I profited by his coming to slip
out of the room into my boudoir, from which I despatched the
following note to M. d'Aiguillon:
"MY DEAR DUKE,--Victoria! We are conquerors;
master and man quit Paris to-morrow. We shall
replace them by our friends; and you best know
whether you are amongst the number of them."
When I returned to the drawing-room, the king exclaimed,
"Come, madam., you are waited for; the prince de Soubise has a
very curious anecdote to relate, which befell a lady of his
acquaintance; I begged of him to defer telling it till you
rejoined us."
"Are you afraid of ghosts?" inquired the marechal of me.
"Not this evening," replied I; "to-morrow, perhaps, or the next
day, I may be."
This jest amused the king and the duc de la Vrilliere, whilst M.
de Maupeou, who seemed to fear lest I should by any indiscretion,
reveal our secret, made a signal of impatience; to which I
replied, by shrugging up my shoulders. Poor M. de Soubise,
although he did not comprehend my joke, laughed at it as heartily
as heartily as the rest who saw its application. "Oh! you
courtier," thought I We then entreated of him to commence the
recital of his tale, which he did in the following words--
"There is in Lower Brittany a family gifted with a most singular
endowment: each member of the family, male or female, is warned
exactly one month previous to his or her decease of the precise
hour and day in which it will take place.
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