“On this point I am constrained to add, knowing what might be the consequence of sinister counsels and your own clemency and good-nature, that your enemies have even dared, with that imprudence and wickedness which is the result of despair, to spread the report that this detestable crime was instigated by you. You neither can nor ought to hesitate about this action, without making an irreparable breach in your reputation; but, on the contrary, you ought to pursue the matter to judgment and execution, so as to stop the mouths of these detestable calumniators in the sight of God and man.”[129] After ordering the arrest of the Princesse de Condé, Henri despatched one of his gentlemen, the Sieur de Veau Limery, to the Court, with a letter for “the Queen, mother of the King, my lord,” in which he informed her that the page Belcastel, “the principal instrument of the crime,” had taken refuge in Poitiers, and begged her to give orders that search should be made for him, and that, when apprehended, he should be conducted to Saint-Jean-d’Angely, to be confronted with his accomplices. Instructions to that effect were sent to Poitiers; but nothing was ever heard of the fugitive page, who seemed to have vanished off the face of the earth. The position of the Princesse de Condé was a terrible one. It was not only at Saint-Jean-d’Angely that public opinion had pronounced against her. The more zealous Huguenots, furious at the supposed crime which had deprived them of the prince who had shared all their passions and prejudices, were loud in their demands that she should be brought to justice; while the Catholics were very hostile to the princess, on account of her abjuration and her conduct in recent events, in which she had rendered such good service to the Protestant cause. To her relatives she looked in vain for help or sympathy. The Duchesse de Thouars, who, since the affair of Taillebourg, had been on the worst possible terms with her daughter, never seems to have even thought of coming to Saint-Jean-d’Angely to inquire if she were innocent or guilty; and her absence still further prejudiced the princess’s case in the eyes of the public. The young Duc de Thouars, who, one would naturally suppose, would have been eager to champion his sister, does not appear to have moved in the matter at all. As for her husband’s relatives, the Prince de Conti and the Comte de Soissons seem to have at once made up their minds that she was guilty and did all in their power to hasten the prosecution; while the attitude of the Dowager-Princesse de Condé may be gauged from the following remarkable letter: