She strewed a few sweet flowers on the freshly sodded earth; then, wiping the tears from her eyes, the heavily stricken lady bowed to D’Artagnan, and disappeared.
The captain watched the departure of the horses, horsemen, and carriage, then crossing his arms upon his swelling chest, “When will it be my turn to depart?” said he, in an agitated voice. “What is there left for man after youth, love, glory, friendship, strength, and wealth have disappeared? That rock, under which sleeps Porthos, who possessed all I have named; this moss, under which repose Athos and Raoul, who possessed much more!”
He hesitated for a moment, with a dull eye; then, drawing himself up, “Forward! still forward!” said he. “When it is time, God will tell me, as he foretold the others.”
He touched the earth, moistened with the evening dew, with the ends of his fingers, signed himself as if he had been at the benitier in church, and retook alone—ever alone—the road to Paris.
Epilogue.
Four years after the scene we have just described, two horsemen, well mounted, traversed Blois early in the morning, for the purpose of arranging a hawking party the king had arranged to make in that uneven plain the Loire divides in two, which borders on the one side Meung, on the other Amboise. These were the keeper of the king’s harriers and the master of the falcons, personages greatly respected in the time of Louis XIII., but rather neglected by his successor. The horsemen, having reconnoitered the ground, were returning, their observations made, when they perceived certain little groups of soldiers, here and there, whom the sergeants were placing at distances at the openings of the inclosures. These were the king’s musketeers. Behind them came, upon a splendid horse, the captain, known by his richly embroidered uniform. His hair was gray, his beard turning so. He seemed a little bent, although sitting and handling his horse gracefully. He was looking about him watchfully.
“M. d’Artagnan does not get any older,” said the keeper of the harriers to his colleague the falconer; “with ten years more to carry than either of us, he has the seat of a young man on horseback.”
“That is true,” replied the falconer. “I don’t see any change in him for the last twenty years.”
But this officer was mistaken; D’Artagnan in the last four years had lived a dozen. Age had printed its pitiless claws at each angle of his eyes; his brow was bald; his hands, formerly brown and nervous, were getting white, as if the blood had half forgotten them.
D’Artagnan accosted the officers with the shade of affability which distinguishes superiors, and received in turn for his courtesy two most respectful bows.