Chapter XXXI. Mademoiselle de la Valliere's Pocket-Handkerchief.
Madame was not bad-hearted--she was only hasty and impetuous. The kingwas not imprudent--he was simply in love. Hardly had they entered intothis compact, which terminated in La Valliere's recall, when they bothsought to make as much as they could by their bargain. The king wishedto see La Valliere every moment of the day, while Madame, who wassensible of the king's annoyance ever since he had so entreated her,would not relinquish her revenge on La Valliere without a contest. Sheplanted every conceivable difficulty in the king's path; he was,in fact, obliged, in order to get a glimpse of La Valliere, to beexceedingly devoted in his attentions to his sister-in-law, and this,indeed, was Madame's plan of policy. As she had chosen some one tosecond her efforts, and as this person was our old friend Montalais,the king found himself completely hemmed in every time he paid Madamea visit; he was surrounded, and was never left a moment alone. Madamedisplayed in her conversation a charm of manner and brilliancy of witwhich dazzled everybody. Montalais followed her, and soon renderedherself perfectly insupportable to the king, which was, in fact, thevery thing she expected would happen. She then set Malicorne at theking, who found means of informing his majesty that there was a youngperson belonging to the court who was exceedingly miserable; and onthe king inquiring who this person was, Malicorne replied that itwas Mademoiselle de Montalais. To this the king answered that it wasperfectly just that a person should be unhappy when she rendered othersso. Whereupon Malicorne explained how matters stood; for he had receivedhis directions from Montalais. The king began to open his eyes; heremarked that, as soon as he made his appearance, Madame made hers too;that she remained in the corridors until after he had left; that sheaccompanied him back to his own apartments, fearing that he might speakin the ante-chambers to one of her maids of honor. One evening she wentfurther still. The king was seated, surrounded by the ladies who werepresent, and holding in his hand, concealed by his lace ruffle, a smallnote which he wished to slip into La Valliere's hand. Madame guessedboth his intention and the letter too. It was difficult to prevent theking going wherever he pleased, and yet it was necessary to prevent hisgoing near La Valliere, or speaking to her, as by so doing he couldlet the note fall into her lap behind her fan, or into herpocket-handkerchief. The king, who was also on the watch, suspected thata snare was being laid for him. He rose and pushed his chair, withoutaffectation, near Mademoiselle de Chatillon, with whom he began totalk in a light tone. They were amusing themselves making rhymes; fromMademoiselle de Chatillon he went to Montalais, and then to Mademoisellede Tonnay-Charente. And thus, by this skillful maneuver, he foundhimself seated opposite to La Valliere, whom he completely concealed.Madame pretended to be greatly occupied, altering a group of flowersthat she was working in tapestry. The king showed the corner of hisletter to La Valliere, and the latter held out her handkerchief witha look that signified, "Put the letter inside." Then, as the king hadplaced his own handkerchief upon his chair, he was adroit enough to letit fall on the ground, so that La Valliere slipped her handkerchief onthe chair. The king took it up quietly, without any one observing whathe did, placed the letter within it, and returned the handkerchief tothe place he had taken it from. There was only just time for La Valliereto stretch out her hand to take hold of the handkerchief with itsvaluable contents.
But Madame, who had observed everything that had passed, said toMademoiselle de Chatillon, "Chatillon, be good enough to pick up theking's handkerchief, if you please; it has fallen on the carpet."
The young girl obeyed with the utmost precipitation, the king havingmoved from his seat, and La Valliere being in no little degree nervousand confused.
"Ah! I beg your majesty's pardon," said Mademoiselle de Chatillon; "youhave two handkerchiefs, I perceive."
And the king was accordingly obliged to put into his pocket LaValliere's handkerchief as well as his own. He certainly gained thatsouvenir of Louise, who lost, however, a copy of verses which had costthe king ten hours' hard labor, and which, as far as he was concerned,was perhaps as good as a long poem. It would be impossible to describethe king's anger and La Valliere's despair; but shortly afterwards acircumstance occurred which was more than remarkable. When the kingleft, in order to retire to his own apartments, Malicorne, informedof what had passed, one can hardly tell how, was waiting in theante-chamber. The ante-chambers of the Palais Royal are naturally verydark, and, in the evening, they were but indifferently lighted. Nothingpleased the king more than this dim light. As a general rule, love,whose mind and heart are constantly in a blaze, contemns all light,except the sunshine of the soul. And so the ante-chamber was dark; apage carried a torch before the king, who walked on slowly, greatlyannoyed at what had recently occurred. Malicorne passed close to theking, almost stumbled against him in fact, and begged his forgivenesswith the profoundest humility; but the king, who was in an exceedinglyill-temper, was very sharp in his reproof to Malicorne, who disappearedas soon and as quietly as he possibly could. Louis retired to rest,having had a misunderstanding with the queen; and the next day, as soonas he entered the cabinet, he wished to have La Valliere's handkerchiefin order to press his lips to it. He called his valet.
"Fetch me," he said, "the coat I wore yesterday evening, but be verysure you do not touch anything it may contain."
The order being obeyed, the king himself searched the pocket of thecoat; he found only one handkerchief, and that his own; La Valliere'shad disappeared. Whilst busied with all kinds of conjectures andsuspicions, a letter was brought to him from La Valliere; it ran thus:
"How good and kind of you to have sent me those beautiful verses; howfull of ingenuity and perseverance your affection is; how is it possibleto help loving you so dearly!"
"What does this mean?" thought the king; "there must be some mistake.Look well about," said he to the valet, "for a pocket-handkerchiefmust be in one of my pockets; and if you do not find it, or if you havetouched it--" He reflected for a moment. To make a state matter of theloss of the handkerchief would be to act absurdly, and he thereforeadded, "There was a letter of some importance inside the handkerchief,which had somehow got among the folds of it."
"Sire," said the valet, "your majesty had only one handkerchief, andthat is it."
"True, true," replied the king, setting his teeth hard together. "Oh,poverty, how I envy you! Happy is the man who can empty his own pocketsof letters and handkerchiefs!"
He read La Valliere's letter over again, endeavoring to imagine in whatconceivable way his verses could have reached their destination. Therewas a postscript to the letter:
"I send you back by your messenger this reply, so unworthy of what yousent me."
"So far so good; I shall find out something now," he said delightedly."Who is waiting, and who brought me this letter?"
"M. Malicorne," replied the _valet de chambre_, timidly.
"Desire him to come in."
Malicorne entered.
"You come from Mademoiselle de la Valliere?" said the king, with a sigh.
"Yes, sire."
"And you took Mademoiselle de la Valliere something from me?"
"I, sire?"
"Yes, you."
"Oh, no, sire."
"Mademoiselle de la Valliere says so, distinctly."
"Oh, sire, Mademoiselle de la Valliere is mistaken."
The king frowned. "What jest is this?" he said; "explain yourself. Whydoes Mademoiselle de la Valliere call you my messenger? What did youtake to that lady? Speak, monsieur, and quickly."
"Sire, I merely took Mademoiselle de la Valliere a pocket-handkerchief,that was all."
"A handkerchief,--what handkerchief?"
"Sire, at the very moment when I had the misfortune to stumble againstyour majesty yesterday--a misfortune which I shall deplore to thelast day of my life, especially after the dissatisfaction which youexhibited--I remained, sire, motionless with despair, your majesty beingat too great a distance to hear my excuses, when I saw something whitelying on th
e ground."
"Ah!" said the king.
"I stooped down,--it was a pocket-handkerchief. For a moment I had anidea that when I stumbled against your majesty I must have been thecause of the handkerchief falling from your pocket; but as I felt it allover very respectfully, I perceived a cipher at one of the corners,and, on looking at it closely, I found that it was Mademoiselle de laValliere's cipher. I presumed that on her way to Madame's apartment inthe earlier part of the evening she had let her handkerchief fall, andI accordingly hastened to restore it to her as she was leaving; and thatis all I gave to Mademoiselle de la Valliere, I entreat your majesty tobelieve." Malicorne's manner was so simple, so full of contrition, andmarked with such extreme humility, that the king was greatly amused inlistening to him. He was as pleased with him for what he had done as ifhe had rendered him the greatest service.
"This is the second fortunate meeting I have had with you, monsieur," hesaid; "you may count upon my good intentions."
The plain and sober truth was, that Malicorne had picked the king'spocket of the handkerchief as dexterously as any of the pickpockets ofthe good city of Paris could have done. Madame never knew of this littleincident, but Montalais gave La Valliere some idea of the manner inwhich it had really happened, and La Valliere afterwards told the king,who laughed exceedingly at it and pronounced Malicorne to be a firstrate politician. Louis XIV. was right, and it is well known that he wastolerably well acquainted with human nature.