Page:The Man in the Iron Mask.djvu/74

60 "A painting? Ah! all the better! And what is this painting to represent?"

"I will tell you; then, at the same time, whatever you may say of it, I went to see the dresses for our poets."

"Bah! and they will be rich and elegant?"

"Splendid! There will be few great monseigneurs with so good. People will see the difference there is between the courtiers of wealth and those of friendship."

"Ever generous and graceful, dear prelate."

"In your school."

Fouquet grasped his hand.

"And where are you going?" he said.

"I am off to Paris, when you shall have given a certain letter."

"For whom?"

"Monsieur de Lyonne."

"And what do you want with Lyonne?"

"I wish to make him sign a lettre de cachet."

"Lettre de cachet! Do you desire to put somebody in the Bastile?"

"0n the contrary—to let somebody out."

"And who?"

"A poor devil—a youth, a lad who has been Bastiled these ten years for two Latin verses he made against the Jesuits."

"'Two Latin verses!' And for 'two Latin verses' the miserable being has been in prison for ten years?"

"Yes."

"And has committed no other crime?"

"Beyond this, he is as innocent as you or I"

"On your word?"

"On my honor!"

"And his name is?"

"Seldon."

"Yes, but it is too bad. You knew this, and you never told me."

"'Twas only yesterday his mother applied to me, monsiegneur."

"And the woman is poor?"

"In the deepest misery."

"Oh, Heaven!" said Fouquet, "you sometimes bear with such injustice on earth that I understand why there are wretches who doubt in your existence. Stay, Monsieur d'Herblay."

And Fouquet, taking a pen, wrote a few rapid lines to his