cs of your noble forefathers. You are now become
our enemy, sire, and henceforth we have nothing to do save with Heaven
alone, our sole master. Be warned, be warned, sire.'"

"What! do you threaten?"

"Oh, no," said Athos, sadly, "I have as little bravado as fear in my
soul. The God of whom I spoke to you is now listening to me; He knows
that for the safety and honor of your crown I would even yet shed every
drop of blood twenty years of civil and foreign warfare have left in
my veins. I can well say, then, that I threaten the king as little as I
threaten the man; but I tell you, sire, you lose two servants; for you
have destroyed faith in the heart of the father, and love in the heart
of the son; the one ceases to believe in the royal word, the other no
longer believes in the loyalty of the man, or the purity of woman: the
one is dead to every feeling of respect, the other to obedience. Adieu!"

Thus saying, Athos broke his sword across his knee, slowly placed the
two pieces upon the floor, and saluting the king, who was almost choking
from rage and shame, he quitted the cabinet. Louis, who sat near the
table, completely overwhelmed, was several minutes before he could
collect himself; but he suddenly rose and rang the bell violently. "Tell
M. d'Artagnan to come here," he said to the terrified ushers.

Chapter LIX. After the Storm.

Our readers will doubtlessly have been asking themselves how it happened
that Athos, of whom not a word has been said for some time past, arrived
so very opportunely at court. We will, without delay, endeavor to
satisfy their curiosity.

Porthos, faithful to his duty as an arranger of affairs, had,
immediately after leaving the Palais Royal, set off to join Raoul at the
Minimes in the Bois de Vincennes, and had related everything, even to
the smallest details, which had passed between Saint-Aignan and himself.
He finished by saying that the message which the king had sent to his
favorite would probably not occasion more than a short delay, and that
Saint-Aignan, as soon as he could leave the king, would not lose a
moment in accepting the invitation Raoul had sent him.

But Raoul, less credulous than his old friend, had concluded from
Porthos's recital that if Saint-Aignan was going to the king,
Saint-Aignan would tell the king everything, and that the king would
most assuredly forbid Saint-Aignan to obey the summons he had received
to the hostile meeting. The consequence of his r