Man in the Iron Mask (Barnes & Noble Classics Series)

by Alexandre Dumas

  “Where is M. Fouquet at this moment?” asked Louis, after a short silence.

  “M. Fouquet, sire,” replied d’Artagnan, “is in the iron cage that M. Colbert had prepared for him, and is going, as fast as four vigorous horses can drag him, towards Angers.”

  “Why did you leave him on the road?”

  “Because your Majesty did not tell me to go to Angers. The proof, the best proof of what I advance is, that the King desired me to be sought for but this minute. And then I have another reason.

  “What is that?”

  “Whilst I was with him, poor M. Fouquet would never attempt to escape.”

  “Well!” cried the King, with stupefaction.

  “Your Majesty ought to understand, and does understand certainly, that my warmest wish is to know that M. Fouquet is at liberty. I have given him one of my brigadiers, the most stupid I could find among my musketeers, in order that the prisoner might have a chance of escaping.”

  “Are you mad, Monsieur d’Artagnan!” cried the King, crossing his arms on his breast. “Do people speak such enormities, even when they have the misfortune to think them?”

  “Ah! sire, you cannot expect that I should be the enemy of M. Fouquet, after what he has just done for you and me. No, no; if you desire that he should remain under your locks and bolts, never give him in charge to me; however closely-wired might be the cage, the bird would, in the end, fly away.”

  “I am surprised,” said the King, in a stern tone, “you have not followed the fortunes of him whom M. Fouquet wished to place upon my throne. You had in him all you want—affection and gratitude. In my service, monsieur, you only find a master.”

  “If M. Fouquet had not gone to seek you in the Bastille, sire,” replied d’Artagnan, with a deeply impressive manner, “one single man would have gone there, and that man would have been me—you know that right well, sire.”

  The King was brought to a pause. Before that speech of his captain of the musketeers, so frankly spoken, and so true, the King had nothing to offer. On hearing d‘Artagnan, Louis remembered the d’Artagnan of former times; him who, at the Palais-Royal, held himself concealed behind the curtains of his bed, when the people of Paris, led on by Cardinal de Retz, came to assure themselves of the presence of the King; the d’Artagnan whom he saluted with his hand at the door of his carriage, when repairing to Notre-Dame on his return to Paris; the soldier who had quitted his service at Blois; the lieutenant whom he had recalled near his person when the death of Mazarin restored him his power; the man he had always found loyal, courageous, and devoted. Louis advanced towards the door and called Colbert. Colbert had not left the corridor where the secretaries were at work. Colbert appeared.

  “Colbert, have you made a perquisition at the house of M. Fouquet?”

  “Yes, sire.”

  “What has it produced?”

  “M. de Roncherat, who was sent with your Majesty’s musketeers, has remitted me some papers,” replied Colbert.

  “I will look at them. Give me your hand.”

  “My hand, sire?”

  “Yes, that I may place it in that of M. d‘Artagnan. In fact, M. d’Artagnan,” added he, with a smile, turning towards the soldier, who, at the sight of the clerk, had resumed his haughty attitude, “you do not know this man; make his acquaintance.” And he pointed to Colbert. “He has been but a moderate servant in subaltern positions, but he will be a great man if I raise him to the first rank.”

  “Sire!” stammered Colbert, confused with pleasure and fear.

  “I have understood why,” murmured d’Artagnan in the King’s ear; “he was jealous.”

  “Precisely, and his jealousy confined his wings.”

  “He will henceforth be a winged serpent,” grumbled the musketeer, with some remains of hatred against his recent adversary.

  But Colbert, approaching him, offered to his eyes a physiognomy so different from that which he had been accustomed to see him wear; he appeared so good, so mild, so easy; his eyes took the expression of an intelligence so noble, that d’Artagnan, a connoisseur in physiognomies, was moved, and almost changed in his convictions. Colbert pressed his hand.

  “That which the King has just told you, monsieur, proves how well His Majesty is acquainted with men. The inveterate opposition I have displayed up to this day, against abuses and not against men, proves that I had it in view to prepare for my King a great reign, for my country a great blessing. I have many ideas, M. d’Artagnan; you will see them expand in the sun of public peace; and if I have not the certainty and good fortune to conquer the friendship of honest men, I am at least certain, monsieur, that I shall obtain their esteem. For their admiration, monsieur, I would give my life.”

  This change, this sudden elevation, this mute approbation of the King, gave the musketeer matter for much reflection. He bowed civilly to Colbert, who did not take his eyes off him. The King, when he saw they were reconciled, dismissed them. They left the room together. As soon as they were out of the cabinet, the new minister, stopping the captain, said:—

  “Is it possible, M. d’Artagnan, that with such an eye as yours, you have not, at the first glance, at the first inspection, discovered what sort of man I am?”

  “Monsieur Colbert,” replied the musketeer, “the ray of the sun which we have in our eyes, prevents us from seeing the most ardent flames. The man in power radiates, you know; and since you are there, why should you continue to persecute him who has just fallen into disgrace, and fallen from such a height?”

  “I! monsieur,” said Colbert; “oh, monsieur! I would never persecute him. I wished to administer the finances and to administer them alone, because I am ambitious, and, above all, because I have the most entire confidence in my own merit; because I know that all the gold of this country will fall beneath my eyes, and I love to look at the King’s gold; because, if I live thirty years in thirty years not a sou of it will remain in my hands; because, with that gold I will build granaries, edifices, cities, and dig ports; because I will create a marine, will equip navies which shall bear the name of France to the most distant peoples; because I will create libraries and academies; because I will make of France the first country in the world, and the richest. These are the motives for my animosity against M. Fouquet, who prevented my acting. And then, when I shall be great and strong, when France is great and strong, in my turn then I will cry, ‘Mercy!’ ”

  “‘Mercy,’ did you say; then ask his liberty of the King. The King only crushes him on your account.”

  Colbert again raised his head. “Monsieur,” said he, “you know that it is not so, and that the King has his personal enmities against M. Fouquet; it is not for me to teach you that.”

  “But the King will be tired; he will forget.”

  “The King never forgets, M. d’Artagnan. Hark! the King calls. He is going to issue an order. I have not influenced him, have I? Listen.”

  The King, in fact, was calling his secretaries. “Monsieur d’Artagnan,” said he.

  “I am here, sire.”

  “Give twenty of your musketeers to M. de Saint-Aignan, to form a guard for M. Fouquet.”

  D’Artagnan and Colbert exchanged looks. “And from Angers,” continued the King, “they will conduct the prisoner to the Bastille, in Paris.”

  “You were right,” said the captain to the minister.

  “Saint-Aignan,” continued the King, “you will have any one shot who shall attempt to speak privately with M. Fouquet, during the journey.”

  “But myself, sire?” said the Duke.

  “You, monsieur, you will only speak to him in the presence of the musketeers.” The Duke bowed, and departed to execute his commission.

  D’Artagnan was about to retire likewise; but the King stopped him.

  “Monsieur,” said he, “you will go immediately, and take possession of the isle and fief of Belle-Isle-en-Mer.”

  “Yes, sire. Alone?”

  “You will take a sufficient number of troops to prevent dela
y, in case the place should be contumacious.”

  A murmur of adulatory incredulity arose from the group of courtiers. “That is to be done,” said d’Artagnan.

  “I saw the place in my infancy,” resumed the King, “and I do not wish to see it again. You have heard me? Go, monsieur, and do not return without the keys of the place.”

  Colbert went up to d’Artagnan. “A commission which, if you carry it out well,” said he, “will be worth a marshal’s baton to you.”

  “Why do you employ the words, ‘if you carry it out well’?”

  “Because it is difficult.”

  “Ah! in what respect?”

  “You have friends in Belle-Isle, Monsieur d’Artagnan; and it is not an easy thing for men like you to march over the bodies of their friends to obtain success.”

  D’Artagnan hung down his head, whilst Colbert returned to the King. A quarter of an hour after, the captain received the written order from the King, to blow up the fortress of Belle-Isle, in case of resistance, with the power of life and death over all the inhabitants or refugees, and an injunction not to allow one to escape.

  “Colbert was right,” thought d’Artagnan; “my baton of a marshal of France will cost the lives of my two friends. Only they seem to forget that my friends are not more stupid than the birds, and that they will not wait for the hand of the fowler to extend their wings. I will show them that hand so plainly, that they will have quite time enough to see it. Poor Porthos! Poor Aramis. No; my fortune shall not cost your wings a feather.”

  Having thus determined, d’Artagnan assembled the royal army, embarked it at Paimbœuf, and set sail, without losing a moment.

  70

  Belle-Isle-En-Mer

  AT THE EXTREMITY OF the mole, which the furious sea beats at evening tide, two men, holding each other by the arm, were conversing in an animated and expansive tone, without the possibility of any other human being hearing their words, borne away, as they were, one by one, by the gusts of wind, with the white foam swept from the crests of the waves. The sun had just gone down in the vast sheet of the reddened ocean, like a gigantic crucible. From time to time, one of these men, turning towards the east, cast an anxious, inquiring look over the sea. The other, interrogating the features of his companion, seemed to seek for information in his looks. Then, both silent, both busied with dismal thoughts, they resumed their walk. Every one has already perceived that those two men were our proscribed heroes, Porthos and Aramis, who had taken refuge in Belle-Isle since the ruin of their hopes, since the discomfiture of the vast plan of M. d’Herblay.

  “It is of no use you saying anything to the contrary, my dear Aramis,” repeated Porthos, inhaling vigorously the saline air with which he filled his powerful chest. “It is of no use, Aramis. The disappearance of all the fishing-boats that went out two days ago, is not an ordinary circumstance. There has been no storm at sea; the weather has been constantly calm, not even the lightest gale; and even if we had had a tempest, all our boats would not have foundered. I repeat, it is strange. This complete disappearance astonishes me, I tell you.”

  “True,” murmured Aramis. “You are right, friend Porthos; it is true, there is something strange in it.”

  “And, further,” added Porthos, whose ideas the assent of the Bishop of Vannes seemed to enlarge; “and, further, have you remarked, that if the boats have perished, not a single plank has been washed ashore?”

  “I have remarked that as well as you.”

  “Have you remarked, besides, that the only two boats we had left in the whole island, and which I sent in search of the others—”

  Aramis here interrupted his companion by a cry, and by so sudden a movement, that Porthos stopped as if he were stupefied. “What do you say, Porthos? What!—You have sent the two boats—”

  “In search of the others! Yes; to be sure I have,” replied Porthos, quite simply.

  “Unhappy man! What have you done? Then we are indeed lost,” cried the Bishop.

  “Lost!—what did you say?” exclaimed the terrified Porthos. “How lost? Aramis. How are we lost?”

  Aramis bit his lips. “Nothing! nothing! Your pardon. I meant to say—”

  “What?”

  “That if we were inclined—if we took a fancy to make an excursion by sea, we could not.”

  “Very good! and why should that vex you? A fine pleasure, ma foi! For my part, I don’t regret it at all. What I regret is, certainly not the more or less amusement we can find at Belle-Isle; —what I regret, Aramis, is Pierrefonds; is Bracieux; is le Vallon; is my beautiful France! Here we are not in France, my dear friend; we are—I know not where. Oh! I tell you, in the full sincerity of my soul, and your affection will excuse my frankness, but I declare to you I am not happy at Belle-Isle. No; in good truth, I am not happy!”

  Aramis breathed a long but stifled sigh. “Dear friend,” replied he; “that is why it is so sad a thing you have sent the two boats we had left in search of the boats which disappeared two days ago. If you had not sent them away, we would have departed.”

  “Departed! And the orders, Aramis?”

  “What orders?”

  “Parbleu! Why the orders you have been constantly and on all occasions, repeating to me—that we were to hold Belle-Isle against the usurper. You know very well!”

  “That is true,” murmured Aramis again.

  “You see then, plainly, my friend, that we could not depart; and that the sending away of the boats in search of the others is not prejudicial to us in any way.”

  Aramis was silent; and his vague glance, luminous as that of a gull, hovered for a long time over the sea, interrogating space, and seeking to pierce the very horizon.

  “With all that, Aramis,” continued Porthos, who adhered to his idea, and that the more closely from the Bishop having found it correct—“with all that, you give me no explanation about what can have happened to these unfortunate boats. I am assailed by cries and complaints whichever way I go. The children cry at seeing the desolation of the women, as if I could restore the absent husbands and fathers. What do you suppose, my friend, and what ought I to answer them?”

  “Suppose, then, my good Porthos, and say nothing.”

  This reply did not satisfy Porthos at all. He turned away, grumbling some words in a very ill humour. Aramis stopped the valiant soldier. “Do you remember,” said he, in a melancholy tone, pressing the two hands of the giant between his own with an affectionate cordiality, “do you remember, my friend, that in the glorious days of our youth—do you remember, Porthos, when we were all strong and valiant—we, and the other two—if we had then had an inclination to return to France, do you think this sheet of salt water would have stopped us?”

  “Oh!” said Porthos, “but six leagues!”

  “If you had seen me get astride of a plank, would you have remained on land, Porthos?”

  “No, pardieu! No! Aramis. But, nowadays, what sort of a plank should we want, my friend! I, in particular.” And the Seigneur de Bracieux cast a proud glance over his colossal rotundity with a loud laugh. “And do you mean seriously to say you are not tired of Belle-Isle also a little, and that you would not prefer the comforts of your dwelling—of your episcopal palace at Vannes? Come, confess!”

  “No,” replied Aramis, without daring to look at Porthos.

  “Let us stay where we are, then,” said his friend, with a sigh; which, in spite of the efforts he made to restrain it, escaped with a loud report from his breast. “Let us remain!—let us remain! And yet,” added he, “and yet, if we seriously wished, but that decidedly—if we had a fixed idea, one firmly taken, to return to France, and there were no boats—”

  “Have you remarked another thing, my friend!—that is, since the disappearance of our barques, during the two days’ absence of the fishermen, not a single small boat has landed on the shores of the isle?”

  “Yes, certainly, you are right. I have remarked it also, and the observation was the more naturally made, for, before th
e last two fatal days, we saw barques and shallops arrive by dozens.”

  “I must inquire,” said Aramis suddenly, and with great agitation. “And then, if I had a raft constructed—”

  “But there are some canoes, my friend; shall I go on board one?

  “A canoe!—a canoe! Can you think of such a thing, Porthos? A canoe to be upset in. No, no,” said the Bishop of Vannes; “it is not our trade to ride upon the waves. We will wait, we will wait.”

  And Aramis continued walking about with increased agitation. Porthos, who grew tired of following all the feverish movements of his friend—Porthos, who, in his calmness and belief, understood nothing of the sort of exasperation which was betrayed by his continual convulsive starts—Porthos stopped him. “Let us sit down upon this rock,” said he. “Place yourself there, close to me, Aramis, and I conjure you, for the last time, to explain to me in a manner I can comprehend,—explain to me what we are doing here.”

  “Porthos,” said Aramis, much embarrassed.

  “I know that the false king wished to dethrone the true king! That is a fact I understand. Well—”

  “Yes,” said Aramis.

  “I know that the false king formed the project of selling Belle-Isle to the English. I understand that too.”

  “Yes.”

  “I know that we engineers and captains came and threw ourselves into Belle-Isle to take the direction of the works, and the command of ten companies levied and paid by M. Fouquet, or rather the ten companies of his son-in-law. All that is plain.”

  Aramis arose in a state of great impatience. He might be said to be a lion importuned by a gnat. Porthos held him by the arm. “But what I cannot understand, what, in spite of all the efforts of my mind, and all my reflections, I cannot comprehend, and never shall comprehend, is, that, instead of sending us troops, instead of sending us reinforcements of men, munitions, and provisions, they leave us without boats, they leave Belle-Isle without arrivals, without help; it is that instead of establishing with us a correspondence, whether by signals, or written or verbal communications, all relations with us are intercepted. Tell me, Aramis, answer me, or rather, before answering me, will you allow me to tell you what I have thought? Will you hear what my idea is, what imagination I have conceived?”