g
gentleman to return, and send you away somewhere with him. If you are of
a different opinion--for girls have strange views and fancies at times,
trust to me, I will put you in a proper path again. I have done as much
for girls who are not so good as you are, perhaps."

La Valliere ceased to hear the queen, who pitilessly added, "I will send
you somewhere by yourself, where you will be able to procure a little
serious reflection. Reflection calms the ardor of the blood, and
swallows up all the illusions of youth. I suppose you have understood
what I have been saying?"

"Madame, madame!"

"Not a word!"

"I am innocent of everything your majesty can suppose. Oh! madame! you
are a witness of my despair. I love, I respect your majesty so much!"

"It would be far better not to respect me at all," said the queen, with
a chilling irony of manner. "It would be far better if you were not
innocent. Do you presume to suppose that I should be satisfied simply to
leave you unpunished if you had committed the fault?"

"Oh, madame! you are killing me."

"No acting, if you please, or I will undertake the _denouement_ of the
comedy; leave the room; return to your own apartment, and I trust my
lesson may be of service to you."

"Madame!" said La Valliere to the Duchesse d'Orleans, whose hands she
seized in her own, "do you, who are so good, intercede for me."

"I!" replied the latter, with an insulting joy, "I--good!--Ah,
mademoiselle, you think nothing of the kind;" and with a rude, hasty
gesture, she repulsed the young girl's hand.

La Valliere, instead of giving way, as from her extreme pallor and from
her tears the two princesses might possibly have expected, suddenly
resumed her calm and dignified air; she bowed profoundly, and left the
room.

"Well!" said Anne of Austria to madame, "do you think she will begin
again?"

"I always suspect those gentle and patient characters," replied Madame.
"Nothing is more full of courage than a patient heart, nothing is more
self-reliant than a gentle spirit."

"I feel I may almost venture to assure you she will think twice before
she looks at the god Mars again."

"So long as she does not obtain the protection of his buckler I do not
care," retorted Madame.

A proud, defiant look of the queen-mother was the reply to this
objection, which was by no means deficient in _finesse_; and both of
them, almost sure of their victory, went to look for Maria-Theresa, who
had been engage