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Updated: September 29, 2025
He was no longer, therefore, a man overwhelmed by misfortune and reduced to resort to expedients; he held his head proudly erect, and indicated by a gesture that Vanel could enter. He was now the first minister of the state, and in his own palace. Aramis knew the superintendent well; the delicacy of the feelings of his heart and the exalted nature of his mind no longer surprised him.
"'My wife, replied Vanel, 'had estimated it at about fourteen hundred thousand. "'Ready money? I said. "'Yes; she has sold some property of hers in Guienne, and has received the purchase money." "That's a pretty sum to touch all at once," said the Abbe Fouquet, who had not hitherto said a word. "Poor Madame Vanel!" murmured Fouquet.
Colbert was obliged to lean against a column of the fireplace. "To a councilor belonging to the parliament, sire, whose name is Vanel." "Vanel?" "Yes, sire, a particular friend of the intendant Colbert," added Fouquet; letting every word fall from his lips with the most inimitable nonchalance, and with an admirably assumed expression of forgetfulness and ignorance.
Aramis cast a look almost of despair at Fouquet, and then, going straight up to Vanel and taking hold of him by the coat, in a familiar manner, he said, "Monsieur Vanel, it is neither the inconvenience, nor the displacement of your money, nor the sale of your wife's property even, that you are thinking of at this moment; it is something more important still.
"Then, as Madame Vanel was obliged to quit M. Colbert for an instant to receive a visitor, and as M. Colbert is industrious, scarcely was the new intendant left alone, before he took a pencil from his pocket, and, there was paper on the table, began to make notes." "Exactly." "I should like to know what those notes were about." "And that is just what I have brought you."
I entreat you to restore it to me." Fouquet suddenly paused. The words "I entreat you," the effect of which he did not immediately perceive, seemed almost to choke him as he uttered it. Aramis, still playing with his knife, fixed a look upon Vanel which seemed as if he wished to penetrate the recesses of his heart.
"Well!" inquired La Fontaine, "what about my negotiation?" "Admirable, my dear poet." "Yes," said Gourville; "but there are some people who are anxious to have the steed who have not even money enough to pay for the bridle." "And Vanel would draw back from his offer if he were to be taken at his word," continued the Abbe Fouquet. "I do not believe it," said La Fontaine.
M. Colbert got into his carriage and the distinguished trio commenced a sufficiently slow pilgrimage toward the wood of Vincennes. Madame de Chevreuse set down Madame Vanel at her husband's house, and, left alone with M. Colbert, chatted upon affairs whilst continuing her ride.
Fouquet held out his hand to him, and, at the very moment, a richly ornamented tortoise-shell clock, supported by golden figures, which was standing on a console table opposite to the fireplace, struck six. The sound of a door being opened in the vestibule was heard, and Gourville came to the door of the cabinet to inquire if Fouquet would received M. Vanel.
"Well, this pencil was a lead-pencil, consequently hard; so, it marked in black upon the first sheet, and in white upon the second." "Go on." "Colbert, when tearing off the first sheet, took no notice of the second." "Well?" "Well, on the second was to be read what had been written on the first; Madame Vanel read it, and sent for me." "Yes, yes."
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