Man in the Iron Mask by Dumas, Alexandre part one

“I only am to blame, Mademoiselle,” continued Raoul. “Better informed than yourself of the difficulties of this life, I should have enlightened you. I ought not to have relied upon uncertainty; I ought to have extracted an answer from your heart, while I hardly even sought an acknowledgement from your lips. Once more, Mademoiselle, it is I who ask your forgiveness.”

“Impossible, impossible!” she cried; “you are mocking me.”

“How, impossible?”

“Yes, it is impossible to be good and excellent and perfect to that extent.”

“Take care!” said Raoul, with a bitter smile; “for presently you may say perhaps that I did not love you.”

“Oh, you love me like an affectionate brother; let me hope that, Raoul.”

“As a brother? Undeceive yourself, Louise! I loved you as a lover, as a husband, with the deepest, the truest, the fondest affection.”

“Raoul, Raoul!”

“As a brother? Oh, Louise! I loved you so much I would have given all my blood for you, drop by drop; all my flesh, shred by shred; all my eternity, hour by hour.”

“Raoul! Raoul! for pity’s sake!”

“I loved you so much, Louise, that my heart is dead, my faith extinguished, my eyes have lost their light. I loved you so much that I see nothing more either on earth or in Heaven.”

“Raoul, dear Raoul! spare me, I implore you!” cried La Valliere. “Oh, if I had known-”

“It is too late, Louise. You love, you are happy; I read your happiness through your tears,- behind the tears which the loyalty of your nature makes you shed; I feel the sighs which your love breathes forth. Louise, Louise, you have made me the most abjectly wretched man living; leave me, I entreat you! Adieu! adieu!”

“Forgive me, I entreat you!”

“Have I not done more? Have I not told you that I love you still?” She buried her face in her hands. “And to tell you that,- do you understand me, Louise?- to tell you that at such a moment as this, to tell you that as I have told you, is to pronounce my own sentence of death. Adieu!”

La Valliere wished to hold out her hands to him.

“We ought not to see each other again in this world,” he said; and as she was on the point of calling out in bitter agony at this remark, he placed his hand on her mouth to stifle the exclamation. She pressed her lips upon it and fell fainting.

“Olivain,” said Raoul, “take this young lady and bear her to the carriage which is waiting for her at the door.”

As Olivain lifted her up, Raoul made a movement towards La Valliere, as if to give her a first and last kiss, but stopping abruptly, he said, “No, she is not mine; I am not the King of France, to steal!” And he returned to his room; while the lackey carried La Valliere, still fainting, to the carriage.

Chapter XXIII: What Raoul Had Guessed

AFTER Raoul’s departure, and the two exclamations which had followed him, Athos and d’Artagnan found themselves alone, face to face. Athos immediately resumed the earnest manner which had possessed him when d’Artagnan arrived.

“Well,” Athos said, “what have you come to announce to me, my friend?”

“I?” inquired d’Artagnan.

“Yes; I do not see you in this way without some reason for it,” said Athos, smiling.

“The deuce!” said d’Artagnan.

“I will place you at your ease. The King is furious, is he not?”

“Well, I must say he is not altogether pleased.”

“And you have come-”

“By his direction; yes.”

“To arrest me, then?”

“My dear friend, you have hit the very mark.”

“Oh, I expected it! Come!”

“Oh! oh! The devil!” said d’Artagnan; “what a hurry you are in!”

“I am afraid of delaying you,” said Athos, smiling.

“I have plenty of time. Are you not curious, besides, to know how things went on between the King and me?”

“If you will be good enough to tell me, I will listen with the greatest pleasure,” said Athos, pointing out to d’Artagnan a large chair, in which the latter stretched himself in an easy attitude.

“Well, I will do so willingly enough,” continued d’Artagnan, “for the conversation is rather interesting. In the first place, the King sent for me.”

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