The Man in the Iron Mask by Alexandre Dumas (read people like a book txt) 📕
"A. M. D. G.," wrote the bishop; and he drew a cross under these four letters, which signify ad majorem Dei gloriam, "to the greater glory of God;" and thus he continued: "It is our pleasure that the order brought to M. de Baisemeaux de Montlezun, governor, for the king, of the castle of the Bastile, be held by him good and effectual, and be immediately carried into operation. "(Signed) D'HERBLAY "General of the Order, by the grace of God."
Baisemeaux was so profoundly astonished, that his features remained contracted, his lips parted, and his eyes fixed. He did not move an inch, nor articulate a sound. Nothing could be heard in that large chamber but the wing-whisper of a little moth, which was fluttering to its death about the candles. Aramis, without even deigning to look at the man whom he had reduced to so miserable a condition, drew from his pocket a small case of black wax; he sealed the letter, and stamped
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“Oh! do not deceive yourselves, my dear brothers in Epicurus,” said the superintendent; “I do not wish to make a comparison between the most humble sinner on the earth, and the God we adore, but remember, he gave one day to his friends a repast which is called the Last Supper, and which was nothing but a farewell dinner, like that which we are making at this moment.”
A painful cry of denial arose from all parts of the table. “Shut the doors,” said Fouquet, and the servants disappeared. “My friends,” continued Fouquet, lowering his voice, “what was I formerly? What am I now? Consult among yourselves and reply. A man like me sinks when he does not continue to rise. What shall we say, then, when he really sinks? I have no more money, no more credit; I have no longer anything but powerful enemies, and powerless friends.”
“Quick!” cried Pelisson. “Since you explain yourself with such frankness, it is our duty to be frank, likewise. Yes, you are ruined—yes, you are hastening to your ruin—stop. And, in the first place, what money have we left?”
“Seven hundred thousand livres,” said the intendant.
“Bread,” murmured Madame Fouquet.
“Relays,” said Pelisson, “relays, and fly!”
“Whither?”
“To Switzerland—to Savoy—but fly!”
“If monseigneur flies,” said Madame Belliere, “it will be said that he was guilty—was afraid.”
“More than that, it will be said that I have carried away twenty millions with me.”
“We will draw up memoirs to justify you,” said La Fontaine. “Fly!”
“I will remain,” said Fouquet. “And, besides, does not everything serve me?”
“You have Belle-Isle,” cried the Abbe Fouquet.
“And I am naturally going there, when going to Nantes,” replied the superintendent. “Patience, then, patience!”
“Before arriving at Nantes, what a distance!” said Madame Fouquet.
“Yes, I know that well,” replied Fouquet. “But what is to be done there? The king summons me to the States. I know well it is for the purpose of ruining me; but to refuse to go would be to evince uneasiness.”
“Well, I have discovered the means of reconciling everything,” cried Pelisson. “You are going to set out for Nantes.”
Fouquet looked at him with an air of surprise.
“But with friends; but in your own carriage as far as Orleans; in your own barge as far as Nantes; always ready to defend yourself, if you are attacked; to escape, if you are threatened. In fact, you will carry your money against all chances; and, whilst flying, you will only have obeyed the king; then, reaching the sea, when you like, you will embark for Belle-Isle, and from Belle-Isle you will shoot out wherever it may please you, like the eagle that leaps into space when it has been driven from its eyrie.”
A general assent followed Pelisson’s words. “Yes, do so,” said Madame Fouquet to her husband.
“Do so,” said Madame de Belliere.
“Do it! do it!” cried all his friends.
“I will do so,” replied Fouquet.
“This very evening?”
“In an hour?”
“Instantly.”
“With seven hundred thousand livres you can lay the foundation of another fortune,” said the Abbe Fouquet.
“What is there to prevent our arming corsairs at Belle-Isle?”
“And, if necessary, we will go and discover a new world,” added La Fontaine, intoxicated with fresh projects and enthusiasm.
A knock at the door interrupted this concert of joy and hope. “A courier from the king,” said the master of the ceremonies.
A profound silence immediately ensued, as if the message brought by this courier was nothing but a reply to all the projects given birth to a moment before. Every one waited to see what the master would do. His brow was streaming with perspiration, and he was really suffering from his fever at that instant. He passed into his cabinet, to receive the king’s message. There prevailed, as we have said, such a silence in the chambers, and throughout the attendance, that from the dining-room could be heard the voice of Fouquet, saying, “That is well, monsieur.” This voice was, however, broken by fatigue, and trembled with emotion. An instant after, Fouquet called Gourville, who crossed the gallery amidst the universal expectation. At length, he himself re-appeared among his guests; but it was no longer the same pale, spiritless countenance they had beheld when he left them; from pale he had become livid; and from spiritless, annihilated. A breathing, living specter, he advanced with his arms stretched out, his mouth parched, like a shade that comes to salute the friends of former days. On seeing him thus, every one cried out, and every one rushed towards Fouquet. The latter, looking at Pelisson, leaned upon his wife, and pressed the icy hand of the Marquise de Belliere.
“Well,” said he, in a voice which had nothing human in it.
“What has happened, my God!” said some one to him.
Fouquet opened his right hand, which was clenched, but glistening with perspiration, and displayed a paper, upon which Pelisson cast a terrified glance. He read the following lines, written by the king’s hand:
“‘DEAR AND WELL-BELOVED MONSIEUR FOUQUET,—Give us, upon that which you have left of ours, the sum of seven hundred thousand livres, of which we stand in need to prepare for our departure.
“‘And, as we know your health is not good, we pray God to restore you, and to have you in His holy keeping. “‘LOUIS.
“‘The present letter is to serve as a receipt.’”
A murmur of terror circulated through the apartment.
“Well,” cried Pelisson, in his turn, “you have received that letter?”
“Received it, yes!”
“What will you do, then?”
“Nothing, since I have received it.”
“But—”
“If I have received it, Pelisson, I have paid it,” said the surintendant, with a simplicity that went to the heart of all present.
“You have paid it!” cried Madame Fouquet. “Then we are ruined!”
“Come, no useless words,” interrupted Pelisson. “Next to money, life. Monseigneur, to horse! to horse!”
“What, leave us!” at once cried both the women, wild with grief.
“Eh! monseigneur, in saving yourself, you save us all. To horse!”
“But he cannot hold himself on. Look at him.”
“Oh! if he takes time to reflect—” said the intrepid Pelisson.
“He is right,” murmured Fouquet.
“Monseigneur! Monseigneur!” cried Gourville, rushing up the stairs, four steps at once. “Monseigneur!”
“Well! what?”
“I escorted, as you desired, the king’s courier with the money.”
“Yes.”
“Well! when I arrived at the Palais Royal, I saw—”
“Take breath, my poor friend, take breath; you are suffocating.”
“What did you see?” cried the impatient friends.
“I saw the musketeers mounting on horseback,” said Gourville.
“There, then!” cried every voice at once; “there, then! is there an instant to be lost?”
Madame Fouquet rushed downstairs, calling for her horses; Madame de Belliere flew after her, catching her in her arms, and saying: “Madame, in the name of his safety, do not betray anything, do not manifest alarm.”
Pelisson ran to have the horses put to the carriages. And, in the meantime, Gourville gathered in his hat all that the weeping friends were able to throw into it of gold and silver—the last offering, the pious alms made to misery by poverty. The surintendant, dragged along by some, carried by others, was shut up in his carriage. Gourville took the reins, and mounted the box. Pelisson supported Madame Fouquet, who had fainted. Madame de Belliere had more strength, and was well paid for it; she received Fouquet’s last kiss. Pelisson easily explained this precipitate departure by saying that an order from the king had summoned the minister to Nantes.
Chapter XXXVI. In M. Colbert’s Carriage.
As Gourville had seen, the king’s musketeers were mounting and following their captain. The latter, who did not like to be confined in his proceedings, left his brigade under the orders of a lieutenant, and set off on post horses, recommending his men to use all diligence. However rapidly they might travel, they could not arrive before him. He had time, in passing along the Rue des Petits-Champs, to see something which afforded him plenty of food for thought and conjecture. He saw M. Colbert coming out from his house to get into his carriage, which was stationed before the door. In this carriage D’Artagnan perceived the hoods of two women, and being rather curious, he wished to know the names of the ladies hid beneath these hoods. To get a glimpse at them, for they kept themselves closely covered up, he urged his horse so near the carriage, that he drove him against the step with such force as to shake everything containing and contained. The terrified women uttered, the one a faint cry, by which D’Artagnan recognized a young woman, the other an imprecation, in which he recognized the vigor and aplomb that half a century bestows. The hoods were thrown back: one of the women was Madame Vanel, the other the Duchesse de Chevreuse. D’Artagnan’s eyes were quicker than those of the ladies; he had seen and known them, whilst they did not recognize him; and as they laughed at their fright, pressing each other’s hands,—
“Humph!” said D’Artagnan, “the old duchesse is no more inaccessible to friendship than formerly. She paying her court to the mistress of M. Colbert! Poor M. Fouquet! that presages you nothing good!”
He rode on. M. Colbert got into his carriage and the distinguished trio commenced a sufficiently slow pilgrimage toward the wood of Vincennes. Madame de Chevreuse set down Madame Vanel at her husband’s house, and, left alone with M. Colbert, chatted upon affairs whilst continuing her ride. She had an inexhaustible fund of conversation, that dear duchesse, and as she always talked for the ill of others, though ever with a view to her own good, her conversation amused her interlocutor, and did not fail to leave a favorable impression.
She taught Colbert, who, poor man! was ignorant of the fact, how great a minister he was, and how Fouquet would soon become a cipher. She promised to rally around him, when he should become surintendant, all the old nobility of the kingdom, and questioned him as to the preponderance it would be proper to allow La Valliere. She praised him, she blamed him, she bewildered him. She showed him the secret of so many secrets that, for a moment, Colbert thought he was doing business with the devil. She proved to him that she held in her hand the Colbert of to-day, as she had held the Fouquet of yesterday; and as he asked her very simply the reason of her hatred for the surintendant: “Why do you yourself hate him?” said she.
“Madame, in politics,” replied he, “the differences of system oft bring about dissentions between men. M. Fouquet always appeared to me to practice a system opposed to the true interests of the king.”
She interrupted him.—“I will say no more to you about M. Fouquet. The journey the king is about to take to Nantes will give a good account of him. M. Fouquet, for me, is a man gone by—and for you also.”
Colbert made no reply. “On his return from Nantes,” continued the duchesse, “the king, who is only anxious for a pretext, will find that the States have not behaved well—that they have made too few sacrifices. The States will say that the imposts are too heavy, and that the surintendant has ruined them. The king will lay all the blame on M. Fouquet, and then—”
“And then?” said Colbert.
“Oh! he will be disgraced. Is not that your opinion?”
Colbert darted a glance at the duchesse, which plainly said: “If M. Fouquet be only disgraced, you will not be the cause of it.”
“Your place, M. Colbert,” the duchesse hastened to say, “must be a high place. Do you perceive any one between the king and yourself, after the fall of M. Fouquet?”
“I do not understand,” said he.
“You will understand. To what does your ambition aspire?”
“I have none.”
“It was useless, then, to overthrow the superintendent, Monsieur Colbert. It was idle.”
“I had the honor to tell you, madame—”
“Oh! yes, I know, all about the interest of the king—but, if you please, we will speak of your own.”
“Mine! that is to say, the affairs of his majesty.”
“In short, are you, or are you not endeavoring
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