Ten Years Later by Dumas, Alexandre. Part one

to consider my authority subordinate to another, therefore

after me, round me, and beneath me they still look for

something. It would result that if I were dead, whatever

might happen, my army would not be demoralized all at once;

it results, that if I choose to absent myself, for instance,

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Dumas, Alexandre – Ten Years Later

as it does please me to do sometimes, there would not be in

the camp the shadow of uneasiness or disorder. I am the

magnet — the sympathetic and natural strength of the

English. All those scattered irons that will be sent against

me I shall attract to myself. Lambert, at this moment,

commands eighteen thousand deserters, but I have never

mentioned that to my officers, you may easily suppose.

Nothing is more useful to an army than the expectation of a

coming battle; everybody is awake — everybody is on guard.

I tell you this that you may live in perfect security. Do

not be in a hurry, then, to cross the seas; within a week

there will be something fresh, either a battle or an

accomodation. Then, as you have judged me to be a honorable

man, and confided your secret to me, I have to thank you for

this confidence, and I shall come and pay you a visit or

send for you. Do not go before I send you word. I repeat the

request.”

“I promise you, general,” cried Athos, with a joy so great,

that in spite of all his circumspection, he could not

prevent its sparkling in his eyes.

Monk surprised this flash, and immediately extinguished it

by one of those silent smiles which always caused his

interlocutors to know they had made no inroad on his mind.

“Then, my lord, it is a week that you desire me to wait?”

“A week? yes, monsieur.”

“And during these days what shall I do?”

“If there should be a battle, keep at a distance from it, I

beseech you. I know the French delight in such amusements,

— you might take a fancy to see how we fight, and you might

receive some chance shot. Our Scotchmen are very bad

marksmen, and I do not wish that a worthy gentleman like you

should return to France wounded. Nor should I like to be

obliged myself, to send to your prince his million left here

by you, for then it would be said, and with some reason,

that I paid the Pretender to enable him to make war against

the parliament. Go, then, monsieur, and let it be done as

has been agreed upon.”

“Ah, my lord,” said Athos, “what joy it would give me to be

the first that penetrated to the noble heart which beats

beneath that cloak!”

“You think, then, that I have secrets,” said Monk, without

changing the half cheerful expression of his countenance.

“Why, monsieur, what secret can you expect to find in the

hollow head of a soldier? But it is getting late, and our

torch is almost out; let us call our man.”

“Hola!” cried Monk in French, approaching the stairs; “hola!

fisherman!”

The fisherman, benumbed by the cold night air, replied in a

hoarse voice, asking what they wanted of him.

“Go to the post,” said Monk, “and order a sergeant, in the

name of General Monk, to come here immediately.”

This was a commission easily performed; for the sergeant,

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Dumas, Alexandre – Ten Years Later

uneasy at the general’s being in that desolate abbey, had

drawn nearer by degrees, and was not much further off than

the fisherman. The general’s order was therefore heard by

him, and he hastened to obey it.

“Get a horse and two men,” said Monk.

“A horse and two men?” repeated the sergeant.

“Yes,” replied Monk. “Have you any means of getting a horse

with a pack-saddle or two paniers?”

“No doubt, at a hundred paces off, in the Scotch camp.”

“Very well.”

“What shall I do with the horse, general?”

“Look here.”

The sergeant descended the three steps which separated him

from Monk, and came into the vault.

“You see,” said Monk, “that gentleman yonder?”

“Yes, general.”

“And you see these two casks?”

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