to the inner courtyard. Fouquet ordered his best horses, while Aramis paused at the foot of the staircase which led to Porthos’s apartment. He reflected profoundly and for some time, while Fouquet’s carriage left the courtyard at full gallop.

“Shall I go alone?” said Aramis to himself, “or warn the prince?

Oh! fury! Warn the prince, and then — do what? Take him with me? To carry this accusing witness about with me everywhere? War, too, would follow — civil war, implacable in its nature! And without any resource save myself — it is impossible! What could he do without me? Oh! without me he will be utterly destroyed. Yet who knows — let destiny be fulfilled — condemned he was, let him remain so then! Good or evil Spirit —