im marvellously quick-tempered
and cross-grained, with rough looks and bearing, and his answers still
more so. One day, a very short time before the St. Bartholomew, setting
out expressly from my quarters to go and see the king, somebody told me
on inquiry that he was in his cabinet, whence the admiral, who had been
alone with him a very long while, had just that instant gone out. I
entered at once, as I had been accustomed to do. But as soon as the king
my brother perceived me, he, without saying anything to me, began walking
about furiously and with long steps, often looking towards me askance and
with a very evil eye, sometimes laying his hand upon his dagger, and in
so excited a fashion that I expected nothing else but that he would come
and take me by the collar to poniard me. I was very vexed that I had
gone in, reflecting upon the peril I was in, but still more upon how to
get out of it; which I did so dexterously, that, whilst he was walking
with his back turned to me, I retreated quickly towards the door, which I
opened, and, with a shorter obeisance than at my entry, I made my exit,
which was scarcely perceived by him until I was outside. And straightway
I went to look for the queen my mother; and, putting together all
reports, notifications, and suspicions, the time, and past circumstances,
in conjunction with this last meeting, we remained both of us easily
persuaded, and as it were certain, that it was the admiral who had
impressed the king with some bad and sinister opinion of us, and we
resolved from that moment to rid ourselves of him."

One idea immediately occurred to Catherine and her son. Two persons felt
a passionate hatred towards Coligny; they were the widow of Duke Francis
of Guise, Anne d'Este, become Duchess of Nemours by a second marriage,
and her son Henry de Guise, a young man of twenty-two. They were both
convinced that Coligny had egged on Poltrot to murder Duke Francis, and
they had sworn to exact vengeance. Being informed of the queen-mother's
and the Duke of Anjou's intention, they entered into it eagerly; the
young Duke of Guise believed his mother quite capable of striking down
the admiral in the very midst of one of the great assemblies at court;
the fair ladies of the sixteenth century were adepts in handling dagger
and pistol. In default of the Duchess of Nemours, her son was thought of
for getting rid of Coligny. "It was at one time decided," says the Duke
de Bouillon in