Planchet, of who I have borrowed a part of his fortune.”

“How is that? What the devil had Planchet to do in all this?”

“Ah, yes, my friend; but this king, so spruce, so smiling, so adored, M. Monk fancies he has recalled him, you fancy you have supported him, I fancy I have brought him back, the people fancy they have reconquered him, he himself fancies he has negotiated his restoration; and yet nothing of all this is true, for Charles II., king of England, Scotland, and Ireland, has been replaced upon the throne by a French grocer, who lives in the Rue des Lombards, and is named Planchet. And such is grandeur! ‘Vanity!’ says the Scripture: vanity, all is vanity.’“

Athos could not help laughing at this whimsical outbreak of his friend.