The star of Montespan was rising bright in the east, and that of La
Valliere was setting in clouds and darkness in the west. But the
King never distrusted for a moment the truth of La Valliere, the
only woman who ever loved him for his own sake, and he knew it even
while he allowed her to be supplanted by another infinitely less
worthy--one whose hour of triumph came when she saw the broken-
hearted Louise throw aside the velvet and brocade of the Court and
put on the sackcloth of the barefooted and repentant Carmelite.
The King burned with indignation at the insult offered to his
mistress, and was still more alarmed to find the new mysterious
death creeping into the corridors of his palace. He hastily
constituted the terrible Chambre Ardente, a court of supreme
criminal jurisdiction, and commissioned it to search out, try, and
burn, without appeal, all poisoners and secret assassins in the
kingdom.
La Regnie, a man of Rhadamanthean justice, as hard of heart as he
was subtle and suspicious, was long baffled, and to his unutterable
rage, set at naught by the indefatigable poisoners who kept all
France awake on its pillows.
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