Come, is not that your opinion ?" "Yes; but still, my dear bishop, I believe you are exaggerating the position of affairs." "Blind, how blind you are!" murmured Aramis.
"La Valliere," returned Fouquet, "whom we assume to be a politician of the greatest ability, is simply nothing more than a coquette, who hopes that I shall pay my court to her, because I have already done so, and who, now that she has received a confirmation of the king's regard, hopes to keep me in leading strings with the letter.

It is natural enough!" Aramis shook his head.
"Is not that your opinion ?" said Fouquet.
"She is not a coquette," he replied.
"Allow me to tell you--" "Oh! I am well enough acquainted with women who are coquettes," said Aramis.
"My dear friend!" "It is a long time ago since I finished my studies, you mean.

But women do not change." "True; but men change, and you at the present day are far more suspicious than you formerly were." And then, beginning to laugh, he added, "Come, if La Valliere is willing to love me only to the extent of a third and the king two-thirds, do you think the condition acceptable ?" Aramis rose impatiently.

"La Valliere," he said, "has never loved, and will never love any one but the king." "At all events," said Fouquet, "what would you do ?" "Ask me rather what I would have done ?" "Well, what would you have done ?" "In the first place, I should not have allowed that man to go." "Toby!" "Yes; Toby is a traitor.

Nay, I am sure of it, and I would not have let him go until he had told me the truth." "There is still time.