Twenty Years Later by Dumas, Alexandre. Part one

“My dear La Ramee,” said the duke, “you are the only man to

turn such faultless compliments.”

“No, my lord duke,” replied La Ramee, in the fullness of his

heart; “I say what I think; there is no compliment in what I

say to you —- ”

“Then you are attached to me?” asked the duke.

“To own the truth, I should be inconsolable if you were to

leave Vincennes.”

“A droll way of showing your affliction.” The duke meant to

say “affection.”

“But, my lord,” returned La Ramee, “what would you do if you

got out? Every folly you committed would embroil you with

the court and they would put you into the Bastile, instead

of Vincennes. Now, Monsieur de Chavigny is not amiable, I

allow, but Monsieur du Tremblay is considerably worse.”

“Indeed!” exclaimed the duke, who from time to time looked

at the clock, the fingers of which seemed to move with

sickening slowness.

“But what can you expect from the brother of a capuchin

monk, brought up in the school of Cardinal Richelieu? Ah, my

lord, it is a great happiness that the queen, who always

wished you well, had a fancy to send you here, where there’s

a promenade and a tennis court, good air, and a good table.”

“In short,” answered the duke, “if I comprehend you aright,

La Ramee, I am ungrateful for having ever thought of leaving

this place?”

“Oh! my lord duke, ’tis the height of ingratitude; but your

highness has never seriously thought of it?”

“Yes,” returned the duke, “I must confess I sometimes think

of it.”

“Still by one of your forty methods, your highness?”

“Yes, yes, indeed.”

“My lord,” said La Ramee, “now we are quite at our ease and

enjoying ourselves, pray tell me one of those forty ways

invented by your highness.”

“Willingly,” answered the duke, “give me the pie!”

“I am listening,” said La Ramee, leaning back in his

armchair and raising his glass of Madeira to his lips, and

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Dumas, Alexandre – Twenty Years After

winking his eye that he might see the sun through the rich

liquid that he was about to taste.

The duke glanced at the clock. In ten minutes it would

strike seven.

Grimaud placed the pie before the duke, who took a knife

with a silver blade to raise the upper crust; but La Ramee,

who was afraid of any harm happening to this fine work of

art, passed his knife, which had an iron blade, to the duke.

“Thank you, La Ramee,” said the prisoner.

“Well, my lord! this famous invention of yours?”

“Must I tell you,” replied the duke, “on what I most reckon

and what I determine to try first?”

“Yes, that’s the thing, my lord!” cried his custodian,

gaily.

“Well, I should hope, in the first instance, to have for

keeper an honest fellow like you.”

“And you have me, my lord. Well?”

“Having, then, a keeper like La Ramee, I should try also to

have introduced to him by some friend or other a man who

would be devoted to me, who would assist me in my flight.”

“Come, come,” said La Ramee, “that’s not a bad idea.”

“Capital, isn’t it? for instance, the former servingman of

some brave gentleman, an enemy himself to Mazarin, as every

gentleman ought to be.”

“Hush! don’t let us talk politics, my lord.”

“Then my keeper would begin to trust this man and to depend

upon him, and I should have news from those without the

prison walls.”

“Ah, yes! but how can the news be brought to you?”

“Nothing easier; in a game of tennis, for example.”

“In a game of tennis?” asked La Ramee, giving more serious

attention to the duke’s words.

“Yes; see, I send a ball into the moat; a man is there who

picks it up; the ball contains a letter. Instead of

returning the ball to me when I call for it from the top of

the wall, he throws me another; that other ball contains a

letter. Thus we have exchanged ideas and no one has seen us

do it.”

“The devil it does! The devil it does!” said La Ramee,