listened with a smile to this noisy manifestation of the enthusiastic feelings of Master Bonancieux: and, when his shouts were lost in the distance: “There,” he said, “is a man who would henceforth die for me!”
The cardinal then set himself to examine with great attention the map of La Rochelle, which was spread out upon the table, and to mark with a pencil the position of the famous breakwater which, eighteen months afterwards, closed the port of the besieged city.
Whilst he was most deeply occupied with these strategic meditations, the door opened, and Rochefort reappeared.
“Well!” said the cardinal, with vivacity, which proved what consequence he attached to the intelligence that he expected from the count.
“Well!” said the latter, “a young woman, between twenty-six and twenty-eight years old, and a man of about thirty-five or forty years of age, have really lodged in the houses indicated by your eminence; but the woman left last night, and the man this morning.”
“It was they!” exclaimed the duke, whose eyes were fixed upon the clock: “but now,” he continued, “it is too late to follow them. The duchess is at Tours, and the duke at Boulogne. It is in London that they must be overtaken.”
“What are your eminence’s commands?”
“Let not one word be said of what has passed. Let the queen remain in perfect peace of mind; let her be ignorant that we know her secret; let her believe that we are hunting after some conspiracy. Send me Seguier, the keeper of the seals.”
“And this man? What has your eminence done with him?”
“What man?” demanded the cardinal.
“This Bonancieux.”
“I have done all that could be done with him. I have set him to spy upon his wife.”
The Count de Rochefort bowed low, like a man who felt the great superiority of his master, and withdrew.
As soon as the cardinal was again alone, he seated himself once more, and wrote a letter, which he sealed with his private signet, and then rang his bell. The officer entered for the fourth time.
“Tell Vitry to come here,” said the cardinal, “and order him to be ready for a journey.”
In another moment the man he had sent for was standing before him, booted and spurred.
“Vitry,” said he, “you must go off at once, without an instant’s delay, to London. You must not stop one moment on the road, and you will give this letter to my lady. There is a cheque for two hundred pistoles; go to my treasurer, and get the money. You shall have the same sum if you return in six days, having performed my commission with success!”
The messenger, without answering one word, bowed; took the letter, and the order for two hundred pistoles, and left the room.
These were the contents of the letter—
“MY LADY,
“Be present at the first ball where you can meet the Duke of Buckingham. He will have on his doublet twelve diamond studs; get close to him, and cut off two.
“As soon as these studs are in your possession, let me know it.”
CHAPTER 15 Civilians and Soldiers
On the day after these events had happened, as Athos had not returned to them, d’Artagnan and Porthos informed M. de Treville of his disappearance.
As for Aramis, he had requested leave of absence for five days, and it was said that he was at Rouen on some family affairs.
M. de Treville was the father of his soldiers. The humblest individual amongst them, from the time that he put on the uniform of the company, was as certain of his assistance and support, as M. de Treville’s own brother could have been.
He went, therefore, at once to the criminal lieutenant. The officer who commanded at La Croix Rouge was sent for, and from various inquiries it was ascertained that Athos was at that time lodged at Fort l’Eveque.
Athos had been subjected to the same trials as we have seen Bonancieux exposed to.
We have witnessed the confrontation of the two prisoners. Athos, who, till then, had said nothing, from fear that d’Artagnan had not had the time he needed, from that moment declared that his name was Athos, and not d’Artagnan. He added that he knew neither M. nor Madame Bonancieux; that he had never spoken either to the one or the other; and that he had gone at about ten at night to pay a visit to his friend, M. d’Artagnan, but until that hour he had been at M. de Treville’s, where he had dined. Twenty witnesses, he added, could confirm this fact, and he named many distinguished gentlemen, amongst whom was the Duc de la Tremouille.
The second commissary was as much surprised as the first, at this simple but firm declaration of the musketeer, on whom he would gladly have taken that revenge which civilians so much love to take on soldiers; but the names of Treville and la Tremouille demanded consideration.
Athos was, therefore, sent to the cardinal; but his eminence was, unfortunately, at the Louvre with the king.
It was just at this time that M. de Treville, having in vain sought Athos from the lieutenant and the governor of Fort l’Eveque, came to make an application to his majesty; to whom he had, as captain of the musketeers, the right of immediate access upon all occasions.
The prejudices of the king against the queen are well known—prejudices which were skilfully fostered by the cardinal, who, in political intrigues, had much greater fear of women than of men. One of the chief causes of this prejudice was the friendship of the queen for Madame de Chevreuse. These two women gave his eminence more uneasiness than the Spanish war, the rupture with England, and the embarrassment of the finances, all combined. He was convinced that Madame de Chevreuse served the queen, not only in political intrigues, but—what was far more vexatious to him—in amorous intrigues as well.
At the first word which the cardinal had uttered, that Madame de Chevreuse, who was exiled to Tours, and had been supposed to be in that city, had come to Paris, and had stayed there five days, escaping the police, the king became furiously enraged. At once capricious, and a false husband, Louis still wished to be distinguished as the just and the chaste. Posterity will, with difficulty, understand this character, which history explains, not by reasoning, but by facts.
But when the cardinal added that not only had Madame de Chevreuse been to Paris, but that the queen had renewed her friendship with her by means of one of those mysterious correspondences which were then called cabals—when he affirmed that he, the cardinal, had all but unravelled the threads of this intrigue—when, at the moment that he was about to detect in the very fact, provided with the fullest proofs, an emissary of the queen, who was in communication with the exile, a musketeer, had dared violently to interrupt the course of justice, by falling, sword in hand, upon the honest officers of the law, who had been charged to examine the whole affair with impartiality, in order to lay it before the king—Louis was no longer able to restrain himself. He took a step towards the queen’s apartments, with that pale and speechless indignation, which, when it burst out, led that prince to acts of the most unfeeling cruelty.
And yet, in all this, the cardinal had not said one word concerning the Duke of Buckingham.
It was at that moment that M. de Treville entered, cool, polite, and with a manner perfectly unobjectionable.
Warned of what had taken place by the presence of the cardinal, and by the change in the king’s countenance, M. de Treville felt himself as strong as Samson in the presence of the Philistines.
The king had already placed his hand upon the handle of the door; but, at the noise of M. de Treville’s entrance, he turned round.
“You come in good time, sir,” said his majesty; who, when his passions were thoroughly excited, never dissembled, “for I hear