en touched by the cruel
words of Madame, or the egotistical cold smile of the king, it would
have annihilated her.

And Montalais herself, the girl of ingenious ideas, would not have
attempted to recall her to life; for ridicule kills beauty even.

But fortunately, as we have said, Louise, whose ears were buzzing, and
her eyes veiled by timidity,--Louise saw nothing and heard nothing; and
the king, who had still his attention directed to the conversation of
the cardinal and his uncle, hastened to return to them.

He came up just at the moment Mazarin terminated by saying: "Mary, as
well as her sisters, has just set off for Brouage. I make them follow
the opposite bank of the Loire to that along which we have traveled; and
if I calculate their progress correctly, according to the orders I have
given, they will to-morrow be opposite Blois."

These words were pronounced with that tact--that measure, that
distinctness of tone, of intention, and reach--which made del Signor
Giulio Mazarini the first comedian in the world.

It resulted that they went straight to the heart of Louis XIV., and
the cardinal, on turning round at the simple noise of the approaching
footsteps of his majesty, saw the immediate effect of them upon the
countenance of his pupil, an effect betrayed to the keen eyes of his
eminence by a slight increase of color. But what was the ventilation of
such a secret to him whose craft had for twenty years deceived all the
diplomatists of Europe?

From the moment the young king heard these last words, he appeared as if
he had received a poisoned arrow in his heart. He could not remain quiet
in a place, but cast around an uncertain, dead, and aimless look over
the assembly. He with his eyes interrogated his mother more than
twenty times: but she, given up to the pleasure of conversing with her
sister-in-law, and likewise constrained by the glance of Mazarin, did
not appear to comprehend any of the supplications conveyed by the looks
of her son.

From this moment, music, lights, flowers, beauties, all became odious
and insipid to Louis XIV. After he had a hundred times bitten his
lips, stretched his legs and his arms like a well-brought-up child
who, without daring to gape, exhausts all the modes of evincing his
weariness--after having uselessly again implored his mother and the
minister, he turned a despairing look towards the door, that is to say,
towards liberty.

At this door, in the embrasure of which