of their cloaks.

D'Artagnan was conqueror--without much effort, it must be confessed,
for only one of the officers was armed, and even he defended himself for
form's sake. It is true that the three others had endeavored to knock
the young man down with chairs, stools, and crockery; but two or
three scratches made by the Gascon's blade terrified them. Ten minutes
sufficed for their defeat, and d'Artagnan remained master of the field
of battle.

The neighbors who had opened their windows, with the coolness peculiar
to the inhabitants of Paris in these times of perpetual riots and
disturbances, closed them again as soon as they saw the four men in
black flee--their instinct telling them that for the time all was over.
Besides, it began to grow late, and then, as today, people went to bed
early in the quarter of the Luxembourg.

On being left alone with Mme. Bonacieux, d'Artagnan turned toward her;
the poor woman reclined where she had been left, half-fainting upon an
armchair. D'Artagnan examined her with a rapid glance.

She was a charming woman of twenty-five or twenty-six years, with dark
hair, blue eyes, and a nose slightly turned up, admirable teeth, and a
complexion marbled with rose and opal. There, however, ended the signs
which might have confounded her with a lady of rank. The hands were
white, but without delicacy; the feet did not bespeak the woman of
quality. Happily, d'Artagnan was not yet acquainted with such niceties.

While d'Artagnan was examining Mme. Bonacieux, and was, as we have said,
close to her, he saw on the ground a fine cambric handkerchief, which
he picked up, as was his habit, and at the corner of which he recognized
the same cipher he had seen on the handkerchief which had nearly caused
him and Aramis to cut each other's throat.

From that time, d'Artagnan had been cautious with respect to
handkerchiefs with arms on them, and he therefore placed in the pocket
of Mme. Bonacieux the one he had just picked up.

At that moment Mme. Bonacieux recovered her senses. She opened her eyes,
looked around her with terror, saw that the apartment was empty and that
she was alone with her liberator. She extended her hands to him with a
smile. Mme. Bonacieux had the sweetest smile in the world.

"Ah, monsieur!" said she, "you have saved me; permit me to thank you."

"Madame," said d'Artagnan, "I have only done what every gentleman would
have done in my place; you owe me no thanks."

"Oh, yes, mon