The most relieved of all was M. le Duc d’Orleans.  For a long time he had groaned in secret beneath the weight of a domination so harsh, and of chains he had forged for himself.  Not only he could no longer dispose or decide upon anything, but he could get the Cardinal to do nothing, great or small, he desired done.  He was obliged, in everything, to follow the will of the Cardinal, who became furious, reproached him, and stormed at him when too much contradicted.  The poor Prince felt thus the abandonment into which he had cast himself, and, by this abandonment, the power of the Cardinal, and the eclipse of his own power.  He feared him; Dubois had become insupportable to him; he was dying with desire, as was shown in a thousand things, to get rid of him, but he dared not—­he did not know how to set about it; and, isolated and unceasingly wretched as he was, there was nobody to whom he could unbosom himself; and the Cardinal, well informed of this, increased his freaks, so as to retain by fear what he had usurped by artifice, and what he no longer hoped to preserve in any other way.

As soon as Dubois was dead, M. le Duc d’Orleans returned to Meudon, to inform the King of the event.  The King immediately begged him to charge himself with the management of public affairs, declared him prime minister, and received, the next day, his oath, the patent of which was immediately sent to the Parliament, and verified.  This prompt declaration was caused by the fear Frejus had to see a private person prime minister.  The King liked M. le Duc d’Orleans, as we have already seen by the respect he received from him, and by his manner of working with him.  The Regent, without danger of being taken at his word, always left him master of all favours, and of the choice of persons he proposed to him; and, besides, never bothered him, or allowed business to interfere with his amusements.  In spite of all the care and all the suppleness Dubois had employed in order to gain the spirit of the King, he never could succeed, and people remarked, without having wonderful eyes, a very decided repugnance of the King for him.  The Cardinal was afflicted, but redoubled his efforts, in the hope at last of success.  But, in addition to his own disagreeable manners, heightened by the visible efforts he made to please, he had two enemies near the King, very watchful to keep him away from the young prince—­the Marechal de Villeroy, while he was there, and Frejus, who was much more dangerous, and who was resolved to overthrow him.  Death, as we have seen, spared him the trouble.

The Court returned from Meudon to Paris on the 13th of August.  Soon after I met M. le Duc d’Orleans there.

As soon as he saw me enter his cabinet he ran to me, and eagerly asked me if I meant to abandon him.  I replied that while his Cardinal lived I felt I should be useless to him, but that now this obstacle was removed, I should always be very humbly at his service.  He promised to live with me on the same terms as before, and, without a word upon the Cardinal, began to talk about home and foreign affairs.  If I flattered myself that I was to be again of use to him for any length of time, events soon came to change the prospect.  But I will not anticipate my story.