Again and again I urged these views, not only upon M. le Duc d’Orleans, but upon M. le Duc.  Nay, with this latter I had two long stolen interviews in the Tuileries Gardens, where we spoke without constraint, and exhausted all our arguments.  But M. le Duc was not to be shaken, and as I could do no more than I had done to move him, I was obliged at last to give in.  It was resolved, however, that disgrace should fall upon M. du Maine alone; that his brother, the Comte de Toulouse, an account of the devotion to the State he had ever exhibited, and his excellent conduct since the death of the late King, should, when stripped of his title like the other, receive it back again the moment after, in acknowledgment of the services he had rendered to the Regent as Councillor of State, and as an expression of personal good feeling towards him, which his excellent qualities so justly merited.

I returned home from my last interview with M. le Duc, and went to mass at the Jacobins, to which I entered from my garden.  It was not without a distracted mind.  But I prayed to God sincerely and earnestly to guide my steps, so that I might labour for His glory and the good of the State without private ends.  My prayer was heard, and in the sequel I had nothing to reproach myself with.  I followed the straight road without turning to the right or to the left.

Fontanieu was waiting for me in my house as I returned home from mass, and I was obliged to listen to his questions and to reply to them, as though I had nothing on my mind.  I arranged my chamber like a Bed of Justice, I made him understand several things; connected with the ceremonial that he had not under stood before, and that it was essential he should in no way omit.  Thus everything went on satisfactorily, and I began to count the hours, by day as well as by night, until the great day was to arrive on which the arrogant pride of the Parliament was to receive a check, and the false plumage which adorned the bastards was to be plucked from them.

In the midst of the sweet joy that I felt, no bitterness entered.  I was satisfied with the part I had played in this affair, satisfied that I had acted sincerely, honestly, that I had not allowed my own private motives to sway me; that in the interests of the State, as opposed to my own interests, I had done all in my power to save the Duc du Maine.  And yet I did not dare to give myself up to the rosy thoughts suggested by the great event, now so rapidly approaching.  I toyed with them instead of allowing myself to embrace them.  I shrunk from them as it were like a cold lover who fears the too ardent caresses of his mistress.  I could not believe that the supreme happiness I had so long pined for was at last so near.  Might not M. le Duc d’Orleans falter at the last moment?  Might not all our preparations, so carefully conducted, so cleverly planned, weigh upon his feebleness until they fell to the ground?  It was not improbable.  He was often firm in promises.  How often was he firm in carrying them out?  All these questions, all these restless doubts—­ natural as it appears to me under the circumstances—­winged their way through my mind, and kept me excited and feverish as though life and death were hanging on one thread.