"You give me a very poor idea of negotiators of the present day. I assure you that if, in my earlier days, a woman had gone to M. de Cinq-Mars, who was not, moreover, a man of very high order of intellect, and had said to him about the cardinal what I have just now said to you of M. Fouquet, M. de Cinq-Mars would by this time have already set actively to work." "Nay, madame, show a little indulgence, I entreat you." "Well, then, you do really consent to replace M. Fouquet?" "Certainly, I do, if the king dismisses M. Fouquet." "Again a word too much; it is quite evident that if you have not yet succeeded in driving M. Fouquet from his post, it is because you have not been able to do so. Therefore, I should be the greatest simpleton possible if, in coming to you, I did not bring you the very thing you require." "I am distressed to be obliged to persist, madame," said Colbert, after a silence which enabled the duchesse to sound the depth of his dissimulation, "but I must warn you that for the last six years denunciation after denunciation has been made against M. Fouquet, and he has remained unshaken and unaffected by them." "There is a time for everything, Monsieur Colbert; those who were the authors of those denunciations were not called Madame de Chevreuse, and they had no proofs equal to the six letters from M. de Mazarin which establish the offense in question." "The offense!" "The crime, if you like it better." "The crime! committed by M. Fouquet!" "Nothing less. It is rather strange, M. Colbert, but your face, which just now was cold and indifferent, is now positively the very reverse." "A crime!" "I am delighted to see it makes an impression upon you." "It is because that word, madame, embraces so many things." "It embraces the post of surintendant of finance for yourself, and a letter of exile, or the Bastille, for M. Fouquet." "Forgive me, Madame la Duchesse, but it is almost impossible that M. Fouquet can be exiled; to be imprisoned or disgraced, that is already a great deal." "Oh, I am perfectly aware of what I am saying," returned Madame de Chevreuse, coldly. "I do not live at such a distance from Paris as not to know what takes place there. The king does not like M. Fouquet, and he would willingly sacrifice M. Fouquet if an opportunity were only given him." "It must be a good one, though." "Good enough, and one I estimate to be worth five hundred thousand francs." "In what way?" said Colbert. "I mean, monsieur, that holding this opportunity in my own hands, I will not allow it to be transferred to yours except for a sum of five hundred thousand francs." "I understand you perfectly, madame. But since you have fixed a price for the sale, let me now see the value of the articles to be sold."