"So much the better if Louvois is there. Let me pass—I command you, let me pass!"
"Indeed, madame, you know not what you ask. I have received stringent orders to admit nobody."
"The royal family are never included in these prohibitions," cried the duchess.
"But to-day, your royal highness, I was placed here to prevent their coming! You well know that none but the princes and princesses of the blood would presume to make use of this entrance."
"It concerns the lives of thousands!" urged the duchess.
"Did it concern that of my own son, I would know better than to seek to save it by disobeying his majesty's orders."
"You will not—positively will not let me pass?"
"I dare not, madame."
"Then you must excuse me, but I shall force my way," returned Elizabeth-Charlotte, grasping the slender form of the king's gentleman, and, with her powerful hands, flinging him into the corner of the room, while she strode rapidly to the opposite door, and opened and had closed it again before her opponent had recovered his breath. Before touching the bolt of the door which opened directly into the king's cabinet, she paused to recover her breath, and to gather courage for the coming interview. She trembled from head to foot, and leaned against the wall for support. But Elizabeth-Charlotte was not a woman to be deterred, by fear of kings, from what she deemed her duty. "With the resolution that characterized her, she uttered one short ejaculation for help from above, and opened the door."
Louvois was in the act of speaking. "Sire, our arms are as successful in Italy as they have been in Germany, where town after town has been taken without the drawing of a sword—where the people have offered the keys of all the fortresses to your generals, and have welcomed the advent of our troops with joy."