As the Comte de Montgommery atoned for this unfortunate casualty by a thousand brilliant exploits, the king bore him no ill-will for it, and interposed no obstacle to his rising to the first rank at court and in the army. In 1530 Jacques married Claudine de Boissière. It was a mere marriage de convenance; but he long mourned for his wife, who died in 1533, when Gabriel was born. Melancholy, moreover, was the most marked trait of his character, as is the case with all those who are predestined to some fatality. When he was left a widower and alone, he found relief only on the battlefield, and was driven into danger by sheer ennui. But in 1538, after the truce of Nice, when this man of war and of action had to conform to the etiquette of the court, and to walk up and down in the galleries of the Tournelles or the Louvre, with his parade-sword at his side, he was near dying of disgust. A mad passion saved him, and was his ruin. The regal Circe involved this overgrown boy, sturdy and ingenuous, in her toils. He fell in love with Diane de Poitiers. Three months he revolved about her, gloomy and lowering, without ever addressing a single word to her; nor was there any need of a word for the grande sénéchale to understand that his heart belonged to her. She made a note of that passion in a corner of her memory as something that might possibly be of use to her on occasion. The occasion came. François I. began to neglect his beautiful mistress for Madame d'Étampes, who was less beautiful in face, but had the great advantage of being attractive in other respects. When the signs that she was being superseded were unmistakable, Diane, for the first time in her life, spoke to Jacques de Montgommery. This took place at the Tournelles, at a fête given by the king to the new favorite. "Monsieur de Montgommery," said Diane, calling him by name. He drew near her, with heaving chest, and made an awkward salutation. "How very sad you are, Monsieur de Montgommery!" she said. "To the point of death, Madame." "And why, in Heaven's name!" "Madame, because I should like to kill myself." "For some one, no doubt?" "To kill myself for some one would be very sweet; but, _ma foi_, to do it for nothing would be sweeter yet." "What a fearful state of melancholy!" said Diane; "and whence comes this black despair, pray?" "Ah! can I say, Madame?" "Well, then, I know, Monsieur de Montgommery. You are in love with me." Jacques turned white as a sheet; and then, with a more tremendous struggle than it would have cost him to cast himself headlong and alone into the midst of a whole battalion of the enemy, he replied in a harsh and uncertain voice,-- "Well, then, Madame, you are right. I do love you. So much the worse for me!" "So much the better, rather," replied Diane, laughing.