A few days after the siege of Montauban had been raised, the King’s other two confidants, the Jesuit Père Arnoux and Puisieux, the former of whom suspected Luynes of desiring to make peace with the Protestants on their own terms, joined forces to procure the downfall of the favourite. But they had underrated the power which habit and the fear of change exercised over the cold heart and indolent mind of Louis XIII. He betrayed them to Luynes, or, perhaps, the pusillanimous Puisieux may have betrayed his fellow-conspirator. Anyway, Luynes learned of the intrigue and insisted on the Jesuit’s disgrace; and “the first news that I had from him [the King],” says Bassompierre, “was that he had been constrained to abandon Père Arnoux to the hatred of the Constable.” The King added that Bassompierre “might be assured that there was nothing against him.” Nevertheless, says that gentleman, “I did not fail to be in great apprehension, although I could say that every time that the King had spoken to me on the subject I had warded off his blows, and that I had been infinitely distressed that he had ever made me the recipient of his confidence.”
However, Bassompierre need not have been alarmed, as it was very soon to be beyond the power of Luynes to injure anyone.
On November 16 Bassompierre and his army encamped before Monheurt, and on the 18th the trenches were opened. A day or two later he had an exceedingly narrow escape of his life.
He was riding, followed by two aides-de-camp, from the trenches of the Piedmont Regiment, to those of the Normandy Regiment, a journey which he had made several times already without interference from the garrison, although it was well within musket-shot of the town, and “dressed in scarlet, with the cross on his cloak, and mounted on a white pony, he was easily recognisable.” Suddenly, the advanced bastion and counterscarp bristled with musketeers, who began firing at him and “with such fury that he heard nothing but balls whistling about him.” One ball struck the pommel of his saddle and another pierced his cloak, but he managed to reach a large tree without being hit, and took shelter behind it. Here he was in safety, though the enemy fired more than a hundred shots at it. At length, the firing ceased and, thinking that they had exhausted their ammunition, he mounted and galloped towards the trenches of the Normandy Regiment. However, they had only been waiting for him to show himself, and, so soon as he did so, they began firing at him again as fiercely as ever. “But,” says he, “as my hour was not yet come, God preserved me against the attempt; though I believe I was never nearer death than I was on that occasion.”
The weather was very bad, rain falling incessantly, and the soldiers were nearly up to their knees in mud. Nevertheless, they worked well, and by the 22nd, on which day the siege-artillery arrived, they had pushed their trenches close to the walls.
Meanwhile, Bassompierre had received a secret communication from the Marquis de Mirambeau, the commander of the garrison, who offered to surrender Monheurt, in consideration of receiving a sum of 4,000 crowns and a formal pardon for his offence of having taken up arms against the King. The Maréchal de Roquelaure, lieutenant-general of Guienne, had lately arrived to take the nominal command of the siege operations. But he left their direction entirely in Bassompierre’s hands, and, as Mirambeau had requested that he should not be informed of his offer, it was communicated to Louis XIII, who was still at Toulouse. This decided the King and the Constable to come to Monheurt, “in order to have the honour of taking it.”
On the 23rd, Bassompierre, after inspecting one of his batteries, advanced a few paces in front of it to survey some point in the defences. “The gunners,” he says, “not thinking that I was there, discharged their pieces, the wind of which threw me very rudely to the ground, and left me with a singing in my right ear, accompanied by insupportable twinges.” Two hours later he was taken ill with fever, but he remained on duty all that day, during which the trenches were pushed up to the border of the moat. Next morning, however, he was so much worse that he wrote to the King and the Constable asking to be relieved of his command, and saying that he proposed to go to La Réole, where he could secure skilled medical attention, for he was too prudent to trust himself to the care of the army surgeons. He also begged them to send him a doctor.
Next morning he received a very kind letter from the King, granting his request and informing him that he was sending a doctor, upon which he embarked in a boat, accompanied by his personal attendants and a guard of Swiss halberdiers, and set off down the Garonne towards La Réole.
On arriving at Tonneins, about midway between Monheurt and Marmande, he learned that a small force of cavalry was crossing the river to the right bank, and that they were the Constable’s own company of gensdarmes.
He sent for the officers in command to inquire where they were going, and was told that they had received orders from the Maréchal de Roquelaure to take up their quarters in a little town called Gontaud, about half-a-league from Marmande. He expressed his surprise that Roquelaure should send a small body of cavalry, unaccompanied by infantry, to an open town in the midst of the enemy’s country, where there was a great danger of their being surprised; and, aware that the King and the Constable would certainly cancel the order if they were informed of it, begged the officers to return, while he sent a message to the King requesting that they should be quartered at Marmande, which was a walled town. But the officers pointed out that the baggage had already been sent on to Gontaud; and, on their assuring him that they would keep a sharp look-out that night, and on the morrow ask to be transferred to safer quarters, he allowed them to proceed, although he felt very uneasy.