Supposing this was the bookshelf and desk of Alexander Dumas? The thought sent tingling shivers through his body.
With trembling fingers he began a systematic exploration of the desk. If it had been the property of Alexander Dumas there might be other identifying marks which he had overlooked. But although he did not miss an inch of the desk’s surface he found nothing else to indicate that it had once been owned by the creator of the Three Musketeers.
He returned again to the crudely scratched signature. For a few seconds he studied it carefully, then he ran his fingers over the faint scratches. When he did this he felt the wood give slightly beneath the tips of his fingers.
He tipped the desk on its side, a strange excitement flooding through his veins. Again his fingers moved over the signature, but this time he pressed gently but firmly against the wood. A section of the underside of the shelf gave way and Phillip heard a faint creaking sound from the side of the desk.
Moving quickly around to the side of the desk he saw that a small drawer had slid out from the apparently solid side of the desk. So cleverly was this secret compartment fitted into the desk that Phillip’s minute examination had failed to reveal its presence.
Experimentally he slowly closed the drawer. Then he again pressed the section of the shelf on which the name of A. Dumas was scratched; and again the secret drawer swung slowly open.
Phillip dug his hand into the drawer, felt crackling paper under his fingers. Hurriedly he removed the object his fingers had touched, a long flat bundle of papers, covered with a close fine scroll.
He flipped through the pages, and as occasional phrases caught his eye, his heart began to hammer with suppressed excitement. This carelessly wrapped bundle of sheets was a French manuscript of Dumas’ immortal romance.
The Three Musketeers.
Phillip knew the novel by heart almost, and he could not be mistaken. This might even be the original manuscript, in Dumas’ own handwriting!
Hardly able to believe his good fortune, Phillip raptly turned the pages of the manuscript, caught again by the spell of Dumas’ magic. The thrilling character of D’Artagnan and the three musketeers, Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, strode again across the pages, somehow more real and alive in this dust-encrusted manuscript than they had ever been in the neat pages of a book.
As Phillip turned the pages of the manuscript dust puffed up from the yellowed, cracked sheets, and swirled about his head in a dense, suffocating fog.
He coughed and waved away the little clouds of dust with his hand. From the open drawer in which he had discovered the manuscript more dust drifted up, until the entire room was hazy with the musty fog.
Phillip blew his nose and wiped the dust from his smarting eyes, but these measures helped but little, for the dust continued to swirl up from the drawer and manuscript like smoke rising from a banked fire.
Alarmed, Phillip laid aside the manuscript and climbed to his feet. But something seemed to be wrong with him. His legs were unsteady and there was a vast roaring sound between his ears. He knew that he needed air. But he was too dizzy to walk to the window.
The room was now so filled with the swirling fog of smoke that he was unable to see a foot in front of him, and he realized that he must get out or he would suffocate.
Stumbling blindly, he turned and staggered toward the door, but before he had moved a yard, his knees gave way and he fell forward to his knees and then to his face.
There was a cloudy film of blackness obscuring his vision and his muscles refused to respond to the instinctive urgings of his brain.
He wondered fleetingly if he were dying. If so, it was not exactly unpleasant. Everything was foggy and hazy, but the floor seemed soft and comfortable and he felt that if he closed his eyes he would drift quietly into a peaceful slumber. As his last conscious thoughts faded he imagined he heard voices behind him and as blackness claimed him, he fancied he felt a strong hand on his shoulder, shaking him urgently.
Chapter III
“Mon dieu. I fear our little liberator will never open his eyes again!”
“A pity. He looks so pale, comrades. A flask of good Burgundy wine would put the glow of good spirits into those cheeks again, I’d wager.”
These voices drifted faintly through the fogs of darkness which shrouded Phillip Poincare and he stirred uneasily.
“Ah!”
“He is moving!”
“Excellent!”
Phillip shook his head side to side and a white light began to gleam through the blackness that enveloped him. The voices seemed far away. As consciousness gradually returned he realized that he was seated in a chair and that a pillow had been propped behind his head. He pressed his hands to his face as memory suddenly returned to him. What had happened?
He had been working on the bookshelf, polishing and cleaning it, when he had discovered the little secret drawer. And in the secret drawer he had found the manuscript, yellow and cracked and aged. Then had come the smothering, suffocating dust...
He shuddered and opened his eyes.
For an instant he stared in growing incredulity at the four, strangely clad men who looked down at him, with friendly concern in their faces, then he closed his eyes tightly and pressed his hands to face.
“Delirium tremens!” he gasped. “And I haven’t taken a drink in years!”
He opened his eyes again, slowly, hesitantly, expecting that the apparitions would have vanished, but they were still there, regarding him with frankly puzzled expressions.
They looked from one to another and shrugged their shoulders significantly as Phillip continued to stare at them in pop-eyed astonishment.
Phillip pinched himself to make sure that he was awake.
“Who are you?” he gasped. “What are you doing in my room?”
As he spoke his gaze swung from figure to figure, automatically drinking in the details of their dress and person. All four were better than average in height and they were all dressed in cloaks, blazing baldrics and gleaming leather boots that came up to the middle of their thighs. Sweeping plumed hats were set rakishly on their dark hair, but the comic-opera effect was not carried out in the long, flashing swords that grazed the floor, or the heavy pistols that were jammed into their gaudy waistbands. These weapons looked grimly business-like and there was something in the eyes and manner of the men regarding him that indicated they would know how to use those weapons with skill and relish.
Phillip swallowed. Although he had an average degree of courage, there was something in the weirdness of this situation that unnerved him.
He clenched his hands nervously.
“Who are you?” he asked again. This time his voice was a bare whisper.
The young man standing directly in front of him removed his sweeping hat with a flourish and bowed. Phillip saw that his hair was curling and brown, almost the same shade as his eyes. The face of this young man was lean and handsome and now it wore an expression of whimsical friendliness. But Phillip had the indefinable feeling that that expression could change; that those jaws could harden; and that those warm brown eyes would glint as coldly as ice if the sword at his side was unsheathed.
“With a thousand pardons,” the young man said, smiling. “We have completely forgotten our manners. With your permission I will introduce ourselves.”
He waved negligently to the largest of his companions, a veritable giant of a man, with heavy powerful shoulders and mighty, steel-thewed hands.
“This ox-like creature,” he murmured, “we call Porthos.”