and self-love, she became persuaded that she was indebted to the Marquise alone for the sudden coldness of the King; and accordingly she vowed an eternal hatred to the woman whom she considered in the light of a successful rival.  Up to the present period, anxious as she was to avenge her wounded vanity, she had been unable to secure an opportunity of revenge; but having at this particular moment won the affection of the Prince de Joinville,[162] who had been a former lover of Madame de Verneuil, and with whom, as she was well aware, he had maintained an active correspondence, she made his surrender of the letters of that lady the price of her own honour.  For a time the Prince hesitated; he felt all the disloyalty of such a concession; but those were not times in which principles waged an equal war against passion; and the letters were ultimately placed in the possession of Madame de Villars.

The Duchess was fully cognizant of the fact that it was from an impulse of self-preservation alone that M. de Joinville had been induced to forego his suit to the favourite, and to absent himself from the Court, a consideration which should have aroused her delicacy as a woman; but she was by no means disposed to yield to so inconvenient a weakness; and she had consequently no sooner secured the coveted documents than she prepared to profit by her good fortune.

Henriette d’Entragues had really loved the Prince—­if indeed so venal and vicious a woman can be supposed capable of loving anything save herself—­and thus the letters which were transferred to Madame de Villars, many of them having been written immediately after the separation of the lovers, were filled with regrets at his absence, professions of unalterable affection, and disrespectful expressions concerning the King and Queen; the latter of whom was ridiculed and slandered without pity.  It is easy to imagine the triumphant joy of the Duchess.  She held her enemy at her mercy, and she had no inclination to be merciful.  She read and re-read the precious letters; and finally, after deep reflection, her plans were matured.

The Princesse de Conti was her personal friend, and was, moreover, attached to the household of the Queen, to whom Madame de Villars, from circumstances which require no comment, had hitherto been comparatively a stranger.  Marie de Medicis, who had experienced little sympathy from the great ladies of the Court, having thrown herself principally upon her Italian followers for society, had in consequence been cold and distant in her deportment to the French members of her circle; who, on their side, trammelled by the rigorous propriety of her conduct, were quite satisfied to be partially overlooked, in order that their own less scrupulous bearing might pass unnoticed by so rigid a censor; and thus, when, upon the earnest request of Madame de Villars to be introduced to the more intimate acquaintance of the Queen, the Princess succeeded in obtaining for her the privilege of the petites entrees (unaware of the powerful passport to favour which she possessed), she found it difficult to account for the eagerness with which the ordinarily unapproachable Marie greeted the appearance and courted the society of the astute Duchess; nor did she for an instant dream that by facilitating the intercourse between them, she was undermining the fortunes of a brother whom she loved.