de
Maupeou, in pamphlets, couplets, and epigrams, both in French and
Latin, but they had no idea of conspiracies or plots.
And thus terminated an affair, which had caused so much alarm,
and which continued for a considerable period to engage the
attention of ministers. How was the mystery to be cleared up?
The poisoned orange-flower water, and the sudden deaths of the
two prisoners, were facts difficult to reconcile with the no less
undeniable innocence of the three accused Jesuits. The whole
business was to me an incomprehensible mass of confusion, in
which incidents the most horrible were mingled. At last we
agreed that the best and only thing to be done was to consign
the affair to oblivion; but there were circumstances which did
not so easily depart from the recollection of my excellent friend,
the marechale de Mirepoix. "My dear soul," said she to me one
day, "have you ever inquired what became of the 100,000 livres
given to madame Lorimer? she had no time to employ them in any
way before her imprisonment in the Bastille. You ought to inquire
into what hands they have fallen."
I fully comprehended the drift of this question, which I put to
M. de Sartines the first time I saw him.
"Bless me," exclaimed he, "you remind me that these 100,000
livres have been lying in a drawer in my office. But I have such
a terrible memory.
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