e guards. Be sure that
your musketeers are placed before his guards arrive. Precedence always
belongs to the first comer."

"Yes, sire."

"And if M. de Gesvres should question you?"

"Question me, sire! Is it likely that M. de Gesvres should question
me?" And the musketeer, turning cavalierly on his heel, disappeared. "To
Nantes!" said he to himself, as he descended from the stairs. "Why did
he not dare to say, from thence to Belle-Isle?"

As he reached the great gates, one of M. Brienne's clerks came running
after him, exclaiming, "Monsieur d'Artagnan! I beg your pardon--"

"What is the matter, Monsieur Ariste?"

"The king has desired me to give you this order."

"Upon your cash-box?" asked the musketeer.

"No, monsieur; on that of M. Fouquet."

D'Artagnan was surprised, but he took the order, which was in the king's
own writing, and was for two hundred pistoles. "What!" thought he, after
having politely thanked M. Brienne's clerk, "M. Fouquet is to pay for
the journey, then! _Mordioux!_ that is a bit of pure Louis XI. Why was
not this order on the chest of M. Colbert? He would have paid it with
such joy." And D'Artagnan, faithful to his principle of never letting
an order at sight get cold, went straight to the house of M. Fouquet, to
receive his two hundred pistoles.

Chapter XXXV. The Last Supper.

The superintendent had no doubt received advice of the approaching
departure, for he was giving a farewell dinner to his friends. From
the bottom to the top of the house, the hurry of the servants bearing
dishes, and the diligence of the _registres_, denoted an approaching
change in offices and kitchen. D'Artagnan, with his order in his hand,
presented himself at the offices, when he was told it was too late
to pay cash, the chest was closed. He only replied: "On the king's
service."

The clerk, a little put out by the serious air of the captain, replied,
that "that was a very respectable reason, but that the customs of the
house were respectable likewise; and that, in consequence, he begged the
bearer to call again next day." D'Artagnan asked if he could not see
M. Fouquet. The clerk replied that M. le surintendant did not interfere
with such details, and rudely closed the outer door in the captain's
face. But the latter had foreseen this stroke, and placed his boot
between the door and the door-case, so that the lock did not catch, and
the clerk was still nose to nose with his interlocutor. This made