“Ah, yes,” said Porthos, “there is nine o’clock. We have a rendezvous, you remember, at the Place Royale.”
“Ah! stop! hold your peace, Porthos, don’t remind me of it; ’tis that which has made me so cross since yesterday. I shall not go.”
“Why?” asked Porthos.
“Because it is a grievous thing for me to meet again those two men who caused the failure of our enterprise.”
“And yet,” said Porthos, “neither of them had any advantage over us. I still had a loaded pistol and you were in full fight, sword in hand.”
“Yes,” said D’Artagnan; “but what if this rendezvous had some hidden purpose?”
“Oh!” said Porthos, “you can’t think that, D’Artagnan!”
D’Artagnan did not believe Athos to be capable of a deception, but he sought an excuse for not going to the rendezvous.
“We must go,” said the superb lord of Bracieux, “lest they should say we were afraid. We who have faced fifty foes on the high road can well meet two in the Place Royale.”
“Yes, yes, but they took part with the princes without apprising us of it. Athos and Aramis have played a game with me which alarms me. We discovered yesterday the truth; what is the use of going to-day to learn something else?”