"I have all the names and descriptions," said the secret judge, eagerly,
bending his tall form and thin, olive-colored visage, wrinkled with a
servile smile, down to the armchair.

"It is well! it is well!" said the minister, pushing him back;
"but that is not the question yet. You, Joseph, be in Paris before this
young upstart, who will become a favorite, I am certain. Become his
friend; make him of my party or destroy him. Let him serve me or fall.
But, above all, send me every day safe persons to give me verbal
accounts. I will have no more writing for the future. I am much
displeased with you, Joseph. What a miserable courier you chose to send
from Cologne! He could not understand me. He saw the King too soon,
and here we are still in disgrace in consequence. You have just missed
ruining me entirely. Go and observe what is about to be done in Paris.
A conspiracy will soon be hatched against me; but it will be the last.
I remain here in order to let them all act more freely. Go, both of you,
and send me my valet after the lapse of two hours; I wish now to be
alone."

The steps of the two men were still to be heard as Richelieu, with eyes
fixed upon the entrance to the tent, pursued them with his irritated
glance.

"Wretches!" he exclaimed, when he was alone, "go and accomplish some
more secret work, and afterward I will crush you, in pure instruments of
my power. The King will soon succumb beneath the slow malady which
consumes him. I shall then be regent; I shall be King of France myself;
I shall no longer have to dread the caprices of his weakness. I will
destroy the haughty races of this country. I will be alone above them