Part 9

— Yes.

— Gravelle.

— Yes.

— The one who is missing three teeth.

— Four.

— Whereas I, look!

And Porthos, parting his thick lips, displayed two rows of teeth a little less white than snow, but as even, as hard, and as sound as ivory.

— You cannot imagine, Porthos, said d’Artagnan, how the king values teeth. Yours decide me; I shall present you to the king.

— You?

— Why not? Do you think I am any less in favor than Aramis?

— Oh! no.

— Do you believe I have the slightest claim on the fortifications of Belle-Île?

— Oh! certainly not.

— It is therefore your interest alone that can move me.

— I do not doubt it.

— Well! I am an intimate friend of the king, and the proof is that when there is something unpleasant to tell him, I am the one who undertakes it.

— But, dear friend, if you present me...

— After?

— Aramis will be angry.

— With me?

— No, with me.

— Bah! whether it is he or I who presents you, since you were to be presented, it is all the same.

— I was to be given new clothes.

— Yours are splendid.

— Oh! the ones I had ordered were much finer.

— Take care, the king likes simplicity.

— Then I shall be simple. But what will M. Fouquet say to knowing I have left?

— Are you then on parole?

— No, not quite. But I had promised him not to go away without warning him.

— Wait, we shall come back to that. Have you anything to do here?

— I? Nothing very important, at least.

— Unless, however, you are Aramis’s intermediary for something serious.

— Upon my word, no.

— What I say to you, you understand, is out of interest for you. I suppose, for example, that you are charged with sending Aramis messages, letters.

— Ah! letters, yes. I send him certain letters.

— Where?

— To Fontainebleau.

— And do you have any such letters?

— But...

— Let me speak. And do you have any such letters?

— I have just received one.

— Interesting?

— I suppose so.

— You do not read them then?

— I am not curious.

And Porthos drew from his pocket the soldier’s letter that Porthos had not read, but that d’Artagnan had read, he.

— Do you know what must be done? said d’Artagnan.

— Of course! what I always do, send it.

— No.

— What, keep it?

— No, not yet. Were you not told this letter was important?

— Very important.

— Well! you must carry it yourself to Fontainebleau.

— To Aramis.

— Yes.

— That is right.

— And since the king is there...

— You will take advantage of that?...

— I will take advantage of that to present you to the king.

— Ah! ox horn! d’Artagnan, truly there is no one but you to find expedients.

— Therefore, instead of sending our friend more or less faithful messages, it is we ourselves who will carry him the letter.

— I had not even thought of it, yet it is quite simple.

— That is why it is urgent, my dear Porthos, that we leave at once.

— Indeed, said Porthos, the sooner we leave, the less delay Aramis’s letter will suffer.

— Porthos, you always reason powerfully, and in you logic secondes imagination.

— You think so? said Porthos.

— It is the result of solid studies, replied d’Artagnan. Come, let us go.

— But, said Porthos, my promise to M. Fouquet?

— Which?

— Not to leave Saint-Mandé without warning him?

— Ah! my dear Porthos, said d’Artagnan, how young you are!

— How so!

— You arrive at Fontainebleau, do you not?

— Yes.

— You will find M. Fouquet there?

— Yes.

— At the king’s, probably?

— At the king’s, repeated Porthos majestically.

— And you approach him saying: “Monsieur Fouquet, I have the honor of warning you that I have just left Saint-Mandé.”

— And, said Porthos with the same majesty, seeing me at Fontainebleau at the king’s, M. Fouquet cannot say I lie.

— My dear Porthos, I opened my mouth to tell you so; you anticipate me in everything. Oh! Porthos! what a happy nature you are! age has not bitten into you.

— Not too much.

— Then all is said.

— I believe so.

— You have no more scruples?

— I believe not.

— Then I take you with me.

— Perfectly; I shall have my horses saddled.

— You have horses here?

— I have five.

— That you had brought from Pierrefonds?

— That M. Fouquet gave me.

— My dear Porthos, we do not need five horses for two; besides, I already have three in Paris, that would make eight; it would be too many.

— It would not be too many if I had my men here; but, alas! I do not.

— You miss your men?

— I miss Mousqueton, Mousqueton is lacking to me.

— Excellent heart! said d’Artagnan; but, believe me, leave your horses here as you left Mousqueton back there.

— Why so?

— Because, later...

— Well?

— Well! later, perhaps it will be well that M. Fouquet has given you nothing at all.

— I do not understand, said Porthos.

— It is useless that you understand.

— However...

— I shall explain it to you later, Porthos.

— It is politics, I wager.

— And of the subtlest kind.

Porthos lowered his head at this word politics; then, after a moment of reverie, he added:

— I will confess to you, d’Artagnan, that I am not political.

— I know it, by God! well.

— Oh! no one knows it; you told me so yourself, you, the bravest of the brave.

— What did I tell you, Porthos?

— That one has one’s days. You told me so and I have experienced it. There are days when one feels less pleasure than on others in receiving sword thrusts.

— That is my thought.

— It is mine too, though I scarcely believe in blows that kill.

— The devil! you have killed, however?

— Yes, but I have never been killed.

— The reason is good.

— Therefore, I do not believe I shall ever die of the blade of a sword or the ball of a musket.

— Then you fear nothing?... Ah! water, perhaps?

— No, I swim like an otter.

— Quartan fever?

— I have never had it, and do not believe I ever shall; but I will confess one thing...

And Porthos lowered his voice.

— Which? asked d’Artagnan, tuning himself to Porthos’s pitch.

— I will confess, repeated Porthos, that I have a horrible fear of politics.

— Ah! bah! cried d’Artagnan.

— Softly! said Porthos in a stentorian voice. I have seen His Eminence the Cardinal de Richelieu and His Eminence the Cardinal de Mazarin; one had a red politics, the other a black politics. I was never much more content with one than with the other: the first had the head cut off of M. de Marcillac, M. de Thou, M. de Cinq-Mars, M. de Chalais, M. de Boutteville, M. de Montmorency; the second had a crowd of frondeurs torn to pieces, among whom we were, my dear.

— Among whom, on the contrary, we were not, said d’Artagnan.

— Oh! yes indeed; for if I drew my sword for the cardinal, I struck for the king.

— Dear Porthos!

— I finish. My fear of politics is such, that, if there is politics underneath, I would rather return to Pierrefonds.

— You would be right, if that were so; but with me, dear Porthos, never any politics, that is clear. You worked to fortify Belle-Île; the king wished to know the name of the able engineer who did the works; you are timid like all men of true merit; perhaps Aramis wishes to hide you under a bushel. I, I take you; I, I declare you; I, I produce you; the king rewards you and that is all my politics.

— It is mine, morbleu! said Porthos, extending his hand to d’Artagnan.

But d’Artagnan knew Porthos’s hand; he knew that once imprisoned between the baron’s five fingers, an ordinary hand did not come out without a bruise. He therefore extended, not his hand, but his fist to his friend. Porthos did not even notice it. After which they both left Saint-Mandé.

The guards whispered a bit and said a few words into each other’s ear that d’Artagnan understood, but that he took good care not to make Porthos understand.

“Our friend,” he said, “was indeed a prisoner of Aramis. Let us see what will result from the liberation of this conspirator.”

Chapter CXLIII — The rat and the cheese

D’Artagnan and Porthos returned on foot as d’Artagnan had come.

When d’Artagnan, entering first into the shop of the _Golden Pestle_, had announced to Planchet that M. du Vallon would be one of the privileged travelers; when Porthos, entering the shop, had made his plume click against the wooden candles suspended from the awning, something like a painful presentiment troubled the joy that Planchet promised himself for the next day.

But it was a heart of gold that our grocer had, a precious relic of the good old times, which is always and has always been, for those who grow old, the time of their youth, and for those who are young, the old age of their ancestors.

Planchet, despite that inward shudder repressed as soon as felt, welcomed Porthos therefore with a respect of tender cordiality.

Porthos, a little stiff at first, because of the social distance that existed at that epoch between a baron and a grocer, Porthos ended by humanizing himself on seeing in Planchet so much good will and attentiveness.

He was especially sensible to the liberty that was given him or rather offered, to plunge his broad hands into the boxes of dried and preserved fruits, into the sacks of almonds and hazelnuts, into the drawers full of sweetmeats.

Also, despite the invitations Planchet made him to go up to the entresol, he chose for his favorite dwelling, during the evening he had to spend at Planchet’s, the shop, where his fingers always met what his nose had scented and seen.

The fine figs of Provence, the filberts of the Forest, the plums of Touraine, became for Porthos the object of a distraction he savored for five hours without interruption.

Beneath his teeth, like beneath millstones, the pits were crushed, whose debris strewed the floor and cried out under the soles of those who came and went; Porthos stripped into his lips, at a single stroke, the rich bunches of dried muscat, of violet colors, of which half a pound thus passed at a single gulp from his mouth into his stomach.

In a corner of the store, the boys, crouched in terror, looked at one another without daring to speak.

They did not know Porthos, they had never seen him. The race of those Titans who had borne the last cuirasses of Hugues Capet, of Philippe-Auguste and of François Ier began to disappear. They asked themselves therefore mentally if this were not the ogre of fairy tales, who was going to make the whole shop of Planchet disappear into his insatiable stomach, and that without effecting the least removal of the casks and boxes.

Crunching, chewing, cracking, nibbling, sucking and swallowing, Porthos said from time to time to the grocer:

— You have a pretty business here, friend Planchet.

— He will soon have no more if this continues, grumbled the head boy, who had Planchet’s word to succeed him.

And, in his despair, he approached Porthos, who took up all the space of the passage leading from the back shop to the shop. He hoped Porthos would rise, and that this movement would distract him from his devouring ideas.

— What do you wish, my friend? asked Porthos with an affable air.

— I should like to pass, sir, if it would not trouble you too much.

— That is only fair, said Porthos, and it troubles me not at all.

And at the same time he took the boy by the waist, lifted him from the ground, and set him gently down on the other side.

All the while smiling with the same affable air.

The legs failed the terrified boy at the moment Porthos set him on the ground, so that he fell on his behind upon some corks.

However, seeing the gentleness of this giant, he ventured again.

— Ah! sir, said he, take care.

— Of what, my friend? asked Porthos.

— You are going to set fire to your body.

— How so, my good friend? said Porthos.

— They are all heating foods, sir.

— Which?

— Grapes, hazelnuts, almonds.

— Yes, but, if almonds, hazelnuts and grapes heat...

— It is incontestable, sir.

— Honey cools.

And stretching his hand toward a small open barrel of honey, into which dipped the spatula by means of which it is served to customers, Porthos swallowed a good half pound of it.

— My friend, said Porthos, I shall ask you for water now.

— In a bucket, sir? asked the boy naively.

— No, in a carafe; a carafe will suffice, replied Porthos with good nature.

And, raising the carafe to his mouth, like a bell-ringer does his horn, he emptied the carafe at a single draught.

Planchet trembled in all the sentiments that correspond to the fibers of property and self-love.

However, a host worthy of ancient hospitality, he feigned to converse very attentively with d’Artagnan, and repeated to him without cease:

— Ah! sir, what joy!... ah! sir, what honor!

— At what hour shall we sup, Planchet? asked Porthos; I have an appetite.

The head boy joined his hands.

The other two slipped under the counters, fearing Porthos might scent fresh flesh.

— We shall take only a light collation here, said d’Artagnan, and, once at Planchet’s country place, we shall sup.

— Ah! it is to your country place we are going, Planchet? said Porthos. So much the better.

— You overwhelm me, Monsieur le Baron.

_Monsieur le Baron_ made a great impression on the boys, who saw a man of the highest quality in an appetite of this sort.

Besides, this title reassured them. Never had they heard tell that an ogre had been called _Monsieur le Baron_.

— I shall take a few biscuits for my road, said Porthos nonchalantly.

And, so saying, he emptied a whole jar of aniseed biscuits into the vast pocket of his doublet.

— My shop is saved, cried Planchet.

— Yes, like the cheese, said the head boy.

— What cheese?

— That Dutch cheese into which a rat had got and of which we found only the rind.

Planchet looked at his shop, and, at the sight of what had escaped Porthos’s tooth, he found the comparison exaggerated.

The head boy perceived what was passing in his master’s mind.

— Beware the return! said he to him.

— Have you fruit at your place? said Porthos, going up to the entresol, where it had just been announced that the collation was served.

“Alas!” thought the grocer, addressing to d’Artagnan a look full of prayers, which the latter half understood.

After the collation, they set out on the road.

It was late when the three horsemen, departed from Paris toward six o’clock, arrived on the pavement of Fontainebleau.

The road was made gaily. Porthos took a liking to Planchet’s company, because the latter testified much respect for him and entertained him lovingly of his meadows, his woods and his warrens.

Porthos had the tastes and the pride of a proprietor.

D’Artagnan, when he had seen the two companions at grips, took the sides of the road, and, leaving the bridle floating on his mount’s neck, isolated himself from the whole world as from Porthos and Planchet.

The moon glided softly through the bluish foliage of the forest. The scents of the plain rose, perfumed, to the nostrils of the horses, who blew with great bounds of joy.

Porthos and Planchet began to talk hay.

Planchet confessed to Porthos that, in the mature age of his life, he had, in effect, neglected agriculture for commerce, but that his childhood had slipped by in Picardy, in the fine lucerne that rose to his knees and under the green apple trees with red apples; also he had sworn to himself, as soon as his fortune was made, to return to nature, and to end his days as he had begun them, as close as possible to the earth, where all men go.

— Eh! eh! said Porthos, then, my dear Monsieur Planchet, your retirement is near?

— How so?

— Yes, you seem to me in train to make a small fortune.

— But yes, replied Planchet, one nibbles away.

— Let us see, how much do you ambition and at what figure do you count on retiring?

— Monsieur, said Planchet without answering the question, interesting as it was, Monsieur, one thing causes me much pain.

— What thing? asked Porthos, looking behind him as if to seek that thing which worried Planchet and deliver him of it.

— Formerly, said the grocer, you called me Planchet plain and simple and you would have said to me: “How much do you ambition, Planchet, and at what figure do you count on retiring?”

— Certainly, certainly, formerly I would have said that, replied the honest Porthos with an embarrassment full of delicacy; but formerly...

— Formerly, I was M. d’Artagnan’s lackey, is that not what you mean to say?

— Yes.

— Well! if I am no longer quite his lackey, I am still his servant; and, moreover, since that time...

— Well! Planchet?

— Since that time, I have had the honor of being his associate.

— Oh! oh! said Porthos. What! d’Artagnan has gone into groceries?

— No, no, said d’Artagnan, whom these words drew from his reverie and who put his mind to the conversation with the skill and rapidity that distinguished each operation of his mind and body. It is not d’Artagnan who has gone into groceries, it is Planchet who has gone into politics. That is it!

— Yes, said Planchet with pride and satisfaction at once, we made together a small operation that brought me, for my part, a hundred thousand livres, and M. d’Artagnan two hundred thousand.

— Oh! oh! said Porthos with admiration.

— So much so, Monsieur le Baron, continued the grocer, that I beg you again to call me Planchet as in the past and to always use the familiar form with me. You could not believe the pleasure that will procure me.

— I will, if that is how it is, my dear Planchet, replied Porthos.

And, as he found himself near Planchet, he raised his hand to strike him on the shoulder as a sign of cordial friendship.

But a providential movement of the horse disordered the cavalier’s gesture, so that his hand fell upon the crupper of Planchet’s horse.

The animal bent its back.

D’Artagnan began to laugh and to think aloud.

— Take care, Planchet; for, if Porthos loves you too much, he will caress you, and, if he caresses you, he will flatten you: Porthos is always very strong, you see.

— Oh! said Planchet, Mousqueton did not die of it, and yet Monsieur le Baron loved him well.

— Certainly, said Porthos with a sigh that simultaneously made the three horses rear, and I was saying again this morning to d’Artagnan how much I regretted him: but, tell me, Planchet?

— Thank you, Monsieur le Baron, thank you.

— Brave fellow, go! How many acres of park do you have, you?

— Of park?

— Yes. We shall count the meadows afterward, then the woods after.

— Where, Monsieur?

— At your château.

— But, Monsieur le Baron, I have neither château, nor park, nor meadows, nor woods.

— What do you have then, asked Porthos, and why do you call that a country place, then?

— I did not say a country place, Monsieur le Baron, replied Planchet a little humiliated, but a simple footing on the ground.

— Ah! ah! said Porthos, I understand; you are reserving yourself.

— No, Monsieur le Baron, I speak the plain truth: I have two guest rooms, that is all.

— But then, where do your friends walk?

— First, in the king’s forest, which is very fine.

— The fact is the forest is fine, said Porthos, almost as fine as my forest of Berry.

Planchet opened wide his eyes.

— You have a forest in the style of the forest of Fontainebleau, Monsieur le Baron? stammered he.

— Yes, I even have two; but that of Berry is my favorite.

— Why so? asked Planchet graciously.

— But, first, because I do not know its end; and, next, because it is full of poachers.

— And how can this profusion of poachers render this forest so agreeable to you?

— In that they hunt my game and that I, I hunt them, which, in time of peace, is for me, in little, an image of war.

They were at this point of the conversation, when Planchet, lifting his nose, perceived the first houses of Fontainebleau which stood out strongly against the sky, while above the compact and shapeless mass leapt the pointed roofs of the château, whose slates shone in the moon like the scales of an immense fish.

— Gentlemen, said Planchet, I have the honor to announce to you that we have arrived at Fontainebleau.

Chapter CXLIV — Planchet’s country place

The horsemen lifted their heads and saw that the honest Planchet spoke the exact truth.

Ten minutes later, they were in the rue de Lyon, on the other side of the Inn of the _Beau-Paon_.

A great hedge of thick elder, hawthorn and hops formed an impenetrable and black enclosure, behind which rose a white house with a broad tiled roof.

Two windows of this house gave onto the street.

Both were dark.

Between the two, a small door surmounted by an awning supported by pilasters gave entrance there.

One reached this door by an elevated threshold.

Planchet put foot to ground as if he were going to knock at this door; then, thinking better of it, he took his horse by the bridle and walked about thirty paces further.

His two companions followed him.

Then he arrived before a cart gate with openwork situated thirty paces further on, and, lifting a wooden latch, the only fastening of this gate, he pushed one of the leaves.

Then he entered first, drawing his horse by the bridle, into a small courtyard surrounded by manure, whose good odor betrayed a neighboring stable.

— It smells good, said boisterously Porthos, putting in his turn foot to ground, and I should truly believe myself in my cowhouses at Pierrefonds.

— I have but one cow, hastened to say modestly Planchet.

— And I, I have thirty, said Porthos, or rather I do not know the number of my cows.

The two horsemen had entered, Planchet closed the door behind them.

During this time, d’Artagnan, who had put foot to ground with his habitual lightness, sniffed the good air, and, joyful like a Parisian who sees greenery, plucked a sprig of honeysuckle with one hand, an eglantine with the other.

Porthos had put his hands on some peas climbing along the stakes and ate or rather browsed pods and fruit.

Planchet busied himself at once with waking, in his outhouses, a sort of peasant, old and broken, who slept on some moss covered with a ragged coat.

This peasant, recognizing Planchet, called him _our master_, to the great satisfaction of the grocer.

— Put the horses to the rack, old man, and good feed, said Planchet.

— Oh! yes indeed! fine beasts, said the peasant; oh! they must burst of it!

— Gently, gently, friend, said d’Artagnan; pest! how we go at it: the oats and the truss of straw, nothing more.

“Stories of the world, in your language.”