"I do not say so, but the registry does."
"And this letter of M. Mazarin indicates the employment of that sum, and the name of the person with whom it was deposited?"
"As your majesty can judge for yourself."
"Yes; and the result is, then, that M. Fouquet has not yet restored the thirteen millions."
"That results from the accounts, certainly, sire."
"Well, and, consequently—"
"Well, sire, in that case, inasmuch as M. Fouquet has not yet given back the thirteen millions, he must have appropriated them to his own purposes; and with those thirteen millions one could incur four times, and a little more as much expense, and make four times as great a display as your majesty was able to do at Fontainebleau, where we only spent three millions altogether, if you remember."
For a blunderer, the souvenir he had evoked was a very skillfully-contrived piece of baseness; for by the remembrance of his own fete he, for the first time, perceived its inferiority compared with that of Fouquet. Colbert received back again at Vaux what Fouquet had given him at Fontainebleau, and, as a good financier, he returned it with the best possible interest. Having once disposed the king's mind in that way, Colbert had nothing of much importance to detain him. He felt that such was the case, for the king too had again sunk into a dull and gloomy state. Colbert awaited the first word from the king's lips with as much impatience as Philippe and Aramis did from their place of observation.
"Are you aware what is the natural consequence of all this, Monsieur Colbert?" said the king, after a few moments' reflection.
"No, sire, I do not know."