which put you in possession of a secret unknown to the whole world. I am
a woman by a love which survives the man I loved. Speak; tell me! It is
now time."

"It is too late, on the contrary," replied Marie, with a forced smile.
"Monsieur de Cinq-Mars and I are united forever."

"Forever!" exclaimed the Queen. "Can you mean it? And your rank, your
name, your future--is all lost? Do you reserve this despair for your
brother, the Duc de Bethel, and all the Gonzagas?"

"For more than four years I have thought of it. I am resolved; and for
ten days we have been affianced."

"Affianced!" exclaimed the Queen, clasping her hands. "You have been
deceived, Marie. Who would have dared this without the King's order? It
is an intrigue which I will know. I am sure that you have been misled
and deceived."

Marie hesitated a moment, and then said:

"Nothing is more simple, Madame, than our attachment. I inhabited, you
know, the old chateau of Chaumont, with the Marechale d'Effiat, the
mother of Monsieur de Cinq-Mars. I had retired there to mourn the death
of my father; and it soon happened that Monsieur de Cinq-Mars had to
deplore the loss of his. In this numerous afflicted family, I saw his
grief only, which was as profound as mine. All that he said, I had
already thought, and when we spoke of our afflictions we found them
wholly alike. As I had been the first to suffer, I was better acquainted
with sorrow than he; and I endeavored to console him by telling him all
that I had suffered, so that in pitying me he forgot himself. This was
the beginning of our love, which, as you see, had its birth, as it were,
between two tombs."

"God grant, my sweet, that it may have a happy termination!" said the
Queen.

"I hope so, Madame, since you pray for me," continued Marie. "Besides,
everything now smiles upon me; but at that time I was very miserable.
The news arrived one day at the chateau that the Cardinal had called
Monsieur de Cinq-Mars to the army. It seemed to me that I was again
deprived of one of my relatives; and yet we were strangers. But Monsieur
de Bassompierre spoke without ceasing of battles and death. I retired
every evening in grief, and I wept during the night. I thought at first
that my tears flowed for the past, but I soon perceived that it was for
the future; and I felt that they could not be the same tears, since
I wished to conceal them. Some time passed in the expectation of his
departure. I saw him every day;