no longer inspired
desire, it inspired respect. Aramis, on entering the chamber, did not
hesitate an instant; and without pronouncing one word, which, whatever
it might be, would have been cold on such an occasion, he went straight
up to the musketeer, so well disguised under the costume of M. Agnan,
and pressed him in his arms with a tenderness which the most distrustful
could not have suspected of coldness or affectation.

D'Artagnan, on his part, embraced him with equal ardor. Porthos pressed
the delicate hand of Aramis in his immense hands, and D'Artagnan
remarked that His Greatness gave him his left hand, probably from habit,
seeing that Porthos already ten times had been near injuring his fingers
covered with rings, by pounding his flesh in the vise of his fist.
Warned by the pain, Aramis was cautious, and only presented flesh to be
bruised, and not fingers to be crushed, against the gold or the angles
of diamonds.

Between two embraces, Aramis looked D'Artagnan in the face, offered him
a chair, sitting down himself in the shade, observing that the light
fell full upon the face of his interlocutor. This maneuver, familiar to
diplomatists and women, resembles much the advantage of the guard which,
according to their skill or habit, combatants endeavor to take on the
ground at a duel. D'Artagnan was not the dupe of this maneuver; but he
did not appear to perceive it. He felt himself caught; but, precisely
because he was caught he felt himself on the road to discovery, and
it little imported to him, old condottiere as he was, to be beaten in
appearance, provided he drew from his pretended defeat the advantages of
victory. Aramis began the conversation.

"Ah! dear friend! my good D'Artagnan," said he, "what an excellent
chance!"

"It is a chance, my reverend companion," said D'Artagnan, "that I will
call friendship. I seek you, as I always have sought you, when I had
any grand enterprise to propose to you, or some hours of liberty to give
you."

"Ah! indeed," said Aramis, without explosion, "you have been seeking
me?"

"Eh! yes, he has been seeking you, Aramis," said Porthos, "and the proof
is that he has unharbored me at Belle-Isle. That is amiable, is it not?"

"Ah! yes," said Aramis, "at Belle-Isle! certainly!"

"Good!" said D'Artagnan; "there is my booby Porthos, without thinking of
it, has fired the first cannon of attack."

"At Belle-Isle!" said Aramis, "in that hole, in that desert! That is
kind, in