"Yes, a thousand times, yes!"

"Write it, then."

"Here is the letter."

D'Artagnan read it, bowed to the king, and left the room. From the
height of the terrace he perceived Gourville, who went by with a joyous
air toward the lodgings of M. Fouquet.

CHAPTER CXIV.

THE WHITE HORSE AND THE BLACK HORSE.

"That is rather surprising," said D'Artagnan, "Gourville running about
the streets so gayly, when he is almost certain that M. Fouquet is in
danger; when it is almost equally certain that it was Gourville who
warned M. Fouquet just now by the note which was torn into a thousand
pieces upon the terrace and given to the winds by Monsieur le
Surintendant. Gourville is rubbing his hands, that is because he has
done something clever. Whence comes M. Gourville? Gourville is coming
from the Rue aux Herbes. Whither does the Rue aux Herbes lead?" And
D'Artagnan followed along the tops of the houses of Nantes dominated by
the castle, the line traced by the streets, as he would have done upon a
topographical plan; only, instead of the dead, flat paper, the living
chart rose in relief with the cries, the movements, and the shadows of
the men and things. Beyond the inclosure of the city, the great verdant
plains stretched out, bordering the Loire, and appeared to run toward
the empurpled horizon, which was cut by the azure of the waters and the
dark green of the marshes. Immediately outside the gates of Nantes two
white roads were seen diverging like the separated fingers of a gigantic
hand. D'Artagnan, who had taken in all the panorama at a glance by
crossing the terrace, was led by the line of the Rue aux Herbes to the
mouth of one of those roads which took its rise under the gates of
Nantes. One step more, and he was about to descend the stairs, take his
trellised carriage and go toward the lodgings of M. Fouquet. But chance
decreed that at the moment of replunging into the staircase he was
attracted by a moving point which was gaining ground upon that road.

"What is that?" said the musketeer to himself; "a horse galloping--a
runaway horse, no doubt. What a pace he is going at!" The moving point
became detached from the road, and entered into the fields. "A white
horse," continued the captain, who had just seen the color thrown out
luminously against the dark ground, "and he is mounted; it must be some
boy whose horse is thirsty and has run away with him to the
drinking-place, diagonally." These reflections, r