“Sir,” he said insolently, “’tis possible that you know my plans better than I know them myself.”
The cardinal inclined his head. “It may be so, M. le Marquis,” he replied, coolly unfolding the paper which he had held in his hand, and spreading it out before his visitor; “you will be so kind as to read over that list and see if I have omitted the name of a single conspirator against the life of Armand Jean du Plessis.”
At the first sight of the paper the dark face of the marquis turned pale, but he controlled himself with wonderful nerve and stared contemptuously at his opponent.
“Sir,” he said coldly, “if you desire to head the list of your enemies with the name of a prince of the blood, it is not for me to confirm or contradict your suspicions.”
“M. de Nançay, you play boldly and well,” Richelieu said, “but you have lost. You have not been unwatched, monsieur, since the day of Castelnaudary. You were followed at Compiègne, your correspondence with Monsieur and with the Comte de Soissons is in yonder cabinet. Your intrigues in Lorraine and with M. d’Épernon are known, as was the plot that you would have hatched in Languedoc. You are in my power, M. le Marquis; it remains with you to obtain my best terms.”
There was not a change in the inscrutable face, but his inexorable black eyes never left those of his victim; his gaze was fixed unwaveringly on the man who sat listening to him, and who was controlling his rising passion with a mighty effort which sent the blood from cheek and lip. M. de Nançay saw that he was caught in a skilfully laid trap, but he was a man of too bold a spirit and too fierce a nature to waver even in the face of his deadly peril. His hand sought the hilt of his sword and played with it, as though he longed to draw the blade and strike it into the bosom of his tormentor.
“M. le Cardinal,” he said haughtily, “you have made strange statements, but I defy you to produce the proof.”
Richelieu smiled for the first time. He leaned forward a little in his chair, and pointed in the direction of the garden, which was one of the beauties of the Palais Cardinal.
“M. le Marquis remembers perhaps the conversation which he held with M. de Vesson under the lime-tree yonder?”
M. de Nançay wetted his parched lips with his tongue, and the beads of perspiration stood out on his forehead.