“I certainly am lucky in them,” said D’Artagnan, with a proud simplicity. “You know that if for this affair I had my dear Athos, my brave Porthos, and my cunning Aramis, the business would be settled; but they are all lost, as it appears, and nobody knows where to find them. I will do it, then, alone. Now, do you find the business good, and the investment advantageous?”
“Too much so—too much so.”
“How can that be?”
“Because fine things never reach the expected point.”
“This is infallible, Planchet, and the proof is that I undertake it. It will be for you a tolerably pretty gain, and for me a very interesting stroke. It will be said, ‘Such was the old age of M. d’Artagnan,’ and I shall hold a place in tales and even in history itself, Planchet. I am greedy of honor.”
“Monsieur,” cried Planchet, “when I think that it is here, in my home, in the midst of my sugar, my prunes, and my cinnamon, that this gigantic project is ripened, my shop seems a palace to me.”
“Beware, beware, Planchet! If the least report of this escapes, there is the Bastile for both of us. Beware, my friend, for this is a plot we are hatching. M. Monk is the ally of M. Mazarin—beware!”
“Monsieur, when a man has had the honor to belong to you, he knows nothing of fear; and when he has had the advantage of being bound up in interests with you, he holds his tongue.”
“Very well; that is more your affair than mine, seeing that in a week I shall be in England.”
“Depart, monsieur, depart—the sooner the better.”