112 LOUISE DE LA VALLIERE.
- 'Very good; tell me what details you are acquainted with
respecting this unhappy affair. Monsieur de Manicamp." "Perhaps your majesty has already been informed of them, and I fear to fatigue you by useless repetitions/' "No, do not be afraid of that." Manicamp looked all round him; he only saw D'Artagnan leaning with his back agatest the wainscot— D'Artagnan, calm, kind, and good-natured as usual — and St. Aignan, whom he had accompanied, and who still leaned over the king's armchair, with an expression of countenance equally full of good feeling. He determined, therefore, to speak out. "Your majesty is perfectly aware," he said, "that acci- dents are very frequent in hunting." "In hunting, do you say?" "I mean, sire, when an animal is brought to bay." "Ah! ah!" said the king, "it was when the animal was brought to bay, then, that the accident happened?" "Alas! sire, unhappily, it was so." The king paused for a moment before he said: "What animal was being hunted?" "A wild boar, sire." "And what could possibly have possessed De Guiche to go to a wild-boar hunt by himself; that is but a clownish idea of sport, and only fit for that class of people who, un- like the Marechal de Grammont, have no dogs and hunts- men to hunt as gentlemen should do." Manicamp shrugged his shoulders. "Youth is very rash," he said sententiously. "Well, go on," said the king. "At all events," continued Manicamp, not venturing to be too precipitate and hasty, and letting his words fall very slowly one by one, "at all events, sire, poor De Guiche went hunting — quite alone." "Quite alone, indeed! What a sportsman! And is not Monsieur de Guiche aware that the wild boar always stands at bay?" "That is the very thing that really happened, sire." "He had some idea, then, of the beast being there?" "Yes, sire; some peasants had seen it among their potatoes." "And what kind of animal was it?" "A short, thick beast." "You may as well tell me, monsieur, that De Gniche had some idea of committing suicide; for I have seen him hunt.
