The Man in the Iron Mask
Captive and Jailers.
When they had entered the fort, and the was making some for the of his guests, “Come,” said Athos, “let us have a word of we are alone.”
“It is this,” the musketeer. “I have a prisoner, who the king shall not be seen. You came here, he has something to you through the of his window; I was at dinner with the governor, I saw the object thrown, and I saw Raoul it up. It not take long to this. I it, and I you in with my prisoner. And then—”
“And then—you us to be shot.”
“Ma foi! I admit it; but, if I was the to a musket, fortunately, I was the last to take at you.”
“If you had killed me, D’Artagnan, I should have had the good to die for the house of France, and it would be an to die by your hand—you, its and most defender.”
“What the devil, Athos, do you by the house?” D’Artagnan. “You don’t that you, a well-informed and man, can place any in the nonsense by an idiot?”
“I do in it.”
“With so much the more reason, my dear chevalier, from your having orders to kill all those who do in it,” said Raoul.
“That is because,” the captain of the musketeers—“because every calumny, it may be, has the almost of popular.”
“No, D’Artagnan,” Athos, promptly; “but the king is not that the of his family should among the people, and with the of the son of Louis XIII.”
“Do not talk in such a manner, Athos, or I shall to think you have your senses. Besides, to me how it is possible Louis XIII. should have a son in the Isle of Sainte-Marguerite.”
“A son you have masked, in a fishing-boat,” said Athos. “Why not?”
D’Artagnan was to a pause.
“Oh!” said he; “whence do you know that a fishing-boat—?”
“Brought you to Sainte-Marguerite’s with the the prisoner—with a you monseigneur. Oh! I am with all that,” the comte. D’Artagnan his mustache.
“If it were true,” said he, “that I had in a and with a a prisoner, nothing proves that this must be a prince—a of the house of France.”
“Ask Aramis such riddles,” Athos, coolly.
“Aramis,” the musketeer, at a stand. “Have you Aramis?”
“After his at Vaux, yes; I have Aramis, a fugitive, pursued, bewildered, ruined; and Aramis has told me to make me in the this cut upon the of the plate.”
D’Artagnan’s on his in some confusion. “This is the way,” said he, “in which God to nothing that which men call wisdom! A must that be of which twelve or fifteen the fragments! Athos, be the which has you to with me in this affair! for now—”
“Well,” said Athos, with his mild severity, “is your I know it? Consult your memory, my friend. Have I not than this?”
“You have one so dangerous,” D’Artagnan, in a of sadness. “I have something like a idea that all who are with this will die, and die unhappily.”
“The will of God be done!” said Athos, “but here is your governor.”
D’Artagnan and his friends their parts. The governor, and hard, D’Artagnan with a almost to obsequiousness. With respect to the travelers, he himself with good cheer, and taking his from them. Athos and Raoul that he often to them by attacks, or to catch them off their guard; but neither the one the other gave him the least advantage. What D’Artagnan had said was probable, if the did not it to be true. They rose from the table to awhile.
“What is this man’s name? I don’t like the looks of him,” said Athos to D’Artagnan in Spanish.
“De Saint-Mars,” the captain.
“He is, then, I suppose, the prince’s jailer?”
“Eh! how can I tell? I may be at Sainte-Marguerite forever.”
“Oh! no, not you!”
“My friend, I am in the of a man who a in the of a desert. He would like to it away, but he cannot; he would like to it, but he not. The king will not to me, for no one else would him as as I do; he not having me near him, from being aware that no one would be of so much service near his person as myself. But it will as it may God.”
“But,” Raoul, “your not being proves that your here is provisional, and you will return to Paris?”
“Ask these gentlemen,” the governor, “what was their purpose in to Saint-Marguerite?”
“They came from learning there was a of Benedictines at Sainte-Honnorat which is curious; and from being told there was excellent in the island.”
“That is at their service, as well as yours,” Saint-Mars.
D’Artagnan thanked him.
“When will they depart?” added the governor.
“To-morrow,” D’Artagnan.
M. de Saint-Mars to make his rounds, and left D’Artagnan alone with the Spaniards.
“Oh!” the musketeer, “here is a life and a that me very little. I this man, and he me, mordioux! Come, let us have a or two at the rabbits; the walk will be beautiful, and not fatiguing. The whole is but a and a in length, with the of a league; a park. Let us try to ourselves.”
“As you please, D’Artagnan; not for the of ourselves, but to an opportunity for talking freely.”
D’Artagnan a to a soldier, who the some guns, and then returned to the fort.
“And now,” said the musketeer, “answer me the question put to you by that black-looking Saint-Mars: what did you come to do at the Lerin Isles?”
“To you farewell.”
“Bid me farewell! What do you by that? Is Raoul going anywhere?”
“Yes.”
“Then I will a it is with M. de Beaufort.”
“With M. de Beaufort it is, my dear friend. You always correctly.”
“From habit.”
Whilst the two friends were their conversation, Raoul, with his and his oppressed, seated himself on a rock, his gun across his knees, looking at the sea—looking at the heavens, and to the voice of his soul; he allowed the sportsmen to a from him. D’Artagnan his absence.
“He has not the blow?” said he to Athos.
“He is to death.”
“Oh! your exaggerate, I hope. Raoul is of a nature. Around all as as his, there is a second that a cuirass. The bleeds, the second resists.”
“No,” Athos, “Raoul will die of it.”
“Mordioux!” said D’Artagnan, in a tone. And he did not add a word to this exclamation. Then, a minute after, “Why do you let him go?”
“Because he on going.”
“And why do you not go with him?”
“Because I not to see him die.”
D’Artagnan looked his friend in the face. “You know one thing,” the comte, upon the arm of the captain; “you know that in the of my life I have been of but things. Well! I have an gnawing, that an hour will come in which I shall the of that boy in my arms.”
“Oh!” D’Artagnan; “oh!”
“He will die, I know, I have a perfect of that; but I would not see him die.”
“How is this, Athos? you come and place in the presence of the man, you say you have seen, of your own D’Artagnan, of that man without an equal, as you called him, and you come and tell him, with your arms folded, that you are of the death of your son, you who have all that can be in this world! Why have you this fear, Athos? Man upon this earth must everything, and ought to everything.”
“Listen to me, my friend. After having myself out upon this earth of which you speak, I have but two religions: that of life, friendship, my as a father—that of eternity, love, and respect for God. Now, I have me the that if God should that my friend or my son should up his last in my presence—oh! no, I cannot tell you, D’Artagnan!”
“Speak, speak, tell me!”
“I am against everything, against the death of those I love. For that only there is no remedy. He who dies, gains; he who sees others die, loses. No, this is it—to know that I should no more meet on earth him I now with joy; to know that there would be a D’Artagnan any more, again be a Raoul, oh! I am old, look you, I have no longer courage; I pray God to me in my weakness; but if he me so and in that fashion, I should him. A Christian ought not to his God, D’Artagnan; it is to once have a king!”
“Humph!” D’Artagnan, a little by this of grief.
“Let me speak to him, Athos. Who knows?”
“Try, if you please, but I am you will not succeed.”
“I will not attempt to him. I will him.”
“You will?”
“Doubtless, I will. Do you think this would be the time a woman had of an infidelity? I will go to him, I tell you.”
Athos his head, and his walk alone, D’Artagnan, across the brambles, Raoul and out his hand to him. “Well, Raoul! You have something to say to me?”
“I have a to ask of you,” Bragelonne.
“Ask it, then.”
“You will some day return to France?”
“I so.”
“Ought I to to Mademoiselle de la Valliere?”
“No, you must not.”
“But I have many to say to her.”
“Go and say them to her, then.”
“Never!”
“Pray, what do you to a letter, which your speech might not possess?”
“Perhaps you are right.”
“She loves the king,” said D’Artagnan, bluntly; “and she is an girl.” Raoul started. “And you, you she abandons, she, perhaps, loves than she the king, but after another fashion.”
“D’Artagnan, do you she loves the king?”
“To idolatry. Her is to any other feeling. You might continue to live near her, and would be her best friend.”
“Ah!” Raoul, with a of at such a hope.
“Will you do so?”
“It would be base.”
“That is a very word, which would lead me to think of your understanding. Please to understand, Raoul, that it is to do that which is upon us by a force. If your says to you, ‘Go there, or die,’ why go, Raoul. Was she or brave, she you loved, in the king to you, the king her her to to you? No, she was the of women. Do, then, as she has done. Oblige yourself. Do you know one thing of which I am sure, Raoul?”
“What is that?”
“Why, that by her closely with the of a man—”
“Well?”
“Well! you would to love her.”
“Then I am decided, my dear D’Artagnan.”
“To set off to see her again?”
“No; to set off that I may see her again. I wish to love her forever.”
“Ha! I must confess,” the musketeer, “that is a which I was from expecting.”
“This is what I wish, my friend. You will see her again, and you will give her a which, if you think proper, will to her, as to yourself, what is in my heart. Read it; I it up last night. Something told me I should see you to-day.” He the out, and D’Artagnan read:
“MADEMOISELLE,—You are not in my in not me. You have only been of one fault me, that of having left me to you loved me. This error will cost me my life. I you, but I cannot myself. It is said that happy lovers are to the of rejected lovers. It will not be so with you, who did not love me, save with anxiety. I am sure that if I had in to that into love, you would have out of a of about my death, or the I had for you. It is much more to me to die, that you are free and satisfied. How much, then, will you love me, when you will no longer either my presence or reproaches? You will love me, because, a new love may appear to you, God has not me in anything to him you have chosen, and my devotedness, my sacrifice, and my painful end will me, in your eyes, a over him. I have allowed to escape, in the of my heart, the I possessed. Many people tell me that you loved me to lead me to you would have loved me much. That idea takes from my mind all bitterness, and leads me only to myself. You will accept this last farewell, and you will me for having taken in the where is extinguished, and where all love forever. Adieu, mademoiselle. If your be purchased by the last of my blood, I would that drop. I make the of it to my misery!
“RAOUL, VICOTME DE BRAGELONNE.”
“The reads very well,” said the captain. “I have only one fault to with it.”
“Tell me what that is!” said Raoul.
“Why, it is that it tells everything, the thing which exhales, like a from your and from your heart; the love which still you.” Raoul paler, but silent.
“Why did you not these words:
“‘MADEMOISELLE,—Instead of you, I love you and I die.’”
“That is true,” Raoul, with a of joy.
And the he had just taken back, he the upon a of his tablets:
“To the of once more telling you I love you, I the of to you; and to myself for that baseness, I die.” And he it.
“You will give her these tablets, captain, will you not?”
“When?” asked the latter.
“On the day,” said Bragelonne, pointing to the last sentence, “on the day when you can place a date under these words.” And he away to join Athos, who was returning with slow steps.
As they re-entered the fort, the sea rose with that rapid, which the Mediterranean; the ill-humor of the a tempest. Something shapeless, and about by the waves, appeared just off the coast.
“What is that?” said Athos,—“a boat?”
“No, it is not a boat,” said D’Artagnan.
“Pardon me,” said Raoul, “there is a the port rapidly.”
“Yes, there is a in the creek, which is here; but that which Athos points to in the is not a at all—it has aground.”
“Yes, yes, I see it.”
“It is the carriage, which I into the sea after landing the prisoner.”
“Well!” said Athos, “if you take my advice, D’Artagnan, you will that carriage, in order that no of it may remain, without which the of Antibes, who have they had to do with the devil, will to prove that your was but a man.”
“Your is good, Athos, and I will this night have it out, or rather, I will it out myself; but let us go in, for the rain heavily, and the is terrific.”
As they were over the to a of which D’Artagnan had the key, they saw M. de Saint-Mars his steps the by the prisoner. Upon a from D’Artagnan, they themselves in an of the staircase.
“What is it?” said Athos.
“You will see. Look. The is returning from chapel.”
And they saw, by the red of against the which the wind upon the bank-ward sky, they saw pass gravely, at six the governor, a man in black and by a of steel, to a of the same nature, which the whole of his head. The fire of the red on the surface, and these reflections, off capriciously, to be angry looks by the unfortunate, of imprecations. In the middle of the gallery, the stopped for a moment, to the horizon, to the of the tempest, to drink in the rain, and to breathe a a groan.
“Come on, monsieur,” said Saint-Mars, sharply, to the prisoner, for he already at him look so long the walls. “Monsieur, come on!”
“Say monseigneur!” Athos, from his corner, with a voice so and terrible, that the from to foot. Athos upon respect being paid to majesty. The round.
“Who spoke?” asked Saint-Mars.
“It was I,” D’Artagnan, himself promptly. “You know that is the order.”
“Call me neither monseigneur,” said the in his turn, in a voice that to the very of Raoul; “call me ACCURSED!” He passed on, and the iron door after him.
“There goes a man!” the in a whisper, pointing out to Raoul the by the prince.
