Part 13

— Where am I going... he said to himself; what is it I want to do?... alone... all alone, without family, without friends... Bah! he suddenly cried out.

And he dug his heels into his mount, which, having found nothing melancholy in the heavy oats of Pierrefonds, took advantage of the permission to show its cheerfulness in a gallop that swallowed up two leagues.

"To Paris!" said d'Artagnan to himself.

And the next day he arrived in Paris.

He had taken ten days to make the journey.

Chapter XIX — What d'Artagnan Had Come to Do in Paris

The lieutenant dismounted in front of a shop on the rue des Lombards, at the sign of the Golden Pestle. A man of good appearance, wearing a white apron and stroking his grey moustache with a fine fat hand, gave a cry of joy at the sight of the piebald horse.

— Monsieur le chevalier, said he; ah! it is you!

— Good day, Planchet! replied d'Artagnan, hunching his shoulders to enter the shop.

— Quick, someone, cried Planchet, for Monsieur d'Artagnan's horse, someone for his room, someone for his supper!

— Thank you, Planchet! good day, my lads, said d'Artagnan to the attentive boys.

— You will permit me to dispatch this coffee, this molasses and these boiled raisins? said Planchet; they are intended for the office of Monsieur the Superintendent.

— Dispatch, dispatch.

— It will be the matter of a moment, then we shall sup.

— See to it that we sup alone, said d'Artagnan, I have things to say to you.

Planchet looked at his former master in a meaningful way.

— Oh! set your mind at rest, it is nothing but pleasant matters, said d'Artagnan.

— So much the better! so much the better!...

And Planchet breathed freely, while d'Artagnan seated himself very simply in the shop upon a bale of corks, and took stock of the surroundings. The shop was well stocked; one breathed there a perfume of ginger, cinnamon and ground pepper that made d'Artagnan sneeze. The boys, happy to be at the side of a man of war as renowned as a lieutenant of musketeers who approached the person of the king, set to work with an enthusiasm bordering on frenzy, and served the customers with a disdainful haste that more than one remarked.

Planchet took the money and made up his accounts interspersed with polite attentions addressed to his former master.

Planchet had with his clients the brief speech and haughty familiarity of the rich merchant, who serves everyone and waits for no one. D'Artagnan observed this nuance with a pleasure that we shall analyze later. He saw night gradually fall; and at last Planchet led him into a room on the first floor, where, among the bales and the cases, a very cleanly laid table awaited two diners.

D'Artagnan profited from a moment of respite to consider the face of Planchet, whom he had not seen for a year.

The intelligent Planchet had grown a belly, but his face was not bloated. His bright gaze still played with ease in his deep eye-sockets, and the fat, which levels all the characteristic prominences of the human face, had not yet touched either his jutting cheekbones, index of cunning and cupidity, or his sharp chin, index of finesse and perseverance. Planchet held court with as much majesty in his dining room as in his shop. He offered his master a frugal but thoroughly Parisian meal: the roast cooked in the baker's oven, with the vegetables, the salad, and the dessert borrowed from the shop itself. D'Artagnan thought it good that the grocer had drawn from behind the faggots a bottle of that Anjou wine which, throughout d'Artagnan's life, had been his preferred wine.

— Formerly, monsieur, said Planchet with a smile full of hearty good nature, it was I who drank your wine; now, I have the happiness that you drink mine.

— And God be thanked! friend Planchet, I shall drink it for long yet, I hope, for now here I am free.

— Free! You have leave, monsieur?

— Unlimited!

— You are leaving the service? said Planchet, stupefied.

— Yes, I am resting.

— And the king? cried Planchet, who could not suppose that the king could do without the services of a man such as d'Artagnan.

— And the king will seek his fortune elsewhere... But we have supped well, you are in a vein of witticisms, you excite me to confide in you, so open your ears.

— I open them.

And Planchet, with a laugh more frank than sly, uncorked a bottle of white wine.

— Only leave me my reason.

— Oh! when you lose your head, you, monsieur...

— Now, my head is my own, and I intend to husband it more than ever. First let us talk finances... How is our money doing?

— Marvelously, monsieur. The twenty thousand livres that I received from you are still invested in my business, where they bring nine per cent; I give you seven, so I profit by you.

— And you are still content?

— Delighted. Are you bringing me more?

— Better than that... But do you have need of it?

— Oh! not at all. Everyone wants to entrust me with some now. I am extending my affairs.

— That was your plan.

— I am running a banking business... I buy the goods of my needy fellow merchants, I lend money to those who are straitened for repayments.

— Without usury?...

— Oh! monsieur, last week I had two appointments on the boulevard on account of that very word you just uttered.

— What!

— You are going to understand: it was a question of a loan... The borrower gives me in surety some brown sugars, with the condition that I should sell them if repayment were not made by a fixed date. I lend a thousand livres. He does not pay me, I sell the brown sugars for thirteen hundred livres. He learns of it and claims a hundred écus. Upon my word, I refused... pretending that I might have sold them for only nine hundred livres. He told me I was practising usury. I begged him to repeat that behind the boulevard. He is a former guardsman, he came; I passed your sword through his left thigh.

— Zounds! what banking you do! said d'Artagnan.

— Above thirteen per cent I fight, replied Planchet; that is my character.

— Take only twelve, said d'Artagnan, and call the rest commission and brokerage.

— You are right, monsieur. But your affair?

— Ah! Planchet, it is very long and very difficult to tell.

— Tell it anyway.

D'Artagnan scratched his moustache like a man embarrassed by his confidence and distrustful of the confidant.

— It is an investment? asked Planchet.

— Why, yes.

— Of a fine yield?

— Of a pretty yield: four hundred per cent, Planchet.

Planchet struck the table with his fist so sharply that the bottles bounced as if they were afraid.

— Is it possible!

— I believe there will be more, said d'Artagnan coldly, but after all I prefer to say less.

— Ah, the devil! said Planchet drawing nearer... But, monsieur, it is magnificent!... Can one put in a great deal of money?

— Twenty thousand livres each, Planchet.

— That is all you possess, monsieur. For how long?

— For a month.

— And that will give us?

— Fifty thousand livres each; count it.

— It is monstrous!... One will have to fight hard for a game like that?

— I believe indeed one will have to fight quite a bit, said d'Artagnan with the same tranquillity; but this time, Planchet, we are two, and I take the blows upon myself alone.

— Monsieur, I shall not suffer...

— Planchet, you cannot be in it, you would have to leave your business.

— The affair is not done in Paris?

— No.

— Ah! abroad?

— In England.

— A land of speculation, true, said Planchet... a country I know well... What sort of affair, monsieur, without too much curiosity?

— Planchet, it is a restoration.

— Of monuments?

— Yes, of monuments, we shall restore White Hall.

— That is important... And in a month you believe?...

— I take charge of it.

— That concerns you, monsieur, and once you meddle in it...

— Yes, it concerns me... I am quite in the know... however I shall willingly consult you.

— It is a great honor... but I understand little of architecture.

— Planchet... you are wrong, you are an excellent architect, as good as I for what is in question.

— Thank you...

— I had, I confess, been tempted to offer the thing to those gentlemen, but they are away from their houses... It is a pity, I know none bolder nor more adroit.

— Ah! so it appears there will be competition and the enterprise will be contested?

— Oh! yes, Planchet, yes...

— I burn to have details, monsieur.

— Here they are, Planchet, bolt all the doors well.

— Yes, monsieur.

And Planchet locked himself in with a triple turn.

— Good, now, come close to me.

Planchet obeyed.

— And open the window, because the noise of the passers-by and the carts will deafen all those who might hear us.

Planchet opened the window as he had been told, and the gust of tumult that rushed into the room, cries, wheels, barking and footsteps, deafened d'Artagnan himself, as he had wished. It was then that he drank a glass of white wine and began in these terms:

— Planchet, I have an idea.

— Ah! monsieur, I recognize you well there, replied the grocer, panting with emotion.

Chapter XX — Of the Society Formed in the rue des Lombards at the Sign of the Golden Pestle, to Exploit the Idea of Monsieur d'Artagnan

After a moment of silence, during which d'Artagnan appeared to gather not one idea, but all his ideas:

— It is not, my dear Planchet, said he, that you have not heard speak of His Majesty Charles I, king of England?

— Alas! yes, monsieur, since you left France to bring him aid; that despite this aid he fell and all but dragged you down in his fall.

— Precisely; I see you have a good memory, Planchet.

— Peste! monsieur, the wonder would be if I had lost it, that memory, poor as it is. When one has heard Grimaud, who, you know, seldom tells tales, tell how the head of King Charles fell, how you travelled half a night in a mined vessel, and saw that good M. Mordaunt return upon the water with a certain gilt-handled dagger in his breast, one does not forget such things.

— There are yet those who forget them, Planchet.

— Yes, those who have not seen them or who have not heard Grimaud tell them.

— Well! so much the better, since you recall all that, I shall need to remind you of but one thing, which is that King Charles I had a son.

— He even had two, monsieur, without contradicting you, said Planchet; for I saw the second in Paris, M. the Duke of York, one day he was on his way to the Palais-Royal, and I was assured he was but the second son of King Charles I. As for the elder, I have the honor to know him by name, but not by sight.

— That is just, Planchet, where we must arrive: it is this elder son who was formerly called the Prince of Wales, and who is called today Charles II, king of England.

— King without a kingdom, monsieur, replied Planchet sententiously.

— Yes, Planchet, and you may add unhappy prince, more unhappy than a common man lost in the most wretched quarter of Paris.

Planchet made a gesture full of that banal compassion one accords to foreigners with whom one does not think one could ever be in contact. Besides, he saw, in this politico-sentimental operation, not the least glimmer of the commercial idea of M. d'Artagnan, and it was to this idea that he was principally attached. D'Artagnan, who had the habit of understanding things and men well, understood Planchet.

— I am coming to it, said he. This young Prince of Wales, king without a kingdom, as you put it so well, Planchet, interested me, d'Artagnan. I saw him beg the assistance of Mazarin, who is a boor, and the succor of King Louis, who is a child, and it seemed to me, who know something of the matter, that in that intelligent eye of the fallen king, in that nobility of his whole person, a nobility which has floated above all miseries, there was the stuff of a man of heart and of a king.

Planchet tacitly approved: all that, in his eyes at least, still cast no light upon d'Artagnan's idea. The latter continued:

— Here then is the reasoning I made. Listen well, Planchet, for we approach the conclusion.

— I listen.

— Kings are not sown so thick upon the earth that peoples find them wherever they have need. Now this king without a kingdom is in my opinion a reserved seed which must flower in some season or other, provided a hand at once clever, discreet and vigorous shall sow it fair and square, choosing soil, sky and time.

Planchet still nodded assent, which proved he still did not understand.

— Poor little seed of a king! I said to myself, and truly I was touched, Planchet, which makes me think I am embarking on a folly. That is why I wished to consult you, my friend.

Planchet blushed with pleasure and pride.

— Poor little seed of a king! I pick you up, myself, and I shall throw you into good ground.

— Ah! my God! said Planchet, looking fixedly at his former master, as if he had doubted the full clarity of his reason.

— Well! what? asked d'Artagnan, what wounds you?

— I, nothing, monsieur.

— You said: "Ah! my God!"

— You think so?

— I am sure of it. Do you understand already?

— I confess, Monsieur d'Artagnan, that I am afraid...

— Of understanding?

— Yes.

— Of understanding that I mean to set back upon the throne King Charles II, who has no throne? Is that it?

Planchet gave a prodigious start upon his chair.

— Ah! Ah! said he, quite dismayed; so that is what you call a restoration, you!

— Yes, Planchet, is not that what the thing is named?

— Doubtless, doubtless. But have you well reflected?

— Upon what?

— Upon what is over there?

— Where?

— In England.

— And what is there, come now, Planchet?

— First, monsieur, I beg your pardon if I meddle in these matters, which are not my trade; but since it is an affair you propose to me... for you propose an affair to me, do you not?

— A splendid one, Planchet.

— But since you propose an affair to me, I have the right to discuss it.

— Discuss, Planchet; from discussion is born light.

— Well! since I have Monsieur's permission, I shall tell him there are over there the parliaments first.

— Well! after?

— And then the army.

— Good. Do you see anything else?

— And then the nation.

— Is that all?

— The nation, which consented to the fall and death of the late king, father of this one, and which will not wish to contradict itself.

— Planchet, my friend, said d'Artagnan, you reason like a cheese. The nation... the nation is weary of those gentlemen who call themselves by barbarous names and who sing it psalms. To sing for singing's sake, my dear Planchet, I have remarked that nations prefer to sing bawdy songs than plainchant. Recall the Fronde; was there singing in those times! Well! those were the good times.

— Not too much, not too much; I nearly got hanged in it.

— Yes, but you were not?

— No.

— And you began your fortune amid all those songs?

— That is true.

— So you have nothing to say?

— Indeed I do! I come back to the army and the parliaments.

— I said I was borrowing twenty thousand livres from M. Planchet, and that I was putting twenty thousand livres of my own; with these forty thousand livres I raise an army.

Planchet joined his hands; he saw d'Artagnan was serious, he truly believed his master had lost his senses.

— An army!... Ah! monsieur, said he with his most charming smile, for fear of irritating this madman and making him furious. An army... a large one?

— Of forty men, said d'Artagnan.

— Forty against forty thousand, that is not enough. You are worth a thousand men yourself alone, Monsieur d'Artagnan, I know it well; but where will you find thirty-nine men who are worth as much as you? or, finding them, who will furnish the money to pay them?

— Not bad, Planchet... Ah! the devil! you are turning courtier.

— No, monsieur, I say what I think, and that is just why I say that at the first pitched battle you deliver with your forty men, I much fear...

— Also I shall deliver no pitched battle, my dear Planchet, said the Gascon laughing. We have, in Antiquity, very fine examples of retreats and clever marches which consisted in avoiding the enemy instead of engaging him. You should know that, Planchet, you who commanded the Parisians the day they should have fought the musketeers, and who calculated the marches and countermarches so well that you never left the Place Royale.

Planchet began to laugh.

— It is a fact, replied he, that if your forty men always hide and are not clumsy, they may hope not to be beaten; but after all, do you propose some result?

— Without any doubt. Here then, in my opinion, is the method to employ to replace promptly His Majesty Charles II upon the throne.

— Good! cried Planchet, redoubling his attention, let us see this method. But beforehand it seems to me we are forgetting something.

— What?

— We have set aside the nation, which prefers bawdy songs to psalms, and the army, which we do not fight; but there remain the parliaments, which sing little.

— And which fight no better. How, you, Planchet, an intelligent man, do you trouble yourself over a pack of bawlers who call themselves the rumps and the lean ones! The parliaments do not trouble me, Planchet.

— From the moment they do not trouble Monsieur, let us pass on.

— Yes, and arrive at the result. Do you remember Cromwell, Planchet?

— I have heard much spoken of him, monsieur.

— He was a rough warrior.

— And a terrible eater, above all.

— How so?

— Yes, at one gulp he swallowed England.

— Well! Planchet, the day after the day he swallowed England, if someone had swallowed M. Cromwell?...

— Oh! monsieur, it is one of the first axioms of mathematics that the container must be larger than the contained.

— Very good!... There is our affair, Planchet.

— But M. Cromwell is dead, and his container now is the tomb.

— My dear Planchet, I see with pleasure that not only have you become a mathematician, but a philosopher as well.

— Monsieur, in my grocery business I make much use of printed paper; that instructs me.

— Bravo! You know then, in that case... for you have not learned mathematics and philosophy without a little history... that after this Cromwell so great, there came a very small one.

— Yes; that one was called Richard, and he did as you, Monsieur d'Artagnan, he gave his resignation.

— Good, very good! After the great, who is dead; after the small, who gave his resignation, came a third. That one is called M. Monck; he is a very able general, in that he has never fought; he is a very able diplomat, in that he never speaks, and before saying good day to a man, he meditates twelve hours, and ends by saying good night; which makes them cry miracle, seeing that it falls out aptly.

— It is very able indeed, said Planchet; but I know, myself, another politician who much resembles that one.

— M. de Mazarin, is it not?

— Himself.

— You are right, Planchet; only, M. de Mazarin does not aspire to the throne of France; that changes all, you see. Well! this M. Monck, who already has England all roasted on his plate and who already opens his mouth to swallow it, this M. Monck, who says to the men of Charles II and to Charles II himself: "Nescio vos..."

— I do not know English, said Planchet.

— Yes, but I do, said d'Artagnan. Nescio vos signifies: "I know you not." This M. Monck, the important man of England itself, when he shall have engulfed it...

— Well? asked Planchet.

— Well! my friend, I go over there, and with my forty men I carry him off, I pack him up, and I bring him to France, where two parties present themselves to my dazzled eyes.

— And to mine! cried Planchet, transported with enthusiasm. We put him in a cage and show him for money.

— Well! Planchet, that is a third party I had not thought of and which you have just found, you.

— Do you think it a good one?

— Yes, certainly; but I think mine better.

— Let us see yours, then.

— 1° I hold him to ransom.

— For how much?

— Peste! a fellow like that is well worth a hundred thousand écus.

— Oh! yes.

— You see: 1° I hold him to ransom for a hundred thousand écus.

— Or else?...

— Or else, which is still better, I deliver him to King Charles, who, having no longer either an army general to fear or a diplomat to outplay, will restore himself, and, once restored, will count me out the hundred thousand écus in question. There is the idea I had; what say you to it, Planchet?

— Magnificent, monsieur! cried Planchet, trembling with emotion. And how did that idea come to you?

— It came to me one morning on the bank of the Loire, while King Louis XIV, our well-beloved king, wept upon the hand of Mlle de Mancini.

— Monsieur, I guarantee you the idea is sublime. But...

— Ah! there is a but.

— Permit me! But it is a little like the skin of that fine bear, you know, which was to be sold, but which had to be taken from the living bear. Now, to take M. Monck, there will be a scuffle.

— Doubtless, but since I raise an army.

— Yes, yes, I understand, zounds! a stroke of the hand. Oh! then, monsieur, you will triumph, for none equals you in those sorts of encounters.

— I have luck in them, true, said d'Artagnan, with a proud simplicity; you understand that if for that I had my dear Athos, my brave Porthos and my cunning Aramis, the affair were done; but they are lost, it appears, and none knows where to find them. I shall therefore do the stroke alone. Now, do you find the affair good and the investment advantageous?

— Too much! too much!

— How so?

— Because fine things never come to pass in season.

— This one is infallible, Planchet, and the proof is that I am undertaking it. It will be for you a rather pretty gain and for me a rather interesting stroke. They will say: "See what was the old age of M. d'Artagnan"; and I shall have a place in the histories and even in history, Planchet.

— Monsieur! cried Planchet, when I think that it is here, at my house, amid my brown sugar, my prunes and my cinnamon that this gigantic project is ripening, it seems to me my shop is a palace.

— Take care, take care, Planchet; if the least noise leaks out, there is the Bastille for us both; take care, my friend, for it is a plot we are making there: M. Monck is the ally of M. de Mazarin; take care.

— Monsieur, when one has had the honor to belong to you, one is not afraid, and when one has the advantage to be linked in interest with you, one holds one's tongue.

— Very well, it is your affair even more than mine, seeing that in eight days, I shall be in England.

— Depart, monsieur, depart; the sooner the better.

— Then, the money is ready?

— Tomorrow it will be, tomorrow you shall receive it from my hand. Do you want gold or silver?

— Gold, it is more convenient. But how shall we arrange this? Let us see.

“Stories of the world, in your language.”