love you; she cares more for the Duc d'Alencon; she cares of Bussy;
and she loves that little La Mole."

"What a heart!" exclaimed the king.

"That little La Mole," went on the queen, "wishes to make himself a
great man by giving France a king of his own stripe. He is promised,
they say, the place of connetable."

"Curse that Margot!" cried the king. "This is what comes of her marriage
with a heretic."

"Heretic or not is of no consequence; the trouble is that, in spite of
my advice, you have brought the head of the younger branch too near the
throne by that marriage, and Henri's purpose is now to embroil you with
the rest and make you kill one another. The house of Bourbon is the
enemy of the house of Valois; remember that, monsieur. All younger
branches should be kept in a state of poverty, for they are born
conspirators. It is sheer folly to give them arms when they have none,
or to leave them in possession of arms when they seize them. Let every
younger son be made incapable of doing harm; that is the law of Crowns;
the Sultans of Asia follow it. The proofs of this conspiracy are in my
room upstairs, where I asked you to follow me last evening, when you
bade me good-night; but instead of doing so, it seems you had other
plans. I therefore waited for you. If we do not take the proper measures
immediately you will meet the fate of Charles the Simple within a
month."

"A month!" exclaimed the king, thunderstruck at the coincidence of that
period with the delay asked for by the princes themselves. "'In a
month we shall be masters,'" he added to himself, quoting their words.
"Madame," he said aloud, "what are your proofs?"

"They are unanswerable, monsieur; they come from my daughter Marguerite.
Alarmed herself at the possibilities of such a combination, her love for
the throne of the Valois has proved stronger, this time, than all her
other loves. She asks, as the price of her revelations that nothing
shall be done to La Mole; but the scoundrel seems to me a dangerous
villain whom we had better be rid of, as well as the Comte de Coconnas,
your brother d'Alencon's right hand. As for the Prince de Conde, he
consents to everything, provided I am thrown into the sea; perhaps that
is the wedding present he gives me in return for the pretty wife I gave
him! All this is a serious matter, monsieur. You talk of horoscopes!
I know of the prediction which gives the throne of the Valois to the
Bourbons, and if we do not take