The Three Musketeers. Alexandre Dumas

      “What, sir, must you be off?”

      “Yes. I ordered you to saddle my horse; have I not been obeyed?”

      “Yes; and your excellency may see your horse standing under the grand entrance, quite ready for the road.”

      “Very well; then do as I have ordered.”

      “Heyday!” said the host to himself; “can he be afraid of this young boy?” But a commanding look from the stranger cut him short; he humbly bowed, and left the apartment.

      “My lady must not see this strange fellow,” said the stranger; “as she is already late, she must soon pass. I had better mount my horse and go to meet her. If I could only just learn the contents of that letter addressed to Treville.” And thus muttering, the unknown descended to the kitchen.

      In the meantime, the landlord, who doubted not that this youth’s presence drove the stranger from his inn, had gone to his wife’s chamber, and found that d’Artagnan had regained consciousness. Then, whilst he made him comprehend that the police might be severe on him for having attacked a great lord (for, according to the host’s idea, the stranger could be nothing less than a great lord), he persuaded him, in spite of his weakness, to resume his journey.

      D’Artagnan, half stunned, without doublet, his head completely bandaged, arose, and, pushed out by the host, began to descend the stairs; but on reaching the kitchen, the first object he saw was his opponent, who was quietly talking at the door of a heavy carriage, drawn by two large Norman horses. The person with whom he conversed was a woman of from twenty to twenty-two years of age, whose head appeared, through the window of the carriage, like a picture in a frame. We have already said how rapidly d’Artagnan caught the expression of a countenance; he saw, therefore, at the first glance, that the lady was young and attractive. Now, this beauty was the more striking to him, as it was completely different from that of his own southern country. She was a pale, fair person, with long curling hair falling on her shoulders, large blue languishing eyes, rosy lips, and alabaster hands. She conversed with the unknown with great vivacity.

      “So, his eminence commands me———” said she.

      “To return immediately to England, and apprise him, with all speed, whether the duke has left London,” said the unknown.

      “And as to my other instructions?” demanded the fair traveller.

      “They are enclosed in this box, which you will not open until you are on the other side of the Channel.”

      “Good; and you? What are you going to do?”

      “I return to Paris.”

      “Without chastising this insolent boy?” demanded the lady.

      The unknown was about to reply, but ere he could do so, d’Artagnan, who had heard every word, rushed to the doorway. “It is that insolent boy,” he cried, “who chastises others, and I hope that this time he who deserves chastisement will not escape him.”

      “Will not escape him?” echoed the unknown, knitting his brows.

      “No, in the presence of a woman you would hesitate to fly, I presume.”

      “Consider,” said the lady, seeing the gentleman place his hand to his sword, “consider that the slightest delay might ruin all.”

      “You are right,” said the gentleman; “you go your way, and I will go mine;” and, saluting the lady with a bow, he got into the saddle, whilst the coachman whipped his horses. The lady and gentleman therefore went off at a gallop towards the opposite ends of the street.

      “Hollo! your bill!” shouted mine host, whose affection for the traveller was changed to the most profound contempt when he saw him departing without paying.

      “Pay, rascal,” cried the traveller, as he galloped off, to his valet, who threw three or four pieces of silver at the feet of the landlord, and set off at full speed the way his master went.

      “Oh, coward! wretch! false-hearted gentleman!” cried d’Artagnan, rushing after the valet. But he was still too feeble from his wounds to bear such an effort. Scarcely had he gone ten paces, before his ears tingled, a vertigo seized him, a cloud passed before his eyes, and he fell down in the street, with a final cry of “Coward! coward! coward!”

      “He is a sad coward verily,” murmured the host, who now, approaching d’Artagnan, endeavoured to soothe him by this flattery, as the heron in the fable her friend the snail.

      “Yes, a sad coward,” murmured d’Artagnan; “but she is beautiful.”

      “Who is she?” said the landlord.

      “My lady!” murmured d’Artagnan, and again fainted away.

      “Never mind,” said the host; “although I have lost two, at any rate I have secured this one, whom I am sure of keeping for some days; at all events, I shall gain eleven crowns.”

      It must be borne in mind that eleven crowns was the exact sum which remained in d’Artagnan’s purse; and the host had reckoned upon eleven days’ illness, at a crown a day. On this point, however, he reckoned without his guest. The following day d’Artagnan left his couch, went down to the kitchen, and, besides certain ingredients, the names of which have not descended to posterity, demanded some wine, oil, and rosemary, which, with his mother’s recipe in his hand, he compounded into a salve, wherewith he anointed his numerous wounds, renewing his plasters himself, and not allowing the interposition of any leech.

      Thanks, no doubt, to the Bohemian salve, and perhaps also to the absence of the leech, d’Artagnan found himself on foot in the evening, and almost cured by the next day. But at the moment he was paying for this wine, oil, and rosemary, the sole expense he had incurred (for he had been completely abstinent, whilst, on the contrary, if one believed the hostler, the yellow horse had eaten three times as many oats as one would have supposed possible from his size), d’Artagnan found nothing in his pocket but his little purse, with its eleven crowns. As for the letter to M. de Treville, that was gone. The young man began by looking very patiently for this letter, turning out and rummaging his pockets and fobs twenty times, rummaging his valise again and again, and opening and shutting his purse; but when he was quite convinced that the letter was not to be found, he gave full vent to another fit of rage in a manner which was like to make necessary a second decoction of wine and spiced oil. For, upon beholding this young scatter-brain raging, and threatening to destroy everything in his establishment, if the letter were not found, the host had already seized upon a spit, his wife upon the handle of a broom, and the servants upon the same weapons they had wielded the evening before.

      “My letter of introduction!” cried d’Artagnan, “my letter of introduction! or, by St. Denis, I will spit you all like so many ortolans.”

      One circumstance prevented the youth from accomplishing his threat, which was, that his sword, as we have said, had unfortunately been broken in two in the first struggle—a mischance he had entirely forgotten; consequently, when d’Artagnan went to draw it in earnest, he found himself armed only with the stump, about eight or ten inches long, which the host had carefully thrust into the scabbard. As for the rest of the blade, the cook had adroitly set it aside for a larding-pin. And yet it is probable that this deception would not have stopped our fiery youth, had not the host reflected that the demand which his guest made was perfectly just.

      “But after all,” said he, lowering his spit, “where is this letter?”

      “Yes, where is this letter?” roared d’Artagnan; “and let me tell you that this letter is for M. de Treville, and that it must be found, otherwise M. de Treville will know to have it found—I’ll answer for it!”

      This threat completely frightened mine host. Next to the king and the cardinal, M. de Treville was the man whose name was most frequently in the mouths of the military, and indeed of the citizens. There was certainly, Father Joseph; but his name was never mentioned except in an undertone; so great was the terror which his gray eminence, as the familiar of the cardinal