The Three Musketeers (The Modern Library) - Alexandre Dumas [201]
“Don’t bother,” said Aramis, “take one of mine.”
“One of yours! How many have you then?”
“Three,” Aramis confessed, smiling.
“Well, my friend,” said Athos, “you are most certainly the best mounted poet throughout the length and breadth of France—not to mention Navarre. Recently acquired! Three horses!” Athos said wonderingly. “What can you possibly do with them? I cannot understand what induced you to buy three horses!”
“I only bought two,” Aramis replied.
“And the third?” Athos insisted.
Suavely Aramis told how the third horse had turned up at his lodgings that morning. A groom, out of livery and refusing to divulge his master’s name, delivered the animal as ordered.
“Ordered by his master,” D’Artagnan insinuated, “or by his mistress?”
“What matter?” said Aramis, blushing. “At all events, the fellow informed me that his mistress had ordered him to place this horse in my stable without telling me whence it came.”
“That could happen to none but a poet!” Athos commented sententiously.
“I have an idea!” D’Artagnan proclaimed. “Tell me, Aramis, which of the two horses will you ride: the one you bought or the one that was given to you?”
“The one that was given to me, of course. You understand, D’Artagnan, that I cannot offend—”
“The anonymous donor!” D’Artagnan broke in.
“And who might the mysterious lady be?” Athos asked casually.
“Is the horse you bought useless to you now that you have another from an anonymous donor who may be a mysterious lady?”
“Practically useless,” Aramis replied.
“And you yourself chose it?”
“With the greatest care. As you know the safety of a horseman almost always depends upon his horse.”
“Splendid!” said D’Artagnan. “Can you let me have him for the price he cost you?”
“My dear D’Artagnan, I was about to suggest you take the horse and settle the bagatelle involved at your convenience.”
“How much did you pay?”
“Eight hundred livres.”
“Here are forty double pistoles, my friend,” said D’Artagnan, producing the requisite sum. “You are paid in coin of the sort for your poems, I trust.”
“Then you are really affluent?” Aramis asked, incredulous.
“My dear fellow, I belch gold like Croesus,” D’Artagnan answered, jingling the coins in his pocket.
“Send your saddle to the Hôtel de Tréville, D’Artagnan, and they will bring your horse here with ours.”
“Good! But it is almost five o’clock. Let us make haste!”
Within fifteen minutes, Porthos, superb in his proud joy, loomed at the end of the Rue Ferou mounted upon a most impressive jennet, Mousqueton in his wake, astride a small but handsome horse bred in Auvergne.
Simultaneously, Aramis appeared at the other end of the street, riding a spanking English charger, Bazin at his heels, on a serviceable roan, with the stout Mecklemburg cob that was to be D’Artagnan’s.
The two met at the door; from the window Athos and D’Artagnan observed their meeting.
“A fine mount you have there, Porthos,” said Aramis admiringly.
“Ay, it is the one they should have sent to me at first. The husband tried to play a feeble joke on me by substituting that other sorry nag you saw. But he has been punished for it and I have obtained complete satisfaction.”
Planchet and Grimaud appeared in turn, leading their masters’ steeds. D’Artagnan and Athos left the vantage point of the window, went down into the street, and vaulted into their saddles. Side by side the four companions started off, Athos on the horse he owed to his wife, Aramis on the horse he owed to his mistress, Porthos on the horse he owed to the attorney’s lady and D’Artagnan on the horse he owed to his good fortune—the best mistress of all!
The lackeys drew up the rear.
As Porthos expected the cavalcade cut quite a swath; indeed, had Madame Coquenard seen Porthos ride by majestically on his imposing Spanish jennet, she would not have regretted the bleeding she had inflicted upon her husband’s strongbox.
Near the Louvre the four friends met Monsieur de Tréville who was returning from Saint-Germain. He stopped them to compliment them on their equipment,