CHAPTER 39
Mazarin's Gaming Party
In a large chamber of the Palais Royal, hung with a dark
colored velvet, which threw into strong relief the gilded
frames of a great number of magnificent pictures, on the
evening of the arrival of the two Frenchmen, the whole court
was assembled before the alcove of M. le Cardinal de
Mazarin, who gave a card party to the king and queen.
A small screen separated three prepared tables. At one of
these tables the king and the two queens were seated. Louis
XIV., placed opposite to the young queen, his wife, smiled
upon her with an expression of real happiness. Anne of
Austria held the cards against the cardinal, and her
daughter-in-law assisted her in the game, when she was not
engaged in smiling at her husband. As for the cardinal, who
was lying on his bed with a weary and careworn face, his
cards were held by the Comtesse de Soissons, and he watched
them with an incessant look of interest and cupidity.
The cardinal's face had been painted by Bernouin; but the
rouge, which glowed only on his cheeks, threw into stronger
contrast the sickly pallor of his countenance and the
shining yellow of his brow. His eyes alone acquired a more
brilliant luster from this auxiliary, and upon those sick
man's eyes were, from time to time, turned the uneasy looks
of the king, the queen, and the courtiers. The fact is, that
the two eyes of the Signor Mazarin were the stars more or
less brilliant in which the France of the seventeenth
century read its destiny every evening and every morning.
Monseigneur neither won nor lost; he was, therefore neither
gay nor sad. It was a stagnation in which, full of pity for
him, Anne of Austria would not have willingly left him; but
in order to attract the attention of the sick man by some
brilliant stroke, she must have either won or lost. To win
would have been dangerous, because Mazarin would have
changed his indifference into an ugly grimace; to lose would
likewise have been dangerous, because she must have cheated,
and the infanta, who watched her game, would, doubtless,
have exclaimed against her partiality for Mazarin. Profiting
by this calm, the courtiers were chatting. When not in a bad
humor, M. de Mazarin was a very debonnaire prince, and he,
who prevented nobody from singing, provided they paid, was
not tyrant enough to prevent people from talking, provided
they made up their minds to lose.
They were therefore chatting. At the first table, the king's
younger brother, Philip, Duc d'Anjou, was admiring his
handsome face in the glass of a box. His favorite, the
Chevalier de Lorraine, leaning over the back of the prince's
chair, was listening, with secret envy, to the Comte de
Guiche, another of Philip's favorites, who was relating in
choice terms the various vicissitudes of fortune of the
royal adventurer Charles II. He told, as so many fabulous
events, all the history of his perigrinations in Scotland,
and his terrors when the enemy's party was so closely on his
track, of nights spent in trees, and days spent in hunger
and combats. By degrees, the fate of the unfortunate king
interested his auditors so greatly, that the play languished
even at the royal table, and the young king, with a pensive
look and downcast eye, followed, without appearing to give
any attention to it, the smallest details of this Odyssey,
very picturesquely related by the Comte de Guiche.
The Comtesse de Soissons interrupted the narrator: "Confess,
count, you are inventing."
"Madame, I am repeating like a parrot all the stories
related to me by different Englishmen. To my shame I am
compelled to say, I am as exact as a copy."
"Charles II. would have died before he could have endured
all that."
Louis XIV. raised his intelligent and proud head. "Madame,"
said he, in a grave tone, still partaking something of the
timid child, "monsieur le cardinal will tell you that during
my minority the affairs of France were in jeopardy, -- and
that if I had been older, and obliged to take sword in hand,
it would sometimes have been for the evening meal."
"Thanks to God," said the cardinal, who spoke for the first
time, "your majesty exaggerates, and your supper has always
been ready with that of your servants."
The king colored.
"Oh!" cried Philip, inconsiderately, from his place, and
without ceasing to admire himself, -- "I recollect once, at
Melun, the supper was laid for nobody, and that the king ate
two-thirds of a slice of bread, and abandoned to me the
other third."
The whole assembly, seeing Mazarin smile, began to laugh.
Courtiers flatter kings with the remembrance of past
distresses, as with the hopes of future good fortune.
"It is not to be denied that the crown of France has always
remained firm upon the heads of its kings," Anne of Austria
hastened to say, "and that it has fallen off of that of the
king of England; and when by chance that crown oscillated a
little, -- for there are throne-quakes as well as
earthquakes, -- every time, I say, that rebellion threatened
it, a good victory restored tranquillity."
"With a few gems added to the crown," said Mazarin.
The Comte de Guiche was silent: the king composed his
countenance, and Mazarin exchanged looks with Anne of
Austria, as if to thank her for her intervention.
"It is of no consequence," said Philip, smoothing his hair;
"my cousin Charles is not handsome, but he is very brave,
and fought like a landsknecht; and if he continues to fight
thus, no doubt he will finish by gaining a battle, like
Rocroy ---- "
"He has no soldiers," interrupted the Chevalier de Lorraine.
"The king of Holland, his ally, will give him some. I would
willingly have given him some if I had been king of France."
Louis XIV. blushed excessively. Mazarin affected to be more
attentive to his game than ever.
"By this time," resumed the Comte de Guiche, "the fortune of
this unhappy prince is decided. If he has been deceived by
Monk, he is ruined. Imprisonment, perhaps death, will finish
what exile, battles, and privations have commenced."
Mazarin's brow became clouded.
"Is it certain," said Louis XIV. "that his majesty Charles
II., has quitted the Hague?"
"Quite certain, your majesty," replied the young man; "my
father has received a letter containing all the details; it
is even known that the king has landed at Dover; some
fishermen saw him entering the port; the rest is still a
mystery."
"I should like to know the rest," said Philip, impetuously.
"You know, -- you, my brother."
Louis XIV. colored again. That was the third time within an
hour. "Ask my lord cardinal," replied he, in a tone which
made Mazarin, Anne of Austria, and everybody else open their
eyes.
"That means, my son," said Anne of Austria, laughing, "that
the king does not like affairs of state to be talked of out
of the council."
Philip received the reprimand with good grace, and bowed,
first smiling at his brother, and then his mother. But
Mazarin saw from the corner of his eye that a group was
about to be formed in the corner of the room, and that the
Duc d'Anjou, with the Comte de Guiche, and the Chevalier de
Lorraine, prevented from talking aloud, might say, in a
whisper, what it was not convenient should be said. He was
beginning, then, to dart at them glances full of mistrust
and uneasiness, inviting Anne of Austria to throw
perturbation in the midst of the unlawful assembly, when,
suddenly, Bernouin, entering from behind the tapestry of the
bedroom, whispered in the ear of Mazarin, "Monseigneur, an
envoy from his majesty, the king of England."
Mazarin could not help exhibiting a slight emotion, which
was perceived by the king. To avoid being indiscreet, rather
than to appear useless, Louis XIV. rose immediately, and
approaching his eminence, wished him good-night. All the
assembly had risen with a great noise of rolling of chairs
and tables being pushed away.
"Let everybody depart by degrees," said Mazarin in a whisper
to Louis XIV., "and be so good as to excuse me a few
minutes. I am going to dispatch an affair about which I wish
to converse with your majesty this very evening."
"And the queens?" asked Louis XIV.
"And M. le Duc d'Anjou," said his eminence.
At the same time he turned round in his ruelle, the curtains
of which, in falling, concealed the bed. The cardinal,
nevertheless, did not lose sight of the conspirators.
"M. le Comte de Guiche," said he, in a fretful voice, whilst
putting on, behind the curtain, his dressing-gown, with the
assistance of Bernouin.
"I am here, my lord," said the young man, as he approached.
"Take my cards, you are lucky. Win a little money for me of
these gentlemen."
"Yes, my lord."
The young man sat down at the table from which the king
withdrew to talk with the two queens. A serious game was
commenced between the comte and several rich courtiers. In
the meantime Philip was discussing the questions of dress
with the Chevalier de Lorraine, and they had ceased to hear
the rustling of the cardinal's silk robe from behind the
curtain. His eminence had followed Bernouin into the closet
adjoining the bedroom.
