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Chapter II
Chapter II
The Antechamber Of M. De Treville
M. de Troisville, as his family was still called in Gascony, or M. de
Treville, as he has ended by styling himself in Paris, had really commenced
life as D`Artagnan now did, that is to say, without a sou in his pocket, but
with a fund of courage, shrewdness, and intelligence, that makes the poorest
Gascon gentleman often derive more in his hope from the paternal inheritance
than the richest Pengordian or Berrichan gentleman derives in reality from
his. His insolent bravery, his still more insolent success at a time when
blows poured down like hail, had borne him to the top of that ladder called
court favor, which he had climbed four steps at a time.
He was the friend of the king, who honored highly, as every one knows,
the memory of his father, Henry IV. The father of M. de Treville had served
him so faithfully in his wars against the League, that for want of money -
a thing to which the Bearnais was accustomed all his life, and who constantly
paid his debts with that of which he never stood in need of borrowing, that
is to say, with ready wit - for want of money, we repeat, he authorized him
after the reduction of Paris to assume for his arms a golden lion passant
upon gules with the device of: Fidelis et fortis... This was a great matter
in the way of honor, but very little in the way of wealth; so that when the
illustrious companion of the great Henry died, the only inheritance he was
able to leave his son was his sword and his device. Thanks to this double
gift and the spotless name that accompanied them, M. de Treville was admitted
into the household of the young prince, where he made such good use of his
sword, and was so faithful to his device, that Louis XIII., one of the good
blades of his kingdom, was accustomed to say that, if he had a friend who was
about to fight, he would advise him to choose as a second, himself first, and
Treville next, or even perhaps before him.
Thus Louis XIII. had a real liking for Treville, a royal liking, a
selfish liking it is true, but which was still a liking. At that unhappy
period it was an important consideration to be surrounded by such men as De
Treville. Many might take for their device the epithet of strong, which
formed the second part of his motto, but very few gentlemen could lay claim
to the faithful, which constituted the first. Treville was one of these
latter; his was one of those rare organizations, endowed with an obedient
intelligence like that of the dog, with a blind valor, a quick eye, and a
prompt hand, to whom sight appeared only to be given to see if the king were
dissatisfied with any one, and with the hand to strike this displeasing any
one, whether a Besme, a Maurevers, a Poltiot de Mere, or a Vitry. In short,
up to this period, nothing had been wanting to De Treville but opportunity;
but he was ever on the watch for it, and he promised himself that he would
never fail to seize it by its three hairs whenever it came within reach of
his hand. Louis XIII. then made De Treville the captain of his musketeers,
who were to Louis XIII., in devotedness, or rather in fanaticism, what his
Ordinaries had been to Henry III. and his Scotch Guard to Louis XI.
On his part, and in this respect, the cardinal was not behindhand with
the king. When he saw the formidable and chosen body by which Louis XII.
surrounded himself, this second, or rather this first king of France, became
desirous that he too should have his guard. He had his musketeers then, as
Louis XIII. had his, and these two powerful rivals vied with each other in
procuring the most celebrated swordsmen, not only from all the provinces of
France, but even from all foreign states. It was not uncommon for Richelieu
and Louis XIII. to dispute over their evening game of chess upon the merits
of their servants. Each boasted the bearing and the courage of his own
people, and while exclaiming loudly against duels and broils, they excited
them secretly to quarrel, deriving an immoderate satisfaction or a true
regret at the success or defeat of their own combatants. We learn this from
the memoirs of a man who was concerned in some few of these defeats and in
many victories.
Treville had seized on the weak side of his master, and it was to this
address that he owed the long and constant favor of a king who has not left
the reputation behind him of having been very faithful in his friendships.
He paraded his musketeers before the cardinal Aramand Duplessis with an
insolent air, which made the gray mustache of his eminence curl with ire.
Treville was a master of the war of that period, in which he who did not live
at the expense of the enemy, lived at the expense of his compatriots: his
soldiers formed a legion of devil-may-care fellows, perfectly undisciplined
as regarded every one but himself.
Loose, half-drunk, imposing, the king`s musketeers, or rather M. de
Treville`s, spread about in the cabarets, in the public walks, and the public
sports, shouting, twisting their mustaches, clanking their swords, and
"taking great pleasure in annoying the guards of M. le Cardinal when ever
they could fall in with them; then drawing in the open streets, as if it were
the best of all possible sports; sometimes killed, but sure in that case to
be both wept and avenged; often killing others, but then certain of not
rotting in prison, M. de Treville being there to claim them. Thus M. de
Treville was praised to the highest note by these men, who absolutely adored
him, and who, ruffians as they were, trembled before him like scholars before
their master, obedient to his least word, and ready to sacrifice themselves
to wash out the smallest insult.
M. de Treville employed this powerful machine for the king in the first
place, and the friends of the king - and then for himself and his own
friends. For the rest, in none of the memoirs of this period, which has left
so many memoirs, is this worthy gentleman accused even by his enemies, and
he had many such among men of the pen, as well as among men of the sword; in
no instance, we are told, was this worthy gentleman accused of deriving
personal advantage from the co-operation of his minions. Endowed with a
rare genius for intrigue, which rendered him the equal of the ablest
intriguers, he remained an honest man. Still further, in spite of
sword-thrusts which weaken, and painful exercises which fatigue, he had
become one of the most gallant frequenters of revels, one of the most
insinuating squires of dames, one of the softest whisperers of interesting
nothings of his day: the bonnes fortunes of De Treville were talked of as
those of M. de Bassompierre had been talked of twenty years before, and that
was not saying a little. The captain of the musketeers then, was admired,
feared, and loved, which constitutes the apogee of human fortunes.
Louis XIV. absorbed all the smaller stars of his court in his own vast
radiance; but his father, a sun pluribus impar, left his personal splendor
to each of his favorites, his individual value to each of his courtiers. In
addition to the lever of the king and that of the cardinal, there might be
reckoned in Paris at that time more than two hundred smaller levers, each,
in its degree, attended. Among these two hundred levers, that of De Treville
was one of the most thronged.
The court of his hotel, situated in the Rue du Vieux-Colombier,
resembled a camp, and that by six o`clock in the morning in summer and eight
o`clock in winter. From fifty to sixty musketeers, who appeared to relieve
each other in order always to present an imposing number, paraded constantly
about, armed to the teeth and ready for anything. On one of those immense
staircases upon whose space modern civilization would build a whole house,
ascended and descended the solicitors of Paris, who were in search of favors
of any kind: gentlemen from the provinces anxious to be enrolled, and
servants in all sorts of liveries, bringing and carrying messages between
their masters and M. de Treville. In the antechamber upon long circular
benches reposed the elect, that is to say, those who were called. In this
apartment a continued buzzing prevailed from morning till night, while M. de
Treville, in his closet contiguous to this antechamber, received visits,
listened to complaints, gave his orders, and like the king in his balcony at
the Louvre, had only to place himself at the window to review both men and
arms.
The day on which D`Artagnan presented himself, the assemblage was
imposing, particularly for a provincial just arriving from his province: it
is true that this provincial was a Gascon, and that particularly at this
period, the compatriots of D`Artagnan had the reputation of not being easily
intimidated. When he had once passed the massive door, covered with long
square-headed nails, he fell into the midst of a troop of men of the sword,
who crossed each other in their passage, calling out, quarreling, and playing
tricks one among another. To make way through these turbulent and
conflicting waves, it required to be an officer, a great noble, or a pretty
woman.
It was, then, into the midst of this tumult and disorder that our young
man advanced with a beating heart, ranging his long rapier up his lanky leg,
and keeping one hand on the edge of his cap, with that provincial half-smile
which affects confidence. When he had passed one group he began to breathe
more freely; but he could not help observing that they turned round to look
at him, and, for the first time in his life, D`Artagnan, who had till that
day entertained a very good opinion of himself, felt that he was the object
of ridicule.
When arrived at the staircase it was still worse; there were four
musketeers on the bottom steps amusing themselves with the following
exercise, while ten or twelve of their comrades waited upon the landing-place
their turns to take their places in the sport.
One of them, placed upon the top stair, naked sword in hand, prevented,
or at least endeavored to prevent, the three others from going up.
These three others fenced against him with their agile swords, which
D`Artagnan at first took for foils, and believed to be buttoned; but he soon
perceived, by certain scratches, that every weapon was pointed and sharpened,
and that at each of these scratches, not only the spectators, but even the
actors themselves laughed, like so many madmen.
He who at the moment occupied the upper step, kept his adversaries in
check admirably. A circle was formed around them; the conditions required
that at every hit the person hit should quite the game, losing his turn of
audience to the advantage of the person who had hit him. In five minutes
three were slightly wounded, one on the hand, another on the chin, and the
third on the ear, by the defender of the stair, who himself remained intact:
a piece of skill which was worth to him, according to agreement, three turns
of favor.
However difficult it might be, or rather as he pretended it was, to
astonish our young traveler, this pastime really astonished him; he had seen
in his province - that land in which heads become so easily heated - a few
of the preliminaries of duels, but the Gasconades of the four fences appeared
to him the strongest he had ever heard, even in Gascony. He believed himself
transported into that famous country of giants into which Gulliver since went
and was so frightened; and yet he had not gained the goal, for there were
still the landing-place and the antechamber.
On the landing they were no longer fighting, but amused themselves with
stories about women, and in the antechamber with stories about the court.
On the landing, D`Artagnan blushed; in the antechamber, he trembled. His
warm and fickle imagination, which in Gascony had rendered him formidable to
young chambermaids, and even sometimes to their mistresses, had never
dreamed, even in moment of delirium, of half the amorous wonders, or a
quarter of the feats of gallantry, which were here set forth, accompanied by
names the best known, and with details the least delicate. But if his morals
were shocked on the landing, his respect for the cardinal was scandalized in
the antechamber. There, to his great astonishment, D`Artagnan heard the
policy which made all Europe tremble, criticised aloud and openly, as well
as the private life of the cardinal, which had brought about the punishment
of so many great nobles for having dared to pry into: that great man, who was
so revered by D`Artagnan the elder, served as an object of ridicule to the
musketeers, who cracked their jokes upon his bandy legs and his humpback;
some sang ballads upon Madame d`Aiguillon, his mistress, and Madame Cambalet,
his niece; whilst others formed parties and plans to annoy the pages and
guards of the cardinal duke - all things which appeared to D`Artagnan
monstrous impossibilities.
Nevertheless, when the name of the king was now and then uttered
unthinkingly amid all these cardinal jokes, a sort of gag seemed to close for
a moment all the jeering mouths; they looked hesitatingly around them, and
appeared to doubt the thickness of the partition between them and the closet
of M. de Treville; but a fresh allusion soon brought back the conversation
to his eminence, and then the laughter recovered its loudness, and no
coloring was spared to any of his actions.
"Certes, these fellows will all be either embastilled or hung," thought
the terrified D`Artagnan, "and I, no doubt, with them; for from the moment
I have either listened to or heard them, I shall be held to be an accomplice.
What would my good father say, who so strongly pointed out to me the respect
due to the cardinal, if he knew I was in the society of such pagans?"
We have no need, therefore, to say that D`Artagnan did not venture to
join in the conversation; only he looked with all his eyes and listened with
all his ears, stretching his five senses so as to lose nothing; and, in spite
of his confidence in the paternal monitions, he felt himself carried by his
tastes and led by his instincts to praise rather than to blame the unheard-of
things which were passing before him.
D`Artagnan being, however, a perfect stranger in the crowd of M. de
Treville`s courtiers, and this his first appearance in that place, he was at
length noticed, and a person came to him and asked him his business there.
At this demand, D`Artagnan gave his name very modestly, laid a stress upon
the title of compatriot, and begged the servant who had put the question to
him to request a moment`s audience of M. de Treville - a request which the
other, with an air of protection, promised to convey in time and season.
D`Artagnan, a little recovered from his first surprise, had now leisure
to study costumes and countenances.
The center of the most animated group was a musketeer of great height,
of a haughty countenance, and dressed in a costume so peculiar as to attract
general attention. He did not wear the uniform cloak - which, indeed, at
that time, of less liberty and of still greater independence, was not
obligatory - but a cerulean blue doublet, a little faded and worn, and over
this a magnificent baldrick worked in gold, which shone like water-ripples
in the sun. A long cloak of crimson velvet fell in graceful folds from his
shoulders, disclosing in front the splendid baldrick, from which was
suspended a gigantic rapier.
This musketeer had just come off guard, complained of having a cold, and
coughed from time to time affectedly. It was for this reason, he said to
those around him, he had put on his cloak, and while he spoke with a lofty
air and twisted his mustache, all admired his embroidered baldrick, and
D`Artagnan more than any one.
"What do you make a wonder about?" said the musketeer; "the fashion is
coming in; it is a folly, I admit, but still it is the fashion. Besides one
must lay out one`s inheritance somehow."
"Ah, Porthos!" cried one of his companions, "don`t think to palm upon
us that you obtained that baldrick by paternal generosity; it was given to
you by that veiled lady I met you with the other Sunday, near the gate
Saint-Honore."
"No, `pon honor; by the faith of a gentleman, I bought it with the
contents of my own purse," answered he whom they designated under the name
of Porthos.
"Yes, about in the same manner," said another musketeer, "as I bought
this new purse with the money my mistress put into the old one."
"It`s true, though," said Porthos; "and the proof is, that I paid twelve
pistoles for it."
The wonder was increased, though the doubt continued to exist.
"Is it not true, Aramis?" said Porthos, turning toward another
musketeer.
This other musketeer formed a perfect contrast with his interrogator,
who had just designated him by the name of Aramis: he was a stout man, of
about two or three-and-twenty, with an open, ingenuous countenance, a black,
mild eye, and cheeks rosy and downy as an autumn peach; his delicate mustache
marked a perfectly straight line upon his upper lip: he appeared to dread to
lower his hands lest their veins should swell, and he pinched the tips of his
ears from time to time to preserve their delicate pink transparency.
Habitually he spoke little and slowly, bowed frequently, laughed without
noise, showing his teeth, which were fine, and of which, as of the rest of
his person, he appeared to take great care. He answered the appeal of his
friend by an affirmative nod of the head.
This affirmation appeared to dispel all doubts with regard to the
baldrick; they continued to admire it, but said no more about it; and, with
one of the rapid changes of thought, the conversation passed suddenly to
another subject.
"What do you think of the story Chalais` esquire relates?" asked another
musketeer, without addressing any one in particular.
"And what does he say?" asked Porthos, in a self-sufficient tone.
"He relates that he met at Brussels Rochefort, the ame damnee of the
cardinal, disguised as a capuchin; and that this cursed Rochefort, thanks to
his disguise, had tricked M. de Laigues, like a simpleton as he is."
"A simpleton, indeed!" said Porthos; "but is the matter certain?"
"I had it from Aramis," replied the musketeer.
"Indeed!"
"Why, you know it is, Porthos," said Aramis; "I told you of it yesterday
- say nothing more about it."
"Say nothing more about it - that`s your opinion!" replied Porthos.
"Say nothing more about it! Peste! you come to your conclusions quickly.
What! the cardinal sets a spy upon a gentleman, has his letters stolen from
him by means of a traitor, a brigand, a rascal - has, with the help of this
spy, and thanks to this correspondence, Chalais` throat cut under the stupid
pretext that he wanted to kill the king and marry monsieur to the queen!
Nobody knew a word of this enigma. You unraveled it yesterday, to the great
satisfaction of all; and while we are still gaping with wonder at the news,
you come and tell us to day - `Let us say no more about it.`"
"Well, then let us speak about it, since you desire it,`" replied Aramis
patiently.
"This Rochforte," cried Porthos, "if I were poor Chalais` esquire,
should pass a minute or two very uncomfortably with me."
"And you - you would pass rather a sad half-hour with the Red Duke,"
replied Aramis.
"Oh! oh! the Red Duke! bravo! bravo! the Red Duke!" cried Porthos,
clapping his hands and nodding his head. "The Red Duke is capital. I`ll
circulate that saying, be assured, my dear fellow. Who says this Aramis is
not a wit? What a misfortune it is you did not follow your first vocation
- what a delightful abbe you would have made!"
"Oh, it`s only a temporary postponement," replied Aramis; "I shall be
one, some day. You very well know, Porthos, that I continue to study
theology for that purpose."
"He will be one, as he says," cried Porthos; "he will be one, sooner or
later."
"Soon," said Aramis.
"He only waits for one thing to determine him to resume his cassock,
which hangs behind his uniform," said another musketeer.
"What is he waiting for?" asked another.
"Only till the queen has given an heir to the crown of France."
"No jokes upon that subject, gentlemen," said Porthos; "thank God, the
queen is still of an age to give one."
"They say that M. de Buckingham is in France," replied Aramis, with a
significant smile, which gave to this sentence, apparently so simple, a
tolerably scandalous meaning.
"Aramis, my good friend, this time you are wrong," interrupted Porthos,
"your wit is always leading you astray; if M. de Treville heard you, you
would repent of speaking thus."
"Are you going to teach me better, Porthos," cried Aramis, from whose
usually mild eye a flash passed like lightning.
"My dear fellow, be a musketeer or an abbe. Be one or the other, but
not both," replied Porthos. "You know what Athos told you the other day: you
eat at everybody`s mess. Ah! don`t be angry, I beg of you, that would be
useless; you know what is agreed upon between you, Athos, and me. You go to
Madame d`Aiguillon`s, and you pay your court to her; you go to Madame de
Bois-Tracy`s, the cousin of Madame de Chevreuse, and you pass for being far
advanced in the good graces of that lady. Oh, good Lord! don`t trouble
yourself to reveal your good fortunes; no one asks for your secret - all the
world knows your discretion. But since you possess that virtue, why the
devil don`t you make use of it with respect to her majesty? Let whoever
likes talk of the king and the cardinal, and how he likes; but the queen is
sacred, and if any one speaks of her, let it be well."
"Porthos, you are as vain as Narcissus, I plainly tell you so," replied
Aramis; "you know I hate moralizing, except when it is done by Athos. As to
you, good sir, you wear too magnificent a baldrick to be strong on that head.
I will be an abbe if it suits me; in the meanwhile I am a musketeer: in that
quality I say what I please, and at this moment it pleases me to say that you
annoy me."
"Aramis!"
"Porthos!"
"Gentlemen! gentlemen!" cried the surrounding group.
"Monsieur de Treville awaits M. d`Artagnan," cried a servant, throwing
open the door of the cabinet.
At this announcement, during which the door remained open, every one
became mute, and amid the general silence the young man crossed the
antechamber in a part of its length, and entered the apartment of the captain
of the musketeers, congratulating himself with all his heart at having so
narrowly escaped the end of this strange quarrel.
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