Marguerite de Valois. Alexandre Dumas
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companion, "I believe this inn is near the Louvre. However, I am still deliberating whether or not I shall have the honor of sharing your opinion. I am in a quandary."
"You have not yet decided, sir? Nevertheless, the house is attractive. But perhaps, after all, I have been won over to it by your presence. Yet you will grant that is a pretty painting?"
"Very! and it is for that very reason I mistrust it. Paris, I am told, is full of sharpers, and you may be just as well tricked by a sign as by anything else."
"By Heaven!" replied the Piedmontese, "I don't care a fig for their tricks; and if the host does not serve me a chicken as well roasted as the one on his sign, I will put him on the spit, nor will I let him off till I have done him to a turn. Come, let us go in."
"You have decided me," said the Provençal, laughing; "precede me, I beg."
"Oh, sir, on my soul I could not think of it, for I am only your most obedient servant, the Comte Annibal de Coconnas."
"And I, monsieur, but the Comte Joseph Hyacinthe Boniface de Lerac de la Mole, equally at your service."
"Since that is the case, let us go in together, arm in arm."
The result of this conciliatory proposition was that the two young men got off their horses, threw the bridles to the ostler, linked arms, adjusted their swords, and approached the door of the inn, where the landlord was standing. But contrary to the custom of men of his profession, the worthy proprietor seemed not to notice them, so busy was he talking with a tall, sallow man, wrapped in a drab-colored cloak like an owl buried in his feathers.
The two gentlemen were so near the landlord and his friend in the drab-colored cloak that Coconnas, indignant that he and his companion should be treated with such lack of consideration, touched the landlord's sleeve.
He appeared suddenly to perceive them, and dismissed his friend with an "Au revoir! come soon and let me know the hour appointed."
"Well, monsieur le drole," said Coconnas, "do not you see we have business with you?"
"I beg pardon, gentlemen," said the host; "I did not see you."
"Eh, by Heaven! then you ought to have seen us; and now that you do see us, say, 'Monsieur le Comte,' and not merely 'Monsieur,' if you please."
La Mole stood by, leaving Coconnas, who seemed to have undertaken the affair, to speak; but by the scowling on his face it was evident that he was ready to come to his assistance when the moment of action should present itself.
"Well, what is your pleasure, Monsieur le Comte?" asked the landlord, in a quiet tone.
"Ah, that's better; is it not?" said Coconnas, turning to La Mole, who nodded affirmatively. "Monsieur le Comte and myself, attracted by the sign of your establishment, wish to sup and sleep here to-night."
"Gentlemen," said the host, "I am very sorry, but I have only one chamber, and I am afraid that would not suit you."
"So much the better," said La Mole; "we will go and lodge somewhere else."
"By no means," said Coconnas, "I shall stay here; my horse is tired. I will have the room, since you will not."
"Ah! that is quite different," replied the host, with the same cool tone of impertinence. "If there is only one of you I cannot lodge you at all, then."
"By Heaven!" cried Coconnas, "here's a witty animal! Just now you could not lodge us because we were two, and now you have not room for one. You will not lodge us at all, then?"
"Since you take this high tone, gentlemen, I will answer you frankly."
"Answer, then; only answer quickly."
"Well, then, I should prefer not to have the honor of lodging you at all."
"For what reason?" asked Coconnas, growing white with rage.
"Because you have no servants, and for one master's room full, I should have two servants' rooms empty; so that, if I let you have the master's room, I run the risk of not letting the others."
"Monsieur de la Mole," said Coconnas, "do you not think we ought to massacre this fellow?"
"Decidedly," said La Mole, preparing himself, together with Coconnas, to lay his whip over the landlord's back.
But the landlord contented himself with retreating a step or two, despite this two-fold demonstration, which was not particularly reassuring, considering that the two gentlemen appeared so full of determination.
"It is easy to see," said he, in a tone of raillery, "that these gentlemen are just from the provinces. At Paris it is no longer the fashion to massacre innkeepers who refuse to let them rooms—only great men are massacred nowadays and not the common people; and if you make any disturbance, I will call my neighbors, and you shall be beaten yourselves, and that would be an indignity for two such gentlemen."
"Why! he is laughing at us," cried Coconnas, in a rage.
"Grégoire, my arquebuse," said the host, with the same voice with which he would have said, "Give these gentleman a chair."
"Trippe del papa!" cried Coconnas, drawing his sword; "warm up, Monsieur de la Mole."
"No, no; for while we warm up, our supper will get cold."
"What, you think"—cried Coconnas.
"That Monsieur de la Belle Étoile is right; only he does not know how to treat his guests, especially when they are gentlemen, for instead of brutally saying, 'Gentlemen, I do not want you,' it would have been better if he had said, 'Enter, gentlemen'—at the same time reserving to himself the right to charge in his bill, master's room, so much; servants' room, so much."
With these words, La Mole gently pushed by the landlord, who was just on the point of taking his arquebuse, and entered with Coconnas.
"Well," said Coconnas, "I am sorry to sheathe my sword before I have ascertained that it is as sharp as that rascal's larding-needle."
"Patience, my dear friend, patience," said La Mole. "All the inns in Paris are full of gentlemen come to attend the King of Navarre's marriage or attracted by the approaching war with Flanders; we should not find another lodging; besides, perhaps it is the custom at Paris to receive strangers in this manner."
"By Heaven! how patient you are, Monsieur de la Mole!" muttered Coconnas, curling his red mustache with rage and hurling the lightning of his eyes on the landlord. "But let the scoundrel take care; for if his cooking be bad, if his bed be hard, his wine less than three years in bottle, and his waiter be not as pliant as a reed"—
"There! there! my dear gentleman!" said the landlord, whetting his knife on a strap, "you may make yourself easy; you are in the land of Cocagne."
Then in a low tone he added:
"These are some Huguenots; traitors have grown so insolent since the marriage of their Béarnais with Mademoiselle Margot!"
Then, with a smile that would have made his guests shudder had they seen it:
"How strange it would be if I were just to have two Huguenots come to my house, when"—
"Now, then," interrupted Coconnas, pointedly, "are we going to have any supper?"
"Yes, as soon as you please, monsieur," returned the landlord, softened, no doubt, by the last reflection.
"Well, then, the sooner the better," said Coconnas; and turning to La Mole:
"Pray, Monsieur le Comte, while they are putting our room in order, tell me, do you think Paris seems a gay city?"
"Faith! no," said La Mole. "All the faces I have seen looked scared or forbidding; perhaps the Parisians also are afraid of the storm; see how very black the sky is, and the air feels heavy."
"Tell me, count, are you not bound for the Louvre?"
"Yes! and you also, Monsieur