“Planchet, you are wrong; you are an excellent architect, quite as good as I am, for the case in question.” “Thanks, monsieur. But your old friends of the musketeers?” “I have been, I confess, tempted to speak of the thing to those gentlemen, but they are all absent from their houses. It is vexatious, for I know none more bold or more able.” “Ah! then it appears there will be an opposition, and the enterprise will be disputed?” “Oh, yes, Planchet, yes.” “I burn to know the details, monsieur.” “Here they are, Planchet—close all the doors tight.” “Yes, monsieur.” And Planchet double-locked them. “That is well; now draw near.” Planchet obeyed. “And open the window, because the noise of the passers-by and the carts will deafen all who might hear us.” Planchet opened the window as desired, and the gust of tumult which filled the chamber with cries, wheels, barkings, and steps deafened D’Artagnan himself, as he had wished. He then swallowed a glass of white wine and began in these terms: “Planchet, I have an idea.” “Ah! monsieur, I recognize you so well in that!” replied Planchet, panting with emotion. CHAPTER 20. Of the Society which was formed in the Rue des Lombards, at the Sign of the Pilon d’Or, to carry out M. d’Artagnan’s Idea After a moment’s silence, in which D’Artagnan appeared to be collecting, not one idea, but all his ideas—“It cannot be, my dear Planchet,” said he, “that you have not heard of his majesty Charles I. of England?” “Alas! yes, monsieur, since you left France in order to assist him, and that, in spite of that assistance, he fell, and was near dragging you down in his fall.” “Exactly so; I see you have a good memory, Planchet.” “Peste! the astonishing thing would be, if I could have lost that memory, however bad it might have been. When one has heard Grimaud, who, you know, is not given to talking, relate how the head of King Charles fell, how you sailed the half of a night in a scuttled vessel, and saw floating on the water that good M. Mordaunt with a certain gold-hafted dagger buried in his breast, one is not very likely to forget such things.” “And yet there are people who forget them, Planchet.” “Yes, such as have not seen them, or have not heard Grimaud relate them.” “Well, it is all the better that you recollect all that; I shall only have to remind you of one thing, and that is that Charles I. had a son.” “Without contradicting you, monsieur, he had two,” said Planchet; “for I saw the second one in Paris, M. le Duke of York, one day, as he was going to the Palais Royal, and I was told that he was not the eldest son of Charles I. As to the eldest, I have the honor of knowing him by name, but not personally.” “That is exactly the point, Planchet, we must come to: it is to this eldest son, formerly called the Prince of Wales, and who is now styled Charles II., king of England.” “A king without a kingdom, monsieur,” replied Planchet, sententiously.