“I! Listen, Raoul. Day by day, hour by hour,—take note of my words,—I will predict what he will do. The cardinal being dead, he will fret; very well, that is the least silly thing he will do, particularly if he does not shed a tear.”
“And then?”
“Why then he will get M. Fouquet to allow him a pension, and will go and compose verses at Fontainebleau, upon some Mancini or other, whose eyes the queen will scratch out. She is a Spaniard, you see,—this queen of ours, and she has, for mother-in-law, Madame Anne of Austria. I know something of the Spaniards of the house of Austria.”
“And next?”
“Well, after having torn off the silver lace from the uniforms of his Swiss, because lace is too expensive, he will dismount the musketeers, because the oats and hay of a horse cost five sols a day.”
“Oh! do not say that.”
“Of what consequence is it to me? I am no longer a musketeer, am I? Let them be on horseback, let them be on foot, let them carry a larding-pin, a spit, a sword, or nothing—what is it to me?”
“My dear Monsieur d’Artagnan, I beseech you speak no more ill of the king. I am almost in his service, and my father would be very angry with me for having heard, even from your mouth, words injurious to his majesty.”
“Your father, eh? He is a knight in every bad cause. Pardieu! yes, your father is a brave man, a Caesar, it is true—but a man without perception.”
“Now, my dear chevalier,” exclaimed Raoul, laughing, “are you going to speak ill of my father, of him you call the great Athos. Truly you are in a bad vein to-day; riches render you as sour as poverty renders other people.”