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86 - Story of Old France by H. A. Guerber · Story of Old France

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  Speaker 1: Section eighty five of the Story of Old Friends. This
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  Speaker 1: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
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  Speaker 1: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
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  Speaker 1: LibriVox dot org. The Story of Old Friends by H. A. Gerber,
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  Speaker 1: Section eighty five. The Iron Mask. As we have seen,
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  Speaker 1: Louis begun his independent reign by proceeding to supervise everything himself.
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  Speaker 1: But his principal advisor was Colbert, who had served Mazarin
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  Speaker 1: and was therefore well posted about all government matters. Albert
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  Speaker 1: soon informed the young monarch that there was something amiss
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  Speaker 1: in regard to Fouquet, Minister of Finance, who, beginning his
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  Speaker 1: duty as a poor man, was at the end of
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  Speaker 1: a few years, noted for great wealth. At first, the
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  Speaker 1: king would not credit such tales, But before Mazarin had
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  Speaker 1: been in his grave many months, Fouquet's stealings became too
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  Speaker 1: glaring to be ignored, and his fall came about in
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  Speaker 1: a dramatic way. It seems that Fouquet once invited the
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  Speaker 1: king to his country home, where the great magnificence of
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  Speaker 1: his establishment eclipsed everything that had hitherto been seen at court.
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  Speaker 1: Louis the fourteenth, who expected to be first in everything,
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  Speaker 1: gazed around him in wondering displeasure, and showed his wrass
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  Speaker 1: by remarking coldly, I shall never again, sir, venture to
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  Speaker 1: invite you to visit me, for you would find your
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  Speaker 1: herself inconvenienced. Still apparently polite and well entertained, Louis soon
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  Speaker 1: came to the conclusion that all this wealth could not
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  Speaker 1: have been obtained by honest means. It is possible, however,
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  Speaker 1: that Fouquet would only have been the private of office,
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  Speaker 1: had not the king discovered that his dishonest minister there
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  Speaker 1: to rival him. In another line, Louis had recently begun
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  Speaker 1: to pay court to a beautiful young lady, Mademoiselle de
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  Speaker 1: la Valliere, over whose graceful head he once, at a picnic,
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  Speaker 1: held his plummet hat to protect her from a summer shower.
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  Speaker 1: The King's infatuation was no secret, so no one else
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  Speaker 1: ventured to pay this lady attentions for fear of arousing
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  Speaker 1: royal jealousy. It is said, however, that Fouquet, also smitten
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  Speaker 1: with the fair lady's charms, secreted her portrait in a
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  Speaker 1: private room when it was closely covered by a curtain,
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  Speaker 1: so that the gaze of the vogar might never rest
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  Speaker 1: upon it. By some accident, Louis went into this very apartment,
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  Speaker 1: where his attention was naturally attracted by the shrouded painting.
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  Speaker 1: Wishing to gratify his curiosity, the king quickly pushed aside
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  Speaker 1: the curtain, and so discovered the full extent of his
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  Speaker 1: minister's perfidy in his breath. The king soon after had
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  Speaker 1: Fouquet arrested and confiscated all his possessions. Nineteen years years later,
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  Speaker 1: it was publicly reported that Fouquet had died in one
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  Speaker 1: of the king's fortresses. But about the same time a
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  Speaker 1: mysterious prisoner was first mentioned in France. This man, evidently
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  Speaker 1: some important personage, was treated with great respect by his jailers,
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  Speaker 1: but no one was ever allowed to converse privately with him,
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  Speaker 1: or even to catch a glimpse of his face, which
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  Speaker 1: was always covered by a velvet mask. As this mask
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  Speaker 1: was black, it was said to be of iron, And
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  Speaker 1: because no name was ever given to this captive, he
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  Speaker 1: was popularly known as the Ion Mask. Many stories are
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  Speaker 1: told about him, some of which you will like to hear.
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  Speaker 1: From one fortress to another, this prisoner traveled through France,
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  Speaker 1: each governor being obliged in turn to answer with his
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  Speaker 1: life for the man's saved detention. For a time, the
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  Speaker 1: Iron Mask was locked up in a tower overlooking the sea,
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  Speaker 1: and one day, it is said, he managed to scratch
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  Speaker 1: a few words on a silver dish, which he flung
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  Speaker 1: through the bars out of his window. A poor fisherman
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  Speaker 1: casting his nets in that neighborhood drew up this silver vessel,
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  Speaker 1: which he immediately carried to the castle in hopes of
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  Speaker 1: securing a rich reward. He obstinately refused, however, to give
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  Speaker 1: it up or even to show it to anyone, save
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  Speaker 1: the governor, who, on catching sight of the words scratched
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  Speaker 1: on the smooth silver surface, turned ghastly pale, finding, however,
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  Speaker 1: by close cross questioning that the fisherman did not know
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  Speaker 1: how to read and had not shown his find to
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  Speaker 1: any one, The governor congratulated the men upon his ignorance
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  Speaker 1: and caution, grimly declaring that to them he owed his life.
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  Speaker 1: In time, the Iron Mask was conveyed to the Bastille
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  Speaker 1: in Paris, where he died in seventeen o three, after
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  Speaker 1: being some say twenty four and others forty three years
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  Speaker 1: a prisoner, but even then the mystery was not revealed,
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  Speaker 1: for we are told that no one was permitted to
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  Speaker 1: see the dead man's features. The man in the iron
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  Speaker 1: mask is one of the great puzzles in history, because
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  Speaker 1: no great person is known to have disappeared at that time.
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  Speaker 1: There are many theories about him, but as no positive
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  Speaker 1: proof exists that any one of these is correct, you
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  Speaker 1: may think what you please. Dumal, the great French novelist,
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  Speaker 1: romantically asserted that the man with the iron mask was
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  Speaker 1: a twin brother of Louis the fourteenth, so exactly like
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  Speaker 1: him that they could not be told apart. He claimed
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  Speaker 1: that the prince was kept in prison lest trouble should
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  Speaker 1: arise for the state, but that if anything untoward had
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  Speaker 1: happened during Louis the fourteenth minority, his twin brother would
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  Speaker 1: undoubtedly have been put in his place without any one
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  Speaker 1: suspecting the substitution. Another theory is that this man was Fouquet,
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  Speaker 1: although his death had been openly announced, was still made
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  Speaker 1: to suffer for having there to raise his eyes to
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  Speaker 1: the king's favorite, if not for having robbed the state.
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  Speaker 1: A third supposition, the least romantic, but most plausible is
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  Speaker 1: that the secretary of the Duke of Mantua, trying to
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  Speaker 1: treat the French government, was secretly seized and imprisoned by
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  Speaker 1: Louis's orders. These are only three out of many versions
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  Speaker 1: of the story of the Mysterious Prisoner, to which you
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  Speaker 1: will find many allusions, both in history and in fiction.
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  Speaker 1: End of section eighty five.