"Thank you, I need nothing and desire no longer," sighed the prelate.
"My lord," sighed the tempter, drawing nearer, "such a reply ought not to be made to a wizard by a prince, young, fiery, handsome, rich and bearing the name of Rohan. Because the wizard reads hearts and knows to the contrary."
"I wish for nothing," repeated the high nobleman, almost frightened.
"On the contrary, I thought that your eminence entertained desires which he shrank from naming to himself, as they are truly royal."
"I believe you are alluding to some words you used in the Princess Royal's rooms?" said the prince, starting. "You were in error then, and are so still."
"Your highness is forgetting that I see as clearly in your heart what is going on now as I saw your carriage coming from the Carmelite convent, traversing the town and stopping under the trees fifty paces off from my house."
"My lord, the princes of your house have always hungered for a great and hazardous love affair."
"I do not know what you mean, my lord," faltered the prince.
"Nay, you understand to a T. I might have touched several chords in you--but why the useless? I went straight to the heartstring which sounds loudest, and it is vibrating deeply, I am sure."
With a final effort of mistrust the cardinal raised his head and interrogated the other's clear and sure gaze. The latter smiled with such superiority that the cardinal lowered his eyes.
"Oh, you are right not to meet my glance, my lord, for then I see into your heart too clearly. It is a mirror which retains the image which it has reflected."
"Silence, Count Fenix; do be silent," said the prelate, subjugated.
"Silence?--you are right, for the time has not come to parade such a passion."
"And can you tell me whether this is not a mad passion, as I have thought, and must think until I have a proof to the opposite?"
"You ask too much, my lord. I cannot say anything until I am in contact with some portion of the love-inspirer's self--for instance, a tress of her golden hair, however scanty."
"Verily you are a deep man! You truly say you can read into hearts as I in my prayer-book."
"Almost the very words your ancestor used--I mean Chevalier Louis Rohan, when I bade farewell to him, on the execution-stage in the Bastille, which he had ascended so courageously."