"My dear madame!" cried Maurepas, when she had grown tearful with laughter, "your disclosure has done me an excellent turn. It has saved me five hundred livres. I was about thus to impoverish myself that you might be permitted to get still closer to heaven by spending another week in the criminal quarter distributing them."
The Marquise de Coigny grew suddenly serious again. "M. de Maurepas, let me take you at your word. I beg that you will send the money to him who was my companion in the work—l'Abbé de Bernis."
"Oh!—François de Bernis?" asked St. Pierre, in quick surprise. "I have met him at the Vincent de Paul."
"Her Majesty, I believe, receives him at times into her most religious coterie," put in de Maurepas.
"Well, since you know who he is, I will continue, if you will permit me. I beg that you will all, at least, believe that what I have said concerning my occupation in Paris was wholly serious. Indeed, indeed, I am in the highest sympathy with the work of the Jesuit fathers among the people; and there are few men in our world whom I—respect—as I do M. de Bernis."
At these words, so solemnly spoken that they could not but impress the listeners with their sincerity, the eyebrows of St. Pierre went up with surprise, though he remained silent. As a matter of fact, the reputation of the Abbé François Joachim de Pierre de Bernis was not noted for its sanctity.
"Will you, then, permit me, madame, to double my first offer?" said de Maurepas, with his mind on the treasury. "I will to-day send you a note for one thousand livres, which I beg that you will dispense in charity."
"M. de Maurepas, I wish that you could imagine what your word will mean to those poor creatures."
"And shall you yourself return to Paris with the money, madame?" inquired de Gêvres, smiling slightly.
De Coigny moved as though he would speak, but his wife answered immediately, in his stead: "No, Monsieur le Duc. I have no intention of taking permanently to a black gown. For two weeks it has occupied me satisfactorily to attend the poor. Now I shall come back to Court till I am again fatigued by all of you. After that I must devise a new amusement. Really—you all know my one eternal vow: I will not become successor to Mme. du Deffant. Death, if you like,—never such ennui as hers. M. de Mailly-Nesle, will you give—"