"That, madame," said he, "that is not the interesting part of my situation. I made, two days ago, a little donation to the king; up to this time, from delicacy, no doubt, his majesty has not condescended to say anything about it; but the time for explanation is come, and I implore your majesty to tell me if the king has made up his mind on that matter."
Anne of Austria was about to reply, when Mazarin stopped her.
"The truth, madame," said he - "in the name of Heaven, the truth! Do not flatter a dying man with a hope that may prove vain." There he stopped, a look from Colbert telling him he was on the wrong track.
"I know," said Anne of Austria, taking the cardinal's hand, "I know that you have generously made, not a little donation, as you modestly call it, but a magnificent gift. I know how painful it would be to you if the king - "
Mazarin listened, dying as he was, as ten living men could not have listened.
"If the king - " replied he.
"If the king," continued Anne of Austria, "should not freely accept what you offer so nobly."
Mazarin allowed himself to sink back upon his pillow like Pantaloon; that is to say, with all the despair of a man who bows before the tempest; but he still preserved sufficient strength and presence of mind to cast upon Colbert one of those looks which are well worth ten sonnets, which is to say, ten long poems.
"Should you not," added the queen, "have considered the refusal of the king as a sort of insult?" Mazarin rolled his head about upon his pillow, without articulating a syllable. The queen was deceived, or feigned to be deceived, by this demonstration.
"Therefore," resumed she, "I have circumvented him with good counsels; and as certain minds, jealous, no doubt, of the glory you are about to acquire by this generosity, have endeavored to prove to the king that he ought not to accept this donation, I have struggled in your favor, and so well I have struggled, that you will not have, I hope, that distress to undergo."
"Ah!" murmured Mazarin, with languishing eyes, "ah! that is a service I shall never forget for a single minute of the few hours I still have to live."
"I must admit," continued the queen, "that it was not without trouble I rendered it to your eminence."
"Ah, _peste!_ I believe that. Oh! oh!"
"Good God! what is the matter?"
"I am burning!"
"Do you suffer much?"
"As much as one of the damned."
Colbert would have liked to sink through the floor.
"So, then," resumed Mazarin, "your majesty thinks that the king - " he stopped several seconds - "that the king is coming here to offer me some small thanks?"
"I think so," said queen. Mazarin annihilated Colbert with his last look.
At that moment the ushers announced that the king was in the ante- chambers, which were filled with people. This announcement produced a stir of which Colbert took advantage to escape by the door of the _ruelle_. Anne of Austria arose, and awaited her son, standing. Louis XIV. appeared at the threshold of the door, with his eyes fixed upon the dying man, who did not even think it worth while to notice that majesty from whom he thought he had nothing more to expect. An usher placed an armchair close to the bed. Louis bowed to his mother, then to the cardinal, and sat down. The queen took a seat in her turn.
Then, as the king looked behind him, the usher understood that look, and made a sign to the courtiers who filled up the doorway to go out, which they instantly did. Silence fell upon the chamber with the velvet curtains. The king, still very young, and very timid in the presence of him who had been his master from his birth, still respected him much, particularly now, in the supreme majesty of death. He did not dare, therefore, to begin the conversation, feeling that every word must have its weight not only upon things of this world, but of the next. As to the cardinal, at that moment he had but one thought - his donation. It was not physical pain which gave him that air of despondency, and that lugubrious look; it was the expectation of the thanks that were about to issue from the king's mouth, and cut off all hope of restitution.
Mazarin was the first to break the silence. "Is your majesty come to make any stay at Vincennes?" said he.
Louis made an affirmative sign with his head.
"That is a gracious favor," continued Mazarin, "granted to a dying man, and which will render death less painful to him."
"I hope," replied the king, "I am come to visit, not a dying man, but a sick man, susceptible of cure."
Mazarin replied by a movement of the head.
"Your majesty is very kind; but I know more than you on that subject.
The last visit, sire," said he, "the last visit."
"If it were so, monsieur le cardinal," said Louis, "I would come a last time to ask the counsels of a guide to whom I owe everything."
Anne of Austria was a woman; she could not restrain her tears. Louis showed himself much affected, and Mazarin still more than his two guests, but from very different motives. Here the silence returned. The queen wiped her eyes, and the king resumed his firmness.
"I was saying," continued the king, "that I owed much to your eminence."
The eyes of the cardinal had devoured the king, for he felt the great moment had come. "And," continued Louis, "the principal object of my visit was to offer you very sincere thanks for the last evidence of friendship you have kindly sent me."
The cheeks of the cardinal became sunken, his lips partially opened, and the most lamentable sigh he had ever uttered was about to issue from his chest.
"Sire," said he, "I shall have despoiled my poor family; I shall have ruined all who belong to me, which may be imputed to me as an error; but, at least, it shall not be said of me that I have refused to sacrifice everything to my king."
Anne of Austria's tears flowed afresh.
"My dear Monsieur Mazarin," said the king, in a more serious tone than might have been expected from his youth, "you have misunderstood me, apparently."
Mazarin raised himself upon his elbow.
"I have no purpose to despoil your dear family, nor to ruin your servants. Oh, no, that must never be!"