering he went out and brought in
the blade of a rapier.
“Do you know that?” he asked.
Athos merely glanced at it.
“’Tis D’Artagnan’s sword,” he said.
“Does it belong to the smaller or to the larger of the two?” asked the
host.
“To the smaller.”
“I see that you are the friends of these gentlemen.”
“Well, what has happened to them?”
“They were pursued by eight of the light dragoons, who rode into the
courtyard before they had time to close the gate.”
“Eight!” said Aramis; “it surprises me that two such heroes as Porthos
and D’Artagnan should have allowed themselves to be arrested by eight
men.”
“The eight men would doubtless have failed had they not been assisted
by twenty soldiers of the regiment of Italians in the king’s service,
who are in garrison in this town so that your friends were overpowered
by numbers.”
“Arrested, were they?” inquired Athos; “is it known why?”
“No, sir, they were carried off instantly, and had not even time to
tell me why; but as soon as they were gone I found this broken
sword-blade, as I was helping to raise two dead men and five or six
wounded ones.”
“’Tis still a consolation that they were not wounded,” said Aramis.
“Where were they taken?” asked Athos.
“Toward the town of Louvres,” was the reply.
The two friends having agreed to leave Blaisois and Grimaud at
Compiègne with the horses, resolved to take post horses; and having
snatched a hasty dinner they continued their journey to Louvres. Here
they found only one inn, in which was consumed a liqueur which
preserves its reputation to our time and which is still made in that
town.
“Let us alight here,” said Athos. “D’Artagnan will not have let slip an
opportunity of drinking a glass of this liqueur, and at the same time
leaving some trace of himself.”
They went into the town and asked for two glasses of liqueur, at the
counter—as their friends must have done before them. The counter was
covered with a plate of pewter; upon this plate was written with the
point of a large pin: “Rueil... D..”
“They went to Rueil,” cried Aramis.
“Let us go to Rueil,” said Athos.
“It is to throw ourselves into the wolf’s jaws,” said Aramis.
“Had I been as great a friend of Jonah as I am of D’Artagnan I should
have followed him even into the inside of the whale itself; and you
would have done the same, Aramis.”
“Certainly—but you make me out better than I am, dear count. Had I been
alone I should scarcely have gone to Rueil without great caution. But
where you go, I go.”
They then set off for Rueil. Here the deputies of the parliament had
just arrived, in order to enter upon those famous conferences which
were to last three weeks, and produced eventually that shameful peace,
at the conclusion of which the prince was arrested. Rueil was crowded
with advocates, presidents and councillors, who came from the
Parisians, and, on the side of the court, with officers and guards; it
was therefore easy, in the midst of this confusion, to remain as
unobserved as any one might wish; besides, the conferences implied a
truce, and to arrest two gentlemen, even Frondeurs, at this time, would
have been an attack on the rights of the people.
The two friends mingled with the crowd and fancied that every one was
occupied with the same thought that tormented them. They expected to
hear some mention made of D’Artagnan or of Porthos, but every one was
engrossed by articles and reforms. It was the advice of Athos to go
straight to the minister.
“My friend,” said Aramis, “take care; our safety lies in our obscurity.
If we were to make ourselves known we should be sent to rejoin our
friends in some deep ditch, from which the devil himself could not take
us out. Let us try not to find them out by accident, but from our
notions. Arrested at Compiègne, they have been carried to Rueil; at
Rueil they have been questioned by the cardinal, who has either kept
them near him or sent them to Saint Germain. As to the Bastile, they
are not there, though the Bastile is especially for the Frondeurs. They
are not dead, for the death of D’Artagnan would make a sensation. As
for Porthos, I believe him to be eternal, like God, although less
patient. Do not let us despond, but wait at Rueil, for my conviction is
that they are at Rueil. But what ails you? You are pale.”
“It is this,” answered Athos, with a trembling voice.
“I remember that at the Castle of Rueil the Cardinal Richelieu had some
horrible ‘oubliettes’ constructed.”
“Oh! never fear,” said Aramis. “Richelieu was a gentleman, our equal in
birth, our superior in position. He could, like the king, touch the
greatest of us on the head, and touching them make such heads shake on
their shoulders. But Mazarin is a low-born rogue, who can at the most
take us by the collar, like an archer. Be calm—for I am sure that
D’Artagnan and Porthos are at Rueil, alive and well.”
“But,” resumed Athos, “I recur to my first proposal. I know no better
means than to act with candor. I shall seek, not Mazarin, but the
queen, and say to her, ‘Madame, restore to us your two servants and our
two friends.’”
Aramis shook his head.
“’Tis a last resource, but let us not employ it till it is imperatively
called for; let us rather persevere in our researches.”
They continued their inquiries and at last met with a light dragoon who
had formed one of the guard which had escorted D’Artagnan to Rueil.
Athos, however, perpetually recurred to his proposed interview with the
queen.
“In order to see the queen,” said Aramis, “we must first see the
cardinal; and when we have seen the cardinal—remember what I tell you,
Athos—we shall be reunited to our friends, but not in the way you wish.
Now, that way of joining them is not very attractive to me, I confess.
Let us act in freedom, that we may act well and quickly.”
“I shall go,” he said, “to the queen.”
“Well, then,” answered Aramis, “pray tell me a day or two beforehand,
that I may take that opportunity of going to Paris.”
“To whom?”
“Zounds! how do I know? perhaps to Madame de Longueville. She is
all-powerful yonder; she will help me. But send me word should you be
arrested, for then I will return directly.”
“Why do you not take your chance and be arrested with me?”
“No, I thank you.”
“Should we, by being arrested, be all four together again, we should
not, I am not sure, be twenty-four hours in prison without getting
free.”
“My friend, since I killed Châtillon, adored of the ladies of Saint
Germain, I am too great a celebrity not to fear a prison doubly. The
queen is likely to follow Mazarin’s counsels and to have me tried.”
“Do you think she loves this Italian so much as they say she does?”
“Did she not love an Englishman?”
“My friend, she is a woman.”
“No, no, you are deceived—she is a queen.”
“Dear friend, I shall sacrifice myself and go and see Anne of Austria.”
“Adieu, Athos, I am going to raise an army.”
“For what purpose?”
“To come back and besiege Rueil.”
“Where shall we meet again?”
“At the foot of the cardinal’s gallows.”
The two friends departed—Aramis to return to Paris, Athos to take
measures preparatory to an interview with the queen.
Chapter LXXX.
The Gratitude of Anne of Austria.
Athos found much less difficulty than he had expected in obtaining an
audience of Anne of Austria. It was granted, and was to take place
after her morning’s “levee,” at which, in accordance with his rights of