water: and some dry bread.
He refreshed his lamp, drank half a glass of wine, curled his lip with a smile full of expression, installed himself in his large armchair, and made preparations for sleeping.
CHAPTER 9. In which the Unknown of the Hostelry of Les Medici loses his
Incognito.
This officer, who was sleeping, or preparing to sleep, was, notwithstanding his careless air, charged with a serious responsibility.
Lieutenant of the king's musketeers, he commanded all the company which came from Paris, and that company consisted of a hundred and twenty men; but, with the exception of the twenty of whom we have spoken, the other hundred were engaged in guarding the queen-mother, and more particularly the cardinal.
Monsignor Giulio Mazarini economized the traveling expenses of his guards; he consequently used the king's, and that largely, since he took fifty of them for himself -- a peculiarity which would not have failed to strike any one unacquainted with the usages of that court.
That which would still further have appeared, if not inconvenient, at least extraordinary, to a stranger, was, that the side of the castle destined for monsieur le cardinal was brilliant, light and cheerful. The musketeers there mounted guard before every door, and allowed no one to enter, except the couriers, who, even while he was traveling, followed the cardinal for the carrying on of his correspondence.
Twenty men were on duty with the queen-mother; thirty rested, in order to relieve their companions the next day.
On the king's side, on the contrary, were darkness, silence, and solitude. When once the doors were closed, there was no longer an