“Well; change nothing in the position of affairs. Let the poor madman rot between the slimy walls of the Bastile, and M. d’Herblay and M. du Vallon will stand in no need of my forgiveness. Their new king will absolve them.”
“Your majesty does me a great injustice, sire; and you are wrong,” replied Fouquet, dryly; “I am not child enough, nor is M. d’Herblay silly enough, to have omitted to make all these reflections; and if I had wished to make a new king, as you say, I had no occasion to have come here to force open the gates and doors of the Bastile, to free you from this place. That would show a want of even common sense. Your majesty’s mind is disturbed by anger; otherwise you would be far from offending, groundlessly, the very one of your servants who has rendered you the most important service of all.”
Louis perceived that he had gone too far; that the gates of the Bastile were still closed upon him, whilst, by degrees, the floodgates were gradually being opened, behind which the generous-hearted Fouquet had restrained his anger. “I did not say that to humiliate you, Heaven knows, monsieur,” he replied. “Only you are addressing yourself to me in order to obtain a pardon, and I answer according to my conscience. And so, judging by my conscience, the criminals we speak of are not worthy of consideration or forgiveness.”
Fouquet was silent.
“What I do is as generous,” added the king, “as what you have done, for I am in your power. I will even say it is more generous, inasmuch as you place before me certain conditions upon which my liberty, my life, may depend; and to reject which is to make a sacrifice of both.”
“I was wrong, certainly,” replied Fouquet. “Yes,—I had the appearance of extorting a favor; I regret it, and entreat your majesty’s forgiveness.”
“And you are forgiven, my dear Monsieur Fouquet,” said the king, with a smile, which restored the serene expression of his features, which so many circumstances had altered since the preceding evening.
“I have my own forgiveness,” replied the minister, with some degree of persistence; “but M. d’Herblay, and M. du Vallon?”
“They will never obtain theirs, as long as I live,” replied the inflexible king. “Do me the kindness not to speak of it again.”
“Your majesty shall be obeyed.”