Twenty years after
“Help!” cried D’Artagnan. “What! will you let me be killed? _Jésus
Seigneur!_”
No sooner had he uttered this cry than the door opened and Athos and
Aramis rushed out. The coast, owing to the Gascon’s stratagem, was
clear.
“The prisoners are escaping! the prisoners are escaping!” cried the
sergeant.
“Stop! stop!” cried D’Artagnan, giving rein to his famous steed, who,
darting forth, overturned several men.
“Stop! stop!” cried the soldiers, and ran for their arms.
But the prisoners were in their saddles and lost no time hastening to
the nearest gate.
In the middle of the street they saw Grimaud and Blaisois, who were
coming to find their masters. With one wave of his hand Athos made
Grimaud, who followed the little troop, understand everything, and they
passed on like a whirlwind, D’Artagnan still directing them from behind
with his voice.
They passed through the gate like apparitions, without the guards
thinking of detaining them, and reached the open country.
All this time the soldiers were calling out, “Stop! stop!” and the
sergeant, who began to see that he was the victim of an artifice, was
almost in a frenzy of despair. Whilst all this was going on, a cavalier
in full gallop was seen approaching. It was Mordaunt with the order in
his hand.
“The prisoners!” he exclaimed, jumping off his horse.
The sergeant had not the courage to reply; he showed him the open door,
the empty room. Mordaunt darted to the steps, understood all, uttered a
cry, as if his very heart was pierced, and fell fainting on the stone
steps.
Chapter LIX.
Noble Natures never lose Courage, nor good Stomachs their Appetites.
The little troop, without looking behind them or exchanging a word,
fled at a rapid gallop, fording a little stream, of which none of them
knew the name, and leaving on their left a town which Athos declared to
be Durham. At last they came in sight of a small wood, and spurring
their horses afresh, rode in its direction.
As soon as they had disappeared behind a green curtain sufficiently
thick to conceal them from the sight of any one who might be in pursuit
they drew up to hold a council together. The two grooms held the
horses, that they might take a little rest without being unsaddled, and
Grimaud was posted as sentinel.
“Come, first of all,” said Athos to D’Artagnan, “my friend, that I may
shake hands with you—you, our rescuer—you, the true hero of us all.”
“Athos is right—you have my adoration,” said Aramis, in his turn
pressing his hand. “To what are you not equal, with your superior
intelligence, infallible eye, your arm of iron and your enterprising
mind!”
“Now,” said the Gascon, “that is all well, I accept for Porthos and
myself everything—thanks and compliments; we have plenty of time to
spare.”
The two friends, recalled by D’Artagnan to what was also due to
Porthos, pressed his hand in their turn.
“And now,” said Athos, “it is not our plan to run anywhere and like
madmen, but we must map up our campaign. What shall we do?”
“What are we going to do, i’faith? It is not very difficult to say.”
“Tell us, then, D’Artagnan.”
“We are going to reach the nearest seaport, unite our little resources,
hire a vessel and return to France. As for me I will give my last sou
for it. Life is the greatest treasure, and speaking candidly, ours
hangs by a thread.”
“What do you say to this, Du Vallon?”
“I,” said Porthos, “I am entirely of D’Artagnan’s opinion; this is a
‘beastly’ country, this England.”
“You are quite decided, then, to leave it?” asked Athos of D’Artagnan.
“Egad! I don’t see what is to keep me here.”
A glance was exchanged between Athos and Aramis.
“Go, then, my friends,” said the former, sighing.
“How, go then?” exclaimed D’Artagnan. “Let us go, you mean?”
“No, my friend,” said Athos, “you must leave us.”
“Leave you!” cried D’Artagnan, quite bewildered at this unexpected
announcement.
“Bah!” said Porthos, “why separate, since we are all together?”
“Because you can and ought to return to France; your mission is
accomplished, but ours is not.”
“Your mission is not accomplished?” exclaimed D’Artagnan, looking in
astonishment at Athos.
“No, my friend,” replied Athos, in his gentle but decided voice, “we
came here to defend King Charles; we have but ill defended him—it
remains for us to save him!”
“To save the king?” said D’Artagnan, looking at Aramis as he had looked
at Athos.
Aramis contented himself by making a sign with his head.
D’Artagnan’s countenance took an expression of the deepest compassion;
he began to think he had to do with madmen.
“You cannot be speaking seriously, Athos!” said he; “the king is
surrounded by an army, which is conducting him to London. This army is
commanded by a butcher, or the son of a butcher—it matters
little—Colonel Harrison. His majesty, I can assure you, will be tried
on his arrival in London; I have heard enough from the lips of Oliver
Cromwell to know what to expect.”
A second look was exchanged between Athos and Aramis.
“And when the trial is ended there will be no delay in putting the
sentence into execution,” continued D’Artagnan.
“And to what penalty do you think the king will be condemned?” asked
Athos.
“The penalty of death, I greatly fear; they have gone too far for him
to pardon them, and there is nothing left to them but one thing, and
that is to kill him. Have you never heard what Oliver Cromwell said
when he came to Paris and was shown the dungeon at Vincennes where
Monsieur de Vendôme was imprisoned?”
“What did he say?” asked Porthos.
“‘Princes must be knocked on the head.’”
“I remember it,” said Athos.
“And you fancy he will not put his maxim into execution, now that he
has got hold of the king?”
“On the contrary, I am certain he will do so. But then that is all the
more reason why we should not abandon the august head so threatened.”
“Athos, you are becoming mad.”
“No, my friend,” Athos gently replied, “but De Winter sought us out in
France and introduced us, Monsieur d’Herblay and myself, to Madame
Henrietta. Her majesty did us the honor to ask our aid for her husband.
We engaged our word; our word included everything. It was our strength,
our intelligence, our life, in short, that we promised. It remains now
for us to keep our word. Is that your opinion, D’Herblay?”
“Yes,” said Aramis, “we have promised.”
“Then,” continued Athos, “we have another reason; it is this—listen: In
France at this moment everything is poor and paltry. We have a king ten
years old, who doesn’t yet know what he wants; we have a queen blinded
by a belated passion; we have a minister who governs France as he would
govern a great farm—that is to say, intent only on turning out all the
gold he can by the exercise of Italian cunning and invention; we have
princes who set up a personal and egotistic opposition, who will draw
from Mazarin’s hands only a few ingots of gold or some shreds of power
granted as bribes. I have served them without enthusiasm—God knows that
I estimated them at their real value, and that they are not high in my
esteem—but on principle. To-day I am engaged in a different affair. I
have encountered misfortune in a high place, a royal misfortune, a
European misfortune; I attach myself to it. If we can succeed in saving
the king it will be good; if we die for him it will be grand.”
“So you know beforehand you must perish!” said D’Artagnan.
“We fear so, and our only regret is to die so far from both of _you_.”
“What will you do in a foreign land, an enemy’s country?”
“I traveled in England when I was young, I speak English like an
Englishman, and Aramis, too, knows something of the language. Ah! if we
had you, my friends! With you, D’Artagnan, with you, Porthos—all four
reunited for the first time for twenty years—we would dare not only
England, but the three kingdoms put together!”
“And did you promise the queen,” resumed D’Artagnan, petulantly, “to
storm the Tower of London, to kill a hundred thousand soldiers, to
fight victoriously against the wishes of the nation and the ambition of
a man, and when that man is Cromwell? Do not exaggerate your duty. In
Heaven’s name, my dear Athos, do not make a useless sacrifice. When I
see you merely, you look like a reasonable being; when you speak, I
seem to have to do with a madman. Come, Porthos, join me; say frankly,
what do you think of this business?”
“Nothing good,” replied Porthos.
“Come,” continued D’Artagnan, who, irritated that instead of listening
to him Athos seemed to be attending to his own thoughts, “you have
never found yourself the worse for my advice. Well, then, believe me,
Athos, your mission is ended, and ended nobly; return to France with
us.”
“Friend,” said Athos, “our resolution is irrevocable.”
“Then you have some other motive unknown to us?”
Athos smiled and D’Artagnan struck his hands together in anger and
muttered the most convincing reasons that he could discover; but to all
these reasons Athos contented himself by replying with a calm, sweet
smile and Aramis by nodding his head.
“Very well,” cried D’Artagnan, at last, furious, “very well, since you
wish it, let us leave our bones in this beggarly land, where it is
always cold, where fine weather is a fog, fog is rain, and rain a
deluge; where the sun represents the moon and the moon a cream cheese;
in truth, whether we die here or elsewhere matters little, since we
must die.”
“Only reflect, my good fellow,” said Athos, “it is but dying rather
sooner.”
“Pooh! a little sooner or a little later, it isn’t worth quarreling
over.”
“If I am astonished at anything,” remarked Porthos, sententiously, “it
is that it has not already happened.”
“Oh, it will happen, you may be sure,” said D’Artagnan. “So it is
agreed, and if Porthos makes no objection——”
“I,” said Porthos, “I will do whatever you please; and besides, I think
what the Comte de la Fère said just now is very good.”
“But your future career, D’Artagnan—your ambition, Porthos?”
“Our future, our ambition!” replied D’Artagnan, with feverish
volubility. “Need we think of that since we are to save the king? The
king saved—we shall assemble our friends together—we will head the
Puritans—reconquer England; we shall re-enter London—place him securely
on his throne——”
“And he will make us dukes and peers,” said Porthos, whose eyes
sparkled with joy at this imaginary prospect.
“Or he will forget us,” added D’Artagnan.
“Oh!” said Porthos.
“Well, that has happened, friend Porthos. It seems to me that we once
rendered Anne of Austria a service not much less than that which to-day
we are trying to perform for Charles I.; but, none the less, Anne of
Austria has forgotten us for twenty years.”
“Well, in spite of that, D’Artagnan,” said Athos, “you are not sorry
that you were useful to her?”
“No, indeed,” said D’Artagnan; “I admit even that in my darkest moments
I find consolation in that remembrance.”
“You see, then, D’Artagnan, though princes often are ungrateful, God
never is.”
“Athos,” said D’Artagnan, “I believe that were you to fall in with the
devil, you would conduct yourself so well that you would take him with
you to Heaven.”
“So, then?” said Athos, offering his hand to D’Artagnan.
“’Tis settled,” replied D’Artagnan. “I find England a charming country,
and I stay—but on one condition only.”
“What is it?”
“That I am not forced to learn English.”
“Well, now,” said Athos, triumphantly, “I swear to you, my friend, by
the God who hears us—I believe that there is a power watching over us,
and that we shall all four see France again.”
“So be it!” said D’Artagnan, “but I—I confess I have a contrary
conviction.”
“Our good D’Artagnan,” said Aramis, “represents among us the opposition