The armies were once more called up; all the Princes returned to their posts and the Prince de Montpensier decided that his wife should come with him to Paris so as to be further from the area where it was expected that fighting would take place. The Huguenots besieged Poitiers. The Duc de Guise went there to organise the defence and, while there, enhanced his reputation by his conduct. The Duc d'Anjou suffered from some illness, and left the army either on account of the severity of this or because he wanted to return to the comfort and security of Paris, where the presence of the Princess de Montpensier was not the least of the attractions. The command of the army was taken over by the Prince de Montpensier, and shortly after this, a peace having been arranged, the Court assembled in Paris. Here the beauty of the Princess eclipsed that of all her rivals. She charmed everyone by her looks and personality. The Duc d'Anjou did not abandon the sentiments she had inspired in him at Champigny, he took great care to make her aware of this by all sorts of delicate considerations, being careful at the same time not to make his attentions too obvious for fear of arousing the jealousy of her husband. The Duc de Guise was now fervently in love with her, but wishing, for a variety of reasons, to keep this secret, he resolved to tell her so privately and avoid any preliminaries which, as always, would give rise to talk and exposure. One day when he was in the Queen's apartments where there were very few people, the Queen having left to discuss affairs of state with Cardinal de Lorraine, the Princess de Montpensier arrived. He decided to take this opportunity to speak to her, and going up to her he said, "Although it may surprise and displease you, I want you to know that I have always felt for you that emotion which you once knew so well, and that its power has been so greatly increased by seeing you again that neither your disapproval, the hatred of your husband, nor the rivalry of the first Prince in the kingdom can in the least diminish it. It would perhaps have been more tactful to have let you become aware of this by my behaviour rather than by my words, but my behaviour would have been evident to others as well as to yourself and I wanted you alone to know of my love for you."The Princess was so surprised and thrown into confusion by this speech that she could not think of an answer, then, just when she had collected her wits and begun to reply, the Prince de Montpensier entered the room. The Princess's face displayed her agitation, and her embarrassment was compounded by the sight of her husband, to such an extent that he was left in no doubt about what the Duc de Guise had been saying to her. Fortunately at that moment the Queen re-entered the room and the Duc de Guise moved away to avoid the jealous Prince.
That evening the Princess found her husband in the worst temper imaginable. He berated her with the utmost violence and forbade her ever to speak to the Duc de Guise again. She retired to her room very sad and much preoccupied with the events of the day.
She saw the Duc the next day amid the company around the Queen, but he did not come near her and left soon after she did, indicating that he had no interest in remaining if she was not there. Not a day passed without her receiving a thousand covert marks of the Duc's passion though he did not attempt to speak to her unless he was sure that they could be seen by nobody.
Convinced of the Duc's sincerity, the Princess, in spite of the resolution she had made at Champigny, began to feel in the depths of her heart something of what she had felt in the past.
The Duc d'Anjou for his part, omitted nothing which could demonstrate his devotion in all the places where he could meet her. In the Queen his mother's apartments he followed her about continually, completely ignoring his sister who was very fond of him. It was at around this time that it became evident that this sister, who later became the Queen of Navarre, had a liking for the Duc de Guise, and another thing that became evident was a cooling of the friendship between that Duc and the Duc d'Anjou.
The rumour linking the name of the Royal Princess with that of the Duc de Guise disturbed The Princess de Montpensier to a degree which surprised her, and made her realise that she was more interested in the Duc than she had supposed.
Now it so happened that her father-in-law, M. de Montpensier, married a sister of the Duc de Guise, and the princess was bound to meet the Duc frequently in the various places where the marriage celebrations required their presence. She was greatly offended that a man who was widely believed to be in love with "Madame", the King's sister, should dare to make advances to her, she was not only offended but distressed at having deceived herself.
