Athos smiled disdainfully.

“We don’t ask you to smile,” said one of the colonels warmly; “we require you to answer.”

“And I, gentlemen, declare to you that I will not reply until I am in the presence of the general.”

“But,” replied the same colonel who had already spoken, “you know very well that is impossible.”

“This is the second time I have received this strange reply to the wish I express,” said Athos.  “Is the general absent?”

This question was made with such apparent good faith, and the gentleman wore an air of such natural surprise, that the three officers exchanged a meaning look.  The lieutenant, by a tacit convention with the other two, was spokesman.

“Monsieur, the general left you last night on the borders of the monastery.”

“Yes, monsieur.”

“And you went — "

“It is not for me to answer you, but for those who have accompanied me.  They were your soldiers, ask them.”

“But if we please to question you?”

“Then it will please me to reply, monsieur, that I do not recognize any one here, that I know no one here but the general, and that it is to him alone I will reply.”

“So be it, monsieur; but as we are the masters, we constitute ourselves a council of war, and when you are before judges you must reply.”

The countenance of Athos expressed nothing but astonishment and disdain, instead of the terror the officers expected to read in it at this threat.

“Scottish or English judges upon me, a subject of the king of France; upon me, placed under the safeguard of British honor!  You are mad, gentlemen!” said Athos, shrugging his shoulders.

The officers looked at each other.  “Then, monsieur,” said one of them, “do you pretend not to know where the general is?”

“To that, monsieur, I have already replied.”

“Yes, but you have already replied an incredible thing.”

“It is true, nevertheless, gentlemen.  Men of my rank are not generally liars.  I am a gentleman, I have told you, and when I have at my side the sword which, by an excess of delicacy, I left last night upon the table whereon it still lies, believe me, no man says that to me which I am unwilling to hear.  I am at this moment disarmed; if you pretend to be my judges, try me; if you are but my executioners, kill me.”

“But, monsieur — " asked the lieutenant, in a more courteous voice, struck with the lofty coolness of Athos.

“Sir, I came to speak confidentially with your general about affairs of importance.  It was not an ordinary welcome that he gave me.  The accounts your soldiers can give you may convince you of that.  If, then, the general received me in that manner, he knew my titles to his esteem.  Now, you do not suspect, I should think, that I should reveal my secrets to you, and still less his.”

“But these casks, what do they contain?”