"Good heavens! What are you saying, Monsieur d'Herblay? And what is this poor prince doing?"
"Ask me, rather, what he has done?"
"Yes, yes."
"He was brought up in the country, and then thrown into a fortress which goes by the name of the Bastille."
"Is it possible?" cried the surintendant, clasping his hands.
"The one was the most fortunate of men; the other the most unhappy and most miserable of all living beings."
"Does his mother not know this?"
"Anne of Austria knows it all."
"And the king?"
"Knows absolutely nothing."