that the orders I had received did not come from him, and that if I had the audacity to mention his name as being concerned in this disturbance he would have me hanged. It appears that I had made a mistake, Monsieur, that I had arrested the wrong person, and that he whom I ought to have arrested had escaped.”
“But Athos!” cried d’Artagnan, whose impatience was increased by the disregard of the authorities, “Athos, where is he?”
“As I was anxious to repair the wrongs I had done the prisoner,” resumed the innkeeper, “I took my way straight to the cellar in order to set him at liberty. Ah, Monsieur, he was no longer a man, he was a devil! To my offer of liberty, he replied that it was nothing but a snare, and that before he came out he intended to impose his own conditions. I told him very humbly—for I could not conceal from myself the scrape I had got into by laying hands on one of His Majesty’s Musketeers—I told him I was quite ready to submit to his conditions.