The Three Musketeers (Translated by Richard Pevear) - Alexandre Dumas [67]
“Must Aramis do the same, Madame?” d’Artagnan asked, piqued.
“This is the second or third time you’ve mentioned that name, Monsieur, and yet I’ve told you that I do not know it.”
“You don’t know the man on whose shutter you were knocking? Come, Madame, you think me all too credulous!”
“Admit that you have invented this story and created this character in order to make me talk.”
“I am inventing nothing, Madame, and creating nothing. I am speaking the exact truth.”
“And you say a friend of yours lives in that house?”
“I say it and I repeat it for the third time: that house is inhabited by a friend of mine, and that friend is Aramis.”
“This will all be cleared up later,” murmured the young woman. “For now, Monsieur, keep quiet.”
“If you could see into my open heart,” said d’Artagnan, “you would read so much curiosity in it that you would have pity on me, and so much love that you would satisfy my curiosity that same instant. There is nothing to fear from those who love you.”
“You are rather quick to speak of love, Monsieur!” said the young woman, shaking her head.
“That is because love has come to me quickly and for the first time, and I am not yet twenty years old.”
The young woman looked at him furtively.
“Listen, I’m already on the scent,” said d’Artagnan. “Three months ago I nearly had a duel with Aramis over a handkerchief like the one you showed to that woman who was in his house, over a handkerchief marked in the same way, I’m sure of it.”
“Monsieur,” said the young woman, “I swear you weary me terribly with these questions.”
“But you who are so prudent, Madame, just think, if you were arrested with that handkerchief, and the handkerchief was seized, wouldn’t you be compromised?”
“Why is that? Aren’t the initials mine: C. B., Constance Bonacieux?”
“Or Camille de Bois-Tracy?”
“Silence, Monsieur, once again, silence! Ah! since the risks I am running on my own cannot stop you, think of those you are running yourself!”
“I?”
“Yes, you. There is a risk of prison, there is a risk to your life in knowing me.”
“Then I shall never leave you.”
“Monsieur,” said the young woman, imploring him and clasping her hands, “Monsieur, in the name of heaven, in the name of soldierly honor, in the name of gentlemanly courtesy, go away. Wait, it’s striking midnight; that’s the hour when I’m expected.”
“Madame,” the young man said, bowing, “I am unable to refuse someone who asks me in that way. Be content, I am going away.”
“But you won’t follow me, you won’t spy on me?”
“I will go straight home.”
“Ah! I just knew you were a brave young man!” cried Mme Bonacieux, holding one hand out to him and placing the other on the knocker of a little door all but lost in the wall.
D’Artagnan seized the hand held out to him and kissed it ardently.
“Ah! I’d much rather I had never seen you,” cried d’Artagnan, with that naive coarseness that women often prefer to the affectations of politeness, because it reveals the depths of thought and proves that feeling has won out over reason.
“Well,” Mme Bonacieux picked up with an almost caressing voice, and pressing d’Artagnan’s hand, which had not abandoned her own, “well, I wouldn’t go so far as that: what’s lost for today is not lost for the future. Who knows whether, one day when I’m free, I won’t satisfy your curiosity?”
“And will you make the same promise to my love?” cried the overjoyed d’Artagnan.
“Oh! in that respect, I don’t wish to bind myself; it will depend on the feelings you are able to arouse in me.”
“So, for today, Madame…”
“For today, Monsieur, I have only come as far as gratitude.”
“Ah, you are too charming,” d’Artagnan said sadly, “and you take advantage of my love!”
“No, I have the advantage of your generosity, that’s all. But, believe me, with certain people, everything comes out right.”
“Oh, you make me the happiest of men! Do not forget this evening, do not forget this promise.”
“Don’t worry, in the right time and place I’ll remember everything. Well, go then,