"True," said the princess, "and there certainly is something behind all this."
"To be sure there is," said Lenet; "there is Mademoiselle Nanon de Lartigues."
"Nanon de Lartigues!" cried Claire, stung to the heart by a terrible memory.
"That courtesan!" said the princess, with the utmost contempt.
"Yes, madame," said Lenet, "that courtesan, whom your Highness refused to see, when she solicited the honor of being presented to you, and whom the queen, less punctilious than yourself in matters of etiquette, did receive; which caused her to make answer to your chamberlain that it was possible that Madame la Princesse de Condé was a more exalted personage than Anne of Austria, but that Anne of Austria most assuredly had more prudence than the Princesse de Condé."
"Your memory is failing, Lenet, or else you wish to spare my feelings," cried the princess. "The insolent creature was not content to say 'more prudence,' she said 'more sense,' as well."
"Possibly," said Lenet, with a smile. "I stepped into the antechamber at that moment, and did not hear the end of the sentence."
"But I was listening at the door," said Madame la Princesse, "and I heard the whole of it."
"At all events you understand, madame, that it is a woman who will wage relentless war upon you. The queen would have sent soldiers to fight against you; Nanon will send insidious enemies, whom you must unearth and crush."
"Perhaps," said Madame de Tourville, sourly, to Lenet, "if you had been in her Highness's place you would have received her with reverential awe?"