The Three Musketeers (Translated by Richard Pevear) - Alexandre Dumas [239]
“Don’t worry, Monsieur,” said Planchet, “you’ll see that you can count on me.”
And, mounted on an excellent horse, which he would have to abandon twenty leagues from there in order to take the stagecoach, Planchet left at a gallop, his heart slightly wrung by the triple promise the musketeers had made him, but otherwise in the best spirits in the world.
Bazin left the next morning for Tours and had eight days to carry out his mission.
The four friends, for the whole duration of these two absences, as is quite understandable, kept their eyes peeled, their noses to the wind, and their ears pricked up more than ever. They spent their days trying to catch what was being said, keeping watch on the cardinal’s attitude, and sniffing out the couriers who arrived. They were seized more than once by an insurmountable trembling, when they were summoned for some unexpected service. They had, besides, to look out for their own safety. Milady was a phantom who, having once appeared to people, never let them sleep peacefully.
On the morning of the eighth day, Bazin, fresh as ever and smiling his habitual smile, came into the Parpaillot tavern as the four friends were having breakfast, saying, according to the agreed convention:
“M. Aramis, here is your cousin’s reply.”
The four friends exchanged joyful glances: half the task was done—true, it was the shortest and easiest half.
Blushing in spite of himself, Aramis took the letter, which was written in a crude hand and with very poor spelling.
“Good God!” he exclaimed, laughing. “I decidedly despair of her: this poor Michon will never write like M. de Voiture!”
“Vat doss dat mean, this boor Migeon?” asked the Switzer, who had been chatting with the four friends when the letter came.
“Oh, my God, less than nothing!” said Aramis. “A charming little seamstress I was very much in love with, and whom I asked for a few lines in her own hand by way of a souvenir.”
“Dutieu!” said the Switzer, “if she’s as pig a leddy as her hentwriting, you’re in luck, gomrade!”
Aramis read the letter and handed it to Athos.
“See what she writes to me, Athos,” he said.
Athos glanced at the epistle, and, to dispel any suspicions that might have been aroused, read it aloud:
My dear Cousin,
My sister and I are very good at interpreting dreams, and are even awfully afraid of them; but of yours one may say, I hope, that every dream is a delusion. Good-bye! Be well, and let us hear from you now and then.
Aglaé Michon
“And what dream is she talking about?” asked the dragoon, who had come over during the reading.
“Ja, vat tream?” asked the Switzer.
“Eh, pardieu!” said Aramis, “it’s quite simple: a dream that I had and that I told to her.”
“Oh, ja, partieu! it’s to be quite zimple to tell hiss tream; but me, I nefer tream.”
“You are very lucky,” said Athos, getting up. “I wish I could say the same!”
“Nefer!” repeated the Switzer, delighted that a man like Athos envied him for something, “nefer! nefer!”
Porthos and Aramis stayed to face the gibes of the dragoon and the Switzer.
As for Bazin, he went to sleep on a bundle of hay; and as he had more imagination than the Switzer, he dreamed that M. Aramis, become pope, was placing a cardinal’s hat on his head.
But, as we have said, Bazin, by his fortunate return, had taken away only part of the anxiety that goaded the four friends. Days of waiting are long, and d’Artagnan above all would have bet that the days now had forty-eight hours. He forgot the unavoidable delays of sailing. He exaggerated the power of Milady, endowing the woman, who seemed like a demon to him, with supernatural auxiliaries like herself. He imagined, at the least noise, that men were coming to arrest him, and that they were bringing Planchet to confront him and his friends. Moreover, his confidence in the worthy Picard, formerly so great, was diminishing day by day. This anxiety was so intense that it spread to Porthos and Aramis. Only Athos remained impassive, as if there was no danger stirring around him and he was breathing his everyday air.
On the