THE AGREEMENT.
The chevalier extended his hand to Roquefinette, saying:
"Yes, you are a man of your word, but enter quickly; it is important
that my neighbors should not notice you."
"In that case I am as dumb as a log," answered the captain; "besides,"
added he, pointing to the pate and the bottles which covered the table,
"you have found the true way of shutting my mouth."
The chevalier shut the door behind the captain and pushed the bolt.
"Ah! ah! mystery--so much the better, I am fond of mystery. There is
almost always something to be gained when people begin by saying 'hush.'
In any case you cannot do better than address yourself to your servant,"
continued the captain, resuming his mythological language. "You see in
me the grandson of Hippocrates, the god of silence. So do not be
uneasy."
"That is well, captain," answered D'Harmental, "for I confess that what
I have to say to you is of sufficient importance for me to claim your
discretion beforehand."
"It is granted, chevalier. While I was giving a lesson to little
Ravanne, I saw, out of a corner of my eye, that you were a skillful
swordsman, and I love brave men. Then, in return for a little service,
only worth a fillip, you made me a present of a horse which was worth a
hundred louis, and I love generous men. Thus you are twice my man, why
should I not be yours once?"
"Well," said the chevalier, "I see that we understand each other."
"Speak, and I will listen," answered the captain, assuming his gravest
air.
"You will listen better seated, my dear guest. Let us go to breakfast."
"You preach like St. John with the golden mouth, chevalier," said the
captain, taking off his sword and placing that and his hat on the
harpsichord; "so that," continued he, sitting down opposite D'Harmental,
"one cannot differ from you in opinion. I am here; command the maneuver,
and I will execute it."
"Taste that wine while I cut the pate."
"That is right," said the captain, "let us divide our forces, and fight
the enemy separately, then let us re-unite to exterminate what remains."
And joining practice to theory, the captain seized the first bottle by
the neck, drew the cork, and having filled a bumper, drank it off with
such ease that one would have said that nature had gifted him with an
especial method of deglutition; but, to do him justice, scarcely had he
drunk it than he perceived that the liquor, which he had disposed of so
cavalierly, merited a more particular attention than he had given it.
"Oh!" said he, putting down his glass with a respectful slowness, "what
have I done, unworthy that I am? I drink nectar as if it were trash, and
that at the beginning of the feast! Ah!" continued he, shaking his head,
"Roquefinette, my friend, you are getting old. Ten years ago you would
have known what it was at the first drop that touched your palate, while
now you want many trials to know the worth of things. To your health,
chevalier."
And this time the captain, more circumspect, drank the second glass
slowly, and set it down three times before he finished it, winking his
eyes in sign of satisfaction. Then, when he had finished--
"This is hermitage of 1702, the year of the battle of Friedlingen. If
your wine-merchant has much like that, and if he will give credit, let
me have his address. I promise him a good customer."
"Captain," answered the chevalier, slipping an enormous slice of pate on
to the plate of his guest, "my wine-merchant not only gives credit, but
to my friends he gives altogether."
"Oh, the honest man!" cried the captain. Then, after a minute's silence,
during which a superficial observer would have thought him absorbed in
the appreciation of the pate, as he had been an instant before in that
of the wine, he leaned his two elbows on the table, and looking at
D'Harmental with a penetrating glance between his knife and fork--
"So, my dear chevalier," said he, "we conspire, it seems, and in order
to succeed we have need of poor Captain Roquefinette."
"And who told you that, captain?" broke in the chevalier, trembling in
spite of himself.
"Who told me that, pardieu! It is an easy riddle to answer. A man who
gives away horses worth a hundred louis, who drinks wine at a pistole
the bottle, and who lodges in a garret in the Rue du Temps Perdu, what
should he be doing if not conspiring?"
"Well, captain," said D'Harmental, laughing, "I shall never be discreet;
you have divined the truth. Does a conspiracy frighten you?" continued
he, filling his guest's glass.
"Frighten _me_! Who says that anything on earth can frighten Captain
Roquefinette?"
"Not I, captain; for at the first glance, at the first word, I fixed on
you as my second."
"Ah! that is to say, that if you are hung on a scaffold twenty feet
high, I shall be hung on one ten feet high, that's all!"
"Peste! captain," said D'Harmental, "if one always began by seeing thing
in their worst light, one would never attempt anything."
"Because I have spoken of the gallows?" answered the captain. "That
proves nothing. What is the gallows in the eyes of a philosopher? One of
the thousand ways of parting from life, and certainly one of the least
disagreeable. One can see that you have never looked the thing in the
face, since you have such an aversion to it. Besides, on proving our
noble descent, we shall have our heads cut off, like Monsieur de Rohan.
Did you see Monsieur de Rohan's head cut off?" continued the captain,
looking at D'Harmental. "He was a handsome young man, like you, and
about your age. He conspired, but the thing failed. What would you have?
Everybody may be deceived. They built him a beautiful black scaffold;
they allowed him to turn toward the window where his mistress was; they
cut the neck of his shirt with scissors, but the executioner was a
bungler, accustomed to hang, and not to decapitate, so that he was
obliged to strike three or four times to cut the head off, and at last
he only managed by the aid of a knife which he drew from his girdle, and
with which he chopped so well that he got the neck in half. Bravo! you
are brave!" continued the captain, seeing that the chevalier had
listened without frowning to all the details of this horrible execution.
"That will do--I am your man. Against whom are we conspiring? Let us
see. Is it against Monsieur le Duc de Maine? Is it against Monsieur le
Duc d'Orleans? Must we break the lame one's other leg? Must we cut out
the blind one's other eye? I am ready."
"Nothing of all that, captain; and if it pleases God there will be no
blood spilled."
"What is going on then?"
"Have you ever heard of the abduction of the Duke of Mantua's
secretary?"
"Of Matthioli?"----"Yes."
"Pardieu! I know the affair better than any one, for I saw them pass as
they were conducting him to Pignerol. It was the Chevalier de
Saint-Martin and Monsieur de Villebois who did it; and by this token
they each had three thousand livres for themselves and their men."
"That was only middling pay," said D'Harmental, with a disdainful air.
"You think so, chevalier? Nevertheless three thousand livres is a nice
little sum."
"Then for three thousand livres you would have undertaken it?"
"I would have undertaken it," answered the captain.
"But if instead of carrying off a secretary it had been proposed to you
to carry off a duke?"
"That would have been dearer."
"But you would have undertaken it all the same?"
"Why not? I should have asked double--that is all."
"And if, in giving you double, a man like myself had said to you,
'Captain, it is not an obscure danger that I plunge you into; it is a
struggle in which I am myself engaged, like you, and in which I venture
my name, my future, and my head:' what would you have answered?"
"I would have given him my hand, as I now give it you. Now what is the
business?"
The chevalier filled his own glass and that of the captain.
"To the health of the regent," said he, "and may he arrive without
accident at the Spanish frontier, as Matthioli arrived at Pignerol."
"Ah! ah!" said the captain, raising his glass. Then, after a pause, "And
why not?" continued he, "the regent is but a man after all. Only we
shall neither be hanged nor decapitated; we shall be broken on the
wheel. To any one else I should say that a regent would be dearer, but
to you, chevalier, I have only one price. Give me six thousand livres,
and I will find a dozen determined men."
"But those twelve men, do you think that you may trust them?"
"What need for their knowing what they are doing? They shall think they
are only carrying out a wager."
"And I," answered D'Harmental, "will show you that I do not haggle with
my friends. Here are two thousand crowns in gold, take them on account
if we succeed; if we fail we will cry quits."
"Chevalier," answered the captain, taking the bag of money and poising
it on his hand with an indescribable air of satisfaction, "I will not do
you the injustice of counting after you. When is the affair to be?"
"I do not know yet, captain; but if you find the pate to your taste, and
the wine good, and if you will do me the pleasure of breakfasting with
me every day as you have done to-day, I will keep you informed of
everything."
"That would not do, chevalier," said the captain. "I should not have
come to you three mornings before the police of that cursed Argenson
would have found us out. Luckily he has found some one as clever as
himself, and it will be some time before we are at the bar together. No,
no, chevalier, from now till the moment for action, the less we see of
one another the better; or rather, we must not see each other at all.
Your street is not a long one, and as it opens at one end on the Rue du
Gros-Chenet, and at the other on the Rue Montmartre, I shall have no
reason for coming through it. Here," continued he, detaching his
shoulder-knot, "take this ribbon. The day that you want me, tie it to a
nail outside your window. I shall understand it, and I will come to
you."
"How, captain!" said D'Harmental, seeing that his companion was
fastening on his sword. "Are you going without finishing the bottle?
What has the wine, which you appeared to appreciate so much a little
while ago, done to you, that you despise it so now?"
"It is just because I appreciate it still that I separate myself from
it; and the proof that I do not despise it," said the captain, filling
his glass, "is that I am going to take an adieu of it. To your health,
chevalier; you may boast of having good wine. Hum! And now, n--o, no,
that is all. I shall take to water till I see the ribbon flutter from
your window. Try to let it be as soon as possible, for water is a liquid
that does not suit my constitution."
"But why do you go so soon?"
"Because I know Captain Roquefinette. He is a good fellow; but when he
sits down before a bottle he must drink, and when he has drunk he must
talk; and, however well one talks, remember that those who talk much
always finish by making some blunder. Adieu, chevalier. Do not forget
the crimson ribbon; I go to look after our business."
"Adieu, captain," said D'Harmental, "I am pleased to see that I have no
need to preach discretion to you."
The captain made the sign of the cross on his mouth with his right
thumb, placed his hat straight on his head, raised his sword for fear of
its making a noise or beating against the wall, and went downstairs as
silently as if he had feared that every step would echo in the Hotel
d'Argenson.