ers. The king is so simple and so conceited that he will believe me;
and then we can go and tell others how credulous the king is, and can
enjoy a laugh at his expense."

"Oh!" exclaimed La Valliere, "to think that, to believe that! it is
frightful."

"And," pursued the king, "that is not all; if this self-conceited prince
should take our jest seriously, if he should be imprudent enough to
exhibit before others anything like delight at it, well, in that case,
the king will be humiliated before the whole court; and what a
delightful story it will be, too, for him to whom I am really attached,
a part of my dowry for my husband, to have the adventure to relate of
the king who was so amusingly deceived by a young girl."

"Sire!" exclaimed La Valliere, her mind bewildered, almost wandering,
indeed, "not another word, I implore you; do you not see that you are
killing me?"

"A jest, nothing but a jest," murmured the king, who, however, began to
be somewhat affected.

La Valliere fell upon her knees, and that so violently, that their sound
could be heard upon the hard floor. "Sire," she said, "I prefer shame to
disloyalty."

"What do you mean?" inquired the king, without moving a step to raise
the young girl from her knees.

"Sire, when I shall have sacrificed my honor and my reason both to you,
you will perhaps believe in my loyalty. The tale which was related to
you in Madame's apartments, and by Madame herself, is utterly false; and
that which I said beneath the great oak--"

"Well!"

"That only is the truth."

"What!" exclaimed the king.

"Sire," exclaimed La Valliere, hurried away by the violence of her
emotions, "were I to die of shame on the very spot where my knees are
fixed, I would repeat it until my latest breath; I said that I loved
you, and it is true; I do love you."

"You!"

"I have loved you, sire, from the very day first I saw you; from the
moment when at Blois, where I was pining away my existence, your royal
looks, full of light and life, were first bent upon me. I love you
still, sire; it is a crime of high treason, I know, that a poor girl
like myself should love her sovereign and should presume to tell him so.
Punish me for my audacity, despise me for my shameless immodesty; but do
not ever say, do not ever think, that I have jested with or deceived
you. I belong to a family whose loyalty has been proved, sire; and I,
too, love my king."

Suddenly her strength, voice, and respiration c