"Your majesty alarms me; and yet I wait most confident in your justice and goodness."
"Do you know I am told, Monsieur Fouquet, that you are preparing a grand fete at Vaux."
Fouquet smiled, as a sick man would do at the first shiver of a fever which has left him but returns again.
"And that you have not invited me!" continued the king.
"Sire," replied Fouquet, "I have not even thought of the fete you speak of, and it was only yesterday evening that one of my friends" (Fouquet laid a stress upon the word) "was kind enough to make me think of it."
"Yet I saw you yesterday evening, Monsieur Fouquet, and you said nothing to me about it."
"How dared I hope that your majesty would so greatly descend from your own exalted station as to honor my dwelling with your royal presence?"
"Excuse me, Monsieur Fouquet, you did not speak to me about your fete."
"I did not allude to the fete to your majesty, I repeat, in the first place, because nothing had been decided with regard to it, and, secondly, because I feared a refusal."
"And something made you fear a refusal, Monsieur Fouquet? You see I am determined to push you hard."