d to change his station. The very same
night he saw him arrive, and let himself in with a key that he carried
about him; and an hour afterwards he observed another man stop at the
same door, and enter by the same means. He was wrapped in a cloak so
that the Count could not recognize him; but he desired my valet, who was
not far off at the time, to follow him when he came out, by which means
we ascertained that the individual who was thus tracked to his own
residence was the Grand Equerry of France, M. de Cinq-Mars; while
before the end of another week we discovered Radbod in the same
manner." [236]

Were not this incident recorded by one of the actors in the adventure,
it would have been impossible to have related it with any faith in its
veracity; as, assuredly, never was the meaning of "secret service"
defined more broadly or more unblushingly than in the instance of the
sycophantic courtier who divested himself of his brilliant attire to don
the tatters of a beggar, and exchanged his velvet-covered couch for the
manure-heap of a city street; while as little would it be credited that
any man in power would venture to suggest so revolting an expedient to
an individual of high birth and position, the companion of princes, and
the associate of Court ladies. Nor is it the least singular feature of
the tale that the chronicler by whom it is told indulges in no
expression of disgust, either at the indelicate selfishness of
Richelieu, or the undignified complaisance of his adherent; although he
evidently seeks to infer that the Cardinal did not venture to request so
monstrous a concession from himself; and dwells with such palpable
enjoyment upon all the details of Rochefort's overweening condescension,
that it is easy to detect his dread of being suspected by his readers of
an equal amount of disgraceful self-abnegation.

The arrest and subsequent execution of the ill-fated Cinq-Mars and his
friend M. de Thou, together with the cowardly policy of Monsieur, who
no sooner found his treason discovered than he once more wrote to demand
his pardon from the King, and to renew his promises of future loyalty
and devotion,[237] are circumstances of such universal notoriety that we
shall not permit ourselves to enlarge upon them. It must suffice,
therefore, to say that this new peril had merely served to increase
alike the bodily suffering and the irascibility of Richelieu, who, even
on the very brink of the grave, was indulging in