So much did this one idea haunt the cardinal even in his sleep, that when at seven in the morning Bernouin came to arouse him, his first words were: “Well, what’s the matter? Has Monsieur de Beaufort escaped from Vincennes?”
“I do not think so, my lord,” said Bernouin; “but you will hear about him, for La Ramee is here and awaits the commands of your eminence.”
“Tell him to come in,” said Mazarin, arranging his pillows, so that he might receive the visitor sitting up in bed.
The officer entered, a large fat man, with an open physiognomy. His air of perfect serenity made Mazarin uneasy.
“Approach, sir,” said the cardinal.
The officer obeyed.
“Do you know what they are saying here?”
“No, your eminence.”
“Well, they say that Monsieur de Beaufort is going to escape from Vincennes, if he has not done so already.”
The officer’s face expressed complete stupefaction. He opened at once his little eyes and his great mouth, to inhale better the joke his eminence deigned to address to him, and ended by a burst of laughter, so violent that his great limbs shook in hilarity as they would have done in an ague.