“Monsieur,” replied the King, in a tone and with a manner more than easy, “give my compliments and my thanks to the King and Queen of England, and say to them in my name, that my affairs and theirs will go on none the worse for what has happened.”

The officer made a bow and retired, astonishment painted upon his face, and expressed in all his bearing.  I anxiously observed all this, and also remarked, that all the principal people around the King looked at each other, but said no word.  The fact was, as I afterwards learned, that Louvois, when he died, was so deeply in disgrace, that the very next day he was to have been arrested and sent to the Bastille!  The King told Chamillart so, and Chamillart related it to me.  This explains, I fancy, the joy of the King at the death of his minister; for it saved him from executing the plan he had resolved on.

The suddenness of the disease and death of Louvois caused much talk, especially when, on the opening of the body, it was discovered that he had been poisoned.  A servant was arrested on the charge; but before the trial took place he was liberated, at the express command of the King, and the whole affair was hushed up.  Five or six months afterwards Seron, private physician of Louvois, barricaded himself in his apartment at Versailles, and uttered dreadful cries.  People came but he refused to open; and as the door could not be forced, he went on shrieking all day, without succour, spiritual or temporal, saying at last that he had got what he deserved for what he had done to his master; that he was a wretch unworthy of help; and so he died despairing, in eight or ten hours, without having spoken of any ones or uttered a single name!

CHAPTER LXXVII

It must not be imagined that in order to maintain her position Madame de Maintenon had need of no address.  Her reign, on the contrary, was only one continual intrigue; and that of the King a perpetual dupery.

Her mornings, which she commenced very early, were occupied with obscure audiences for charitable or spiritual affairs.  Pretty often, at eight o’clock in the morning, or earlier, she went to some minister; the ministers of war, above all those of finance, were those with whom she had most business.

Ordinarily as soon as she rose, she went to Saint-Cyr, dined in her apartment there alone, or with some favourite of the house, gave as few audiences as possible, ruled over the arrangements of the establishment, meddled with the affairs of convents, read and replied to letters, directed the affairs of the house, received information and letters from her spies, and returned to Versailles just as the King was ready to enter her rooms.  When older and more infirm, she would lie down in bed on arriving between seven and eight o’clock in the morning at Saint-Cyr, or take some remedy.