The Forty-Five Guardsmen. Dumas Alexandre
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a beautiful horse!"
Madame Fournichon replied in an equally audible voice, "And what a handsome cavalier!"
The officer, who did not appear insensible to flattery, raised his head and looked first at the host and hostess and then at the hotel. Fournichon ran rapidly downstairs and appeared at the door.
"Is the house empty?" asked the officer.
"Yes, monsieur; just at present," replied the host, humiliated; "but it is not usually so."
However, Dame Fournichon, like most women, was more clear-sighted than her husband, and called out, "If monsieur desires solitude, he will find it here."
"Yes, my good woman, that is what I desire, at present," said the officer, who dismounted, threw the bridle to the soldier, and entered the hotel.
He was a man of about thirty-five years of age, but he did not look more than twenty-eight, so carefully was he dressed. He was tall, with a fine countenance and a distinguished air.
"Ah! good!" said he, "a large room and not a single guest. But there must be something," he added, "either in your house or conduct that keeps people away."
"Neither, monsieur," replied Madame Fournichon; "only the place is new, and we choose our customers."
"Oh! very well."
"For example," continued she, "for a person like your lordship, we would send away a dozen."
"Thanks, my kind hostess."
"Will monsieur taste the wine?" asked M. Fournichon.
"Will monsieur visit the rooms?" added his wife.
"Both, if you please."
Fournichon descended to the cellar.
"How many people can you lodge here?" asked the captain of the hostess.
"Thirty."
"That is not enough."
"Why so, monsieur?"
"I had a project – but we will speak of it no more."
"Ah! monsieur, you will find nothing larger, except the Louvre itself."
"Well; you can lodge thirty people?"
"Yes, doubtless."
"But for a day?"
"Oh! for a day, forty, or even forty-five."
"Without making a commotion outside?" – "We have often eighty soldiers here, on Sundays."
"And no crowd before the house – no spying by the neighbors?"
"Mon Dieu! no! our nearest neighbors are a worthy bourgeois, who meddles with no one, and a lady who lives so retired, that although she has been here for three weeks, I have not seen her."
"That will do excellently."
"So much the better."
"And in a month from to-day – "
"That will be the 26th of October."
"Precisely. Well, on that day I hire your inn." – "The whole of it?"
"Yes, the whole. I wish to give a surprise to some countrymen, officers – or at least – soldiers: they will be told to come here."
"But if it be a surprise – "
"Oh! if you are curious, or indiscreet – "
"No, no, monsieur," cried she.
M. Fournichon, who had heard what had passed, added, "Monsieur, you shall be master here; and all your friends will be welcome."
"I did not say my friends, I said countrymen," replied the officer, haughtily.
"Yes, monsieur, it was my mistake."
"You will give them supper."
"Certainly."
"If necessary, they will sleep here."
"Yes, monsieur."
"In a word, give them all they want, and ask no questions."
"Very well, monsieur."
"Here are thirty livres in advance."
"Well, monsieur, these gentlemen shall be treated like princes; will you assure yourself by tasting the wine?"
"Thank you, I never drink."
"But, monsieur, how shall I know these gentlemen?"
"That is true; parfandious! I forgot. Give me paper, light, and wax."
When they were brought, the captain made a seal on the paper with a ring he had on his finger. "Do you see this figure?" said he.
"A beautiful woman."
"Yes; a Cleopatra. Well, each of these men will present a similar one, on which you will receive him. You will have further orders afterward."
The captain then descended the stall's and rode off, leaving the Fournichons delighted with their thirty livres in advance.
"Decidedly," said the host, "the sign has brought us good fortune."
CHAPTER VIII.
THE GASCON
We dare not affirm that Dame Fournichon was as discreet as she had promised to be, for she interrogated the first soldier whom she saw pass as to the name of the captain who had conducted the review. The soldier, more cautious than she, asked her why she wished to know.
"Because he has just been here," she replied, "and one likes to know to whom one has been talking."
The soldier laughed. "The captain who conducted the review would not have entered this hotel," said he.
"Why not; is he too great for that?"
"Perhaps so."
"Well, but it is not for himself that he wanted the hotel."
"For whom then?"
"For his friends."
"He would not lodge his friends here, I am sure."
"Peste! why, who can he be, then?"
"Well, my good woman, he who conducted the review is simply Monsieur le Duc Nogaret de Lavalette d'Epernon, peer of France, and colonel-general of infantry. What do you say to that?"
"That if it was he, he did me great honor."
"Did you hear him say 'parfandious'?"
"Oh! yes."
We may now judge if the 26th of October was impatiently expected. On the evening of the 25th a man entered, bearing a heavy bag, which he placed on Fournichon's table.
"It is the price of the repast ordered for to-morrow," said he.
"At how much a head?"
"At six livres."
"Will they have only one meal here?"
"That is all."
"Has the captain found them a lodging, then?"
"It appears so," said the messenger, who went, and declined to answer any more questions.
At last the much-desired day arrived; half-past twelve had just struck when some cavaliers stopped at the door of the hotel. One, who appeared to be their chief, came with two well-mounted lackeys. Each of them produced the seal of Cleopatra's head, and were received with all sorts of courtesies, especially the young man with the lackeys. Nevertheless, excepting this young man, they all seemed timid and preoccupied. Most of them dispersed, however, until supper-time, either to swell the crowd at the execution of Salcede, or to see Paris.
About two o'clock, others began to arrive. One man came in alone, without a hat, a cane in his hand, and swearing at Paris, where he said the thieves were so adroit that they had stolen his hat as he had passed through a crowd, without his being able to see who had taken it. However, he said, it was his own fault, for wearing a hat ornamented with such a superb diamond. At four o'clock, forty people had arrived.
"Is it not strange," said Fournichon to his wife, "they are all Gascons?"
"Well,