Essential Novelists - Alexandre Dumas. Alexandre Dumas

have parted with him.”

      “How?”

      “Why, here is the simple fact. This morning I awoke at six o’clock. You were still fast asleep, and I did not know what to do with myself; I was still stupid from our yesterday’s debauch. As I came into the public room, I saw one of our Englishman bargaining with a dealer for a horse, his own having died yesterday from bleeding. I drew near, and found he was bidding a hundred pistoles for a chestnut nag. ‘PARDIEU,’ said I, ‘my good gentleman, I have a horse to sell, too.’ ‘Ay, and a very fine one! I saw him yesterday; your friend’s lackey was leading him.’ ‘Do you think he is worth a hundred pistoles?’ ‘Yes! Will you sell him to me for that sum?’ ‘No; but I will play for him.’ ‘What?’ ‘At dice.’ No sooner said than done, and I lost the horse. Ah, ah! But please to observe I won back the equipage,” cried Athos.

      D’Artagnan looked much disconcerted.

      “This vexes you?” said Athos.

      “Well, I must confess it does,” replied d’Artagnan. “That horse was to have identified us in the day of battle. It was a pledge, a remembrance. Athos, you have done wrong.”

      “But, my dear friend, put yourself in my place,” replied the Musketeer. “I was hipped to death; and still further, upon my honor, I don’t like English horses. If it is only to be recognized, why the saddle will suffice for that; it is quite remarkable enough. As to the horse, we can easily find some excuse for its disappearance. Why the devil! A horse is mortal; suppose mine had had the glanders or the farcy?”

      D’Artagnan did not smile.

      “It vexes me greatly,” continued Athos, “that you attach so much importance to these animals, for I am not yet at the end of my story.”

      “What else have you done.”

      “After having lost my own horse, nine against ten—see how near—I formed an idea of staking yours.”

      “Yes; but you stopped at the idea, I hope?”

      “No; for I put it in execution that very minute.”

      “And the consequence?” said d’Artagnan, in great anxiety.

      “I threw, and I lost.”

      “What, my horse?”

      “Your horse, seven against eight; a point short—you know the proverb.”

      “Athos, you are not in your right senses, I swear.”

      “My dear lad, that was yesterday, when I was telling you silly stories, it was proper to tell me that, and not this morning. I lost him then, with all his appointments and furniture.”

      “Really, this is frightful.”

      “Stop a minute; you don’t know all yet. I should make an excellent gambler if I were not too hot-headed; but I was hot-headed, just as if I had been drinking. Well, I was not hot-headed then—”

      “Well, but what else could you play for? You had nothing left?”

      “Oh, yes, my friend; there was still that diamond left which sparkles on your finger, and which I had observed yesterday.”

      “This diamond!” said d’Artagnan, placing his hand eagerly on his ring.

      “And as I am a connoisseur in such things, having had a few of my own once, I estimated it at a thousand pistoles.”

      “I hope,” said d’Artagnan, half dead with fright, “you made no mention of my diamond?”

      “On the contrary, my dear friend, this diamond became our only resource; with it I might regain our horses and their harnesses, and even money to pay our expenses on the road.”

      “Athos, you make me tremble!” cried d’Artagnan.

      “I mentioned your diamond then to my adversary, who had likewise remarked it. What the devil, my dear, do you think you can wear a star from heaven on your finger, and nobody observe it? Impossible!”

      “Go on, go on, my dear fellow!” said d’Artagnan; “for upon my honor, you will kill me with your indifference.”

      “We divided, then, this diamond into ten parts of a hundred pistoles each.”

      “You are laughing at me, and want to try me!” said d’Artagnan, whom anger began to take by the hair, as Minerva takes Achilles, in the ILLIAD.

      “No, I do not jest, MORDIEU! I should like to have seen you in my place! I had been fifteen days without seeing a human face, and had been left to brutalize myself in the company of bottles.”

      “That was no reason for staking my diamond!” replied d’Artagnan, closing his hand with a nervous spasm.

      “Hear the end. Ten parts of a hundred pistoles each, in ten throws, without revenge; in thirteen throws I had lost all—in thirteen throws. The number thirteen was always fatal to me; it was on the thirteenth of July that—”

      “VENTREBLEU!” cried d’Artagnan, rising from the table, the story of the present day making him forget that of the preceding one.

      “Patience!” said Athos; “I had a plan. The Englishman was an original; I had seen him conversing that morning with Grimaud, and Grimaud had told me that he had made him proposals to enter into his service. I staked Grimaud, the silent Grimaud, divided into ten portions.”

      “Well, what next?” said d’Artagnan, laughing in spite of himself.

      “Grimaud himself, understand; and with the ten parts of Grimaud, which are not worth a ducatoon, I regained the diamond. Tell me, now, if persistence is not a virtue?”

      “My faith! But this is droll,” cried d’Artagnan, consoled, and holding his sides with laughter.

      “You may guess, finding the luck turned, that I again staked the diamond.”

      “The devil!” said d’Artagnan, becoming angry again.

      “I won back your harness, then your horse, then my harness, then my horse, and then I lost again. In brief, I regained your harness and then mine. That’s where we are. That was a superb throw, so I left off there.”

      D’Artagnan breathed as if the whole hostelry had been removed from his breast.

      “Then the diamond is safe?” said he, timidly.

      “Intact, my dear friend; besides the harness of your Bucephalus and mine.”

      “But what is the use of harnesses without horses?”

      “I have an idea about them.”

      “Athos, you make me shudder.”

      “Listen to me. You have not played for a long time, d’Artagnan.”

      “And I have no inclination to play.”

      “Swear to nothing. You have not played for a long time, I said; you ought, then, to have a good hand.”

      “Well, what then?”

      “Well; the Englishman and his companion are still here. I remarked that he regretted the horse furniture very much. You appear to think much of your horse. In your place I would stake the furniture against the horse.”

      “But he will not wish for only one harness.”

      “Stake both, PARDIEU! I am not selfish, as you are.”

      “You would do so?” said d’Artagnan, undecided, so strongly did the confidence of Athos begin to prevail, in spite of himself.

      “On my honor, in one single throw.”

      “But having lost the horses, I am particularly anxious to preserve the harnesses.”

      “Stake