round thrice with their pikes; and the King appeared.

He entered, supporting himself with a cane on one side, and on the other
leaning upon the shoulder of his confessor, Father Sirmond, who withdrew,
and left him with the Cardinal; the latter rose with difficulty, but
could not advance a step to meet the King, because his legs were bandaged
and enveloped. He made a sign that they should assist the King to a seat
near the fire, facing himself. Louis XIII fell into an armchair furnished
with pillows, asked for and drank a glass of cordial, prepared to
strengthen him against the frequent fainting-fits caused by his malady of
languor, signed to all to leave the room, and, alone with Richelieu, he
said in a languid voice:

"I am departing, my dear Cardinal; I feel that I shall soon return to
God. I become weaker from day to day; neither the summer nor the southern
air has restored my strength."

"I shall precede your Majesty," replied the minister. "You see that death
has already conquered my limbs; but while I have a head to think and a
hand to write, I shall be at the service of your Majesty."

"And I am sure it was your intention to add, 'a heart to love me.'"

"Can your Majesty doubt it?" answered the Cardinal, frowning, and biting
his lips impatiently at this speech.

"Sometimes I doubt it," replied the King. "Listen: I wish to speak openly
to you, and to complain of you to yourself. There are two things which
have been upon my conscience these three years. I have never mentioned
them to you; but I reproached you secretly; and could anything have
induced me to consent to any proposals contrary to your interest, it
would be this recollection."

There was in this speech that frankness natural to weak minds, who seek
by thus making their ruler uneasy, to compensate for the harm they dare
not do him, and revenge their subjection by a childish controversy.

Richelieu perceived by these words that he had run a great risk; but he
saw at the same time the necessity of venting all his spleen, and, to
facilitate the explosion of these important avowals, he accumulated all
the professions he thought most calculated to provoke the King.

"No, no!" his Majesty at length exclaimed, "I shall believe nothing until
you have explained those two things, which are always in my thoughts,
which were lately mentioned to me, and which I can justify by no
reasoning. I mean the trial of Urbain Grandier, of which I was never well
infor