m, reconciliations
occasionally took place, in which even the Cardinal's coldness,
caution, and his laborious occupation, could not, it is said, place him
beyond reach of the Duchess's irresistible fascinations. But the latter,
well aware that the _role_ of Mazarin's mistress would not give to her
grasp the helm of the State, which he reserved exclusively to himself,
preferred, therefore, rather to remain his enemy, and figure at the head
and front of the faction antagonistic to his government.

This flirting and skirmishing had gone on for some time, but at last
natural feeling prevailed over political reticence. Madame de Chevreuse
grew impatient at obtaining words only, and scarcely anything serious or
effective. She had, it is true, received some money for her own use,
either in repayment of that which she had formerly lent the Queen, or
for the discharge of debts contracted during exile and in the interest
of Anne of Austria. On returning to Court, one of her earliest steps was
to withdraw her friend and _protege_, Alexandre de Campion, from the
service of the Vendomes, and place him in a suitable position in the
Queen's household. Chateauneuf had been reinstated in his former post of
Chancellor (_des Ordres du Roi_), and later his governorship of Touraine
was restored to him on the death of the Marquis de Gevres, who fell at
the siege of Thionville; but the Duchess considered that that was doing
very little for a man of Chateauneuf's merit--for him who had staked
fortune and life, and undergone ten years' imprisonment. She readily
perceived, therefore, that the perpetual delay of favours ever promised,
ever deferred in the instances of the Vendomes and La Rochefoucauld,
were so many artifices of the Cardinal, and that she was his dupe. This
conviction put the spirited partisan upon her mettle. She began to
titter, to mock, and to expostulate by turns, and sometimes twitted the
minister in pert and derisive terms. This, however, betrayed a want of
her ordinary precaution, and only served to fill Mazarin's quiver with
shafts to be used against herself. He made the Queen believe that Madame
de Chevreuse sought to rule her with a rod of iron; that she had changed
her mask, but not her character; that she was ever the same impulsive
and restless person, who, with all her talent and devotedness, had never
worked aught but mischief around her, and was only instrumental in
ruining others as well as herself. By degrees, und