The Queen’s ladies had been entertaining their friends, and the antechamber was well filled with a company of the most fashionable and powerful of the noblesse, particularly of those high-born ladies and gentlemen who devoted whatever time they could spare from breaking the Ten Commandments with a dulcet courtesy to the amusement of political intrigue. Strangely enough the Queen’s friends were drawn from three very different types—there were the “devout,” les dévots, les rigoristes, to whom the free-thinking of the fashionable philosophers coming to be the mode in the Faubourg St. Germain was anathema maranatha, my lords of the hierarchy of the bishops, with the high-born women who were their obedient pupils; there were the “fribbles,” the great seigneurs with their wives and sisters and daughters privileged morally as well as politically if only the breach were made within their own class and with due regard to etiquette and good manners, the men and women born within the purple who sincerely believed that “God could scarcely condemn a person of that quality” for what would be mortal sin in a bourgeois; and there were the “snobs,” the women above all of the inferior noblesse remorselessly struggling upwards who snatched at the splendid opportunity a queen’s cause and a minister’s cause offered. Monsieur the Dauphin, mesdames the princesses of the blood were known to hate Madame de Pompadour, to be plotting her overthrow; that was enough. Surely with royalty lay the social future.
“Yes, to be sure,” the Abbé St. Victor was explaining with the smile of the lay roué to the Duchesse de Pontchartrain, “the King’s sin would be only one-half as heinous if Madame de Pompadour were simply a widow or even a demoiselle”; he took a pinch of snuff and regretfully shrugged his shoulders.
“Or if she were really vulgar,” the Duchess interposed with the pouting staccato which she knew became her best. “I wonder if all bourgeoise women are like her. She is not vulgar, alas! and really it is her duty to be vulgar. Pontchartrain says she dresses better than I do.”
“That is mere outward show,” the Abbé remarked, “as well as being not true.”
“I wonder,” the Duchess asked with an air of profundity, “if a woman can be vulgar inside without being vulgar outside.”
“She is not a Christian,” Mademoiselle Eugénie pronounced. “That is enough for me.”
“But she goes regularly to mass,” objected the puzzled Duchess.
“To show her fine dresses to the Duke de Pontchartrain,” Mademoiselle retorted with sour severity. “Clothes, Madame, have nothing to do with religion.”
“For heaven’s sake,” cried the Duchess, alarmed, “don’t say so to Pontchartrain. It would put the most embarrassing ideas into his head.”
The Abbé tittered into his lace handkerchief till he was checked by the ferocious glare of the dévotes at his elbow. “You will see how vulgar the Pompadour can be,” he said hurriedly, “when you have turned her out.”
“Inside out or outside in?” asked the Comtesse des Forges to annoy Mademoiselle Eugénie.
“Oh, do let it be soon,” the Duchess pleaded, “whichever way it is.”
The Abbé nodded mysteriously. He was as pleased as the rest of the company that afternoon with the progress of the great plot.
“You saw His Majesty’s confessor?” The Duke de Pontchartrain had drawn Denise into a corner. “Is it satisfactory?”
“Eminently so. His Majesty listened with great attention, and was much impressed, his reverence thought.”
“Good.” The Duke studied Denise’s eyes and figure. What a magnificent coryphée she would have made, to be sure, and how the diamonds he had just given to that perfidious minx Babette would have suited her. “The ministers,” he added quietly, “have followed the confessor’s remonstrances up, I hear. They urged how unpopular the lady was in Paris. His Majesty likes popularity, you know, with the canaille.”
“Yes,” said Denise, “everything is going as we could wish.”
Her eyes, like the Duke’s, had unconsciously crossed the room, where André was talking to the Comtesse des Forges.
“We miss Mont Rouge,” his Grace remarked carelessly. “He was a valuable friend to the cause.” Like the rest of the Court the Duke was ignorant of what had brought about the duel, but the sudden colour in Denise’s cheeks and her silence confirmed his shrewd suspicions. “And,” he added with the same carelessness, “I am not sure that De Nérac is—what shall I say?—altogether a friend.”
“Why do you think that?” Denise asked almost proudly.
The Duke shrugged his shoulders. “My fancy, I suppose,” he answered lightly. “Perhaps, however, our dear, captivating friend yonder will convert him. She could convert St. Anthony if she really tried, eh?”
Denise knew that under this persiflage the Duke was studying her closely and she was greatly relieved that he now bowed himself away. For all his affectation of being a man of pleasure and nothing more she had divined his keen ability and wide knowledge of life. He had talked to test her and she was angry that she could not meet his searching gaiety with the polished impenetrability that was his unique gift. She bitterly resented, too, that André should stand there basking in the languishing eyes of the Comtesse des Forges, who was never happy save when she was making her stammering nincompoop of a husband unhappy. Two days had passed since that painful evening when he had parted from her in the Salle des Gardes de la Reine. He had proved his chivalry; he had triumphantly vindicated her honour; why did he not give her the opportunity to show that his conduct had appealed both to her pride and her heart? Why had he not come to ask and to receive forgiveness? Was it as gossip whispered, that he really preferred the Comtesse des Forges? Or was it, as the Duke had plainly hinted, because he really preferred, what was far worse, the service and rewards of Madame de Pompadour? And reward him the mistress could, poor Denise was thinking; for to the surprise of the Court the King had simply ignored the duel, though in other similar cases both victor and vanquished had been forbidden Versailles for a season. And André was still Captain of the Queen’s Guards. Denise’s foot beat on the floor. Yes, in the King’s private salon André had a powerful protector, herself and her friends a dangerous enemy, yet her pride and gratitude alike forbade her to reveal the truth to her allies—to the Queen, to the ministers, to the dévots, to the nobles working together for a common end.
André saluted her as he passed out. On the threshold he paused to nod quietly to the Chevalier de St. Amant, who was entering. The young man was as gaily dressed as usual, but his boyish face was grave and sad. He whispered something to the Duke de Pontchartrain.
“Good heavens!” exclaimed his Grace, “impossible!”
“I wish it were,” said the Chevalier, “but it is quite true.”
“Dismissed! The Comptroller-General dismissed!” St. Benôit repeated, and the news flew round the room. “But why? Why?”
“It is an intrigue,” the Chevalier explained. “Messieurs Paris, the bankers, who are related to the Pompadour, have refused to do any further business with the Comptroller-General. And so His Majesty has dismissed not the bankers but the minister.”
“You mean,” remarked the Comtesse des Forges, “that the Pompadour has dismissed the Comptroller-General?”
“Exactly.”
The consternation was general. “It is no laughing matter,” the Duke de Pontchartrain pronounced. “This is the first time that that woman or any woman in her position has interfered with high affairs of state. It will not be the last.”
“Ah, I knew she must be vulgar inside,” cried his Duchess triumphantly. “It is a pity she dresses so well. The bankers pay, I suppose.”
“It is an outrage,” Mademoiselle Eugénie said. “The Court must protest.”
“My dear lady,” answered the Duke with his most finished scorn, “when a king owes twenty million livres to a pair of money-lenders and wants twenty million more you will find that it is they, not the Court, who can protest.”
“And that is not all,” the Chevalier proceeded grimly. “His Majesty has been pleased to promise the reversion of the Comptroller-General’s place to the Marquis de Vaudières.”
“Impossible! Impossible!” The consternation increased, for the Marquis till a few weeks before had been better known as Abel Poisson, Madame de Pompadour’s brother.
“Charming,” said the Duke, “if His Majesty must make marquises from the gutter at the bidding of a grisette it is only fair he should enable them to be masters of the public finances and to pay their way by plunder. What is His Majesty’s next whim, Chevalier?”
“What it will be to-morrow, Monseigneur, I cannot say. The King has been pleased to do no more to-day than what I have said.”
“And a very pretty day’s work it has been,” his Grace replied. “Well, ladies, I have only one piece of advice to offer you. Smile, smile, smile, for if you protest Madame la Marquise de Pompadour will turn her attention to you. Do not forget that she has a pretty bourgeoise daughter eight years old to whom the post of maid of honour to her Majesty would be a delightful and profitable education.”
He saluted the company, and taking most of the men with him withdrew, for the situation was sufficiently grave to demand an instant conference.
All the heart and gaiety had already been struck out of the ladies. The Chevalier’s dejected air, so strange to his careless and irrepressible spirit, was the most telling comment on the menace in his news. To the angry indignation and rapid questions of the ladies he now replied with melancholy brevity. The King was infatuated and obdurate, and Madame de Pompadour was plainly determined to make him the instrument of her vulgar vengeance.
“She has captured the King,” the young man remarked in his gloomiest tones. “She will now coerce the Queen. Her ambition is to be mistress of the robes and thus to rule all Versailles.”
The mere suggestion of such an outrage on precedent and etiquette made the ladies speechless with horror. A bourgeoise mistress of the robes! It was unthinkable—blasphemous. As if her Majesty in dressing could take even the simplest garment except from the hands of a princess of the blood or of a duchess.
“You forget, Madame,” the Chevalier remarked drily, “that the King’s will is law. Le Roi gouverne par lui-même.”
They were the words of Louis XIV. To-day they can still be read as the motto of Le Roi Soleil in the centre of the superb ceiling of that Galerie des Glaces at Versailles which enshrines for all generations the imperial ambitions of the king who made it. Arrogant words, but true.
The antechamber became gradually deserted. The Chevalier stood at the window watching the gathering gloom. His dejection was not acting. His boyish face was almost tragic in its gravity. Presently he rose and began to pace up and down, wrestling with his thoughts, until he became suddenly aware that Denise had re-entered and was looking at him in questioning silence.
“Mademoiselle,” he advanced to meet her. “I have no comfort for you. Before long I shall be bidding you adieu for ever.”
Her eyes invited an explanation, but she said nothing.
“I speak seriously,” he proceeded. “You and your friends, Mademoiselle, are aware that I am with you heart and soul in the desire to overthrow this woman who will ruin us all. I have been able in the past, as you know, to do some service to the cause by bringing you information that I learned as His Majesty’s confidential secretary. At your request I have to the best of my power abstained from appearing publicly to be of your party, for His Majesty is suspicious and jealous. But I fear from to-day my services must end.”
“Why?” The single word revealed both anxiety and sympathy.
“His Majesty has signified that for the present he will conduct his private correspondence by himself. It is the first step. The next will be that His Majesty no longer needs my services in any capacity, that I am free,” he laughed with gentle bitterness, “to leave Versailles. Yes, Mademoiselle, I can no longer help your cause.”
“That—that woman—” Denise began.
“Certainly. This is her doing. I stood between her and such secrets as His Majesty was pleased to entrust to me, secrets not known to ministers and to the Court. So long as I was private secretary that woman was not the King’s master. But when I am finally dismissed she will rule the King body and soul.”
“Oh, cannot it be stopped?”
“No, Marquise. I am not as his grace of Pontchartrain a great noble, not even a Comptroller-General. I am the King’s creature, just as she is. His Majesty made me, His Majesty can unmake me to-morrow.”
“This is dreadful,” Denise murmured. “Without your help, your information, your private influence with the King, we shall be beaten, humiliated, ruined. You have been a true friend to our cause, Chevalier.”
The young man bowed. “I have done my best,” he said with unmistakable sincerity; “that Madame de Pompadour should triumph cuts me to the heart. But when I am obliged to leave Versailles her victory will not be my only grief.”
Denise looked up at him. His tone had completely altered.
“I shall leave you, Mademoiselle,” he said simply, “and I love you. Ah! it is the truth, the bare truth. You are a great noble, I am only the Chevalier de St. Amant, a parvenu tolerated by the Court merely because he is useful to them. It is presumption in me to dare to love you. But even a parvenu’s heart can love. This cause is sacred to me because not your beauty, nor your nobility, nor your wealth, but the womanhood that is the greatest gift of God to you has taught me what you are—has taught me that your service can be all that a man could desire.”
“Monsieur——” Denise began, but the words failed her.
“I had hoped that some day I might, perhaps, have dared to do more—to ask for your love in return. But that is impossible—impossible.”
“Is it?” Denise asked in a low voice, almost as if she were talking to herself.
“Yes, Marquise, because you love another.”
She looked up half angrily, half inquiringly. “No,” she answered as he was still silent, “I do not.”
St. Amant resumed his pacing up and down. “Mademoiselle,” he said presently, “are you aware how the King can be stopped in his present course?”
Denise turned eagerly towards him. “Madame de Pompadour,” he added very slowly, “is only a woman, but she has an ally, the Vicomte de Nérac, the ablest, subtlest brain in all Versailles. He is ambitious; he loves the Marquise de Beau Séjour—hear me out, please. Take the Vicomte de Nérac from Madame de Pompadour, make him her enemy, not her friend, and——”
“You believe that?” she interrupted.
“Unfortunately it cannot be done,” he replied with decision. “André de Nérac has chosen his party and he will not be turned aside. Therefore the only other course is to ruin him. Publish to the world that he is Madame’s spy, that he has the key of Madame’s secret passage in his pocket, publish what I have told you and you compel me to keep a secret, and you can ruin him to-morrow.”
Denise drew a deep breath. Something like terror shone in her eyes.
“I have information,” continued the Chevalier very quietly, “that if made known to the King would ruin the Vicomte to-night. Am I to use it or not? It is for you, Marquise, to say.”
Denise’s lips paled. Her hand unconsciously crept to her throat. “What sort of information?” she asked in a dry whisper.
“That, Mademoiselle, must be my secret. But I do not jest when I say that you can ruin Madame de Pompadour to-day, but you will also most certainly ruin the Vicomte de Nérac at the same time. Am I to keep silent or to reveal the whole truth to the Comte d’Argenson and the President of the Council of Ministers?”
Denise stood pale and trembling. Her eyes looked on her questioner with a dumb piteousness cruel to behold.
“You have answered me, Marquise,” he replied after an agitating pause. “I shall hold my tongue, and forgive me, I beg, that I have been so merciless. But love is merciless and blind.” He took her hand. “If you doubt that a parvenu can love you better far than he loves himself, think of my silence. When I am driven from Versailles do not forget that I refused to speak the truth of one who regards me as his enemy, at your bidding. Adieu!”
In the doorway he paused to look back. For a moment he wavered. Denise had stumbled to a chair and was crying softly. “Soit!” he muttered, throwing up his head, “Soit!” and humming a reckless catch he strode down the gallery.