come another
Richelieu or Mazarin, the first Minister of the Crown, the empurpled
ruler of France, the guiding power behind the throne. All this he looked
confidently to achieve; all this he might have achieved but for the
obstacle that Marie Therese's resentment flung across his path. The
Empress saw to it that, through the person of her daughter, her hatred
should pursue him even into France.

Obedient ever to the iron will of her mother, sharing her mother's
resentment, Marie Antoinette exerted all her influence to thwart this
Cardinal whom her mother had taught her to regard as a dangerous,
unprincipled man.

On his return from Vienna bearing letters from Marie Therese to Louis
XVI and Marie Antoinette, the Cardinal found himself coldly received by
the dull King, and discouraged from remaining at Court, whilst the Queen
refused to grant him so much as the audience necessary for the delivery
of these letters, desiring him to forward them instead.

The chagrined Cardinal had no illusions. He beheld here the hand
of Marie Therese controlling Marie Antoinette, and, through Marie
Antoinette, the King himself. Worse followed. He who had dreamt himself
another Richelieu could only with difficulty obtain the promised
position of Grand Almoner of France, and this solely as a result of the
powerful and insistent influence exerted by his family.

He perceived that if he was to succeed at all he must begin by softening
the rigorous attitude which the Queen maintained towards him. To that
end he addressed himself. But three successive letters he wrote to the
Queen remained unanswered. Through other channels persistently he begged
for an audience that he might come in person to express his regrets for
the offending indiscretion. But the Queen remained unmoved, ruled ever
by the Austrian Empress, who through her daughter sought to guide the
affairs of France.

Rohan was reduced to despair, and then in an evil hour his path was
crossed by Jeanne de la Motte de Valois, who enjoyed the reputation
of secretly possessing the friendship of the Queen, exerting a sort of
back-stair influence, and who lived on that reputation.

As a drowning man clutches at a straw, so the Cardinal-Prince Louis de
Rohan, Grand Almoner of France, Landgrave of Alsace, Commander of the
Order of the Holy Ghost, clutched at this faiseuse d'affaires to help
him in his desperate need.

Jeanne de la Motte de Valois--perhaps the most astounding adventuress