Ten Years Later: The Vicomte of Bragelonne by Alexandre Dumas Chapter 21 Page 5

so more carefully still with twenty. Twenty — that is a round number; that, besides, reduces the number of the horses by ten, which is a consideration; and then, with a good lieutenant — Mordioux! what things patience and calculation are! Was I not going to embark with forty men, and I have now reduced them to twenty for an equal success? Ten thousand livres saved at one stroke, and more safety; that is well! Now, then, let us see; we have nothing to do but to find this lieutenant — let him be found, then; and after — That is not so easy; he must be brave and good, a second myself. Yes, but a lieutenant must have my secret, and as that secret is worth a million, and I shall only pay my man a thousand livres, fifteen hundred at the most, my man will sell the secret to Monk. Mordioux! no lieutenant. Besides, this man, were he as mute