D'Artagnan, a poor but noble young man from Gascony, leaves his home to make his fortune in Paris; he is carrying a letter of introduction to his father's friend, Monsieur de Treville, captain of the King's Musketeers. On the way to Paris, d'Artagnan's impulsive nature gets him into trouble; he is beaten and the letter of introduction is taken from him. In Paris, he nevertheless is granted an interview with Monsieur de Treville, and is promised acceptance in the Royal Academy free of charge, where he can learn fencing, riding, and good manners; later, with experience, d'Artagnan, can expect to become a musketeer.
While Treville, is writing a new letter of introduction, d'Artagnan glances out the window and, by accident, sees the person who robbed him. He runs after him, and while pursuing him, he offends three musketeers: first, he collides with Athos, reinjuring Athos's wounded shoulder; then he jostles Porthos and reveals a partly counterfeit golden shoulder belt that he is wearing; and finally, he offends Aramis by ungallantly and unintentionally bringing attention to a lady's handkerchief. He is challenged to a duel by each of the musketeers. After he meets the musketeers and begins dueling with Athos, they are all threatened with arrest by the dreaded cardinal's guards because of a law against dueling. D'Artagnan joins forces with the musketeers and helps drive the cardinal's men away. Thus, almost immediately after his arrival in Paris, D'Artagnan becomes an intimate friend of the three musketeers.
One day, d'Artagnan's elderly landlord, Bonacieux, comes to ask him for help; the landlord's young wife, Constance, has been kidnapped — probably by the cardinal's men because she is the queen's linen maid and knows many of the queen's secrets, secrets which the cardinal desperately wants revealed so that he can discredit the queen, who earlier rejected his romantic advances. D'Artagnan is able to rescue Madame Bonacieux from her abductors and, while doing so, falls in love with her. Later, when he inadvertently sees her cross a bridge with a strange man, he stops them and discovers that the man is an English nobleman, the duke of Buckingham, the queen's secret lover; being an Englishman, the man is also an enemy of France. That night, the queen gives the duke an elegant gift of twelve diamond tags in a rosewood box.
