"Ah! you are like all the rest, jealous," he said.

"I would wager that it was M.Colbert who turned that pretty phrase." D'Artagnan, in order to throw Aramis off his guard, related Colbert's misadventures with regard to the _vin de Melun_.
"He comes of a mean race, does Colbert," said Aramis.
"Quite true." "When I think, too," added the bishop, "that that fellow will be your minister within four months, and that you will serve him as blindly as you did Richelieu or Mazarin--" "And as you serve M.Fouquet," said D'Artagnan.
"With this difference, though, that M.Fouquet is not M.Colbert." "True, true," said D'Artagnan, as he pretended to become sad and full of reflection; and then, a moment after, he added, "Why do you tell me that M.Colbert will be minister in four months ?" "Because M.Fouquet will have ceased to be so," replied Aramis.
"He will be ruined, you mean ?" said D'Artagnan.
"Completely so." "Why does he give these _fetes_, then ?" said the musketeer, in a tone so full of thoughtful consideration, and so well assumed, that the bishop was for the moment deceived by it.

"Why did you not dissuade him from it ?" The latter part of the phrase was just a little too much, and Aramis's former suspicions were again aroused.

"It is done with the object of humoring the king." "By ruining himself ?" "Yes, by ruining himself for the king." "A most eccentric, one might say, sinister calculation, that." "Necessity, necessity, my friend." "I don't see that, dear Aramis." "Do you not?
Have you not remarked M.Colbert's daily increasing antagonism, and that he is doing his utmost to drive the king to get rid of the superintendent ?" "One must be blind not to see it." "And that a cabal is already armed against M.Fouquet ?" "That is well known." "What likelihood is there that the king would join a party formed against a man who will have spent everything he had to please him ?" "True, true," said D'Artagnan, slowly, hardly convinced, yet curious to broach another phase of the conversation.

"There are follies, and follies," he resumed, "and I do not like those you are committing." "What do you allude to ?" "As for the banquet, the ball, the concert, the theatricals, the tournaments, the cascades, the fireworks, the illuminations, and the presents--these are well and good, I grant; but why were not these expenses sufficient?
Why was it necessary to have new liveries and costumes for your whole household ?" "You are quite right.