On his return from Lyons, Louis knelt down before his mother and Mazarin, supplicating them to permit him to marry the one he loved. He found them inflexible. The Queen realised that such a mésalliance would cast disrepute on royalty. The Cardinal was torn by conflicting emotions, but in the end sent away his niece.
A second journey lasted more than a year. The Court set out on June 29, 1659, and passed through Blois. It stopped with Gaston. We owe to the Mémoires of Mademoiselle a last glimpse of this Prince, formerly so brilliant, now become a lazy good-for-nothing in his provincial life, where nothing of Parisian fashion was found; neither toilettes nor cooking, nor household elegance, nor even Monsieur himself, who no longer knew how to receive, and was vexed that the King should kill his pheasants. He permitted it to be seen that he was put out, and this became so plain that every one was eager to depart, and there was a sudden scattering.
The eldest of his daughters by his last marriage, Marguerite d'Orléans, had a great reputation for beauty. Her parents had for a long time anticipated seeing her Queen of France.
On the night of the King's arrival at Blois, this damsel was disfigured with mosquito bites. Her dancing was much extolled, but on this special evening, she danced very badly. Gaston had announced that this little girl of ten "would astonish every one with her brilliant conversation." No one could draw a single word from her. In short, nothing succeeded. Mademoiselle was not especially vexed at this failure; she had trembled at the thought of seeing her younger sister "above her."
Hardly had the Court remounted their carriages, before the royal cavalcade, according to the universal custom, commenced to mock its hosts. The King joked at the sight of his uncle's face on seeing the pheasants fall dead. Mademoiselle laughed with the others. She had, however, been moved by a tender scene played by her father.
He had come to awaken her at four o'clock in the morning:
He seated himself on my bed and said: "I believe that you will not be vexed at being waked since I shall not soon have the chance of again seeing you. You are going to take a long journey. I am old, exhausted; I may die during your absence. If I do die, I recommend your sisters to you. I know very well that you do not love Madame: that her behaviour towards you has not been all it should be; but her children have had nothing to do with this, for my sake take care of them. They will have need of you; as for Madame, she will be of little help to them."
He embraced me three or four times. I received all this with much tenderness; for I have a good heart. We separated on the best terms, and I went again to sleep.
Mademoiselle believed that at length they again loved each other. Six weeks later a scandal broke out at the Court of France, then at Bordeaux.
The Duc de Savoie had refused to marry the Princess Marguerite d'Orléans, and Mademoiselle was accused of having secretly written to him that her sister was a humpback. The accusation came from Gaston himself, who said that he had proof of it. This was a most disagreeable incident for Mademoiselle and further illusion was impossible; Gaston was always Gaston, the most dangerous man in France.