“In the street, facing your window, in the embrasure of that door—a man wrapped in a cloak.”
“It is he!” cried D’Artagnan and the citizen at the same time, each having recognized his man.
“Ah, this time,” cried D’Artagnan, springing to his sword, “this time he will not escape me!”
Drawing his sword from its scabbard, he rushed out of the apartment. On the staircase he met Athos and Porthos, who were coming to see him. They separated, and D’Artagnan rushed between them like a dart.
“Pah! Where are you going?” cried the two Musketeers in a breath.
“The man of Meung!” replied D’Artagnan, and disappeared.
D’Artagnan had more than once related to his friends his adventure with the stranger, as well as the apparition of the beautiful foreigner, to whom this man had confided some important missive.
The opinion of Athos was that D’Artagnan had lost his letter in the skirmish. A gentleman, in his opinion—and according to D’Artagnan’s portrait of him, the stranger must be a gentleman—would be incapable of the baseness of stealing a letter.
Porthos saw nothing in all this but a love meeting, given by a lady to a cavalier, or by a cavalier to a lady, which had been disturbed by the presence of D’Artagnan and his yellow horse.
Aramis said that as these sorts of affairs were mysterious, it was better not to fathom them.