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Updated: May 14, 2025
As if she only awaited this signal to discharge her shaft, Marguerite exclaimed, "Well, Elise, it is said you are in love." And she looked fixedly at Madame de Belliere, who blushed against her will. "Women can never escape slander," replied the marquise, after a moment's pause. "No one slanders you, Elise." "What! people say that I am in love, and yet they do not slander me!"
"Infamous!" murmured Madame de Belliere, tortured by her friend's merciless delight. "M. Fouquet, I should think, must certainly have four millions," she replied, courageously. "If he has those which the king requires to-day," said Marguerite, "he will not, perhaps, possess those which the king will demand in a month or so." "The king will exact money from him again, then?"
Marguerite said, or rather muttered a few words, which Madame de Belliere did not even hear. As soon, however, as the marquise had disappeared, her envious enemy, not being able to resist the desire to satisfy herself that her suspicions were well founded, advanced stealthily like a panther, and seized the envelope.
"Gentlemen," he said, "all this plate which you behold once belonged to Madame de Belliere, who, having observed one of her friends in great distress, sent all this gold and silver, together with the heap of jewels now before her, to her goldsmith. This noble conduct of a devoted friend can well be understood by such friends as you. Happy indeed is that man who sees himself loved in such a manner.
Fouquet, who had risen from his seat at the same moment as Madame de Belliere, remained for a moment plunged in thought; then suddenly starting back, he turned pale, and sank down in his chair, concealing his face in his hands. "Madame, madame," he murmured, "what opinion can you have of me, when you make me such an offer?" "Of you!" returned the marquise.
Du Guesclin was attended by the flower of the French nobility, including the Marshal de Beaumanoir, Olivier de Mauny, Bertrand de Saint Pern, and the Viscount de la Belliere, while the Englishman appeared with no more than the customary retinue of two seconds, two squires, two coutilliers, or daggermen, and two trumpeters.
"Do not let us talk about it, then," said Madame de Belliere, who detected the ill-nature that was concealed by all these prefaces, yet felt the most anxious curiosity on the subject. "Well, then, my dear marquise, it is said, for some time past, you no longer continue to regret Monsieur de Belliere as you used to." "It is an ill-natured report, Marguerite.
This gloomy gentleness of manner, this smiling sadness of expression, which had replaced his former excessive joy, produced an indescribable effect upon Madame de Belliere, who was regarding him at a distance.
"Yes, madame; but it was not expected that your ladyship would leave for Belliere for the next few days." "All my jewels and articles of value, then, are packed up?" "Yes, madame; but hitherto we have been in the habit of leaving them in Paris. Your ladyship does not generally take your jewels with you into the country." "But they are all in order, you say?" "Yes, in your ladyship's own room."
As she leaned back on the sofa on which she was sitting, Madame de Belliere covered the paper with the thick folds of her large silk dress, and so concealed it. "Come, Marguerite, tell me, is it to tell me all these foolish reports that you have come to see me so early in the day?"
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