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 Compiegne 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 Compiegne 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
Compiegne, 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 Chatillon, 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.
80
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 birth, he was entitled to
be present. A vast crowd filled the apartments of Saint
Germain. Anne had never at the Louvre had so large a court;
but this crowd represented chiefly the second class of
nobility, while the Prince de Conti, the Duc de Beaufort and
the coadjutor assembled around them the first nobility of
France.
The greatest possible gayety prevailed at court. The
particular characteristic of this was that more songs were
made than cannons fired during its continuance. The court
made songs on the Parisians and the Parisians on the court;
and the casualties, though not mortal, were painful, as are
all wounds inflicted by the weapon of ridicule.
In the midst of this seeming hilarity, nevertheless,
people's minds were uneasy. Was Mazarin to remain the
favorite and minister of the queen? Was he to be carried
back by the wind which had blown him there? Every one hoped
so, so that the minister felt that all around him, beneath
the homage of the courtiers, lay a fund of hatred, ill
disguised by fear and interest. He felt ill at ease and at a
loss what to do.
Conde himself, whilst fighting for him, lost no opportunity
of ridiculing, of humbling him. The queen, on whom he threw
himself as sole support, seemed to him now not much to be
relied upon.
When the hour appointed for the audience arrived Athos was
obliged to stay until the queen, who was waited upon by a
new deputation from Paris, had consulted with her minister
as to the propriety and manner of receiving them. All were
fully engrossed with the affairs of the day; Athos could not
therefore have chosen a more inauspicious moment to speak of
his friends -- poor atoms, lost in that raging whirlwind.
But Athos was a man of inflexible determination; he firmly
adhered to a purpose once formed, when it seemed to him to
spring from conscience and to be prompted by a sense of
duty. He insisted on being introduced, saying that although
he was not a deputy from Monsieur de Conti, or Monsieur de
Beaufort, or Monsieur de Bouillon, or Monsieur d'Elbeuf, or
the coadjutor, or Madame de Longueville, or Broussel, or the
Parliament, and although he had come on his own private
account, he nevertheless had things to say to her majesty of
the utmost importance.
The conference being finished, the queen summoned him to her
cabinet.
Athos was introduced and announced by name. It was a name
that too often resounded in her majesty's ears and too often
vibrated in her heart for Anne of Austria not to recognize
it; yet she remained impassive, looking at him with that
fixed stare which is tolerated only in women who are queens,
either by the power of beauty or by the right of birth.
"It is then a service which you propose to render us,
count?" asked Anne of Austria, after a moment's silence.
"Yes, madame, another service," said Athos, shocked that the
queen did not seem to recognize him.
Athos had a noble heart, and made, therefore, but a poor
courtier.
Anne frowned. Mazarin, who was sitting at a table folding up
papers, as if he had only been a secretary of state, looked
up.
"Speak," said the queen.
Mazarin turned again to his papers.
"Madame," resumed Athos, "two of my friends, named
D'Artagnan and Monsieur du Vallon, sent to England by the
cardinal, suddenly disappeared when they set foot on the
shores of France; no one knows what has become of them."
"Well?" said the queen.
"I address myself, therefore, first to the benevolence of
your majesty, that I may know what has become of my friends,
reserving to myself, if necessary, the right of appealing
hereafter to your justice."
"Sir," replied Anne, with a degree of haughtiness which to
certain persons became impertinence, "this is the reason
that you trouble me in the midst of so many absorbing
concerns! an affair for the police! Well, sir, you ought to
know that we no longer have a police, since we are no longer
at Paris."
"I think your majesty will have no need to apply to the
police to know where my friends are, but that if you will
deign to interrogate the cardinal he can reply without any
further inquiry than into his own recollections."
"But, God forgive me!" cried Anne, with that disdainful curl
of the lips peculiar to her, "I believe that you are
yourself interrogating."
"Yes, madame, here I have a right to do so, for it concerns
Monsieur d'Artagnan ---d'Artagnan," he repeated, in such a
manner as to bow the regal brow with recollections of the
weak and erring woman.
The cardinal saw that it was now high time to come to the
assistance of Anne.
"Sir," he said, "I can tell you what is at present unknown
to her majesty. These individuals are under arrest. They
disobeyed orders."
"I beg of your majesty, then," said Athos, calmly and not
replying to Mazarin, "to quash these arrests of Messieurs
d'Artagnan and du Vallon."
"What you ask is merely an affair of discipline and does not
concern me," said the queen.
"Monsieur d'Artagnan never made such an answer as that when
