Colbert reappeared beneath the curtains.

"Have you heard?" said Mazarin.

"Alas! yes, my lord."

"Can he be right? Can all this money be badly acquired?"

"A Theatin, monseigneur, is a bad judge in matters offinance," replied Colbert, coolly. "And yet it is verypossible that, according to his theological ideas, youreminence has been, in a certain degree, in the wrong. Peoplegenerally find they have been so, - when they die."

"In the first place, they commit the wrong of dying,Colbert."

"That is true, my lord. Against whom, however, did theTheatin make out that you had committed these wrongs?Against the king?!"

Mazarin shrugged his shoulders. "As if I had not saved bothhis state and his finances."

"That admits of no contradiction, my lord."

"Does it? Then I have received a merely legitimate salary,in spite of the opinion of my confessor?"

"That is beyond doubt."

"And I might fairly keep for my own family, which is soneedy, a good fortune, - the whole, even, of which I haveearned?"

"I see no impediment to that, monseigneur."

"I felt assured that in consulting you, Colbert, I shouldhave good advice," replied Mazarin, greatly delighted.

Colbert resumed his pedantic look. "My lord," interruptedhe, "I think it would be quite as well to examine whetherwhat the Theatin said is not a snare."

"Oh! no; a snare? What for? The Theatin is an honest man."

"He believed your eminence to be at death's door, becauseyour eminence consulted him. Did not I hear him say - `Distinguish that which the king has given you from thatwhich you have given yourself.' Recollect, my lord, if hedid not say something a little like that to you? - that isquite a theatrical speech."

"That is possible."

"In which case, my lord, I should consider you as requiredby the Theatin to - - "

"To make restitution!" cried Mazarin, with great warmth.

"Eh! I do not say no."

"What, of all! You do not dream of such a thing! You speakjust as the confessor did."

"To make restitution of a part, - that is to say, hismajesty's part; and that, monseigneur, may have its dangers.Your eminence is too skillful a politician not to know that,at this moment, the king does not possess a hundred andfifty thousand livres clear in his coffers."

"That is not my affair," said Mazarin, triumphantly; "thatbelongs to M. le Surintendant Fouquet, whose accounts I gaveyou to verify some months ago."

Colbert bit his lips at the name of Fouquet. "His majesty,"said he, between his teeth, "has no money but that which M.Fouquet collects: your money, monseigneur, would afford hima delicious banquet."

"Well, but I am not the superintendent of his majesty'sfinances - I have my purse - surely I would do much forhis majesty's welfare - some legacy - but I cannotdisappoint my family."

"The legacy of a part would dishonor you and offend theking. Leaving a part to his majesty is to avow that thatpart has inspired you with doubts as to the lawfulness ofthe means of acquisition."

"Monsieur Colbert!"

"I thought your eminence did me the honor to ask my advice?"

"Yes, but you are ignorant of the principal details of thequestion."

"I am ignorant of nothing, my lord; during ten years, allthe columns of figures which are found in France have passedin review before me, and if I have painfully nailed theminto my brain, they are there now so well riveted, that,from the office of M. Letellier, who is sober, to the littlesecret largesses of M. Fouquet, who is prodigal, I couldrecite, figure by figure, all the money that is spent inFrance from Marseilles to Cherbourg."

"Then, you would have me throw all my money into the coffersof the king!" cried Mazarin, ironically; and from whom, atthe same time, the gout forced painful moans. "Surely theking would reproach me with nothing, but he would laugh atme, while squandering my millions, and with good reason."

"Your eminence has misunderstood me. I did not, the least inthe world, pretend that his majesty ought to spend yourmoney."

"You said so clearly, it seems to me, when you advised me togive it to him."

"Ah," replied Colbert, "that is because your eminence,absorbed as you are by your disease, entirely loses sight ofthe character of Louis XIV."

"How so?"

"That character, if I may venture to express myself thus,resembles that which my lord confessed just now to theTheatin."

"Go on - that is?"

"Pride! Pardon me, my lord, haughtiness, nobleness; kingshave no pride, that is a human passion."

"Pride, - yes, you are right. Next?"

"Well, my lord, if I have divined rightly, your eminence hasbut to give all your money to the king, and thatimmediately."

"But for what?" said Mazarin, quite bewildered.

"Because the king will not accept of the whole."

"What, and he a young man, and devoured by ambition?"

"Just so."

"A young man who is anxious for my death - - "

"My lord!"

"To inherit, yes, Colbert, yes; he is anxious for my deathin order to inherit. Triple fool that I am! I would preventhim!"

"Exactly: if the donation were made in a certain form hewould refuse it."

"Well, but how?"

"That is plain enough. A young man who has yet done nothing- who burns to distinguish himself - who burns to reignalone, will never take anything ready built, he willconstruct for himself. This prince, monseigneur, will neverbe content with the Palais Royal, which M. de Richelieu lefthim, nor with the Palais Mazarin, which you have had sosuperbly constructed, nor with the Louvre, which hisancestors inhabited; nor with St. Germain, where he wasborn. All that does not proceed from himself, I predict, hewill disdain."

"And you will guarantee, that if I give my forty millions tothe king - - "

"Saying certain things to him at the same time, I guaranteehe will refuse them."

"But those things - what are they?"

"I will write them, if my lord will have the goodness todictate them."

"Well, but, after all, what advantage will that be to me?"

"An enormous one. Nobody will afterwards be able to accuseyour eminence of that unjust avarice with which pamphleteershave reproached the most brilliant mind of the present age."

"You are right, Colbert, you are right; go, and seek theking, on my part, and take him my will."

"Your donation, my lord."

"But, if he should accept it; if he should even think ofaccepting it!"

"Then there would remain thirteen millions for your family,and that is a good round sum."

"But then you would be either a fool or a traitor."

"And I am neither the one nor the other, my lord. You appearto be much afraid that the king will accept; you have a dealmore reason to fear that he will not accept."

"But, see you, if he does not accept, I should like toguarantee my thirteen reserved millions to him - yes, Iwill do so - yes. But my pains are returning, I shallfaint. I am very, very ill, Colbert; I am very near my end!"

Colbert started. The cardinal was indeed very ill; largedrops of sweat flowed down upon his bed of agony, and thefrightful pallor of a face streaming with water was aspectacle which the most hardened practitioner could nothave beheld without compassion. Colbert was, without doubt,very much affected, for he quitted the chamber, callingBernouin to attend the dying man and went into the corridor.There, walking about with a meditative expression, whichalmost gave nobility to his vulgar head, his shouldersthrown up, his neck stretched out, his lips half open, togive vent to unconnected fragments of incoherent thoughts,he lashed up his courage to the pitch of the undertakingcontemplated, whilst within ten paces of him, separated onlyby a wall, his master was being stifled by anguish whichdrew from him lamentable cries, thinking no more of thetreasures of the earth, or of the joys of Paradise, but muchof all the horrors of hell. Whilst burning-hot napkins,physic, revulsives, and Guenaud, who was recalled, wereperforming their functions with increased activity, Colbert,holding his great head in both his hands, to compress withinit the fever of the projects engendered by the brain, wasmeditating the tenor of the donation he would make Mazarinwrite, at the first hour of respite his disease shouldafford him. It would appear as if all the cries of thecardinal, and all the attacks of death upon thisrepresentative of the past, were stimulants for the geniusof this thinker with the bushy eyebrows, who was turningalready towards the rising sun of a regenerated society.Colbert resumed his place at Mazarin's pillow at the firstinterval of pain, and persuaded him to dictate a donationthus conceived.

"About to appear before God, the Master of mankind, I begthe king, who was my master on earth, to resume the wealthwhich his bounty has bestowed upon me, and which my familywould be happy to see pass into such illustrious hands. Theparticulars of my property will be found - they are drawnup - at the first requisition of his majesty, or at thelast sigh of his most devoted servant,

Jules, Cardinal de Mazarin."

The cardinal sighed heavily as he signed this; Colbertsealed the packet, and carried it immediately to the Louvre,whither the king had returned.

He then went back to his own home, rubbing his hands withthe confidence of a workman who has done a good day's work.