The making of a king (35 page)

In spite of the lull in the hostilities between the Princes and the Regent, Paris continued to be far from tranquil. Every man's hand was against every man where rival interests conflicted ; nor was any means of injuring an enemy despised, whether it took the form of stabbing a foe in the open streets or recourse

was had to more secret and unobtrusive methods. The Due de Bellegarde, Grand Equerry, more commonly called M. le Grand, was, if report did him no wrong, engaged about this time in a private enterprise of his own, of this last kind, directed against the Concini couple.

Bellegarde was a prominent figure at Court. A close attendant upon the late King, he had been a frequent guest at Saint-Germain in Louis's childish days, and the strong liking entertained for him by the boy would in itself have sufficed to render him an object of suspicion.

" Here is an honest man," Louis had remarked, taking hold of the Duke's beard with a laugh, as he received the formal salutations of the Knights of the Holy Ghost at Rheims ; and Heroard notes that, on the return of the Grand Equerry, after an absence, in the course of the present year, the King made him welcome cc avec transport."

These facts alone would have caused him to be regarded with jealousy by other aspirants to Louis's favour ; it was also natural that, as an attached servant of Henri's, Bellegarde should, for his part, have been in opposition to Concini and his wife, and anxious to combat their influence. Despairing, as Richelieu surmised, of compassing his purpose by legitimate and human means, he resolved to resort to diabolical methods. There was at Paris a certain Moisset who, from a simple tailor, had risen to wealth and opulence, and was likewise understood to indulge in illicit practices. This gentleman was said to have offered to put Belle-garde into communication with persons who, by means

of an enchanted mirror, would supply him with accurate information as to the degree of favour enjoyed by the Marquis and his wife, and who would moreover enable him to secure the like for himself. The Duke was reported to have fallen in readily with the suggestion ; but, before it had been put into operation, the Concini had got wind of the affair, apparently through the very dealers in the black art who were to have been employed against them ; the matter was taken up by the Queen, and for a time the ruin of the Grand Equerry appeared imminent.

Such was one account of the matter. The Tuscan Secretary, Ammirato, gave a more definite colour to the transaction. According to him the plot, whatever it was, had been revealed to the Regent and the Chancellor by a Spaniard introduced by the papal Nuncio. This man reported that certain persons he named were implicated in a design, by means of a mirror, to inspire the Queen with love, and thus to gain control over her will. Moisset and Bellegarde were denounced as guilty ; and Guise, at this time closely allied to the latter, hurried to Normandy, where his friend was, to bring him to Paris to answer to the charge. Bellegarde, as might have been expected, indignantly asserted his innocence, and, going with Guise to the Queen, told her plainly that his birth and position should have safeguarded him from doubts which were mere inventions of his enemies, and that, should his honour be attacked, he would know how to take vengeance.

Guise, in still more violent language, declared that M. le Grand's true offence lay in the fact that he was

Charge against Bellegarde

his friend ; that if this was to be the way in which affairs were conducted and his ruin projected, he would die sword in hand, and others should be involved in his destruction, with more of the same kind ; and though, some days later, he made a species of apology for the lack of respect he had shown the Regent, it was accompanied by reiteration of his complaints and of his determination that others should suffer by his ruin.

His impassioned partisanship of Bellegarde, as well as his violent denunciation of the forces at work against himself, was of course a declaration of war against Marie, and as such the Queen, as she answered him coldly, must have understood it.

In the end the question of sorcery was passed over, the charge against Moisset was made to deal with the more material crime of false coinage, and that against the Grand Equerry tacitly withdrawn. The Parlement had taken cognisance of the affair ; but that body was not to be trusted where d'Ancre was concerned ; and he was ultimately persuaded that it was more to his interest to allow the matter to drop than to risk an adverse verdict. The suit was removed from the official records and burnt. There was no further question of consulting the magic mirror—M. Zeller believes it may have been a case of hypnotic suggestion— and Bellegarde continued to fill his post in the King's household as before.

An incident occurring in the course of the affair had shown the excitable condition of the Paris of that day. A soldier of the guard, accused of connection with the coiners, had taken flight, pursued by those charged with the duty of apprehending him. The words they

shouted after the fugitive were misunderstood ; it was said that the King had been killed like his father ; in a moment the streets were filled with a weeping and sobbing crowd ; the gates of the city were shut and an immense multitude collected at the Louvre. Even at the palace itself the report was widely believed ; Louis was out driving at the moment ; his mother, though affecting incredulity, was terror-struck ; nor was it until the King reached home and was heard demanding that his dinner should be brought in forthwith that her anxiety was allayed. On the following morning the boy was taken to Mass at Notre Dame, that he might be shown, safe and sound, to the people, who received him with affectionate acclamation.

For the rest, the whole episode had done no more than show the violent antagonism of the various parties at Court. Moisset was acquitted of the charges brought against him ; and the fact that, with a total lack of decency and decorum, d'Ancre had, before the trial took place, put in a claim to the property of the accused in case of his condemnation, increased the dislike entertained for him. The Queen, too, was considered to have shown partiality, and forfeited a portion of the popularity she could ill spare. Hints of coming trouble were thrown out in the communications of the Tuscan Resident to his Government ; and, quoting the opinion of men acquainted with Louis's disposition and character, he looked forward to a time, not more than four or five years distant, when his mother would have lost all authority over him. Hasty, hot-tempered, and wilful, it was thought not impossible that, under the influence

Photo by A. Giraudon, after a contemporary drawing in the Bibliotheque National.

CHARLES DE BOURBON, Comte de Soissons.

of the Princes or others opposed to the Queen, he would evince a desire to take the government upon himself.

u In an interview I had with the Marquise d'Ancre," he added, " I divined that neither she nor the Queen is far from entertaining some such suspicion." The suspicion was to be amply justified.

The autumn was stormy ; all the great nobles were malcontent. Most of them, after their fashion if they felt they had a special grievance against the Regent, were withdrawing to the provinces ; another cause for anxiety was supplied by the attitude of the Protestant party, who, their apprehensions quickened by the Spanish alliance, were showing a spirit of insubordination, if not sedition. Nothing was incredible to the common people ; the expulsion of the adherents of the Religion from France was believed by them to be in contemplation, and the Huguenot nobles had their own reasons for distrust. Things were in this condition when one chief factor of disquietude was removed by the death of the Comte de Soissons from smallpox. With him the most turbulent spirit passed away and the party of the Princes of the Blood was deprived of its practical head. His son was a child ; Conti was of no account ; and only Conde remained. The important government of Normandy, which Soissons had held, was reclaimed by the Regent in the name of her second son, and she could breathe more freely.