you will heal
the wounds of the suffering Church."

"Ah! if I could!"

"But you can. While there is heresy within the land there can be no
peace or rest for the faithful. It is the speck of mould which will in
time, if it be not pared off, corrupt the whole fruit."

"What would you have, then, father?"

"The Huguenots must go. They must be driven forth. The goats must be
divided from the sheep. The king is already in two minds. Louvois is
our friend now. If you are with us, then all will be well."

"But, father, think how many there are!"

"The more reason that they should be dealt with."

"And think, too, of their sufferings should they be driven forth."

"Their cure lies in their own hands."

"That is true. And yet my heart softens for them."

Pere la Chaise and the bishop shook their heads. Nature had made them
both kind and charitable men, but the heart turns to flint when the
blessing of religion is changed to the curse of sect.

"You would befriend God's enemies then?"

"No, no; not if they are indeed so."

"Can you doubt it? Is it possible that your heart still turns towards
the heresy of your youth?"

"No, father; but it is not in nature to forget that my father and my
grandfather--"

"Nay, they have answered for their own sins. Is it possible that the
Church has been mistaken in you? Do you then refuse the first favour
which she asks of you? You would accept her aid, and yet you would give
none in return."

Madame de Maintenon rose with the air of one who has made her
resolution. "You are wiser than I," said she, "and to you have been
committed the interests of the Church. I will do what you advise."

"You promise it?"

"I do."

Her two visitors threw up their hands together. "It is a blessed day,"
they cried, "and generations yet unborn will learn to deem it so."

She sat half stunned by the prospect which was opening out in front of
her. Ambitious she had, as the Jesuit had surmised, always been--
ambitious for the power which would enable her to leave the world better
than she found it. And this ambition she had already to some extent
been able to satisfy, for more than once she had swayed both king and
kingdom. But to marry the king--to marry the man for whom she would
gladly lay down her life, whom in the depths of her heart she loved in
as pure and as noble a fashion as woman ever yet loved man--that was
indeed a thing above her utmost hopes. She knew her own