How D’Artagnan regulated the “Assets” of the Company before he
established its “Liabilities”
“Decidedly,” said D’Artagnan to himself, “I have struck a good vein.
That star which shines once in the life of every man, which shone for
Job and Iris, the most unfortunate of the Jews and the poorest of the
Greeks, is come at last to shine on me. I will commit no folly, I will
take advantage of it; it comes quite late enough to find me
reasonable.”
He supped that evening, in very good humor, with his friend Athos; he
said nothing to him about the expected donation, but he could not
forbear questioning his friend, while eating, about country produce,
sowing, and planting. Athos replied complacently, as he always did. His
idea was that D’Artagnan wished to become a land-owner, only he could
not help regretting, more than once, the absence of the lively humor
and amusing sallies of the cheerful companion of former days. In fact,
D’Artagnan was so absorbed, that, with his knife, he took advantage of
the grease left at the bottom of his plate, to trace ciphers and make
additions of surprising rotundity.
The order, or rather license, for their embarkation, arrived at Athos’s
lodgings that evening. While this paper was remitted to the comte,
another messenger brought to D’Artagnan a little bundle of parchments,
adorned with all the seals employed in setting off property deeds in
England. Athos surprised him turning over the leaves of these different
acts which establish the transmission of property. The prudent
Monk—others would say the generous Monk—had commuted the donation into
a sale, and acknowledged the receipt of the sum of fifteen thousand
crowns as the price of the property ceded. The messenger was gone.
D’Artagnan still continued reading, Athos watched him with a smile.
D’Artagnan, surprising one of those smiles over his shoulder, put the
bundle in its wrapper.
“I beg your pardon,” said Athos.
“Oh! not at all, my friend,” replied the lieutenant, “I shall tell
you——”
“No, don’t tell me anything, I beg you; orders are things so sacred,
that to one’s brother, one’s father, the person charged with such
orders should never open his mouth. Thus I, who speak to you, and love
you more tenderly than brother, father, or all the world——”
“Except your Raoul?”
“I shall love Raoul still better when he shall be a man, and I shall
have seen him develop himself in all the phases of his character and
his actions—as I have seen you, my friend.”
“You said, then, that you had an order likewise, and that you would not
communicate it to me.”
“Yes, my dear D’Artagnan.”
The Gascon sighed. “There was a time,” said he, “when you would have
placed that order open upon the table, saying, ‘D’Artagnan, read this
scrawl to Porthos, Aramis, and to me.’”
“That is true. Oh! that was the time of youth, confidence, the generous
season when the blood commands, when it is warmed by feeling!”
“Well! Athos, will you allow me to tell you?”
“Speak, my friend!”
“That delightful time, that generous season, that ruling by warm blood,
were all very fine things, no doubt; but I do not regret them at all.
It is absolutely like the period of studies. I have constantly met with
fools who would boast of the days of pensums, ferules and crusts of dry
bread. It is singular, but I never loved all that; for my part, however
active and sober I might be (you know if I was so, Athos), however
simple I might appear in my clothes, I would not the less have
preferred the braveries and embroideries of Porthos to my little
perforated cassock, which gave passage to the wind in winter and the
sun in summer. I should always, my friend, mistrust him who would
pretend to prefer evil to good. Now, in times past all went wrong with
me, and every month found a fresh hole in my cassock and in my skin, a
gold crown less in my poor purse; of that execrable time of small beer
and see-saw, I regret absolutely nothing, nothing, nothing save our
friendship; for within me I have a heart, and it is a miracle that
heart has not been dried up by the wind of poverty which passed through
the holes of my cloak, or pierced by the swords of all shapes which
passed through the holes in my poor flesh.”
“Do not regret our friendship,” said Athos, “that will only die with
ourselves. Friendship is composed, above all things, of memories and
habits, and if you have just now made a little satire upon mine,
because I hesitate to tell you the nature of my mission into France——”
“Who! I?—Oh! heavens! if you knew, my dear friend, how indifferent all
the missions of the world will henceforth become to me!” And he laid
his hand upon the parchment in his vest pocket.
Athos rose from the table and called the host in order to pay the
reckoning.
“Since I have known you, my friend,” said D’Artagnan, “I have never
discharged the reckoning. Porthos often did, Aramis sometimes, and you,
you almost always drew out your purse with the dessert. I am now rich
and should like to try if it is heroic to pay.”
“Do so,” said Athos; returning his purse to his pocket.
The two friends then directed their steps towards the port, not,
however, without D’Artagnan’s frequently turning round to watch the
transportation of his dear crowns. Night had just spread her thick veil
over the yellow waters of the Thames; they heard those noises of casks
and pulleys, the preliminaries of preparing to sail which had so many
times made the hearts of the musketeers beat when the dangers of the
sea were the least of those they were going to face. This time they
were to embark on board a large vessel which awaited them at Gravesend,
and Charles II., always delicate in small matters, had sent one of his
yachts, with twelve men of his Scotch guard, to do honor to the
ambassador he was sending to France. At midnight the yacht had
deposited its passengers on board the vessel, and at eight o’clock in
the morning, the vessel landed the ambassador and his friend on the
wharf at Boulogne. Whilst the comte, with Grimaud, was busy procuring
horses to go straight to Paris, D’Artagnan hastened to the hostelry
where, according to his orders, his little army was to wait for him.
These gentlemen were at breakfast upon oysters, fish, and spiced
brandy, when D’Artagnan appeared. They were all very gay, but not one
of them had yet exceeded the bounds of reason. A hurrah of joy welcomed
the general. “Here I am,” said D’Artagnan, “the campaign is ended. I am
come to bring to each his supplement of pay, as agreed upon.” Their
eyes sparkled. “I will lay a wager there are not, at this moment, a
hundred crowns remaining in the purse of the richest among you.”
“That is true,” cried they in chorus.
“Gentlemen,” said D’Artagnan, “then, this is the last order. The treaty
of commerce has been concluded thanks to our coup-de-main which made us
masters of the most skillful financier of England, for now I am at
liberty to confess to you that the man we had to carry off was the
treasurer of General Monk.”
This word treasurer produced a certain effect on his army. D’Artagnan
observed that the eyes of Menneville alone did not evince perfect
faith. “This treasurer,” he continued, “I conveyed to a neutral
territory, Holland; I forced him to sign the treaty; I have even
reconducted him to Newcastle, and as he was obliged to be satisfied
with our proceedings towards him—the deal coffer being always carried
without jolting, and being lined softly, I asked for a gratification
for you. Here it is.” He threw a respectable-looking purse upon the
cloth; and all involuntarily stretched out their hands. “One moment, my
lambs,” said D’Artagnan; “if there are profits, there are also
charges.”
“Oh! oh!” murmured they.
“We are about to find ourselves, my friends, in a position that would
not be tenable for people without brains. I speak plainly: we are
between the gallows and the Bastile.”
“Oh! oh!” said the chorus.
“That is easily understood. It was necessary to explain to General Monk
the disappearance of his treasurer. I waited, for that purpose, till
the very unhopedfor moment of the restoration of King Charles II., who
is one of my friends.”
The army exchanged a glance of satisfaction in reply to the
sufficiently proud look of D’Artagnan. “The king being restored, I
restored to Monk his man of business, a little plucked, it is true,
but, in short, I restored him. Now, General Monk, when he pardoned me,
for he has pardoned me, could not help repeating these words to me,
which I charge every one of you to engrave deeply there, between the
eyes, under the vault of the cranium:—‘Monsieur, the joke has been a
good one, but I don’t naturally like jokes; if ever a word of what you
have done’ (you understand me, Menneville) ‘escapes from your lips, or
the lips of your companions, I have, in my government of Scotland and
Ireland, seven hundred and forty-one wooden gibbets, of strong oak,
clamped with iron, and freshly greased every week. I will make a
present of one of these gibbets to each of you, and observe well, M.
d’Artagnan,’ added he (observe it also, M. Menneville), ‘I shall still
have seven hundred and thirty left for my private pleasure. And still
further——’”
“Ah! ah!” said the auxiliaries, “is there more still?”
“A mere trifle. ‘Monsieur d’Artagnan, I send to the king of France the
treaty in question, with a request that he will cast into the Bastile
provisionally, and then send to me, all who have taken part in this
expedition; and that is a prayer with which the king will certainly
comply.’”
A cry of terror broke from all corners of the table.
“There! there! there,” said D’Artagnan, “this brave M. Monk has
forgotten one thing, and that is he does not know the name of any one
of you, I alone know you, and it is not I, you may well believe, who
will betray you. Why should I? As for you—I cannot suppose you will be
silly enough to denounce yourselves, for then the king, to spare
himself the expense of feeding and lodging you, will send you off to
Scotland, where the seven hundred and forty-one gibbets are to be
found. That is all, messieurs; I have not another word to add to what I
have had the honor to tell you. I am sure you have understood me
perfectly well, have you not, M. Menneville?”
“Perfectly,” replied the latter.
“Now the crowns!” said D’Artagnan. “Shut the doors,” he cried, and
opened the bag upon the table, from which rolled several fine gold
crowns. Every one made a movement towards the floor.
“Gently!” cried D’Artagnan. “Let no one stoop, and then I shall not be
out in my reckoning.” He found it all right, gave fifty of those
splendid crowns to each man, and received as many benedictions as he
bestowed pieces. “Now,” said he, “if it were possible for you to reform
a little, if you could become good and honest citizens——”
“That is rather difficult,” said one of the troop.
“What then, captain?” said another.
“Because I might be able to find you again, and, who knows what other
good fortune?” He made a sign to Menneville, who listened to all he
said with a composed air. “Menneville,” said he, “come with me. Adieu
my brave fellows! I need not warn you to be discreet.”
Menneville followed him, whilst the salutations of the auxiliaries were
mingled with the sweet sound of the money clinking in their pockets.
“Menneville,” said D’Artagnan, when they were once in the street, “you
were not my dupe; beware of being so. You did not appear to me to have
any fear of the gibbets of Monk, or the Bastile of his majesty, King
Louis XIV., but you will do me the favor of being afraid of me. Then
listen at the smallest word that shall escape you, I will kill you as I
would a fowl. I have absolution from our holy father, the pope, in my
pocket.”
“I assure you I know absolutely nothing, my dear M. d’Artagnan, and
that your words have all been to me so many articles of faith.”
“I was quite sure you were an intelligent fellow,” said the musketeer;
“I have tried you for a length of time. These fifty gold crowns which I
give you above the rest will prove the esteem I have for you. Take
them.”
“Thanks, Monsieur d’Artagnan,” said Menneville.
“With that sum you can really become an honest man,” replied
D’Artagnan, in the most serious tone possible. “It would be disgraceful
for a mind like yours, and a name you no longer dare to bear, to sink
forever under the rust of an evil life. Become a gallant man,
Menneville, and live for a year upon those hundred gold crowns: it is a
good provision; twice the pay of a high officer. In a year come to me,
and, Mordioux! I will make something of you.”
Menneville swore, as his comrades had sworn, that he would be as silent
as the grave. And yet some one must have spoken; and as, certainly, it
was not one of the nine companions, and quite as certainly, it was not
Menneville, it must have been D’Artagnan, who, in his quality of a
Gascon, had his tongue very near to his lips. For, in short, if it were
not he, who could it be? And how can it be explained that the secret of
the deal coffer pierced with holes should come to our knowledge, and in
so complete a fashion that we have, as has been seen, related the
history of it in all its most minute details; details which, besides,
throw a light as new as unexpected upon all that portion of the history
of England which has been left, up to the present day, completely in
darkness by the historian of our neighbors?