“What day does your majesty wish for it?”
“Your majesty shall have it on the third.”
“My greatest happiness is to please your majesty, and I beg you never will allow yourself to be embarrassed for want of money.” He rose, the queen gave him her hand to kiss, and then said, “After all, this money causes me some remorse, for it is for a caprice.”
“That is true; you have a charming mode of consoling one.”
“Oh, madame, if we had none of us more reasons for remorse than you, we should all go straight to heaven.”
“But it will be cruel to make the poor people pay for my caprices.”
“Have no scruples, madame; it is not the poor who will pay.”
“How so?” asked the queen, in some surprise.
“Because, madame, they have nothing to pay with.”
Hardly had M. de Calonne traversed the gallery, when Madame de la Motte was shown in to the queen.
“Madame,” said she, “the cardinal is here.” She then introduced him, and took her leave.
The cardinal, finding himself alone with the queen, bowed respectfully, without raising his eyes.
“Monsieur,” said the queen, “I have heard of you what has effaced many wrongs.”
“Permit me, madame,” said he, trembling with real emotion, “to assure your majesty that these wrongs of which you speak I could explain in a few words.”
“I do not forbid you to justify yourself,” replied she, with dignity; “but if what you are about to say throws the smallest shade upon my family or country, you will only wound me still more. Let us leave this subject; and I will only see you under the fresh light, which shows you to me obliging, respectful, and devoted.”
“But,” said Marie Antoinette, with a smile, “at present it is a question not of death, but of ruin; and I do not wish you devoted even so far. You shall live, and not be ruined, at least, not by me; for they say you are ruining yourself.”
“Oh! that is your own business; only, as a friend, I would counsel you to be economical—the king would like you better.”
“I would become a miser to please your majesty.”
“Oh, the king,” replied she, with an accent on the word, “does not love misers either.”
“I will become whatever your majesty desires,” replied he, with a hardly-disguised passion.
“I said, then,” continued she, “that you shall not be ruined for me. You have advanced money on my account, and I have the means of meeting the calls; therefore, regard the affair for the future as in my hands.”