D’Artagnan was little used to resistance like that he had just
experienced. He returned, profoundly irritated, to Nantes. Irritation,
with this vigorous man, usually vented itself in impetuous attack, which
few people, hitherto, were they king, were they giants, had been able to
resist. Trembling with rage, he went straight to the castle, and asked
an audience with the king. It might be about seven o’clock in the
morning, and, since his arrival at Nantes, the king had been an early
riser. But on arriving at the corridor with which we are acquainted,
D’Artagnan found M. de Gesvres, who stopped him politely, telling him
not to speak too loud and disturb the king. “Is the king asleep?” said
D’Artagnan. “Well, I will let him sleep. But about what o’clock do you
suppose he will rise?”
“Oh! in about two hours; his majesty has been up all night.”
D’Artagnan took his hat again, bowed to M. de Gesvres, and returned to
his own apartments. He came back at half-past nine, and was told that
the king was at breakfast. “That will just suit me,” said D’Artagnan. “I
will talk to the king while he is eating.”
M. de Brienne reminded D’Artagnan that the king would not see any one at
meal-time.
“But,” said D’Artagnan, looking askant at Brienne, “you do not know,
perhaps, monsieur, that I have the privilege of _entree_ anywhere--and
at any hour.”
Brienne took the captain’s hand kindly, and said, “Not at Nantes, dear
Monsieur d’Artagnan. The king, in this journey, has changed everything.”
D’Artagnan, a little softened, asked about what o’clock the king would
have finished his breakfast.
“We don’t know.”
“Eh?--don’t know! What does that mean? You don’t know how much time the
king devotes to eating? It is generally an hour; and, if we admit that
the air of the Loire gives an additional appetite, we will extend it to
an hour and a half; that is enough, I think. I will wait where I am.”
“Oh! dear Monsieur d’Artagnan, the order of the day is not to allow any
person to remain in this corridor; I am on guard for that particular
purpose.”
D’Artagnan felt his anger mounting to his brain a second time. He
went out quickly, for fear of complicating the affair by a display of
premature ill-humor. As soon as he was out he began to reflect. “The
king,” said he, “will not receive me, that is evident. The young man is
angry; he is afraid, beforehand, of the words that I may speak to him.
Yes; but in the meantime Belle-Isle is besieged, and my two friends by
now probably taken or killed. Poor Porthos! As to Master Aramis, he is
always full of resources, and I am easy on his account. But, no, no;
Porthos is not yet an invalid, nor is Aramis in his dotage. The one
with his arm, the other with his imagination, will find work for his
majesty’s soldiers. Who knows if these brave men may not get up for
the edification of his most Christian majesty a little bastion of
Saint-Gervais! I don’t despair of it. They have cannon and a garrison.
And yet,” continued D’Artagnan, “I don’t know whether it would not
be better to stop the combat. For myself alone I will not put up with
either surly looks or insults from the king; but for my friends I must
put up with everything. Shall I go to M. Colbert? Now, there is a man
I must acquire the habit of terrifying. I will go to M. Colbert.” And
D’Artagnan set forward bravely to find M. Colbert, but was informed that
he was working with the king, at the castle of Nantes. “Good!” cried he,
“the times have come again in which I measured my steps from De Treville
to the cardinal, from the cardinal to the queen, from the queen to
Louis XIII. Truly is it said that men, in growing old, become children
again!--To the castle, then!” He returned thither. M. de Lyonne was
coming out. He gave D’Artagnan both hands, but told him that the king
had been busy all the preceding evening and all night, and that orders
had been given that no one should be admitted. “Not even the captain who
takes the order?” cried D’Artagnan. “I think that is rather too strong.”
“Not even he,” said M. de Lyonne.
“Since that is the case,” replied D’Artagnan, wounded to the heart;
“since the captain of the musketeers, who has always entered the
king’s chamber, is no longer allowed to enter it, his cabinet, or
his _salle-a-manger_, either the king is dead, or his captain is in
disgrace. Do me the favor, then, M. de Lyonne, who are in favor, to
return and tell the king, plainly, I send him my resignation.”
“D’Artagnan, beware of what you are doing!”
“For friendship’s sake, go!” and he pushed him gently towards the
cabinet.
“Well, I will go,” said Lyonne.
D’Artagnan waited, walking about the corridor in no enviable mood.
Lyonne returned.
“Well, what did the king say?” exclaimed D’Artagnan.
“He simply answered, ‘’Tis well,’” replied Lyonne.
“That it was well!” said the captain, with an explosion. “That is to
say, that he accepts it? Good! Now, then, I am free! I am only a plain
citizen, M. de Lyonne. I have the pleasure of bidding you good-bye!
Farewell, castle, corridor, ante-chamber! a _bourgeois_, about to
breathe at liberty, takes his farewell of you.”
And without waiting longer, the captain sprang from the terrace down the
staircase, where he had picked up the fragments of Gourville’s letter.
Five minutes after, he was at the hostelry, where, according to the
custom of all great officers who have lodgings at the castle, he had
taken what was called his city-chamber. But when he arrived there,
instead of throwing off his sword and cloak, he took his pistols, put
his money into a large leather purse, sent for his horses from the
castle-stables, and gave orders that would ensure their reaching Vannes
during the night. Everything went on according to his wishes. At eight
o’clock in the evening, he was putting his foot in the stirrup, when
M. de Gesvres appeared, at the head of twelve guards, in front of the
hostelry. D’Artagnan saw all from the corner of his eye; he could not
fail seeing thirteen men and thirteen horses. But he feigned not to
observe anything, and was about to put his horse in motion. Gesvres rode
up to him. “Monsieur d’Artagnan!” said he, aloud.
“Ah, Monsieur de Gesvres! good evening!”
“One would say you were getting on horseback.”
“More than that,--I am mounted,--as you see.”
“It is fortunate I have met with you.”
“Were you looking for me, then?”
“_Mon Dieu!_ yes.”
“On the part of the king, I will wager?”
“Yes.”
“As I, three days ago, went in search of M. Fouquet?”
“Oh!”
“Nonsense! It is of no use being over-delicate with me; that is all
labor lost. Tell me at once you are come to arrest me.”
“To arrest you?--Good heavens! no.”
“Why do you come to accost me with twelve horsemen at your heels, then?”
“I am making my round.”
“That isn’t bad! And so you pick me up in your round, eh?”
“I don’t pick you up; I meet with you, and I beg you to come with me.”
“Where?”
“To the king.”
“Good!” said D’Artagnan, with a bantering air; “the king is disengaged.”
“For Heaven’s sake, captain,” said M. de Gesvres, in a low voice to the
musketeer, “do not compromise yourself! these men hear you.”
D’Artagnan laughed aloud, and replied:
“March! People who are arrested are placed between the six first guards
and the six last.”
“But as I am not arresting you,” said M. de Gesvres, “you will march
behind, with me, if you please.”
“Well,” said D’Artagnan, “that is very polite, duke, and you are
right in being so; for if ever I had had to make my rounds near your
_chambre-de-ville_, I should have been courteous to you, I assure you,
on the word of a gentleman! Now, one favor more; what does the king want
with me?”
“Oh, the king is furious!”
“Very well! the king, who has thought it worth while to be angry, may
take the trouble to grow calm again; that is all. I shan’t die of that,
I will swear.”
“No, but--”
“But--I shall be sent to keep company with unfortunate M. Fouquet.
_Mordioux!_ That is a gallant man, a worthy man! We shall live very
sociably together, I will be sworn.”
“Here we are at our place of destination,” said the duke. “Captain, for
Heaven’s sake be calm with the king!”
“Ah! ah! you are playing the brave man with me, duke!” said D’Artagnan,
throwing one of his defiant glances over Gesvres. “I have been told
that you are ambitious of uniting your guards with my musketeers. This
strikes me as a splendid opportunity.”
“I will take exceeding good care not to avail myself of it, captain.”
“And why not, pray?”
“Oh, for many reasons--in the first place, for this: if I were to
succeed you in the musketeers after having arrested you--”
“Ah! then you admit you have arrested me?”
“No, I _don’t_.”
“Say met me, then. So, you were saying _if_ you were to succeed me after
having arrested me?”
“Your musketeers, at the first exercise with ball cartridges, would fire
_my_ way, by mistake.”
“Oh, as to that I won’t say; for the fellows _do_ love me a little.”
Gesvres made D’Artagnan pass in first, and took him straight to the
cabinet where Louis was waiting for his captain of the musketeers, and
placed himself behind his colleague in the ante-chamber. The king could
be heard distinctly, speaking aloud to Colbert in the same cabinet where
Colbert might have heard, a few days before, the king speaking aloud
with M. d’Artagnan. The guards remained as a mounted picket before the
principal gate; and the report was quickly spread throughout the city
that monsieur le capitaine of the musketeers had been arrested by order
of the king. Then these men were seen to be in motion, and as in the
good old times of Louis XIII. and M. de Treville, groups were formed,
and staircases were filled; vague murmurs, issuing from the court below,
came rolling to the upper stories, like the distant moaning of the
waves. M. de Gesvres became uneasy. He looked at his guards, who, after
being interrogated by the musketeers who had just got among their ranks,
began to shun them with a manifestation of innocence. D’Artagnan was
certainly less disturbed by all this than M. de Gesvres, the captain of
the guards. As soon as he entered, he seated himself on the ledge of a
window whence with his eagle glance he saw all that was going on without
the least emotion. No step of the progressive fermentation which had
shown itself at the report of his arrest escaped him. He foresaw
the very moment the explosion would take place; and we know that his
previsions were in general correct.
“It would be very whimsical,” thought he, “if, this evening, my
praetorians should make me king of France. How I should laugh!”
But, at the height, all was stopped. Guards, musketeers, officers,
soldiers, murmurs, uneasiness, dispersed, vanished, died away; there was
an end of menace and sedition. One word had calmed the waves. The king
had desired Brienne to say, “Hush, messieurs! you disturb the king.”
D’Artagnan sighed. “All is over!” said he; “the musketeers of the
present day are not those of his majesty Louis XIII. All is over!”
“Monsieur d’Artagnan, you are wanted in the ante-chamber of the king,”
proclaimed an usher.