Man in the Iron Mask by Dumas, Alexandre part one

“I find you, Madame, as courageous as ever against your enemies; I do not find you showing confidence in your friends.”

“Queens have no friends. If you have nothing further to say to me, if you feel yourself inspired by Heaven as a prophetess, leave me, I pray; for I dread the future.”

“I should have supposed,” said the Beguine, resolutely, “that you would dread the past even more.”

Hardly had these words escaped the Beguine’s lips, when the Queen rose proudly. “Speak!” she cried, in a short, imperious tone of voice; “explain yourself briefly, quickly, entirely; or else-”

“Nay, do not threaten me, your Majesty!” said the Beguine, gently. “I have come to you full of compassion and respect; I have come on the part of a friend.”

“Prove it, then! Comfort, instead of irritating me.”

“Easily enough; and your Majesty will see who is friendly to you. What misfortune has happened to your Majesty during these twenty-three years past?”

“Serious misfortunes, indeed! Have I not lost the King?”

“I speak not of misfortunes of that kind. I wish to ask you if, since- the birth of the King,- any indiscretion on a friend’s part has caused your Majesty distress?”

“I do not understand you,” replied the Queen, setting her teeth hard together in order to conceal her emotion.

“I will make myself understood, then. Your Majesty remembers that the King was born on the 5th of September, 1638, at quarter-past eleven o’clock.”

“Yes,” stammered the Queen.

“At half-past twelve,” continued the Beguine, “the Dauphin, who had been baptized by Monseigneur de Meaux in the King’s and in your own presence, was acknowledged as the heir of the crown of France. The King then went to the chapel of the old Chateau de St. Germain to hear the Te Deum chanted.”

“Quite true, quite true,” murmured the Queen.

“Your Majesty’s confinement took place in the presence of Monsieur, his Majesty’s late uncle, of the princes, and of the ladies attached to the court. The King’s physician, Bouvard, and Honore, the surgeon, were stationed in the antechamber; your Majesty slept from three o’clock until seven, I believe?”

“Yes, yes; but you tell me no more than every one else knows as well as you and myself.”

“I am now, Madame, approaching that with which very few persons are acquainted. Very few persons, did I say? Alas! I might say two only; for formerly there were but five in all, and for many years past the secret has been assured by the deaths of the principal participators in it. The late King sleeps now with his ancestors; Peronne, the midwife, soon followed him; Laporte is already forgotten.”

The Queen opened her lips as though about to reply; she felt beneath her icy hand, with which she touched her face, the beads of perspiration upon her brow.

“It was eight o’clock,” pursued the Beguine. “The King was seated at supper, full of joy and happiness; around him on all sides arose wild cries of delight and drinking of healths; the people cheered beneath the balconies; the Swiss Guards, the Musketeers, and the Royal Guard wandered through the city, borne about in triumph by the drunken students. Those boisterous sounds of the general joy disturbed the Dauphin, the future King of France, who was quietly lying in the arms of Madame de Hausac, his nurse, and whose eyes, when he should open them, might have observed two crowns at the foot of his cradle. Suddenly your Majesty uttered a piercing cry, and Dame Peronne flew to your bedside.

“The doctors were dining in a room at some distance from your chamber; the palace, abandoned in the general confusion, was without either sentinels or guards. The midwife, having questioned and examined your Majesty, gave a sudden exclamation of surprise, and taking you in her arms, bewildered, almost out of her senses from sheer distress of mind, despatched Laporte to inform the King that her Majesty the Queen wished to see him in her room.

“Laporte, you are aware, Madame, was a man of the most admirable calmness and presence of mind. He did not approach the King as if he were the bearer of alarming intelligence and, feeling his importance, wished to inspire the terror which he himself experienced; besides, it was not a very terrifying intelligence which awaited the King. At any rate, Laporte, with a smile upon his lips, approached the King’s chair, saying to him, ‘Sire, the Queen is very happy, and would be still more so to see your Majesty.’

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