ing towards Athos, "come again,
also; I have an important message to confide to you. Your hand, duke."
Monk pressed the hand of the king.

"Adieu! gentlemen," said Charles, holding out each of his hands to the
two Frenchmen, who carried them to their lips.

"Well," said Athos, when they were out of the palace, "are you
satisfied?"

"Hush!" said D'Artagnan, wild with joy, "I have not yet returned from
the treasurer's--a shutter may fall upon my head."

Chapter XXXIV. Of the Embarrassment of Riches.

D'Artagnan lost no time, and as soon as the thing was suitable and
opportune, he paid a visit to the lord treasurer of his majesty. He had
then the satisfaction to exchange a piece of paper, covered with very
ugly writing, for a prodigious number of crowns, recently stamped with
the _effigies_ of his very gracious majesty Charles II.

D'Artagnan easily controlled himself: and yet, on this occasion, he
could not help evincing a joy which the reader will perhaps comprehend,
if he deigns to have some indulgence for a man who, since his birth, had
never seen so many pieces and rolls of pieces juxta-placed in an order
truly agreeable to the eye. The treasurer placed all the rolls in bags,
and closed each bag with a stamp sealed with the arms of England, a
favor which treasurers do not grant to everybody. Then, impassible,
and just as polite as he ought to be towards a man honored with the
friendship of the king, he said to D'Artagnan:

"Take away your money, sir." _Your money!_ These words made a thousand
chords vibrate in the heart of D'Artagnan, which he had never felt
before. He had the bags packed in a small cart, and returned home
meditating deeply. A man who possessed three hundred thousand livres
can no longer expect to wear a smooth brow; a wrinkle for every hundred
thousand livres is not too much.

D'Artagnan shut himself up, ate no dinner, closed his door to everybody,
and, with a lighted lamp, and a loaded pistol on the table, he watched
all night, ruminating upon the means of preventing these lovely crowns,
which from the coffers of the king had passed into his coffers, from
passing from his coffers into the pockets of any thief whatever. The
best means discovered by the Gascon was to inclose his treasure, for
the present, under locks so solid that no wrist could break them, and
so complicated that no master-key could open them. D'Artagnan remembered
that the English are masters in mechanics and conservati