“I shall precede your Majesty,” replied the minister.  “You see that death has already conquered my limbs; but while I have a head to think and a hand to write, I shall be at the service of your Majesty.”

“And I am sure it was your intention to add, ‘a heart to love me.’”

“Can your Majesty doubt it?” answered the Cardinal, frowning, and biting his lips impatiently at this speech.

“Sometimes I doubt it,” replied the King.  “Listen:  I wish to speak openly to you, and to complain of you to yourself.  There are two things which have been upon my conscience these three years.  I have never mentioned them to you; but I reproached you secretly; and could anything have induced me to consent to any proposals contrary to your interest, it would be this recollection.”

There was in this speech that frankness natural to weak minds, who seek by thus making their ruler uneasy, to compensate for the harm they dare not do him, and revenge their subjection by a childish controversy.

Richelieu perceived by these words that he had run a great risk; but he saw at the same time the necessity of venting all his spleen, and, to facilitate the explosion of these important avowals, he accumulated all the professions he thought most calculated to provoke the King.

“No, no!” his Majesty at length exclaimed, “I shall believe nothing until you have explained those two things, which are always in my thoughts, which were lately mentioned to me, and which I can justify by no reasoning.  I mean the trial of Urbain Grandier, of which I was never well informed, and the reason for the hatred you bore to my unfortunate mother, even to her very ashes.”

“Is this all, Sire?” said Richelieu.  “Are these my only faults?  They are easily explained.  The first it was necessary to conceal from your Majesty because of its horrible and disgusting details of scandal.  There was certainly an art employed, which can not be looked upon as guilty, in concealing, under the title of ‘magic,’ crimes the very names of which are revolting to modesty, the recital of which would have revealed dangerous mysteries to the innocent; this was a holy deceit practised to hide these impurities from the eyes of the people.”

“Enough, enough, Cardinal,” said Louis XIII, turning away his head, and looking downward, while a blush covered his face; “I can not hear more.  I understand you; these explanations would disgust me.  I approve your motives; ’tis well.  I had not been told that; they had concealed these dreadful vices from me.  Are you assured of the proofs of these crimes?”

“I have them all in my possession, Sire; and as to the glorious Queen, Marie de Medicis, I am surprised that your Majesty can forget how much I was attached to her.  Yes, I do not fear to acknowledge it; it is to her I owe my elevation.  She was the first who deigned to notice the Bishop of Luton, then only twenty-two years of age, to place me near her.  What have I not suffered when she compelled me to oppose her in your Majesty’s interest!  But this sacrifice was made for you.  I never had, and never shall have, to regret it.”