Unfortunately, the ambition of Concini was more powerful than his devotion to his benefactress; and his influence continued unabated.  Moreover, his vanity was mortified, as he could not conceal from himself that he was indebted for his position at Court, indefinite as it was, to the affection of the Regent for his wife; and he consequently urged Leonora to induce the Queen to purchase for him the town of Ancre in Picardy, whose possession would invest him with the title of marquis, and assure to him the consideration due to that rank.  Madame de Concini accordingly proffered her request, which was conceded without difficulty; for Marie was at that moment, to adopt the expression of Richelieu, keeping her hands open; and this purchase formed a comparatively unimportant item in her lavish grants.  Encouraged by so facile a success, the Italian adventurer was, however, by no means disposed to permit even this coveted dignity to satisfy his ambition, and through the same agency he ere long became Governor of Peronne, Roye, and Montdidier, which he purchased from M. de Crequy for the sum of forty thousand crowns.  The Queen had been induced to furnish an order upon the royal treasury for this amount, which was presented without any misgiving by the exulting favourite; but M. de Villeroy, who considered himself to have been slighted on some occasion by her Majesty, refused to countersign the document, an opposition which so enraged Concini that he hastened to pour out his complaints to Marie; who, overcome by the wrath of the husband and the tears of the wife, summoned the Duc de Sully, of whom she inquired if it were not possible to procure the requisite amount by having recourse to the money lodged at the Arsenal.  Sully replied in the negative, declaring that the sums therein deposited were not available for such a purpose, and reminding her that seven millions of livres had already been withdrawn since the death of the King.[75] It was, consequently, necessary to raise the desired purchase-money by other means, which having been at length effected, Concini found himself not only placed by his court-appointment on a par with the peers of the realm, but also enabled, by the munificence of the Regent, and the revenues of his new government, to rival them in magnificence.

Then it was that his talent for intrigue boldly developed itself.  In vain did his wife warn him of the danger of further forcing his fortunes, and thus drawing down upon himself the hatred and envy of the native nobility; in vain did she represent that by indulging his passion for power and display he must eventually create enemies who were certain to prove fatal to his prosperity; Concini, as weak and vain as he was greedy and ambitious, disregarded her advice, and strenuously turned his attention to fomenting a misunderstanding among the most influential of the nobles, in order to prevent a coalition which threatened to diminish his own importance.  He was well aware of his unpopularity