t fixing, all the time, an
intelligent and inquiring look upon the new occupant of the cell. The
king could not resist a sudden impulse of fear and disgust; he moved
back toward the door uttering a loud cry; and, as if he but needed this
cry, which escaped from his breast almost unconsciously, to recognize
himself, Louis knew that he was alive and in full possession of his
natural senses. "A prisoner!" he cried. "I--I, a prisoner!" He looked
round him for a bell to summon some one to him. "There are no bells at
the Bastille," he said, "and it is in the Bastille I am imprisoned. In
what way can I have been made a prisoner? It must have been owing to a
conspiracy of M. Fouquet. I have been drawn to Vaux as into a snare. M.
Fouquet cannot be acting alone in this affair. His agent--. That voice I
but just now heard was M. d'Herblay's; I recognized it. Colbert was
right, then. But what is Fouquet's object? To reign in my place and
stead?--Impossible! Yet, who knows!" thought the king, relapsing into
gloom again. "Perhaps, my brother, the Duc d'Orleans, is doing that
which my uncle wished to do during the whole of his life against my
father. But the queen?--My mother, too? And La Valliere? Oh! La
Valliere, she will have been abandoned to Madame. Dear, dear girl! Yes,
it is--it must be so. They must have shut her up, as they have me. We
are separated forever!" And at this idea of separation, the poor lover
burst into a flood of tears, and sobs and groans.

"There is a governor in this place," the king continued, in a fury of
passion; "I will speak to him, I will summon him to me."

He called, but no voice replied to his. He seized hold of his chair, and
hurled it against the massive oaken door. The wood resounded against the
door, and awakened many a mournful echo in the profound depths of the
staircase; but from a human creature, not one.

This was a fresh proof for the king of the slight regard in which he was
held at the Bastille. Therefore, when his first fit of anger had passed
away, having remarked a barred window, through which there passed a
stream of light, lozenge-shaped, which must be, he knew, the bright orb
of approaching day, Louis began to call out, at first gently enough,
then louder and louder still; but no one replied to him. Twenty other
attempts which he made, one after another, obtained no other or better
success. His blood began to boil within him, and mount to his head. His
nature was such, that, accus