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Updated: June 16, 2025
The unabated rigor of Fouquet's prison had convinced his friends that it was useless to hope for clemency, and that it might be difficult to save his life. The King was as malignant as at first; Colbert and Le Tellier as venomous, as if it had been a question of Fouquet's head or their own. They talked about justice, affected moderation, and deceived nobody.
It is to me even touching to see how he insists on Fouquet's honour; not seeing, you might think, that unflawed honour is impossible to spendthrifts; but rather, perhaps, in the light of his own life, seeing it too well, and clinging the more to what was left. Honour can survive a wound; it can live and thrive without a member.
Madame de Belliere had more strength, and was well paid for it; she received Fouquet's last kiss. Pelisson easily explained this precipitate departure by saying that an order from the king had summoned the minister to Nantes. As Gourville had seen, the king's musketeers were mounting and following their captain.
The highest and noblest of France came to stare at Fouquet's magnificence, to wonder at the strange birds and beasts, and to admire the fountains and cascades. After a walk about the grounds, the august company were served with supper in the château. Vatel was the maître d'hôtel.
The king, in fact, was entering the city, which soon resounded with the cannon from the ramparts, and from a vessel which replied from the lower parts of the river. Fouquet's brow darkened; he called his valets de chambre and dressed in ceremonial costume.
It all sounds perfectly delightful, and I have secured a copy of the Vicomte de Bragelonne, at Brentano's, in order to read over again his account of Fouquet's reception of the King at Vaux. We shall be glad to see Fontainebleau again.
At the foot of the stairs, and while he was on the first step, he seized me by the arm, and raising his shako, whispered in my ear: "Look, Joseph, do you recognize that?" I saw the old tri-colored cockade in the lining. "That is ours," he said, "all the soldiers have it." I hardly had time to glance at it when he shook my hand and, turning away, hurried to Fouquet's corner.
When the device was interpreted, the measure of his wrath was full. He was on the point of ordering Fouquet's instant arrest; but the Queen-Mother persuaded him to wait until every precaution had been taken. After supper, the guests were conducted to the play. The theatre was at the end of an alley of pines, almost al fresco.
"Decidedly," he said to himself, "this mansion has no other limits than the pillars of the habitable world. Is it probable Porthos has taken it into his head to go back to Pierrefonds without even leaving M. Fouquet's house?"
"My dear lord, it was the uncertainty and ignorance in which I was as to where you were to be found." "You would have found the money you require at M. Fouquet's, for he is a man whose hand is always open." "I swear that I should never have ventured to ask M. Fouquet for money. I only wished to ask him for your address."
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