arde was accused of
having been accessory to the assassination of her father; but neither of
these considerations appears to have had any weight with the young
Princess. According to her own version of the circumstance, Gabrielle
conceived so violent a jealousy that the Duke was compelled to
condescend to every imaginable subterfuge in order to conceal the truth;
while the King, who soon became aware of the secret intelligence which
subsisted between the lovers, ceased to feel any inclination to raise
Mademoiselle de Guise to the throne of France; although, as we have
seen, he was by no means insensible either to the charm of her wit or
the attraction of her beauty.

In order to follow up his great design of pacification, Henry, after
having re-established Philip of Nassau in his principality of Orange,
also effected his marriage with Eleonore de Bourbon,[304] by which union
he secured another desirable ally.[305]

During the development of the late conspiracy the monarch had been
indebted for much of the information which he had received relative to
the intrigues of the Comte d'Auvergne to the intelligence afforded by
the ex-Queen Marguerite, who, having come into possession of many facts
which could not otherwise have been known to the King, had assiduously
imparted to him every circumstance that she conceived to be of
importance; a service for which he had not failed to express his
gratitude. That Marguerite had, however, been in no small degree
actuated in this matter by feelings of self-interest, there can be no
doubt, D'Auvergne having long enjoyed the proprietorship of the county
from whence he derived his title, and which had been bestowed on him by
Henri III, as well as several other estates which that monarch had
inherited from his mother, Catherine de Medicis, the said territories
having formed a portion of her dowry on her union with Henri II.
Marguerite's memories of her brother, as the reader will readily
comprehend, were not sufficiently attaching to induce her to submit
patiently to such a substitution, as she was aware that, by the marriage
contract, the property in question was settled upon the female offspring
of Catherine in default of male issue; and her lavish expenditure and
errant adventures having exhausted her means, she resolved to exert
every effort to establish her claim. She had already upon several
occasions solicited permission to return to the French capital; and,
although it had never