The Three Musketeers (The Modern Library) - Alexandre Dumas [242]
“I heartily agree and I vote for Bazin,” D’Artagnan spoke up, “but grant me Planchet. Milady had him thrown out of her house one day amid a thumping and thwacking of cudgels. Now Planchet has a good memory and I guarantee that if he can invent some possible vengeance, he will allow himself to be flayed alive before he abandons it. If the affairs of Tours concern you, Aramis, those of London are mine. I request then that Planchet be chosen, especially as he has already been to London with me and can say very correctly: ‘London, sir, if you please,’ and ‘My master, Lord d’Artagnan!’ With that equipment you may rest satisfied; he will make his way handily, both going and returning.”
“In that case Planchet must receive seven hundred livres for going and seven hundred for coming back,” Athos advised, “and Bazin three hundred for going and three hundred for returning. That will reduce our general assets to five thousand livres. We will each take one thousand livres to be employed as each sees fit and we will leave a fund of one thousand livres under the guardianship of Monsieur l’Abbé, here, for extraordinary occasions or for common necessities. Will that do?”
“My dear Athos, you speak like Nestor,” Aramis declared, “and Nestor, as all men know, was the wisest among the Greeks.”
“Good, that’s settled!” Athos said with some satisfaction. “Planchet and Bazin shall be our messengers. All in all, I am not sorry to retain Grimaud. He is accustomed to my ways and I am very particular. Yesterday’s affair must have shaken him a little and this journey would utterly unnerve him.”
Planchet was summoned and given his instructions; D’Artagnan had already broached the matter to him, pointing out first how much money, next how much glory and third how much danger were involved.
“I will slip the letter in the lining of my coat,” the lackey said, “and if I am caught, I will swallow it.”
“But how will you fulfill your mission then?” D’Artagnan objected.
“Monsieur need but give me a copy this evening and I shall learn the text by heart overnight.”
D’Artagnan looked quizzically at his comrades as though to invite them to confirm his faith in Planchet and to congratulate him on his lackey’s resourcefulness. Then, turning to Planchet:
“You have sixteen days in all: eight days to get to Lord Winter and eight days to return here. If you are not here at exactly eight o’clock in the evening on the sixteenth day—I mean eight and not even five minutes past—then you will receive no money whatever for the return journey.”
“Well, then, Monsieur must buy me a watch.”
“Take this watch,” Athos interrupted with his usual careless generosity, sliding his own watch across the table, “take it and be a good lad. Remember that if you gossip or babble or lag on the way you are risking the head of a master who believed so roundly in your loyalty that he answered for you and persuaded us to choose you for this mission. But remember this too: if through your fault anything untoward befalls Monsieur d’Artagnan, I swear I shall find you wherever you may be and I shall make a point of ripping up your belly!”
Planchet flushed, at once humiliated by the suspicion and terrified at the musketeer’s icy calm.
“Monsieur may trust me—” he said meekly.
“And remember,” Porthos put in, “remember I will skin you alive!”
“Oh, Monsieur—”
“As for me,” Aramis added in his soft melodious voice, “remember I will roast you before a slow fire like a savage.”
“Oh, Monsieur—”
And Planchet began to weep, perhaps from terror at these threats or perhaps from tenderness at seeing these four friends so closely united. D’Artagnan clasped the lackey’s hand and embraced him:
“Cheer up, Planchet,” he said comfortingly, “these gentlemen are saying all this out of love for me. At bottom they have a great respect for you.”
“Monsieur, I shall succeed or I shall be cut in quarters, and if they cut me in quarters, not a morsel of me will speak!”
It was resolved that Planchet should set out next morning at eight in order