"You are mistaken, gentlemen: this handkerchief is not mine, and I cannot understand why this gentleman has taken it into his head to offer it to me rather than to one of you. And as a proof of what I say, here is mine in my pocket."
So saying, he pulled out his handkerchief, which was also not only a very dainty one, and of fine linen (though linen was then costly), but was embroidered and without arms, bearing only a single cipher, the owner's.
This time D'Artagnan saw his mistake; but Aramis's friends were by no means convinced, and one of them, addressing the young musketeer with pretended gravity, said:—
"If things were as you make out, I should feel obliged, my dear Aramis, to reclaim it myself; for as you very well know, Bois-Tracy is an intimate friend of mine, and I cannot allow one of his wife's belongings to be exhibited as a trophy."
"You make the demand clumsily," replied Aramis; "and while I acknowledge the justice of your reclamation, I refuse it on account of the form."
"The fact is," D'Artagnan put in hesitatingly, "I did not actually see the handkerchief fall from M. Aramis's pocket. He had his foot on it, that's all, and I thought it was his."
"And you were deceived, my dear sir," replied Aramis coldly, very little obliged for the explanation; then turning to the guard who had professed himself Bois-Tracy's friend—"Besides," he went on, "I have reflected, my dear intimate friend of Bois-Tracy, that I am not less devotedly his friend than you can possibly be, so that this handkerchief is quite as likely to have fallen from your pocket as from mine!"
"On my honor, no!"
"You are about to swear on your honor, and I on my word; and then it will be pretty evident that one of us will have lied. Now here, Montaran, we will do better than that: let each take a half."
"Perfectly fair," cried the other two guardsmen; "the judgment of Solomon! Aramis, you are certainly full of wisdom!"