"The devil take his gilded tongue!" grumbled D'Artagnan. "A clown with a
word would be worth a dozen of him. Adieu!"

"Monsieur, I have the honor to present you my respects."

"_Cuistre!_" said D'Artagnan to himself, "the fellow is unbearable." He
gave another look up to the house, turned his horse's head, and set off
like a man who has nothing either annoying or embarrassing in his mind.
When he was at the end of the wall, and out of sight, - "Well, now, I
wonder," said he, breathing quickly, "whether Athos was at home. No; all
those idlers, standing with their arms crossed, would have been at work
if the eye of the master was near. Athos gone on a journey? - that is
incomprehensible. Bah! it is all devilish mysterious! And then - no -
he is not the man I want. I want one of a cunning, patient mind. My
business is at Melun, in a certain presbytery I am acquainted with.
Forty-five leagues - four days and a half! Well, it is fine weather, and
I am free. Never mind the distance!"

And he put his horse into a trot, directing his course towards Paris. On
the fourth day he alighted at Melun, as he had intended.

D'Artagnan was never in the habit of asking any one on the road for any
common information. For these sorts of details, unless in very serious
circumstances, he confided in his perspicacity, which was so seldom at
fault, in his experience of thirty years, and in a great habit of reading
the physiognomies of houses, as well as those of men. At Melun,
D'Artagnan immediately found the presbytery - a charming house, plastered
over red brick, with vines climbing along the gutters, and a cross, in
carved stone, surmounting the ridge of the roof. From the ground-floor