THE WATER QUESTION--EXILI--THE PLACE DE GRÊVE
The early morning of the terrible day arrived. With its first dawn
the good Pirot, according to his promise, was at the gates of the
Conciergerie; and being immediately conducted to the cell in which
Marie was confined, discovered that she had not been to bed that
night, but since the departure of Louise Gauthier had been occupied in
writing to various branches of her family.
She rose to receive him as he entered; and at a sign the person who
had been in attendance took her departure. Pirot observed that her
eyelids were red with watching, not from tears: but a fire was burning
in her eyes with almost unearthly brilliancy. Her cheek was flushed
with hectic patches, and her whole frame was trembling with nervous
excitement. As the doctor saluted her with the conventional words of
greeting she smiled and replied--
‘You forget, monsieur, that I shall scarcely witness the noon of
to-day. A few hours--only a few hours more! I have often tried to
imagine the feelings of those who were condemned; and now that I am
almost upon the scaffold it appears like some troubled dream.’
‘We will not waste this brief interval in speculations,’ replied
Pirot. ‘The officers of the prison will soon interrupt us. Have you
nothing to confide to me before they arrive?’
‘They will take charge of these letters I have written, and will read
them before they send them forth,’ replied Marie. ‘But here is one,’
she continued, as her voice hesitated and fell, ‘that I could wish you
yourself would deliver. It is to M. de Brinvilliers, my husband; it
relates only to him, and--my children!’
Pirot looked at her as she spoke, and her face betrayed the violent
emotion that the mention of her children had given rise to. She
struggled with her pride for a few seconds, and then broke down into a
natural and violent burst of tears. Her sympathies had been scarcely
touched whilst merely thinking of her two little daughters; but the
instant she named them to another her wonderful self-possession gave
way. She leant upon the rude table, and covering her face with her
mantle wept aloud.
Pirot took the letter from her hand, and read as follows--thinking it
best to allow the violence of Marie’s grief to have full play, rather
than to attempt to check it by any reasoning of his own:--
‘For the last time, Antoine, and on the point of delivering up my soul
to God, I write to you, wishing to assure you of my friendship, which
will continue until the latest moment of my life. I am about to suffer
the degrading punishment my enemies have condemned me to. Forgive
them, I beseech you, as I have done: and forgive me also, for the
shame which, through my actions, will fall upon your name. Remember
that we are but on earth for a short period; and that, before long,
you yourself may have to render a just account to God of all your
actions, even the most insignificant, as I shall have to do in a few
hours. Instruct and watch over our poor children: Madame Marillac and
Madame Cousté will inform you of all they will require. Let your
prayers be continually offered up for my repose, and believe that I
die thinking of you only.
‘Marie.’
He had scarcely concluded the epistle when the Marchioness recovered
from the access of emotion, and raised her face towards him, as she
hurriedly wiped her eyes.
‘This is childish,’ she exclaimed. ‘What must you think of me,
monsieur? And yet I would sooner you should have witnessed this weak
ebullition than others in the prison. Come, sir, we will pray for the
forgiveness of those under whose directions and hands I am about to
suffer, and for the salvation of my own soul.’
She threw open the leaves of a religious book that was lying on the
bench, and prayed long and earnestly. Pirot joined her: and thus they
continued for more than an hour, until their devotions were
interrupted by the arrival of the concierge and one or two officers,
who came to announce to her that the chief greffier was waiting in the
lower room to read the sentence of the Court to her. Upon this she
arose, without betokening any fresh emotion, and wrapping a cloak
about her, accompanied by Pirot, preceded and followed by the people
of the prison, she quitted her cell.
They descended some steps, and led her into a low arched room, but
dimly lighted by a few glimmering lamps suspended in iron frames from
the ceiling. The walls were damp and rugged; and an old and
half-obscure painting of a holy family was suspended at the end of the
room. Under this was a common wooden _prie-dieu_, such as we now see
in the foreign churches, and near it some rude chairs and a table, on
which were materials for writing; and around it three or four of the
judicial functionaries were sitting, being now joined by Pirot.
Opposite to this, against the wall, was a low pile of what was
apparently furniture, covered entirely with a black tarpaulin, and on
the ground, near that, some brass and earthen vessels full of water.
The things here enumerated comprised all that was movable in the
dungeon.
As Marie entered one of the magistrates made a sign to the concierge,
who placed a seat for her near the table; and when she had taken it
the examination commenced. It was conducted by the officials in turn,
many questions being suggested by Pirot, and to all of them the
Marchioness replied with the most extraordinary coolness and
self-possession, although with a caution which astounded her
interrogators--avowing the fact of having administered certain drugs
to her father and others, but denying all knowledge of their
composition or antidotes--and also vehemently declaring that she had
no accomplices in the crimes with which she was charged. But beyond
this they could extract nothing from her; and although the combined
ingenuity of her examiners, deeply versed as they were in every kind
of method by which any confession might be educed, was exerted against
her during a protracted sitting, she met every question with an
exculpatory reply, and nothing more could be obtained from her.[23]
Seeing this, the examination was at length brought to a conclusion,
and one of the interrogators gave orders that the chief greffier
should read the arrest. The functionary hereon rose from his seat with
the paper in his hand, and commenced reading it in a hurried voice, as
if it were a task he was anxious to bring to a speedy conclusion. The
arrest was to the effect that the Court of the Chambers assembled
having found Marie-Marguerite d’Aubray, the wife of the Marquis of
Brinvilliers, guilty of the crimes attributed to her, condemned her to
do penance before the principal door of Notre Dame, with a lighted
torch in her hand weighing two pounds; and there, whilst on her knees,
to confess that she had wilfully poisoned her father and brothers, and
to demand pardon of God. And having been brought hither on a tumbrel,
with her feet naked, and a cord about her neck, she should be carried
on to the Place de Grêve, to have her head cut off upon a scaffold
erected for that purpose; after which her body should be burned, and
the ashes scattered to the wind: the question--both ordinary and
extraordinary--first being applied. The document went on to speak of
the confiscation of her property, which was to go partly to the king,
partly to defray the expenses of the prosecutions connected with the
affair, including that of Lachaussée; and the residue for masses to
be said in the chapel of the Conciergerie, for the repose of the souls
of her victims.
During the reading of this paper Marie continued to preserve the same
self-possession, even interrogating the greffier with a calm, unshaken
voice, upon certain points connected with it. As the functionary
concluded the magistrates rose, and another man advanced, of whose
presence Marie had not been before aware. He was tall and pale, and he
wore a tight fitting dress of unrelieved black. Marie perceived by the
cords in his hands that he was the executioner; and to him alone she
now belonged.
As the magistrates quitted the chamber he drew away the black cloth
that covered the apparatus of torture, and revealed the ghastly
paraphernalia. Pirot whispered a few words of encouragement in her
ear, and then followed the others, leaving Marie alone with the
executioner and the greffier, who remained at the table to take down
the answers of the prisoner. Marie glanced at the vessels of water
which stood upon the ground. She knew the nature of the terrible
ordeal she was about to undergo, but her courage failed her not.
‘You surely do not mean me to swallow all that water, monsieur?’ she
said to the greffier; ‘small as I am, there is more than enough to
drown me.’
The officer returned no answer, but looked significantly at the
executioner. The man approached the Marchioness, and began to unfasten
her attire, removing one of her clothes after another, until nothing
was left her but an under-garment, in which she now stood before the
greffier, her limbs as white as the linen that scarcely shrouded them,
but exhibiting not the slightest signs of tremor. Again the
interrogator questioned her respecting her accomplices; and again
Marie firmly denied the existence of any. All his efforts were vain,
as had been those of the magistrates. The sentence was ordered to be
carried out.
The ‘water question,’ as it was termed, was one of the most revolting
punishments which the barbarous usages of the period allowed in its
criminal proceedings; the Marchioness of Brinvilliers was one of
almost its last victims, as it was then practised in all its
unmitigated severity. The sufferer was compelled to swallow a large
quantity of water, forced into the mouth by a horn; the body being at
the same time secured to a bench, in a most painful position, whilst
the hands and feet were attached to rings of iron in the wall and
floor of the chamber. For the ‘ordinary question,’ as it was termed,
the bench was two feet high, and the quantity of water to be swallowed
nearly twelve pints; for the ‘extraordinary’ ordeal a trestle three
feet high was substituted for the other, the hands and feet still
remaining fixed to the rings, and an additional quantity of water,
equal to the first, was forced down the sufferer’s throat. In the
event of the prisoner’s obstinacy, and a refusal to open the mouth,
the executioner closed the nostrils with his thumb and finger, until
the unfortunate person was obliged to part his lips to breathe, when
advantage was immediately taken of this to force the end of the horn
down his throat. The consequence of this barbarous practice was, the
distension of the chest by the introduction of the water, causing such
agonising pain that very few were able to resist it.
The executioner approached Marie again, and leading her to the bench
rudely tied her feet to the rings in the floor. Then forcing her back
with brutal violence, he fastened her wrists to the links in the wall,
pulling the cords as tightly as they would come. Finally, he fastened
the edge of her garment round her knees with one of the bands of her
dress, and then announced that all was in readiness for the torture.
The greffier gave the word, and the terrible operation commenced in
silence, broken only by an occasional ejaculation of Marie, as measure
after measure of the fluid disappeared. But beyond this she spoke not
a word: a low wail was her only reply to the questions of the
examiner, whilst she shook her head, as much as the hold of her
tormentor permitted her to do, in answer to all his energetic and
impressive requests that she would disclose all she knew. And in these
he was influenced as much by compassion as by the wish that the ends
of justice should be answered.
The limits of the ordinary torture had been reached without any
admission on her part, and the executioner stopped until he received
fresh directions from the greffier to proceed to the second stage of
the question. The bench upon which Marie was tied down was removed,
and one more than a foot higher was substituted for it--wedged under
her by the power of the torturer, without releasing her hands and
feet, now so tightly wrung by the cords that the blood started from
the parts where they cut into the flesh. Still no cry escaped her
lips; with superhuman endurance she went through the continuation of
the dreadful ordeal, betraying scarcely any signs of life except the
quivering of her limbs and an occasional violent contraction of the
muscles as she turned herself round upon the trestle as far as the
cords would allow of her doing. At last she cried out, with a violence
that for the instant startled the officials in attendance, ‘_Mon Dieu!
mon Dieu!_ they have killed me!’ And this was followed by a piercing
cry of agony; after which all was still.
The greffier rose from his seat, and once more asked her respecting
her accomplices. But she returned no answer, nor indeed gave the least
sign of consciousness: upon which, fearing that the punishment had
been carried too far, he gave orders that she should be unbound. The
executioner obeyed; and then, calling in his fellows to his
assistance, they untied the cords from the rings and staples and bore
the unhappy woman into an adjoining chamber, placing her on a mattress
before a large fire that was burning in the huge open chimney-place.
It was some time before her senses returned. When she came to herself
she found the good Pirot supporting her head, whilst the greffier was
communing with the magistrates respecting the proceedings of the
ordeal. They quitted the chamber soon after she recovered, and then
she was left alone with the doctor, who had thrown his cloak around
her thinly clad and shivering form, and was now only waiting until she
should be sufficiently brought round to join him in assisting at the
last offices of religion.
At last he half-led, half-carried her to a _prie-dieu_, and there
prayed with her until the cold and dismal light of morning, overcoming
the red glare of the fire, stole cheerlessly through the small and
heavy-barred loopholes of the chamber. And with it came something of
terrible import--the low murmur of the vast crowd already assembled
without the gates, and in the Cour des Miracles[24]--the audible
passing and repassing of the Royal Guard, as bodies of them paraded
the streets in the immediate line from the Palais de Justice to Notre
Dame, and thence to the Place de Grêve--and an unwonted stir in the
Conciergerie, as those friends of the officers and other functionaries
who had procured the entree to the prison arrived. Not a sound escaped
Marie’s ear, although Pirot strove in some measure to drown the
distant hum by his voice. Every nerve appeared intensely sensitive,
and the reaction of a terrible excitement had brought the blood back
to the surface of her flesh. Her eyes were again blazing with fevered
brilliancy; her cheek was flushed, and a rapid shuddering movement
kept every muscle in convulsive action.
Her prayers were only interrupted by the arrival of the same
magistrates who had before left her, followed by the executioner and
his assistants; and the Marchioness directly knew that the terrible
hour had arrived. Without a word she held out her wrists, now
discoloured and swollen by the question, to the headsman; and not an
expression of pain escaped her lips as he roughly bound them together.
The cloak which Pirot had lent her was then thrown on one side; when,
as she found her bosom exposed, she requested the man to fasten the
lappets of her garment together with a pin. He, however, threw a large
scarf over her shoulders, and part of this formed a cowl, which she
pulled down over her face as well as her imprisoned hands enabled her
to do. And when this had been arranged she left the chapel, preceded
and followed by the officers of the prison.
Beyond the wicket some people had assembled in the court. As she
emerged from the building a man pressed rudely forward from the little
knot of gazers, and came close to her side, as he thrust a small note
almost in her face. Pirot took it from him, at Marie’s request, and
inquired what it was.
‘An account of money due to me,’ said the man, ‘for a tumbrel and a
horse, both ruined on the road from La Villette to Le Bourget.’
‘I know not what he means,’ said Marie.
‘You do--you do, madame,’ answered the intruder. ‘It was taken from
your _hôtel_ in the Rue St. Paul for your flight to Liége.’
‘Another time will do to settle this,’ observed Pirot.
‘Another time will not do,’ answered the man. ‘Where will be my chance
of payment five minutes after madame reaches the Grêve?’
As he spoke the man was pulled forcibly away, and thrust on one side,
by one of the bystanders. Marie looked up to see who had thus
interfered, and her eyes met those of Philippe Glazer. Clasping his
hands together he gazed at her with a look of intense agony. Even in
the horror of the moment Marie perceived that he had placed in his hat
the clasp she gave him at Compiègne. She bowed her head in
recognition, and then passed on. Philippe never saw her again.
They moved forward through the courts of the Conciergerie, Pirot never
ceasing his religious consolations until they came to the lodge of the
prison. Here the cortege halted, and then the executioner approached
her with a long white garment hanging over his arm. The ghastly
toilette of the scaffold was to be made at this place. She was about
to surrender herself to the operation when a door at the other side of
the lodge was opened, and a large concourse of people--so many that
they nearly filled the apartment--entered eagerly. They were chiefly
females--women holding high rank in Paris, who had met the Marchioness
frequently in society. Amongst them were the Countess of Soissons and
Mademoiselle de Scudery.
The shock given to Marie by this unexpected sight was too great, and
she would have fallen but for the support of Pirot. He sustained her
whilst the executioner once more released her hands, and drew the long
white dress over that she was wearing, tying it up closely round her
neck, and knotting a large cord round her waist in lieu of a girdle.
‘She has a neat foot,’ whispered the Countess of Soissons to M. de
Roquelaure, as she looked at Marie’s small naked foot, not covered by
the garment, planted upon the chill pavement of the lodge.
‘You told me she squeezed it into a shoe always too small when we saw
her at Versailles,’ replied the other. ‘O the jealousy of women!’
‘You have smarted yourself, monsieur, when she has refused you for a
dance,’ returned the Countess; ‘she did not think you equal to the gay
Sainte-Croix.’
‘And yet he dazzled and went out like a firework,’ said Roquelaure; ‘I
hope such will not be my fate.’
He smiled affectedly as he spoke. Marie heard the import of their
heartless conversation, and gazed at them with an expression of
withering contempt. They fell back abashed, and retreated amidst the
crowd.
‘In God’s name, monsieur,’ she said, ‘offer me some consolation. Is
there not something terrible and unnatural in such barbarous curiosity
on the part of these people?’
‘Madame,’ replied Pirot, in whose eyes the tears were standing, from
pity for the ordeal she was then undergoing, and that which he knew
was to come, ‘regard this curiosity rather as an additional misery
imposed upon you as a further expiation than as a wish on the part of
these ill-judging people to cause you further pain. Lean on me if you
need support. I will aid you as far as is in my power, and the law
permits.’
As he spoke the executioner approached, carrying a heavy lighted
torch, which he placed in her hands, according to the sentence of the
arrest; but her strained and swollen wrists refused to sustain it, and
it would have fallen to the ground had not Pirot held it up with his
hand, as Marie was leaning heavily upon his arm. The greffier then
read the paper a second time, and the dreary procession moved on to
the point that required all the nerve of Pirot, no less than of the
Marchioness, to encounter--the gate of the lodge that opened into the
thoroughfare before the Palais de Justice, which was now nearly
blocked up, as far as the eye could reach, in every direction, by a
vast and expectant crowd.
As the officers of the prison, with their wands, came forth on the top
of the flight of steps, the mass of people became suddenly agitated,
and their noise increased; but the moment Marie appeared, prominent
amidst them all by reason of her white dress and the torch which she
was carrying, a loud and savage roar--a wild continuous cry of
ferocious triumph and execration--burst as by one impulse from the
entire crowd, and this was caught up by those who were not even
visible from the Palais, and echoed along the quays and places
adjoining, until the whole of Paris appeared to be speaking with one
voice, and rejoicing at the ghastly ceremony about to take place.
Marie fell back, as though the uproar had been endowed with material
power to strike her; but the expression of her features was not that
which Pirot had expected. She was not terrified; on the contrary, the
demon appeared to be again reigning in her soul; every line in her
face gave indication of the most intense rage; her forehead
contracted; her eyes appeared actually scintillating with passion; her
under lip was compressed until her teeth almost bit through it, and
she clenched Pirot’s arm with a grasp of iron.
‘Speak not to me at present, my friend,’ she said to him, as noticing
her emotion, he addressed to her a few words of intended consolation.
‘This is terrible!’
She remained for some minutes as if fixed to the ground gazing at the
sea of heads before her, and apparently without the power of moving.
Every eye was fixed upon her, for her now fiendish beauty fascinated
all who were near her, and no one more than the great painter Lebrun,
who was on the steps of the Palais. To the impression made upon him at
this fearful moment, and which haunted him long afterwards, we owe the
fine painting in the Louvre.
A few minutes elapsed, and then Pirot, obeying the orders of the
officers, drew Marie towards the steps, the executioner assisting on
the other side. The archers in the street cleared a space with some
difficulty, almost riding the people down, who crowded about the
entrance to the court; and then they saw more plainly, in the middle
of the semicircle thus opened, a small tumbrel, with a horse attached
to it--a wretched animal, in as bad condition as the rude dirty
vehicle he dragged after him. There was no awning, nor were there any
seats; some straw was all for them to travel on. The back-board of the
cart taken out, with one end laid on the steps and the other on the
cart now backed against them, made a rude platform, along which Marie
hurriedly stepped, and then crouched down in the corner, averting her
face from the greater part of the crowd. Pirot next entered, and took
his place at her side; and then the executioner followed them,
replacing the board, upon the edge of which he seated himself; one of
his assistants climbed up in front, and the other walked at the head
of the horse, to guide the animal along the narrow opening made by the
crowd, which the archers with difficulty forced.
Trifling as was the distance, a long space of time was taken up in
passing from the Palais de Justice to the Parvis Notre Dame. The Rue
de Calandre was blocked up with people, and it was only by forcing the
crowd to part right and left into the Rue aux Fèves that sufficient
room could be gained for the tumbrel to pass; and when it halted, as
it did every minute, the more ruffianly of the population, who nested
in this vile quarter of the city,[25] came close up to the vehicle,
slipping between the horses of the troops who surrounded it, and
launched some brutal remark at Marie, with terrible distinctness and
meaning; but she never gave the least mark of having heard them, only
keeping her eyes intently fixed upon the crucifix which Pirot held up
before her, until the tumbrel crossed the square, and at length
stopped before the door of Notre Dame.
[image: img_15.jpg
caption: The Marchioness going to Execution]
Here she was ordered to descend; and as she appeared upon the steps a
fresh cry broke from the multitude, more appalling than any she had
before heard, for the area was large, and every available position,
even to the very housetops, was occupied. So also were the towers and
porticos of the church, as well as the interior, for all the doors
were open, and the sanctity of the place was so far forgotten that
those who were in the body of the cathedral joined alike in the
ringing maledictions of thousands of voices. But the most overwhelming
yell of execration came from the Hôtel Dieu, where the students had,
one and all, assembled to insult the unhappy criminal. Their hate was
the deeper, for they had known her at the hospital, and had all been
deceived by her wondrous hypocrisy; whilst the late revelations at the
trial had shown up the destroying hand that, under the guise of
charity, administered the poisons to the inmates and filled the
dead-house with hapless and unoffending victims.
The amende was the work of a few minutes. The paper, which contained a
simple avowal of her crimes, was handed to her by the executioner; and
the Marchioness read it, firmly and with strange emphasis--albeit the
uproar of the people prevented anybody from hearing it, except in
close approximation. As soon as it was concluded, the torch which she
carried was extinguished; the executioners, with Pirot and Marie,
remounted the tumbrel, and the cortege once more moved on towards the
fearful Place de Grêve, the crowd making an awful rush after it, as
they pushed on in their anxiety to witness the last scene of the
tragedy.
They were approaching the foot of the Pont Notre Dame, when Pirot
observed a sudden change in Marie’s countenance. Her features, which,
notwithstanding all the insults and maledictions of the crowd, had put
on an expression almost of resignation, became violently convulsed,
and the whole of her attention was in an instant abstracted from the
urgent exhortations of her faithful companion. He saw that a violent
revulsion of feeling had taken place, and he directly conjured her to
tell him the cause of her excitement.
‘Do you see that man?’ she asked him, in hurried and almost breathless
words, pointing along the bridge. ‘I was in hopes this last trial
would have been spared me.’
Pirot looked in the direction indicated. A mounted exempt was coming
across the bridge, meeting them, as it were, at the head of a body of
archers, closely surrounding a small party who were walking. The two
escorts with difficulty came nearer to each other, until they met at
the foot of the Pont Notre Dame.
‘It is a party proceeding from the Hôtel de Ville to the Conciergerie
with a prisoner,’ said Pirot. ‘Heed them not, madame. Remember that a
few minutes only are now left to you for prayer in this world.’
‘I cannot pray,’ she answered wildly; ‘it is to that man I owe all
this misery. He hunted me to Liége, and by a mean deception gave me
up into the hands of the officers. It is Desgrais!’
‘Turn your eyes from him, madame,’ said Pirot; ‘and do not at such a
moment give way to this feeling. He acted under authority; and is a
trustworthy officer.’
‘He trapped me like a reptile,’ replied Marie with bitterness; ‘and my
dying curses----’
‘Madame! madame!’ cried Pirot, as Marie raised herself in the tumbrel
and looked towards the exempt, ‘do not peril your soul by this
ill-timed passion. As you value a chance of salvation, listen to me.’
He drew her towards him, and earnestly commenced a prayer, as he
endeavoured to turn her attention from the exempt. But she was no
longer mistress of her feelings. The sight of Desgrais appeared to
have lighted up a fire in her mind; and she continued gazing at him,
though without speaking another word, as if impotent rage had deprived
her of the power of utterance.
But there was soon a diversion to the feelings of Marie and her
companion, as well as to the uproar of the crowd. The escort which
Desgrais was conducting had arrived at the side of the tumbrel; and,
what with the pressure of the multitude, and the narrow thoroughfare,
the vehicle containing the Marchioness stopped to allow the others to
pass, who were, as Pirot had observed, conducting a prisoner to the
Palais de Justice. Marie had kept her eyes riveted upon the exempt
since she first caught sight of him; but suddenly a voice called her
by her name in an accent of thrilling familiarity. She looked
hurriedly round, and perceived Exili at the side of the tumbrel,
surrounded by a party of the Guet Royal.
‘Marchioness of Brinvilliers!’ he cried, ‘we have met again; and the
rencontre is one of triumph for me. Murderess of Gaudin de
Sainte-Croix--of my son--soul and body--you shall quit this world with
my anathema ringing in your ears. _Soyez maudite!_’
‘Forward!’ cried Desgrais, as he rode by the side of Exili, between
him and the cart, touching the Marchioness as he passed, who shrunk
from him shuddering with disgust.
The crowd had thronged round the escort so densely that now neither
party could move. The delay to Marie was fearful, and the terror of
the moment was wrought to its extreme pitch by the curses and horrible
salutations of the people, some of whom were close to the tumbrel.
‘Ho! ho! the capital meeting!’ cried a fellow on the bridge,
applauding with his hands for joy. ‘Two poisoners at a time; Madame de
Brinvilliers and the Physician Exili. What a pity they are not going
to keep company out of the world.’
‘Down with the Italian!’ shouted another man, who was leaning from one
of the windows.
The entire mass of people swayed towards the point where Exili was
standing at the last speaker’s words, forcing the guards against the
houses.
‘Down with the Italian!’ said the fellow who had first cried out.
‘Hang him to Maître Cluet’s sign!’ said another. ‘Who knows but he
and La Voison together may bewitch M. de la Reynie, and get clear from
the Chambre Ardente.’
‘Throw him into the river!’ shouted a third; ‘tied neck to neck with
Madame la Marquise there.’
There was a movement towards the tumbrel. Marie started, and clung to
Pirot as well as her pinioned arms allowed; whilst Desgrais, forcing
himself in front of her, presented a heavy _snaphaunce_ at the ruffian
who had just spoken.
‘Down with the exempt!’ cried several voices. ‘He would murder the
people.’
‘Let him be!’ exclaimed the man at the window. ‘He is only keeping her
to make better sport on the Place de Grêve. Settle the Italian, if
you please.’
There was a fresh rush, against which the guards could make no
opposition, fixed as their arms were to their sides by the pressure of
the mob; and this was increased by the plunging of some of the horses
on which the archers were mounted, causing additional confusion and
crushing. Determined to say a few words to the rabble, Exili contrived
to get upon a round block of stone at the base of one of the houses,
placed, in common with many others, to afford a protection to
foot-passengers from the wheels of vehicles. But he had scarcely
mounted, even before his guards were aware of his intention, when one
of the mob hurled a wooden sabot with great force at his head. It
struck him in the face, and he was in an instant covered with blood.
Stunned by the blow, he fell forwards, and the multitude, excited like
brutes at the sight of gore, rushed on through the ring which the Guet
Royal in vain endeavoured to form, and seized him. A furious contest
now commenced between the people and the archers; but the disparity of
numbers was too great for them. They were borne down by the mere
pressure of the mass, the ringleaders of whom hurried Exili, almost
insensible--his limbs torn and bleeding from their rough handling, in
addition to the blow he had received--towards the parapet of the
bridge.
‘Into the river! into the river!’ cried a hundred voices. ‘Away with
the poisoner! Death to the sorcerer!’
‘He can swim like a fish,’ said the fellow at the window. ‘I recollect
him long ago, when they took him at the boat-mill.’
‘This shall stop him from doing so again!’ shouted a ruffian. ‘I will
take the law out of M. de la Reynie’s hands. My brother in the Guet
Royal was poisoned that night. Now see if he will swim.’
As he spoke he raised a butcher’s bill above the crowd, and it
descended upon the head of the miserable Italian, crushing his skull
before it. An awful yell of triumph broke from the crowd as the body
was raised high above them by a dozen swart arms, and hurled with
savage force over the bridge into the chafing river below. Thus
terribly died the physician.
During this bloody and rapid scene Desgrais took advantage of the rush
made by the mob in another direction to ride before the tumbrel,
clearing the way as he best could for the cortege of the Marchioness
to proceed, expecting that she would next fall a victim to the fury of
the populace. Directly they got from the bridge to the quay adjoining
the Port au Foin, he found the way cleared by the troops, who lined
the footway on either side, and had been on duty since the early
morning. But the crowd was still very great outside the line; and
their cries never ceased, albeit Marie paid no attention to them now
that the danger which had a minute before threatened her was averted;
but never moved her eyes from the crucifix, which Pirot had held
before her throughout the scene, until the procession turned from the
Port to the Place de Grêve.
The sight here presented was sufficient at once to draw Marie’s
attention from the exhortations of her companion. The entire Place was
filled with spectators, the troops keeping but a little space clear
immediately around the scaffold, which rose in the centre some ten
feet from the ground. Far along the quay and the streets leading from
the Grêve did the sea of heads extend. All the housetops were crowded
with gazers, swarming like bees upon the parapets and chimneys, and on
the ledges over the shops; and every window-place in the Hôtel de
Ville had its dozen occupants.
Pirot had expected a terrible outburst of malediction when the cortege
arrived here, and feared also that the courage of the Marchioness
would entirely fail her upon getting the first sight of the scaffold.
But on both points he was mistaken. As the tumbrel advanced, after the
first murmur of recognition a dead silence reigned; amidst this vast
mass of many thousands not a sound was audible but the bell of the
Tour d’Horloge, which kept tolling hoarsely at protracted intervals.
Marie herself betrayed but little emotion. A rapid shiver passed over
her frame as she first saw the preparations for her execution; and
then she bent her eyes upon Pirot, and so kept them steadfastly until
the assistant headsman guided the horse to the foot of the scaffold.
At this fearful moment M. Drouet approached the tumbrel, and taking
off his hat, with a show of courtesy, that appeared a mockery at such
a moment, said--
‘Madame, I have orders to inform you that if you have any further
declarations to make, the magistrates are ready to receive them at the
Hotel de Ville.’
‘Monsieur,’ replied the Marchioness, ‘how much oftener am I to tell
you that you know all? For pity’s sake do not further persecute me. I
have confessed everything.’
Drouet turned his horse away, and rode up to the scaffold to exchange
a few words with some of the officials who were standing near it. At
the same moment the executioner descended from the cart, and with his
man went up the steps of the scaffold.
‘Do you leave me?’ gasped Marie hurriedly, as she seized Pirot’s hand.
‘Be with me on the scaffold, even when---- He is coming. It will soon
be over.’
‘I will not leave you,’ said Pirot, rising, ‘until you are no more.’
‘Stop!’ cried Marie. ‘One word more. I may not speak to you again. Let
me tell you how deeply I feel your patient kindness throughout this
fearful trial. They are ready--keep by my side; and when we are on the
scaffold, at the moment of my death, say a _De Profundis_. You promise
this.’
Pirot bent his head, and squeezed her hand in token of compliance. He
tried to speak, but his voice failed him. His whole frame appeared
convulsed, and he offered a strong contrast to the strange calm of his
companion.
The executioner came down from the scaffold, and assisted the
Marchioness to descend; whilst Pirot also got out, and she went with
him up the ladder--hurriedly, as though she was anxious to bring the
scene to a conclusion. As she reached the platform, her beauty
evidently made an impression on the crowd. They turned one to the
other, and murmured; but this soon died away into the same deep, awful
silence--so perfect, that the voices of the executioner and Pirot
could be plainly heard. Throwing herself upon her knees, Marie
submitted to the second dreary toilet she had been obliged to undergo.
The assistant cut off the whole of her beautiful hair, throwing the
long ringlets carelessly about on the scaffold; and next, tearing down
the collar of her dress, rudely turned it back, so as to leave bare
her neck and shoulders. Then bandaging her eyes with a small scarf, he
retired.
The sun was shining brightly; and at this moment its rays fell upon
the glittering blade of a long sword which the headsman had hitherto
kept concealed under his garment. Pirot saw it, and his heart sank
within him--so much so, that his utterance was choked, and Marie, by
whose side he was kneeling, demanded why he had thus finished his
prayer. And then, as if aware of the cause, she exclaimed rapidly--
‘Holy Virgin, pray for me, and forgive me! I abandon my body, which is
but dust, to the earth. Do thou receive my soul!’
The executioner drew near, and the good Pirot closed his eyes, as with
the greatest difficulty, in broken and quivering words, he commenced
the _De Profundis_. But in a few seconds his voice was again checked
by the noise of a dull heavy blow at his side, and a strange and
sudden sound from the crowd--not a cry of alarm, or triumph, but a
rapid expiration of the breath, almost like a hiccough, terribly
audible. The next instant a hand was laid on his shoulder. He started,
and looking round with an effort, perceived the headsman standing over
him.
‘It was well done, monsieur,’ said the man; ‘and I hope madame has
left me a trifle, for I deserve it.’
Almost mechanically, following the direction of the man’s finger as he
pointed to the platform, Pirot’s eyes fell upon a ghastly head lying
in a pool of blood. He saw no more; but fell insensible on the
scaffold.
This was scarcely noticed in the terrible excitement of the minute.
The executioner calmly took a bottle from his pocket, and refreshed
himself with its contents; and at the same time a cloud of smoke rose
from the back of the scaffold, which was the part farthest from the
river. He raised the head, and, pulling the gory scarf away, showed it
to the people; then taking up the body as he would have done a sack,
he threw them both down upon the pile of faggots which his assistant
had just lighted. The wood was dry, and the flames were further fed by
resinous matter sprinkled amongst them; and in twenty minutes some
charred ashes alone remained, which the crowd nearest the scaffold
struggled violently to collect, as the Garde kicked and dispersed them
as well as they were able about the Place de Grêve.
And in this manner terminated the dark career of the Marchioness of
Brinvilliers.