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"To give ten francs to this honest fellow," replied Raoul, taking a pistole from his pocket. "Ten kicks on his back!" said D'Artagnan; "be off, you little villain, and forget not that I have your address." Friquet, who did not expect to be let off so cheaply, bounded off like a gazelle up the Quai a la Rue Dauphine, and disappeared.
"I want to go into Master Broussel's house, captain," replied Friquet, in that wheedling way the "gamins" of Paris know so well how to assume when necessary. "And on what floor does he live?" asked Comminges. "In the whole house," said Friquet; "the house belongs to him; he occupies the second floor when he works and descends to the first to take his meals; he must be at dinner now; it is noon."
The coachman turning around, gave Friquet a slash with his whip which made him scream with pain. "Ah! devil's coachman!" cried Friquet, "you're meddling too! Wait!" And regaining his entresol he overwhelmed the coachman with every projectile he could lay hands on.
Friquet and Nanette continued to shout; the cries, the noise of the shot and the intoxicating smell of powder produced their usual maddening effects. "Down with the officer! down with him!" was the cry.
"Bring hither that horse." Friquet heard perfectly, but he pretended not to do so and tried to continue his road. D'Artagnan felt inclined for an instant to pursue Master Friquet, but not wishing to leave Raoul alone he contented himself with taking a pistol from the holster and cocking it. Friquet had a quick eye and a fine ear.
"To the tower Saint Jacques la Boucherie;" and delighted with the success of his embassy, Friquet started off at the top of his speed. When the Te Deum was over, the coadjutor, without stopping to change his priestly dress, took his way toward that old tower which he knew so well. He arrived in time. Though sinking from moment to moment, the wounded man was not yet dead.
Dame Nanette, look for those apricots which Madame de Longueville sent to us yesterday from Noisy and give half a dozen of them to your son, with a crust of new bread." "Oh, thank you, sir, thank you, Monsieur Broussel," said Friquet; "I am so fond of apricots!" Broussel then proceeded to his wife's room and asked for breakfast; it was nine o'clock.
Mazarin, clever politician as he was, was for once mistaken; Broussel was a thing, not a name. The next morning, therefore, when Broussel made his entrance into Paris in a large carriage, having his son Louvieres at his side and Friquet behind the vehicle, the people threw themselves in his way and cries of "Long live Broussel!"
"They want to arrest Master Broussel!" he cried; "the guards are in the carriage and the officer is upstairs!" The crowd began to murmur and approached the house. The two guards who had remained in the lane mounted to the aid of Comminges; those who were in the chariot opened the doors and presented arms. "Don't you see them?" cried Friquet, "don't you see? there they are!"
On leaving Bazin, Friquet started off to the Palais Royal, where he arrived at the moment of the turning out of the regiment of guards; and as he had only gone there for the enjoyment of seeing it and hearing the music, he took his place at their head, beating the drum on two pieces of slate and passing from that exercise to that of the trumpet, which he counterfeited quite naturally with his mouth in a manner which had more than once called forth the praises of amateurs of imitative harmony.
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