"That is not my handwriting, that is not my signature!" cried she, furiously. "How are you—sir, a prince and grand almoner of France— how are you so ignorant, so foolish, as to believe that I could subscribe myself 'Marie Antoinette of France?' Everybody knows that queens write only their baptismal names as signatures, and you alone have not known that?"
"I see into it," muttered the cardinal, pale under the look of the queen, and so weak that he had to rest upon the table for support, "I see into it; I have been dreadfully deceived."
The king took a paper from his table and gave it to the cardinal. "Do you confess that you wrote this letter to Bohmer, in which you send him thirty thousand francs in behalf of the queen, in part payment for the necklace?"
"Yes, sire, I confess it," answered the cardinal, with a low voice, which seemed to contradict what he uttered.
"He confesses it," cried the queen, gnashing her teeth, and making up her little hand into a clinched fist. "He has held me fit for such infamy—me, his queen!"
"You assert that you bought the jewels for the queen. Did you deliver them in person?"
"No, sire, the Countess Lamotte did that."
"In your name, cardinal?"
"Yes, in my name, sire, and she gave at the same time a receipt to the queen for one hundred and fifty thousand francs, which I lent the queen toward the purchase."
"And what reward did you have from the queen?"