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to negotiate with him. The prince, who had a great repugnance to treat with such an ill-bred fellow, made out a list, against the grain, and sent it. In this list there were three conditions which displeased Mazarin and he offered the prince ten thousand crowns to renounce them.”

“Ah, ha, ha!” laughed the three friends, “not a bad bargain; and there was no fear of being taken at his word; what did the prince do then?”

“The prince immediately sent fifty thousand francs to Mazarin, begging him never to write to him again, and offered twenty thousand francs more, on condition that he would never speak to him. What did Mazarin do?”

“Stormed!” suggested Athos.

“Beat the messenger!” cried Porthos.

“Accepted the money!” said D’Artagnan.

“You have guessed it,” answered Aramis; and they all laughed so heartily that the host appeared in order to inquire whether the gentlemen wanted anything; he thought they were fighting.

At last their hilarity calmed down and:

“Faith!” exclaimed D’Artagnan to the two friends, “you may well wish ill to Mazarin; for I assure you, on his side he wishes you no good.”

“Pooh! really?” asked Athos. “If I thought the fellow knew me by my name I would be rebaptized, for fear it might be thought I knew him.”

“He knows you better by your actions than your name; he is quite aware that there are two gentlemen who greatly aided the escape of Monsieur de Beaufort, and he has instigated an active search for them, I can answer for it.”

“By whom?”

“By me; and this morning he sent for me to ask me if I had obtained any information.”

“And what did you reply?”

“That I had none as yet; but that I was to dine to-day with two gentlemen, who would be able to give me some.”

“You told him that?” said Porthos, a broad smile spreading over his honest face. “Bravo! and you are not afraid of that, Athos?”

“No,” replied Athos, “it is not the search of Mazarin that I fear.”

“Now,” said Aramis, “tell me a little what you do fear.”

“Nothing for the present; at least, nothing in good earnest.”

“And with regard to the past?” asked Porthos.

“Oh! the past is another thing,” said Athos, sighing; “the past and the future.”

“Are you afraid for your young Raoul?” asked Aramis.

“Well,” said D’Artagnan, “one is never killed in a first engagement.”

“Nor in the second,” said Aramis

“Nor in the third,” returned Porthos; “and even when one is killed, one rises again, the proof of which is, that here we are!”

“No,” said Athos, “it is not Raoul about whom I am anxious, for I trust he will conduct himself like a gentleman; and if he is killed—well, he will die bravely; but hold—should such a misfortune happen—well—” Athos passed his hand across his pale brow.

“Well?” asked Aramis.

“Well, I shall look upon it as an expiation.”

“Ah!” said D’Artagnan; “I know what you mean.”

“And I, too,” added Aramis; “but you must not think of that, Athos; what is past, is past.”

“I don’t understand,” said Porthos.

“The affair at Armentières,” whispered D’Artagnan.

“The affair at Armentières?” asked he again.

“Milady.”

“Oh, yes!” said Porthos; “true, I had forgotten it!”

Athos looked at him intently.

“You have forgotten it, Porthos?” said he.

“Faith! yes, it is so long ago,” answered Porthos.

“This affair does not, then, weigh upon your conscience?”

“Faith, no.”

“And you, D’Artagnan?”

“I—I own that when my mind returns to that terrible period I have no recollection of anything but the rigid corpse of poor Madame Bonancieux. Yes, yes,” murmured he, “I have often felt regret for the victim, but never the very slightest remorse for the assassin.”

Athos shook his dead doubtfully.

“Consider,” said Aramis, “if you admit divine justice and its participation in the things of this world, that woman was punished by the will of heaven. We were but the instruments, that is all.”

“But as to free will, Aramis?”

“How acts the judge? He has a free will, yet he fearlessly condemns. What does the executioner? He is master of his arm, yet he strikes without remorse.”

“The executioner!” muttered Athos, as if arrested by some recollection.

“I know that it is terrible,” said D’Artagnan; “but when I reflect that we have killed English, Rochellais, Spaniards, nay, even French, who never did us any other harm but to aim at and to miss us, whose only fault was to cross swords with us and to be unable to ward off our blows—I can, on my honor, find an excuse for my share in the murder of that woman.”

“As for me,” said Porthos, “now that you have reminded me of it, Athos, I have the scene again before me, as if I now were there. Milady was there, as it were, where _you_ sit.” (Athos changed color.) “I—I was where D’Artagnan stands. I wore a long sword which cut like a Damascus—you remember it, Aramis for you always called it Balizarde. Well, I swear to you, all three, that had the executioner of Bethune—was he not of Bethune?—yes, egad! of Bethune!—not been there, I would have cut off the head of that infamous being without thinking of it, or even after thinking of it. She was a most atrocious woman.”

“And then,” said Aramis, with the tone of philosophical indifference which he had assumed since he had belonged to the church and in which there was more atheism than confidence in God, “what is the use of thinking of it all? At the last hour we must confess this action and God knows better than we can whether it is a crime, a fault, or a meritorious deed. _I_ repent of it? Egad! no. Upon my honor and by the holy cross; I only regret it because she was a woman.”

“The most satisfactory part of the matter,” said D’Artagnan, “is that there remains no trace of it.”

“She had a son,” observed Athos.

“Oh! yes, I know that,” said D’Artagnan, “and you mentioned it to me; but who knows what has become of him? If the serpent be dead, why not its brood? Do you think his uncle De Winter would have brought up that young viper? De Winter probably condemned the son as he had done the mother.”

“Then,” said Athos, “woe to De Winter, for the child had done no harm.”

“May the devil take me, if the child be not dead,” said Porthos. “There is so much fog in that detestable country, at least so D’Artagnan declares.”

Just as the quaint conclusion reached by Porthos was about to bring back hilarity to faces now more or less clouded, hasty footsteps were heard upon the stair and some one knocked at the door.

“Come in,” cried Athos.

“Please your honors,” said the host, “a person in a great hurry wishes to speak to one of you.”

“To which of us?” asked all the four friends.

“To him who is called the Comte de la Fère.”

“It is I,” said Athos, “and what is the name of the person?”

“Grimaud.”

“Ah!” exclaimed Athos, turning pale. “Back already! What can have happened, then, to Bragelonne?”

“Let him enter,” cried D’Artagnan; “let him come up.”

But Grimaud had already mounted the staircase and was waiting on the last step; so springing into the room he motioned the host to leave it. The door being closed, the four