“Unfortunately, my lord, I am acquainted with nobody here but your grace, and if I should no longer find you, or if you should have forgotten me in your greatness?”
“Listen to me, Monsieur d’Artagnan,” replied Monk; “you are a superior man, full of intelligence and courage; you deserve all the good fortune this world can bring you; come with me into Scotland, and, I swear to you, I shall arrange for you a fate which all may envy.”
“Oh! my lord, that is impossible. At present I have a sacred duty to perform; I have to watch over your glory, I have to prevent a low jester from tarnishing in the eyes of our contemporaries—who knows? in the eyes of posterity—the splendor of your name.”
“Of posterity, Monsieur d’Artagnan?”
“Doubtless. It is necessary, as regards posterity, that all the details of that history should remain a mystery; for, admit that this unfortunate history of the deal box should spread, and it should be asserted that you had not re-established the king loyally, and of your own free will, but in consequence of a compromise entered into at Scheveningen between you two. It would be vain for me to declare how the thing came about, for though I know I should not be believed, it would be said that I had received my part of the cake, and was eating it.”
Monk knitted his brow.—“Glory, honor, probity!” said he, “you are but empty words.”
“Mist!” replied D’Artagnan; “nothing but mist, through which nobody can see clearly.”
“Well, then, go to France, my dear Monsieur d’Artagnan,” said Monk; “go, and to render England more attractive and agreeable to you, accept a remembrance of me.
“What now?” thought D’Artagnan.
“I have on the banks of the Clyde,” continued Monk, “a little house in a grove, cottage as it is called here. To this house are attached a hundred acres of land. Accept it as a souvenir.”