It was not only his skill in falconry and all other kinds of sport which endeared Luynes to his young master. From the first he made himself his friend. He was a really good-natured man, as well as a fine sportsman and an ambitious courtier, and he laid himself out to give freedom and happiness to the oppressed, stammering boy. Louis learned, from a child, to fly to Luynes in all his troubles. He was his constant companion through the day, his chief playmate, the organiser of his leisure time. At night in his dreams, often restless and feverish, the boy would cry out for Luynes. This high favour did not pass unnoticed, of course, by the Queen-mother and Concini. They might have crushed Luynes in the early days, but they took the line of propitiating him--a very great and fatal mistake, according to Richelieu. Marie gave him the government of Amboise, resigned by the Prince de Condé in 1615. She thought thus to make Luynes her creature; and the Maréchal d’Ancre, who had watched him anxiously for a short time, was deceived by his retiring manners into thinking him a man of no real account except among birds, but probably a useful friend, having the ear of the King. Through this summer of 1616, the Bishop of Luçon was steadily advancing in favour. Marie de Médicis appointed him her private secretary, with a handsome pension, and employed him on several political missions. One of these was of real importance and led to striking results. In spite of the treaty of Loudun and all its advantages, the Prince de Condé and his friends were still in a sulky frame of mind. Instead of coming at once to Paris, the Prince lingered in his new province of Berry, where the discontented showed signs of gathering round him once more. This temper of his caused much anxiety to Marie, her new Ministers, and the Maréchal d’Ancre. It seemed to them necessary that the Prince should come to Paris. Any fresh disloyalty would be less formidable there, and his support of the present government, if he chose to give it, would be more valuable. The Bishop of Luçon was sent to negotiate with the Prince at Bourges. “The Queen sent me to him,” he says, “believing that I should have sufficient fidelity and skill to dissipate the clouds of suspicion which evil minds had falsely raised against her.” Her belief was justified. Her envoy not only made the most of the promises with which he was laden--promises from herself, from the Maréchal d’Ancre, and last, not least, from Leonora--but he worked on the Prince’s mind by his own clever and flattering persuasions, assisted probably by the influence of Père Joseph and his brother, M. du Tremblay, who were partisans of Condé.