The Man in the Iron Mask
The Angel of Death.
Athos was at this part of his vision, when the was by a great noise from the gates. A was over the hard of the great alley, and the of noisy and to the in which the was dreaming. Athos did not from the place he occupied; he his the door to the sooner what these be. A step the stairs; the horse, which had galloped, slowly the stables. Great appeared in the steps, which by approached the chamber. A door was opened, and Athos, a little the part of the room the noise came from, cried, in a weak voice:
“It is a from Africa, is it not?”
“No, le comte,” a voice which the father of Raoul start in his bed.
“Grimaud!” he. And the to his face. Grimaud appeared in the doorway. It was no longer the Grimaud we have seen, still with and devotion, when he jumped the into the to Raoul de Bragelonne to the of the fleet. ‘Twas now a and old man, his with dust, and by old age. He against the door-frame, and was near on seeing, by the light of the lamps, the of his master. These two men who had so long together in a of intelligence, and eyes, to expressions, how to say so many silently—these two old friends, one as as the other in heart, if they were in and birth, tongue-tied looking at each other. By the of a single they had just read to the of each other’s hearts. The old upon his the of a already old, the of a with woe. He appeared to have no longer in use more than a single of his thoughts. As he was not to speak much, he was now not to at all. Athos read at a all these upon the of his servant, and in the same he would have to speak to Raoul in his dream:
“Grimaud,” said he, “Raoul is dead. Is it not so?”
Behind Grimaud the other breathlessly, with their upon the of their master. They the terrible question, and a heart-breaking followed.
“Yes,” the old man, the from his with a hoarse, sigh.
Then voices of lamentation, which without measure, and with and prayers the where the father with his the portrait of his son. This was for Athos like the which to his dream. Without a cry, without a tear, patient, mild, as a martyr, he his Heaven, in order there to see again, above the of Gigelli, the that was him at the moment of Grimaud’s arrival. Without doubt, while looking the heavens, his dream, he by the same road by which the vision, at once so terrible and sweet, had him before; for after having closed his eyes, he reopened them and to smile: he had just Raoul, who had upon him. With his hands joined upon his breast, his the window, by the fresh air of night, which upon its the of the flowers and the woods, Athos entered, again to come out of it, into the of that which the see. God willed, no doubt, to open to this elect the of beatitude, at this hour when other men with the idea of being by the Lord, and to this life they know, in the of the other life of which they but by the of death. Athos was spirit-guided by the pure of his son, which to be like the soul. Everything for this just man was and perfume in the road take to return to the country. After an hour of this ecstasy, Athos his hands as white as wax; the did not his lips, and he low, so low as to be audible, these three to God or to Raoul:
“HERE I AM!”
And his hands slowly, as though he himself had them on the bed.
Death had been and mild to this creature. It had him the of the agony, of the last departure; had opened with an the gates of to that soul. God had no ordered it thus that the of this death should in the of those present, and in the memory of other men—a death which to be loved the passage from this life to the other by those upon this earth leads them not to the last judgment. Athos preserved, in the sleep, that and smile—an ornament which was to him to the tomb. The and of his his for a long time he had life. The comte’s people to remove Grimaud, who, from a distance, the now marble-pale, and did not approach, from of to him the of death. But Grimaud, as he was, to the room. He sat himself upon the threshold, his master with the of a sentinel, to either his look or his last sigh. The all were in the house—every one the of their lord. But Grimaud, by listening, that the no longer breathed. He himself with his hands on the ground, looked to see if there did not appear some motion in the of his master. Nothing! Fear him; he rose up, and, at the very moment, some one up the stairs. A noise of against a sword—a familiar to his ears—stopped him as he was going the of Athos. A voice more than or three of him.
“Athos! Athos! my friend!” this voice, to tears.
“Monsieur le Chevalier d’Artagnan,” out Grimaud.
“Where is he? Where is he?” the musketeer. Grimaud his arm in his fingers, and pointed to the bed, upon the of which the of death already showed.
A respiration, the opposite to a cry, the of D’Artagnan. He on tip-toe, trembling, at the noise his on the floor, his rent by a agony. He his ear to the of Athos, his to the comte’s mouth. Neither noise, breath! D’Artagnan back. Grimaud, who had him with his eyes, and for each of his movements had been a revelation, came timidly; seated himself at the of the bed, and his to the which was by the of his master. Then large to from his red eyes. This old man in despair, who wept, without a word, presented the most that D’Artagnan, in a life so with emotion, had met with.
The captain in that man, who to have his last thought, to give his best friend, the man he had loved next to Raoul, a welcome life. And for reply to that of hospitality, D’Artagnan and Athos on the brow, and with his closed his eyes. Then he seated himself by the pillow without of that man, who had been so and to him for five and thirty years. He was his with the the of the to his mind in crowds—some and as that smile—some dark, dismal, and as that with its now closed to all eternity.
All at once the which from minute to minute his heart, and his almost to bursting. Incapable of his emotion, he arose, and himself from the where he had just him to he came to report the news of the death of Porthos, he so heart-rending that the servants, who only to wait for an of grief, answered to it by their clamors, and the dogs of the late by their howlings. Grimaud was the only one who did not up his voice. Even in the of his he would not have to the dead, or for the time the of his master. Had not Athos always him be dumb?
At D’Artagnan, who had about the hall, his to his sighs—D’Artagnan up once more; and the moments when Grimaud his him, he him a to come to him, which the without making more noise than a shadow. D’Artagnan again, by Grimaud; and when he had the vestibule, taking the old man’s hands, “Grimaud,” said he, “I have how the father died; now let me know about the son.”
Grimaud from his a large letter, upon the of which was the address of Athos. He the of M. de Beaufort, the seal, and to read, while walking about in the steel-chill of dawn, in the dark of old limes, marked by the still visible of the who had just died.
