“Pay him, booby!” cried the stranger to his servant, without checking the speed of his horse; and the man, after throwing two or three silver pieces at the foot of mine host, galloped after his master.
“Base coward! false gentleman!” cried d’Artagnan, springing forward, in his turn, after the servant. But his wound had rendered him too weak to support such an exertion. Scarcely had he gone ten steps when his ears began to tingle, a faintness seized him, a cloud of blood passed over his eyes, and he fell in the middle of the street, crying still, “Coward! coward! coward!”
“He is a coward, indeed,” grumbled the host, drawing near to d’Artagnan, and endeavoring by this little flattery to make up matters with the young man, as the heron of the fable did with the snail he had despised the evening before.
“Yes, a base coward,” murmured d’Artagnan; “but she—she was very beautiful.”
“What she ?” demanded the host.