“I have heard,” said Blaisois, “that port is a very good
wine.”
“Excellent!” exclaimed Mousqueton, smacking his lips.
“Excellent; there is port wine in the cellar of Monsieur le
Baron de Bracieux.”
“Suppose we ask these Englishmen to sell us a bottle,” said
the honest Blaisois.
“Sell!” cried Mousqueton, about whom there was a remnant of
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his ancient marauding character left. “One may well
perceive, young man, that you are inexperienced. Why buy
what one can take?”
“Take!” said Blaisois; “covet the goods of your neighbor?
That is forbidden, it seems to me.”
“Where forbidden?” asked Mousqueton.
“In the commandments of God, or of the church, I don’t know
which. I only know it says, `Thou shalt not covet thy
neighbor’s goods, nor yet his wife.'”
“That is a child’s reason, Monsieur Blaisois,” said
Mousqueton in his most patronizing manner. “Yes, you talk
like a child — I repeat the word. Where have you read in
the Scriptures, I ask you, that the English are your
neighbors?”
“Where, that is true,” said Blaisois; “at least, I can’t now
recall it.”
“A child’s reason — I repeat it,” continued Mousqueton. “If
you had been ten years engaged in war, as Grimaud and I have
been, my dear Blaisois, you would know the difference there
is between the goods of others and the goods of enemies. Now
an Englishman is an enemy; this port wine belongs to the
English, therefore it belongs to us.”
“And our masters?” asked Blaisois, stupefied by this
harangue, delivered with an air of profound sagacity, “will
they be of your opinion?”
Mousqueton smiled disdainfully.
“I suppose that you think it necessary that I should disturb
the repose of these illustrious lords to say, `Gentlemen,
your servant, Mousqueton, is thirsty.’ What does Monsieur
Bracieux care, think you, whether I am thirsty or not?”
“‘Tis a very expensive wine,” said Blaisois, shaking his
head.
“Were it liquid gold, Monsieur Blaisois, our masters would
not deny themselves this wine. Know that Monsieur de
Bracieux is rich enough to drink a tun of port wine, even if
obliged to pay a pistole for every drop.” His manner became
more and more lofty every instant; then he arose and after
finishing off the beer at one draught he advanced
majestically to the door of the compartment where the wine
was. “Ah! locked!” he exclaimed; “these devils of English,
how suspicious they are!”
“Locked!” said Blaisois; “ah! the deuce it is; unlucky, for
my stomach is getting more and more upset.”
“Locked!” repeated Mousqueton.
“But,” Blaisois ventured to say, “I have heard you relate,
Monsieur Mousqueton, that once on a time, at Chantilly, you
fed your master and yourself by taking partridges in a
snare, carp with a line, and bottles with a slipnoose.”
“Perfectly true; but there was an airhole in the cellar and
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Dumas, Alexandre – Twenty Years After
the wine was in bottles. I cannot throw the loop through
this partition nor move with a pack-thread a cask of wine
which may perhaps weigh two hundred pounds.”
“No, but you can take out two or three boards of the
partition,” answered Blaisois, “and make a hole in the cask
with a gimlet.”
Mousqueton opened his great round eyes to the utmost,
astonished to find in Blaisois qualities for which he did
not give him credit.
“‘Tis true,” he said; “but where can I get a chisel to take
the planks out, a gimlet to pierce the cask?”
“Trousers,” said Grimaud, still squaring his accounts.
“Ah, yes!” said Mousqueton.
Grimaud, in fact, was not only the accountant, but the
armorer of the party; and as he was a man full of
forethought, these trousers, carefully rolled up in his
valise, contained every sort of tool for immediate use.
Mousqueton, therefore, was soon provided with tools and he
began his task. In a few minutes he had extracted three
boards. He tried to pass his body through the aperture, but
not being like the frog in the fable, who thought he was
larger than he really was, he found he must take out three
or four more before he could get through.
He sighed and set to work again.