"Paid, by whom?"
"By monsieur le surintendant."
Colbert grew pale.
"Explain yourself," said he, in a stifled voice--"if you are paid why do you show me that paper?"
"In consequence of the word of order of which you spoke to me so ingeniously just now, dear M. Colbert; the king told me to take a quarter of the pension he is pleased to make me."
"Of me?" said Colbert.
"Not exactly. The king said to me: 'Go to M. Fouquet; the superintendent will, perhaps, have no money, then you will go and draw it of M. Colbert.'"
The countenance of M. Colbert brightened for a moment; but it was with his unfortunate physiognomy as with a stormy sky, sometimes radiant, sometimes dark as night, according as the lightening gleams or the cloud passes. "Eh! and was there any money in the superintendent's coffers?" asked he.
"Why, yes, he could not be badly off for money," replied D'Artagnan--"it may be believed, since M. Fouquet, instead of paying me a quarter or five thousand livres--"
"A quarter or five thousand livres!" cried Colbert, struck, as Fouquet had been, with the generosity of the sum for a soldier's pension, "why, that would be a pension of twenty thousand livres?"
"Exactly, M. Colbert. Peste! you reckon like old Pythagoras; yes, twenty thousand livres."
"Ten times the appointment of an intendant of the finances. I beg to offer you my compliments," said Colbert, with a vicious smile.
"Oh!" said D'Artagnan, "the king apologized for giving me so little; but he promised to make it more hereafter, when he should be rich; but I must be gone, having much to do--"
"So, then, notwithstanding the expectation of the king, the superintendent paid you, did he?"
"In the same manner, as, in opposition to the king's expectation, you refused to pay me."
"I did not refuse, monsieur, I only begged you to wait. And you say that M. Fouquet paid you your five thousand livres?"
"Yes, as you might have done; but he did even better than that, M. Colbert."
"And what did he do?"
"He politely counted me down the sum-total, saying, that for the king, his coffers were always full."
"The sum-total! M. Fouquet has given you twenty thousand livres instead of five thousand?"
"Yes, monsieur."
"And what for?"
"In order to spare me three visits to the money-chest of the superintendent, so that I have the twenty thousand livres in my pocket in good new coin. You see, then, that I am able to go away without standing in need of you, having come here only for form's sake." And D'Artagnan slapped his hand upon his pocket, with a laugh which disclosed to Colbert thirty-two magnificent teeth, as white as teeth of twenty-five years old, and which seemed to say in their language: "Serve up to us thirty-two little Colberts, and we will chew them willingly." The serpent is as brave as the lion, the hawk as courageous as the eagle, that cannot be contested. It can only be said of animals that are decidedly cowardly, and are so called, that they will be brave only when they have to defend themselves. Colbert was not frightened at the thirty-two teeth of D'Artagnan. He recovered, and suddenly,--"Monsieur," said he, "monsieur le surintendant has done what he had no right to do."