it all. The marchioness was heiress presumptive to the
count: he calculated that she would soon lose her own husband; in any
case, the life of a septuagenarian did not much trouble a man like the
marquis; he could then prevail upon the marchioness to marry him, thus
giving him the command of the finest fortune in the province.

He set to work to pay his court to her, especially avoiding anything
that could excite the slightest suspicion. It was, however, difficult
to get on good terms with the marchioness without showing outsiders what
was going on. But the marchioness, already prepossessed by the agreeable
exterior of M. de Saint-Maixent, soon fell into his toils, and the
unhappiness of her marriage, with the annoyances incidental to a
scandalous case in the courts, left her powerless to resist his schemes.
Nevertheless, they had but few opportunities of seeing one another
alone: the countess innocently took a part in all their conversations;
the count often came to take the marquis out hunting; the days passed in
family pursuits. M. de Saint-Maixent had not so far had an opportunity
of saying what a discreet woman ought to pretend not to hear; this
intrigue, notwithstanding the marquis's impatience, dragged terribly.

The countess, as has been stated, had for twenty years never ceased to
hope that her prayers would procure for her the grace of bearing a son
to her husband. Out of sheer weariness she had given herself up to all
kinds of charlatans, who at that period were well received by people of
rank. On one occasion she brought from Italy a sort of astrologer, who
as nearly as possible poisoned her with a horrible nostrum, and was
sent back to his own country in a hurry, thanking his stars for having
escaped so cheaply. This procured Madame de Saint-Geran a severe
reprimand from her confessor; and, as time went on, she gradually
accustomed herself to the painful conclusion that she would die
childless, and cast herself into the arms of religion. The count, whose
tenderness for her never failed, yet clung to the hope of an heir, and
made his Will with this in view. The marchioness's hopes had become
certainties, and M. de Saint-Maixent, perfectly tranquil on this head,
thought only of forwarding his suit with Madame-de Bouille, when, at the
end of the month of November 1640, the Count de Saint-Geran was obliged
to repair to Paris in great haste on pressing duty.

The countess, who could not bear to be separated fr