However, I am too certain of what I assert to
look on with the culpable indifference you are pleased to assume,
whilst your
wife is seeking to supplant me at the
chateau; you shall hear of me before long. Adieu, sir."
So saying, I quitted the room in search of the marechale, to
whom I related what had passed.
"And now, what think you of so base a hypocrite?" asked I, when
I had finished my account.
"He well deserves having the mask torn from his face," replied
she; " but give yourself no further concern; return home, and
depend upon it, that, one way or other, I will force him into
the path of honor."
I accordingly ordered my carriage and returned to Versailles,
where, on the same evening, I received the following letter
from the marechale:--
"MY DEAR COUNTESS, --My efforts have been
attended with no better success than yours. Well
may the proverb say, 'There is none so deaf as he
who will not hear,' and M. de Rumas perseveres in
treating all I advanced respecting his wife as
calumnious falsehoods. According to his version
of the tale, madame de Rumas has no other
motive in seeing Louis XV so frequently, but to
implore his aid in favor of the poor in her
neighborhood. I really lost all patience when
I heard him attempting to veil his infamous conduct
under the mask of charity; I therefore proceeded at
once to menaces, telling him that you bad so many
advantages over his wife, that you scorned to
consider her your rival: but that, nevertheless,
you did not choose that any upstart pretender
should dare ask to share his majesty's heart.
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