The beautiful lady of honour had never been seen to smile since she was made acquainted with the fact of her mock trial and her execution in effigy in one of the public thoroughfares of Paris.  The disgrace which, as she believed, would thenceforward attach to her name, not only wounded her sense of womanly dignity, but also broke her heart, and a rapid consumption deprived the unhappy Queen-mother of one of the most devoted of her friends.

It can scarcely be matter of surprise that, rendered desperate by her accumulated disappointments and misfortunes, Marie de Medicis at this moment welcomed with avidity the suggestions of Chanteloupe, who urged her to revenge upon the Cardinal the daily and hourly mortifications to which she was exposed.  At first she hearkened listlessly to his counsels, for she was utterly discouraged; but ere long, as he unfolded his project, she awoke from her lethargy of sorrow, and entered with renewed vigour into the plan of vengeance which he had concerted.  Whether it were that she hoped to save the life of Montmorency, of whose capture she had been informed, or that she trusted to effect her own return to France by placing herself in a position to make conditions with Richelieu, it is at least certain that she did not hesitate to subscribe to his views, and to lend herself to the extraordinary plot of the reverend Oratorian.

“Your Majesty is aware,” said Chanteloupe, “that Monsieur has not dared to avow his marriage with the Princesse Marguerite; and I have sure information that the minister who endeavoured to effect a union between his favourite niece and the Cardinal de Lorraine without success, has now the audacity to lift his eyes to your own august son.  The Queen is childless, and Richelieu aspires to nothing less than a crown for La Comballet.”

“Per Dio!” exclaimed Marie, trembling with indignation.

“The lady is at present residing in the Petit Luxembourg,” pursued the monk calmly; “in the very hotel given by your Majesty to his Eminence during the period when he possessed your favour—­”

“Given!” echoed the Queen-mother vehemently.  “Yes, given as you say, but on condition that whenever I sought to reclaim it, I was at liberty to do so on the payment of thirty thousand livres; and have you never heard what was the result of this donation?  When he proved unworthy of my confidence I demanded the restoration of the hotel upon the terms of the contract, but when the document was delivered into my hands, I discovered that for livres he had substituted crowns, and that in lieu of ‘whenever she shall desire it,’ he had inserted ’when the King shall desire it.’  I remonstrated against this treachery, but I remonstrated in vain; Louis pronounced against me, and the Cardinal established his wanton niece in my desecrated mansion, where she has held a Court more brilliant than that of the mother of her sovereign.  Nay,” continued the Queen, with increasing agitation, “the lingering atmosphere of royalty which yet clings to the old halls has so increased the greatness of the low-born relative of Jean Armand du-Plessis, that she has deemed it necessary to destroy one of the walls of my own palace in order to enlarge the limits of that which she inhabits.” [185]