Alexandre Dumas' "Twenty Years After" - Chapters 27 and 28 Commentary - ““The four old Friends prepare to meet again” AND “The Place Royale”
100 Days of Alexandre Dumas' "Twenty Years After" - first sequel to "The Three Musketeers" - June 1 - August 31, 2025
100 Days of Alexandre Dumas' "Twenty Years After"
First sequel to "The Three Musketeers"
June 1 - August 31, 2025
June 30
Chapters 27 and 28
Chapter 27
“The four old Friends prepare to meet again”
We are ALMOST caught up - as noted earlier, I need to finish my July column - no commentary again tomorrow - will resume on Wednesday, July 2!!! Next week I will be giving a talk on Napoleon in Paris - working on that presentation as well - the first three days of the conference will be quite packed - will skip a couple of days again - then after July 10 we should go back to commenting on a chapter a day!!!
If Chapters 25 and 26 display the same reckless bravado which was overabundant in “The Three Musketeers,” Chapters 27 and 28 show us just how much the musketeers have matured and learned to live with the friendship-destroying political fluctuations of their age…
D’Artagnan is willing to enrage the cardinal rather than betray his friends - who are separated from him by their political convictions…
“You know, Porthos, I could not give him the particulars without naming our friends; to name them would be to commit them to ruin, so I merely said they were fifty and we were two.”
And so as not to depress the readers with the prospect of this beautiful friendship coming to an end - Dumas givers us biscuits AND wine!!!
“It is incredible how these biscuit soak up wine! They are veritable sponges! Gimblou, another bottle.”
The stingy cardinal does cover the expenses of the failed expedition - including all the lost horses…
““He made a great start and looked at me. I also looked at him; then he understood, and putting his hand into a drawer, he took from it a quantity of notes on a bank in Lyons.”
“For a thousand pistoles?”
“For a thousand pistoles—just that amount, the beggar; not one too many.””
But will the former friends dare to meet - considering the circumstances?…
““We have a rendezvous, you remember, at the Place Royale.”
“Ah! stop! hold your peace, Porthos, don’t remind me of it; ’tis that which has made me so cross since yesterday. I shall not go.”
“Why?” asked Porthos.
“Because it is a grievous thing for me to meet again those two men who caused the failure of our enterprise.”
“And yet,” said Porthos, “neither of them had any advantage over us. I still had a loaded pistol and you were in full fight, sword in hand.”
“Yes,” said D’Artagnan; “but what if this rendezvous had some hidden purpose?””
Athos and Aramis do not trust their former comrades either…
“As they were passing onward, Athos proposed that they should lay aside their arms and military costume, and assume a dress more suited to the city.
“Oh, no, dear count!” cried Aramis, “is it not a warlike encounter that we are going to?”
“What do you mean, Aramis?”
“That the Place Royale is the termination to the main road to Vendomois, and nothing else.”
And they confront each other - after fighting almost to the death…
“Scarcely had they reached by the Rue de la Mule the iron gate of the Place Royale, when they perceived three cavaliers, D’Artagnan, Porthos, and Planchet, the two former wrapped up in their military cloaks under which their swords were hidden, and Planchet, his musket by his side. They were waiting at the entrance of the Rue Sainte Catharine, and their horses were fastened to the rings of the arcade. Athos, therefore, commanded Bazin to fasten up his horse and that of Aramis in the same manner.
They then advanced two and two, and saluted each other politely.
Aramis opened the gate and faced around in order that D’Artagnan and Porthos might enter. In passing through the gate, the hilt of the lieutenant’s sword was caught in the grating and he was obliged to pull off his cloak; in doing so he showed the butt end of his pistols and a ray of the moon was reflected on the shining metal.”
There is no trust on either side - all arrive armed to the teeth…
“Do you see?” whispered Aramis to Athos, touching his shoulder with one hand and pointing with the other to the arms which the Gascon wore under his belt.
“Alas! I do!” replied Athos, with a deep sigh.
He entered third, and Aramis, who shut the gate after him, last. The two serving-men waited without; but as if they likewise mistrusted each other, they kept their respective distances.”
Chapter 28
“The Place Royale”
Ah, how I wish I was still in Paris and could take a photo of Place Royale by moonlight!!! Sadly, it is easier said than done - the courtyard is locked up for the night…
“They proceeded silently to the centre of the Place, but as at this very moment the moon had just emerged from behind a cloud, they thought they might be observed if they remained on that spot and therefore regained the shade of the lime-trees.
D’Artagnan is deeply hurt by his friends’ betrayal…
“When I saw you at your château at Bragelonne, I made certain proposals to you which you perfectly understood; instead of answering me as a friend, you played with me as a child; the friendship, therefore, that you boast of was not broken yesterday by the shock of swords, but by your dissimulation at your castle.”
“D’Artagnan!” said Athos, reproachfully.
“You asked for candor and you have it. You ask what I have against you; I tell you. And I have the same sincerity to show you, if you wish, Monsieur d’Herblay; I acted in a similar way to you and you also deceived me.”
The tension of the situation is pulpable - will they resume the fight abandoned just a few hours earlier? Will they allow politics and ideology to drive them apart irreversibly?
“On seeing D’Artagnan rise, Porthos rose also; these four men were therefore all standing at the same time, with a menacing aspect, opposite to each other.
Upon hearing D’Artagnan’s reply, Aramis seemed about to draw his sword, when Athos prevented him.”
Ah, wise Athos to the rescue…
“The grave and harmonious tones of that beloved voice seemed to have still its ancient influence, whilst that of Aramis, which had become harsh and tuneless in his moments of ill-humor, irritated him.
These proceedings made D’Artagnan and Porthos draw back. D’Artagnan did not draw his sword; Porthos put his back into the sheath.
“Never!” exclaimed Athos, raising his right hand to Heaven, “never! I swear before God, who seeth us, and who, in the darkness of this night heareth us, never shall my sword cross yours, never my eye express a glance of anger, nor my heart a throb of hatred, at you. We lived together, we loved, we hated together; we shed, we mingled our blood together, and too probably, I may still add, that there may be yet a bond between us closer even than that of friendship; perhaps there may be the bond of crime; for we four, we once did condemn, judge and slay a human being whom we had not any right to cut off from this world, although apparently fitter for hell than for this life. D’Artagnan, I have always loved you as my son; Porthos, we slept six years side by side; Aramis is your brother as well as mine, and Aramis has once loved you, as I love you now and as I have ever loved you. What can Cardinal Mazarin be to us, to four men who compelled such a man as Richelieu to act as we pleased? What is such or such a prince to us, who fixed the diadem upon a great queen’s head? D’Artagnan, I ask your pardon for having yesterday crossed swords with you; Aramis does the same to Porthos; now hate me if you can; but for my own part, I shall ever, even if you do hate me, retain esteem and friendship for you. I repeat my words, Aramis, and then, if you desire it, and if they desire it, let us separate forever from our old friends.”
“And whenever,” added Athos, “we meet in battle, at this word, ‘Place Royale!’ let us put our swords into our left hands and shake hands with the right, even in the very lust and music of the hottest carnage.”
Does wisdom come with age? Or experience? Or with recovery from suffering and loss? With Athos the combination brought about a beautiful transformation…
And Aramis provides the friends with a bejeweled cross of a Fronde supporter for the eternal oath of friendship!!! It is still “Un pour tous, tous pour un" - after all these years!!!
““Well,” resumed Athos, “swear on this cross, which, in spite of its magnificent material, is still a cross; swear to be united in spite of everything, and forever, and may this oath bind us to each other, and even, also, our descendants! Does this oath satisfy you?”
“Yes,” said they all, with one accord.
“Ah, traitor!” muttered D’Artagnan, leaning toward Aramis and whispering in his ear, “you have made us swear on the crucifix of a Frondeuse.””
Place Royale lindens and benches - where the four friends meet…
