"If I had wished, I might have escaped what has befallen me; I had only to accept the retreat which a person[141] who warned me of the _lettre de cachet_ obtained against me offered me; but I had no desire to do so." * * * * * A few days after the first of these letters was written, Justine received a letter from the Marshal, in answer to one which she had sent him from Commercy, on her way to Lunéville. In this he attributed her misfortunes to the action of the leaders of the _dévots_, or devout party, at the Court, who were always eager to punish persons who contravened the marriage laws, and "did not easily let go their prey." "Favart," he adds, "ought to feel highly flattered that you should sacrifice for him fortune, pleasure, glory, everything, in short, that might have made the happiness of your life. I hope that he will be able to compensate you for it, and that you will never feel the sacrifice which you are making.... You would not make my happiness and your own. Perhaps you will make your own unhappiness and that of Favart. I do not wish it, but I fear it.--Farewell." At the same time, the hypocritical Marshal wrote to the actress Mlle. Fleury, who had exchanged the rôle of mistress for that of confidante, expressing the grief he felt on hearing of the arrest of the "little fairy," whom he had "imagined out of danger." "How I pity that poor mother [Madame Favart], who is a courageous and sensible woman! I have been her friend since the first time I spoke to her. Tell her that I will do my best, and as she and Favart have not a sou, beg her to accept fifty louis, for which you will find an order enclosed. That will help them for the present, and I promise them assistance in every way for the future." He then declares his opinion that the person responsible for the trouble is the priest who had accompanied Justine's father on his visits to the leading members of the Comédie-Italienne, and that every effort should be made to discover him, if necessary, by bribing Meusnier to reveal his whereabouts. The money offered by the Marshal was refused by Favart, nor could the old lady and her daughter be prevailed upon to accept it. Early in November, Justine was removed from Les Grands-Andelys to a convent at Angers. Her new residence was one of the regular _couvents de force_, or houses of detention, where the most rigorous discipline prevailed, and she was treated "like a State criminal." This, as the worthy Marshal had of course foreseen, rendered her supremely miserable, and all the more eager to recover her liberty. To do her justice, however, she would appear to have been far more exercised over the fate of her husband and his mother and sister, left, through his misfortune, almost entirely without resources, than over her own troubles; for, on November 6, we find Maurice writing from Chambord:-- * * * * *