"I knew how to point the Bastille cannon at the troops of the King," she replied; "but he was very young then. No matter, I will go and see him;if he is my King, I am his cousin; if he has his crotchets, I have my love and my will. He can't do anything, my dear Lauzun; I love you as once he loved La Valliere, as to-day he loves Montespan; I am not afraid of him. As for the permission, I know our history by heart, and I will prove to him by a hundred examples that, from the time of Charlemagne up to the present time, widows and daughters of kings have married mere noblemen. These nobleman may have been most meritorious,--I only know them from history,--but not one of them was as worthy as you."So saying, she asked for her fan, her gloves, and her horses, and attended by her grooms-in-waiting, she went to the King in person.
The King listened to her from beginning to end, and then remarked, "You refused the Kings of Denmark, Portugal, Spain, and England, and you wish to marry my captain of the guard, the Marquis de Lauzun?""Yes, Sire, for I place him above all monarchs,--yourself alone excepted.""Do you love him immensely?"
"More than I can possibly say; a thousand, a hundred thousand times more than myself.""Do you think he is equally devoted to you?"--"That would be impossible,"she tranquilly answered; "but his love for me is delicate, tender; and such friendship suffices me.""My cousin, in all that there is self-interest. I entreat you to reflect. The world, as you know, is a mocking world; you want to excite universal derision and injure the respect which is due to the place that I fill.""Ah, Sire, do not wound me! I fling myself at your feet. Have compassion upon M. de Lauzun, and pity my tears. Do not exercise your power; let him be the consolation of my life; let me marry him."The King, no longer able to hide his disgust and impatience, said, "Cousin, you are now a good forty-four years old; at that age you ought to be able to take care of yourself. Spare me all your grievances, and do what pleases you."On leaving Mademoiselle, he came to my apartment and told me about all this nonsense. I then informed him of what I had heard by letter the day before. Lauzun, while still carrying on with the fastest ladies of the Court and the town, had just wheedled the Princess into making him a present of twenty millions,--a most extravagant gift.
"This is too much!" exclaimed the King; and he at once caused a letter to be despatched to Mademoiselle and her lover, telling them that their intimacy must cease, and that things must go no farther.
But the audacious Lauzun found means to suborn a well-meaning simpleton of a priest, who married them secretly the very same day.
The King's indignation and resentment may well be imagined. He had his captain of the guard arrested and sent as a prisoner to Pignerol.
On this occasion, M. de Lauzun complained bitterly of me; he invented the most absurd tales about me, even saying that he had struck me in my own apartments, after taunting me to my face with "our old intimacy."That is false; he reproached me with nothing, for there was nothing to reproach. Shortly after the Princess's grand scene, he came and begged me to intercede on his behalf. I only made a sort of vague promise, and he knew well enough that, in the great world, a vague promise is the same as a refusal.
For more than six months I had to stanch the tears and assuage the grief of Mademoiselle. So tiresome to me did this prove, that she alone well-nigh sufficed to make me quit the Court.
Such sorrowing and chagrin made her lose the little beauty that still remained to her; nothing seemed more incongruous and ridiculous than to hear this elderly grand lady talking perpetually about "her dearest darling, the prisoner."At the time I write he is at Pignerol; his bad disposition is forever getting him into trouble. She sends him lots of money unknown to the King, who generally knows everything. All this money he squanders or gambles away, and when funds are low, says, "The old lady will send us some."
