e King have the Cardinal arrested. Rohan was placed in the Bastille, a most famous prison, that very night. Jeanne de la Motte-Valois was arrested the next day and also thrown into the Bastille(92). All efforts to recover the diamonds were lost because the Countess had packed her husband off to London with his pockets stuffed with loose diamonds (Zweig 181). The Cardinal, Villette and Olivia confessed to their crimes. The Countess, on the other hand, changed her story from day to day (93).Those who were close to the royal family advised them to hush-up about the entire affair. Maria Antoinette insisted that justice be served. I want this horror and all its details to be brought into the open beforethe whole world, she said (Komroff 94).These trials, that the Queen insisted on, only made matters worse. Her enemies circulated rumors that were printed as facts along with the court proceedings (94). They said that it had really been the Queens plan all along, to ruin the Cardinal. Some said she had written the letters and it was her in the garden, even though Villette and Olivia had confessed. Many insisted Jeanne was innocent (95).In the end, the Cardinal was found innocent. The court said he had been a victim of Motte-Valois and his intentions were pure. The Queen realized that the court had morally condemned her by finding Rohan guilty of no crime. The Countess was condemned to the galleys for life. She was flogged and branded with a V to show that she was a thief and imprisoned for life in the Bastille, from where she later escaped (Affair).For the first time, the French population got an inside look into the intrigue, deceit and corruption of the court and the church (98). And while the Queen was an innocent bystander to the whole plot, the Affair of the Diamond Necklace turned the people against the monarchy and especially the Queen which eventually led to the French Revolution. ...
