Madam de Cleves was afflicted to so violent a degree, that she lost in
a manner the use of her reason; the Queen was so kind as to come to see
her, and carried her to a convent without her being sensible whither
she was conducted; her sisters-in-law brought her back to Paris, before
she was in a condition to feel distinctly even her griefs: when she was
restored to her faculty of thinking, and reflected what a husband she
had lost, and considered that she had caused his death by the passion
which she had for another, the horror she had for herself and the Duke
de Nemours was not to be expressed.
The Duke in the beginning of her mourning durst pay her no other
respects but such as decency required; he knew Madam de Cleves enough
to be sensible that great importunities and eagerness would be
disagreeable to her; but what he learned afterwards plainly convinced
him that he ought to observe the same conduct a great while longer.
A servant of the Duke's informed him that Monsieur de Cleves's
gentleman, who was his intimate friend, had told him, in the excess of
his grief for the loss of his master, that Monsieur de Nemours's
journey to Colomiers was the occasion of his death. The Duke was
extremely surprised to hear this; but after having reflected upon it,
he guessed the truth in part, and rightly judged what Madam de Cleves's
sentiments would be at first, and what a distance it would throw him
from her, if she thought her husband's illness was occasioned by his
jealousy; he was of opinion that he ought not so much as to put her in
mind of his name very soon, and he abided by that conduct, however
severe it appeared to him.
He took a journey to Paris, nor could he forbear calling at her house
to enquire how she did. He was told, that she saw nobody, and that she
had even given strict orders that they should not trouble her with an
account of any that might come to see her; those very strict orders,
perhaps, were given with a view to the Duke, and to prevent her hearing
him spoken of; but he was too much in love to be able to live so
absolutely deprived of the sight of Madam de Cleves; he resolved to
find the means, let the difficulty be what it would, to get out of a
condition which was so insupportable to him.
The grief of that Princess exceeded the bounds of reason; a husband
dying, and dying on her account, and with so much tenderness for her,
never went out of her mind: she continually revolved in her thoughts
what she owed him, and she condemned herself for not having had a
passion for him, as if that had been a thing which depended on herself;
she found no consolation but in the thought that she lamented him as he
deserved to be lamented, and that she would do nothing during the
remainder of her life, but what he would have been glad she should have
done, had he lived.