To return to my history:  Madame de Pompadour said to me, “Be constantly with the accouchee, to prevent any stranger, or even the people of the house, from speaking to her.  You will always say that he is a very rich Polish nobleman, who is obliged to conceal himself on account of his relationship to the Queen, who is very devout.  You will find a wet-nurse in the house, to whom you will deliver the child.  Guimard will manage all the rest.  You will go to church as a witness; everything must be conducted as if for a substantial citizen.  The young lady expects to lie in in five or six days; you will dine with her, and will not leave her till she is in a state of health to return to the Parc-aux-cerfs, which she may do in a fortnight, as I imagine, without running any risk.”  I went, that same evening, to the Avenue de Saint Cloud, where I found the Abbess and Guimard, an attendant belonging to the castle, but without his blue coat.  There were, besides, a nurse, a wet-nurse, two old men-servants, and a girl, who was something between a servant and a waiting-woman.  The young lady was extremely pretty, and dressed very elegantly, though not too remarkably.  I supped with her and the Mother-Abbess, who was called Madame Bertrand.  I had presented the aigrette Madame de Pompadour gave me before supper, which had greatly delighted the young lady, and she was in high spirits.  Madame Bertrand had been housekeeper to M. Lebel, first valet de chambre to the King.  He called her Dominique, and she was entirely in his confidence.  The young lady chatted with us after supper; she appeared to be very naive.  The next day, I talked to her in private.  She said to me, “How is the Count?” (It was the King whom she called by this title.) “He will be very sorry not to be with me now; but he was obliged to set off on a long journey.”  I assented to what she said.  “He is very handsome,” said she, “and loves me with all his heart.  He promised me an allowance; but I love him disinterestedly; and, if he would let me, I would follow him to Poland.”  She afterwards talked to me about her parents, and about M. Lebel, whom she knew by the name of Durand.  “My mother,” said she, “kept a large grocer’s shop, and my father was a man of some consequence; he belonged to the Six Corps, and that, as everybody knows, is an excellent thing.  He was twice very near being head-bailiff.”  Her mother had become bankrupt at her father’s death, but the Count had come to her assistance, and settled upon her fifteen hundred francs a year, besides giving her six thousand francs down.  On the sixth day, she was brought to bed, and, according to my instructions, she was told the child was a girl, though it reality it was a boy; she was soon to be told that it was dead, in order that no trace of its existence might remain for a certain time.  It was eventually to be restored to its mother.  The King gave each of his children about ten thousand francs a year.