_ CHAPTER LXXVI. EXPLANATIONS
"Madame," said the cardinal, bowing, "you know what is passing concerning the necklace?"
"No, monsieur; I wish to learn it from you."
"Why has your majesty for so long only deigned to communicate with me through another? If you have any reason to hate me, why not explain it?"
"I do not know what you mean. I do not hate you; but that is not, I think, the subject of our interview. I wish to hear all about this unlucky necklace; but first, where is Madame de la Motte?"
"I was about to ask your majesty the same question."
"Really, monsieur, if any one knows, I think it ought to be you."
"I, madame! why?"
"Oh! I do not wish to receive your confessions about her, but I wish to speak to her, and have sent for her ten times without receiving any answer."
"And I, madame, am astonished at her disappearance, for I also sent to ask her to come, and, like your majesty, received no answer."
"Then let us leave her, monsieur, and speak of ourselves."
"Oh no, madame; let us speak of her first, for a few words of your majesty's gave me a painful suspicion; it seemed to me that your majesty reproached me with my assiduities to her."
"I have not reproached you at all, sir."
"Oh! madame, such a suspicion would explain all to me; then I should understand all your rigor towards me, which I have hitherto found so inexplicable."
"Here we cease to understand each other, and I beg of you not to still further involve in obscurity what I wished you to explain to me."
"Madame," cried the cardinal, clasping his hands, "I entreat you not to change the subject; allow me only two words more, and I am sure we shall understand each other."
"Really, sir, you speak in language that I do not understand. Pray return to plain French; where is the necklace that I returned to the jewelers?"
"The necklace that you sent back?"
"Yes; what have you done with it?"
"I! I do not know, madame."
"Listen, and one thing is simple; Madame de la Motte took away the necklace, and returned it to the jewelers in my name. The jewelers say they never had it, and I hold in my hands a receipt which proves the contrary; but they say the receipt is forged; Madame de la Motte, if sincere, could explain all, but as she is not to be found, I can but conjecture. She wished to return it, but you, who had always the generous wish to present me the necklace, you, who brought it to me, with the offer to pay for it----"
"Which your majesty refused."
"Yes. Well, you have persevered in your idea, and you kept back the necklace, hoping to return it to me at some other time. Madame de la Motte was weak; she knew my inability to pay for it, and my determination not to keep it when I could not pay; she therefore entered into a conspiracy with you. Have I guessed right? Say yes. Let me believe in this slight disobedience to my orders, and I promise you both pardon; so let Madame de la Motte come out from her hiding-place. But, for pity's sake, let there be perfect clearness and openness, monsieur. A cloud rests over me; I will have it dispersed."
"Madame," replied the cardinal, with a sigh, "unfortunately it is not true. I did not persevere in my idea, for I believed the necklace was in your own hands; I never conspired with Madame de la Motte about it, and I have it no more than you say you or the jewelers have it."
"Impossible! you have not got it?"
"No, madame."
"Is it not you who hide it?"
"No, madame."
"You do not know what has become of it?"
"No, madame."
"But, then, how do you explain its disappearance?"
"I do not pretend to explain it, madame; and, moreover, it is not the first time that I have had to complain that your majesty did not understand me."
"How, sir?"
"Pray, madame, have the goodness to retrace my letters in your memory."
"Your letters!--you have written to me?"
"Too seldom, madame, to express all that was in my heart."
The queen rose.
"Terminate this jesting, sir. What do you mean by letters? How can you dare to say such things?"
"Ah! madame, perhaps I have allowed myself to speak too freely the secret of my soul."
"What secret? Are you in your senses, monsieur?"
"Madame!"
"Oh! speak out. You speak now like a man who wishes to embarrass one before witnesses."
"Madame, is there really any one listening to us?"
"No, monsieur. Explain yourself, and prove to me, if you can, that you are in your right senses."
"Oh! why is not Madame de la Motte here? she could aid me to reawaken, if not your majesty's attachment, at least your memory."
"My attachment! my memory!"
"Ah, madame," cried he, growing excited, "spare me, I beg. It is free to you to love no longer, but do not insult me."
"Ah, mon Dieu!" cried the queen, turning pale: "hear what this man says."
"Well, madame," said he, getting still more excited, "I think I have been sufficiently discreet and reserved not to be ill-treated. But I should have known that when a queen says, 'I will not any longer,' it is as imperious as when a woman says, 'I will.'"
"But, sir, to whom, or when, have I said either the one or the other?"
"Both, to me."
"To you! You are a liar, M. de Rohan. A coward, for you calumniate a woman; and a traitor, for you insult the queen."
"And you are a heartless woman and a faithless queen. You led me to feel for you the most ardent love. You let me drink my fill of hopes----"
"Of hopes! My God! am I mad, or what is he?"
"Should I have dared to ask you for the midnight interviews which you granted me?"
The queen uttered a cry of rage, as she fancied she heard a sigh from the boudoir.
"Should I," continued M. de Rohan, "have dared to come into the park if you had not sent Madame de la Motte for me?"
"Mon Dieu!"
"Should I have dared to steal the key? Should I have ventured to ask for this rose, which since then I have worn here on my heart, and burned up with my kisses? Should I have dared to kiss your hands? And, above all, should I have dared even to dream of sweet but perfidious love."
"Monsieur!" cried she, "you blaspheme."
"Mon Dieu!" exclaimed the cardinal, "heaven knows that to be loved by this deceitful woman I would have given my all, my liberty, my life."
"M. de Rohan, if you wish to preserve either, you will confess immediately that you invented all these horrors; that you did not come to the park at night."
"I did come," he replied.
"You are a dead man if you maintain this."
"A Rohan cannot lie, madame; I did come."
"M. de Rohan, in heaven's name say that you did not see me there."
"I will die if you wish it, and as you threaten me; but I did come to the park at Versailles, where Madame de la Motte brought me."
"Once more, confess it is a horrible plot against me."
"No."
"Then believe that you were mistaken--deceived--that it was all a fancy."
"No."
"Then we will have recourse," said she, solemnly, "to the justice of the king."
The cardinal bowed.
The queen rang violently. "Tell his majesty that I desire his presence."
The cardinal remained firm. Marie Antoinette went ten times to the door of the boudoir, and each time returned without going in.
At last the king appeared. _