"Well!"

"But M. de Mazarin, as you know better than anybody, does not often give,
and sometimes takes back what he has given; he took it back again as soon
as peace was made and he was no longer in want of me. Certainly I was
not worthy to replace M. de Treville, of illustrious memory; but they
had promised me, and they had given me; they ought to have stopped there."

"Is that what dissatisfies you monsieur? Well, I shall make inquiries.
I love justice; and your claim, though made in military fashion, does not
displease me."

"Oh, sire!" said the officer, "your majesty has ill understood me; I no
longer claim anything now."

"Excess of delicacy, monsieur; but I will keep my eye upon your affairs,
and later - "

"Oh, sire! what a word! - later! Thirty years have I lived upon that
promising word, which has been pronounced by so many great personages,
and which your mouth has, in its turn, just pronounced. Later - that is
how I have received a score of wounds, and how I have reached fifty-four
years of age without ever having had a louis in my purse, and without
ever having met with a protector on my way, - I who have protected so
many people! So I change my formula, sire; and when any one says to me
'Later,' I reply '_Now_.' It is rest that I solicit, sire. That may be
easily granted me. That will cost nobody anything."

"I did not look for this language, monsieur, particularly from a man who