"Too late!" muttered the cardinal. "Ah, fortune turns her back upon us! Now, if Ambroise does not save the king's life, we are lost indeed!"
CHAPTER XXXIII
A KING'S DEATH-BED
The queen-mother during that night had not thrown away her time. In the first place, she had sent her creature, Cardinal de Tournon, to the King of Navarre, and had settled terms with the Bourbons in writing. Then before daybreak she had received the Chancellor l'Hôpital, and had learned from him of the expected arrival at Orléans of her ally, the constable; L'Hôpital, by her instructions, promised to be in the great hall, which was next to the king's apartments, at nine o'clock, and to have with him as many of her partisans as he could find. Last of all, she had made an appointment for half after eight with Chapelain and two or three others of the royal physicians, whose mediocre talent was the natural-born enemy of the genius of Ambroise Paré.
Having thus taken her precautions, she was the first, as we have seen, to enter the king's chamber just as he awoke. She went at once to her son's bedside, gazed at him for a few moments with bent head, like a grief-stricken mother, pressed a kiss upon his hand, which was hanging listlessly down, and wiping away a tear or two, took her seat in such a position as to have him always in sight.
She, as well as Mary Stuart, was determined from that time on to watch over that bed of suffering, for her own purposes.
The Duc de Guise entered almost immediately. After exchanging a few words with Mary, he walked toward his brother.
"Have you done nothing?" he asked.
"Alas! I have not been able to do anything," was the reply.
"Fortune is turning against us, then," said the duke. "There is a great crowd in Antoine de Navarre's antechamber this morning."