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The Vicomte De Bragelonne
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The Vicomte De Bragelonne 199 at Prostate Health
gleaming, and drops of blood flyingin the air -- the crowd falls back and crushes itself. Atlength cries for mercy and of despair resound; that is, thefarewell of the vanquished. The two condemned are again inthe hands of the archers. DArtagnan approaches them, seeingthem pale and sinking: "Console yourselves, poor men," saidhe, "you will not undergo the frightful torture with whichthese wretches threatened you. The king has condemned you tobe hung: you shall only be hung. Go on, hang them, and itwill be over."There is no longer anything going on at theImage-de-Notre-Dame. The fire has been extinguished with twotuns of wine in default of water. The conspirators have fledby the garden. The archers were dragging the culprits to thegibbets. From this moment the affair did not occupy muchtime. The executioner, heedless about operating according tothe rules of art, made such haste that he dispatched thecondemned in a couple of minutes. In the meantime the peoplegathered around DArtagnan, -- they felicitated, theycheered him. He wiped his brow, streaming with sweat, andhis sword, streaming with blood. He shrugged his shouldersat seeing Menneville writhing at his feet in the lastconvulsions. And, while Raoul turned away his eyes incompassion, he pointed to the musketeers the gibbets ladenwith their melancholy fruit. "Poor devils!" said he, "I hopethey died blessing me, for I saved them with greatdifficulty." These words caught the ear of Menneville at themoment when he himself was breathing his last sigh. A dark,ironical smile flitted across his lips, he wished to reply,but the effort hastened the snapping of the chord of life --he expired."Oh! all this is very frightful!" murmured Raoul: "let usbegone, monsieur le chevalier.""You are not wounded?" asked DArtagnan."Not at all, thank you.""Thats well! Thou art a brave fellow, mordioux! The head ofthe father, and the arm of Porthos. Ah! if he had been here,good Porthos, you would have seen something worth lookingat." Then as if by way of remembrance --"But where the devil can that brave Porthos be?" murmuredDArtagnan."Come, chevalier, pray come away," urged Raoul."One minute, my friend, let me take my thirty-seven and ahalf pistoles and I am at your service. The house is a goodproperty," added DArtagnan, as he entered theImage-de-Notre-Dame, "but decidedly, even if it were lessprofitable, I should prefer its being in another quarter."CHAPTER 63How M. dEymeriss Diamond passedinto the Hands of M. DArtagnan.Whilst this violent, noisy, and bloody scene was passing onthe Greve, several men, barricaded behind the gate ofcommunication with the garden, replaced their swords intheir sheaths, assisted one among them to mount a readysaddled horse which was waiting in the garden, and like aflock of startled birds, fled in all directions, someclimbing the walls, others rushing out at the gates with allthe fury of a panic. He who mounted the horse, and gave himthe spur so sharply that the animal was near leaping thewall, this cavalier, we say, crossed the Place Baudoyer,passed like lightning before the crowd in the streets,riding against, running over and knocking down all that camein his way, and, ten minutes after, arrived at the gates ofthe superintendent, more out of breath than his horse. TheAbbe Fouquet, at the clatter of the hoofs on the pavement,appeared at a window of the court, and before even thecavalier had set foot to the ground, "Well! Danecamp?" criedhe, leaning half out of the window."Well, it is all over," replied the cavalier."All over!" cried the abbe. "Then they are saved?""No, monsieur," replied the cavalier, "they are hung.""Hung!" repeated the abbe, turning pale. A lateral doorsuddenly opened, and Fouquet appeared in the chamber, pale,distracted, with lips half opened, breathing a cry of griefand anger. He stopped upon the threshold to listen to whatwas addressed from the court to the window."Miserable wretches!" said the abbe. "you did not fight,then?""Like lions.""Say like cowards.""Monsieur!""A hundred men accustomed to war, sword in hand, are worthten thousand archers in a surprise. Where is Menneville,that boaster, that braggart, who was to come back eitherdead or a conqueror?""Well, monsieur, he has kept his word. He is dead!""Dead! Who killed him?""A demon disguised as a man, a giant armed with ten flamingswords -- a madman, who at one blow extinguished the fire,put down the riot, and caused a hundred musketeers to riseup out
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