La Corriveau took the ebony casket from her bosom and laid it solemnly
on the table. “Do not cross yourself,” she exclaimed angrily as she
saw Angélique mechanically make the sacred sign. “There can come no
blessings here. There is death enough in that casket to kill every man
and woman in New France.”
Angélique fastened her gaze upon the casket as if she would have drawn
out the secret of its contents by the very magnetism of her eyes. She
laid her hand upon it caressingly, yet tremblingly--eager, yet fearful,
to see its contents.
“Open it!” cried La Corriveau, “press the spring, and you will see such
a casket of jewels as queens might envy. It was the wedding-gift of
Beatrice Spara, and once belonged to the house of Borgia--Lucrezia
Borgia had it from her terrible father; and he, from the prince of
demons!”
Angélique pressed the little spring,--the lid flew open, and there
flashed from it a light which for the moment dazzled her eyes with its
brilliancy. She thrust the casket from her in alarm, and retreated a few
steps, imagining she smelt the odor of some deadly perfume.
“I dare not approach it,” said she. “Its glittering terrifies me; its
odor sickens me.”
“Tush! it is your weak imagination!” replied La Corriveau; “your
sickly conscience frightens you! You will need to cast off both to rid
Beaumanoir of the presence of your rival! The aqua tofana in the hands
of a coward is a gift as fatal to its possessor as to its victim.”
Angélique with a strong effort tried to master her fear, but could not.
She would not again handle the casket.
La Corriveau looked at her as if suspecting this display of weakness.
She then drew the casket to herself and took out a vial, gilt and chased
with strange symbols. It was not larger than the little finger of a
delicate girl. Its contents glittered like a diamond in the sunshine.
La Corriveau shook it up, and immediately the liquid was filled with
a million sparks of fire. It was the aqua tofana undiluted by mercy,
instantaneous in its effect, and not medicable by any antidote. Once
administered, there was no more hope for its victim than for the souls
of the damned who have received the final judgment. One drop of that
bright water upon the tongue of a Titan would blast him like Jove's
thunderbolt, would shrivel him up to a black, unsightly cinder!
This was the poison of anger and revenge that would not wait for time,
and braved the world's justice. With that vial La Borgia killed her
guests at the fatal banquet in her palace, and Beatrice Spara in her
fury destroyed the fair Milanese who had stolen from her the heart of
Antonio Exili.
This terrible water was rarely used alone by the poisoners; but it
formed the basis of a hundred slower potions which ambition, fear,
avarice, or hypocrisy mingled with the element of time, and colored with
the various hues and aspects of natural disease.
Angélique sat down and leaned towards La Corriveau, supporting her chin
on the palms of her hands as she bent eagerly over the table, drinking
in every word as the hot sand of the desert drinks in the water poured
upon it. “What is that?” said she, pointing to a vial as white as milk
and seemingly as harmless.
“That,” replied La Corriveau, “is the milk of mercy. It brings on
painless consumption and decay. It eats the life out of a man while the
moon empties and fills once or twice. His friends say he dies of quick
decline, and so he does! ha! ha!--when his enemy wills it! The strong
man becomes a skeleton, and blooming maidens sink into their graves
blighted and bloodless, with white lips and hearts that cease gradually
to beat, men know not why. Neither saint nor sacrament can arrest the
doom of the milk of mercy.”
“This vial,” continued she, lifting up another from the casket and
replacing the first, licking her thin lips with profound satisfaction
as she did so,--“this contains the acrid venom that grips the heart like
the claws of a tiger, and the man drops down dead at the time appointed.
Fools say he died of the visitation of God. The visitation of God!”
repeated she in an accent of scorn, and the foul witch spat as she
pronounced the sacred name. “Leo in his sign ripens the deadly nuts of
the East, which kill when God will not kill. He who has this vial for
a possession is the lord of life.” She replaced it tenderly. It was a
favorite vial of La Corriveau.
“This one,” continued she, taking up another, “strikes with the dead
palsy; and this kindles the slow, inextinguishable fires of typhus. Here
is one that dissolves all the juices of the body, and the blood of a
man's veins runs into a lake of dropsy. This,” taking up a green vial,
“contains the quintessence of mandrakes distilled in the alembic when
Scorpio rules the hour. Whoever takes this liquid”--La Corriveau shook
it up lovingly--“dies of torments incurable as the foul disease of lust
which it simulates and provokes.”
There was one vial which contained a black liquid like oil. “It is a
relic of the past,” said she, “an heir-loom from the Untori, the ointers
of Milan. With that oil they spread death through the doomed city,
anointing its doors and thresholds with the plague until the people
died.”
The terrible tale of the anointers of Milan has, since the days of La
Corriveau, been written in choice Italian by Manzoni, in whose wonderful
book he that will may read it.
“This vial,” continued the witch, “contains innumerable griefs, that
wait upon the pillows of rejected and heartbroken lovers, and the wisest
physician is mocked with lying appearances of disease that defy his
skill and make a fool of his wisdom.”
“Oh, say no more!” exclaimed Angélique, shocked and terrified. However
inordinate in her desires, she was dainty in her ways. “It is like a
Sabbat of witches to hear you talk, La Corriveau!” cried she, “I will
have none of those foul things which you propose. My rival shall die
like a lady! I will not feast like a vampire on her dead body, nor shall
you. You have other vials in the casket of better hue and flavor.
What is this?” continued Angélique, taking out a rose-tinted and
curiously-twisted bottle sealed on the top with the mystic pentagon.
“This looks prettier, and may be not less sure than the milk of mercy in
its effect. What is it?”
“Ha! ha!” laughed the woman with her weirdest laugh. “Your wisdom is
but folly, Angélique des Meloises! You would kill, and still spare your
enemy! That was the smelling-bottle of La Brinvilliers, who took it
with her to the great ball at the Hôtel de Ville, where she secretly
sprinkled a few drops of it upon the handkerchief of the fair Louise
Gauthier, who, the moment she put it to her nostrils, fell dead upon the
floor. She died and gave no sign, and no man knew how or why! But she
was the rival of Brinvilliers for the love of Gaudin de St. Croix,
and in that she resembles the lady of Beaumanoir, as you do La
Brinvilliers!”
“And she got her reward! I would have done the same thing for the same
reason! What more have you to relate of this most precious vial of your
casket?” asked Angélique.
“That its virtue is unimpaired. Three drops sprinkled upon a bouquet of
flowers, and its odor breathed by man or woman, causes a sudden swoon
from which there is no awakening more in this world. People feel no
pain, but die smiling as if angels had kissed away their breath. Is it
not a precious toy, Mademoiselle?”
“Oh, blessed vial!” exclaimed Angélique, pressing it to her lips, “thou
art my good angel to kiss away the breath of the lady of Beaumanoir! She
shall sleep on roses, La Corriveau, and you shall make her bed!”
“It is a sweet death, befitting one who dies for love, or is killed by
the jealousy of a dainty rival,” replied the witch; “but I like best
those draughts which are most bitter and not less sure.”
“The lady of Beaumanoir will not be harder to kill than Louise
Gauthier,” replied Angélique, watching the glitter of the vial in the
lamplight. “She is unknown even to the servants of the Château; nor will
the Intendant himself dare to make public either her life or death in
his house.”
“Are you sure, Mademoiselle, that the Intendant will not dare to make
public the death of that woman in the Château?” asked La Corriveau, with
intense eagerness; that consideration was an important link of the chain
which she was forging.
“Sure? yes, I am sure by a hundred tokens!” said Angélique, with an air
of triumph. “He dare not even banish her for my sake, lest the secret
of her concealment at Beaumanoir become known. We can safely risk his
displeasure, even should he suspect that I have cut the knot he knew not
how to untie.”
“You are a bold girl!” exclaimed La Corriveau, looking on her
admiringly, “you are worthy to wear the crown of Cleopatra, the queen of
all the gypsies and enchantresses. I shall have less fear now to do your
bidding, for you have a stronger spirit than mine to support you.”
“'Tis well, La Corriveau! Let this vial of Brinvilliers bring me the
good fortune I crave, and I will fill your lap with gold. If the lady of
Beaumanoir shall find death in a bouquet of flowers, let them be roses!”
“But how and where to find roses? they have ceased blooming,” said La
Corriveau, hating Angélique's sentiment, and glad to find an objection
to it.
“Not for her, La Corriveau; fate is kinder than you think!” Angélique
threw back a rich curtain and disclosed a recess filled with pots of
blooming roses and flowers of various hues. “The roses are blooming here
which will form the bouquet of Beaumanoir.”
“You are of rare ingenuity, Mademoiselle,” replied La Corriveau,
admiringly. “If Satan prompts you not, it is because he can teach you
nothing either in love or stratagem.”
“Love!” replied Angélique quickly, “do not name that! No! I have
sacrificed all love, or I should not be taking counsel of La Corriveau!”
Angélique's thoughts flashed back upon Le Gardeur for one regretful
moment. “No, it is not love,” continued she, “but the duplicity of a man
before whom I have lowered my pride. It is the vengeance I have vowed
upon a woman for whose sake I am trifled with! It is that prompts me to
this deed! But no matter, shut up the casket, La Corriveau; we will talk
now of how and when this thing is to be done.”
The witch shut up her infernal casket of ebony, leaving the vial of
Brinvilliers shining like a ruby in the lamplight upon the polished
table.
The two women sat down, their foreheads almost touching together, with
their eyes flashing in lurid sympathy as they eagerly discussed the
position of things in the Château. The apartments of Caroline, the hours
of rest and activity, were all well known to Angélique, who had adroitly
fished out every fact from the unsuspecting Fanchon Dodier, as had also
La Corriveau.
It was known to Angélique that the Intendant would be absent from
the city for some days, in consequence of the news from France. The
unfortunate Caroline would be deprived of the protection of his vigilant
eye.
The two women sat long arranging and planning their diabolical scheme.
There was no smile upon the cheek of Angélique now. Her dimples, which
drove men mad, had disappeared. Her lips, made to distil words sweeter
than honey of Hybla, were now drawn together in hard lines like La
Corriveau's,--they were cruel and untouched by a single trace of mercy.
The hours struck unheeded on the clock in the room, as it ticked louder
and louder like a conscious monitor beside them. Its slow finger had
marked each wicked thought, and recorded for all time each murderous
word as it passed their cruel lips.
La Corriveau held the casket in her lap with an air of satisfaction, and
sat with eyes fixed on Angélique, who was now silent.
“Water the roses well, Mademoiselle,” said she; “in three days I shall
be here for a bouquet, and in less than thrice three days I promise you
there shall be a dirge sung for the lady of Beaumanoir.”
“Only let it be done soon and surely,” replied Angélique,--her very tone
grew harsh,--“but talk no more of it; your voice sounds like a cry from
a dark gallery that leads to hell. Would it were done! I could then shut
up the memory of it in a tomb of silence, forever, forever, and wash my
hands of a deed done by you, not me!”
“A deed done by you, not me!” She repeated the words, as if repeating
them made them true. She would shut up the memory of her crime forever;
she reflected not that the guilt is in the evil intent, and the sin the
same before God even if the deed be never done.
Angélique was already an eager sophist. She knew better than the
wretched creature whom she had bribed with money, how intensely wicked
was the thing she was tempting her to do; but her jealousy maddened her,
and her ambition could not let her halt in her course.
There was one thought which still tormented her “What would the
Intendant think? What would he say should he suspect her of the murder
of Caroline?” She feared his scrutinizing investigation; but, trusting
in her power, she risked his suspicions, nay, remembering his words,
made him in her own mind an accessory in the murder.
If she remembered Le Gardeur de Repentigny at all at this moment, it was
only to strangle the thought of him. She shied like a horse on the brink
of a precipice when the thought of Le Gardeur intruded itself. Rising
suddenly, she bade La Corriveau be gone about her business, lest she
should be tempted to change her mind.
La Corriveau laughed at the last struggle of dying conscience, and bade
Angélique go to bed. It was two hours past midnight, and she would bid
Fanchon let her depart to the house of an old crone in the city who
would give her a bed and a blessing in the devil's name.
Angélique, weary and agitated, bade her be gone in the devil's name, if
she preferred a curse to a blessing. The witch, with a mocking laugh,
rose and took her departure for the night.
Fanchon, weary of waiting, had fallen asleep. She roused herself,
offering to accompany her aunt in hopes of learning something of her
interview with her mistress. All she got was a whisper that the jewels
were found. La Corriveau passed out into the darkness, and plodded her
way to the house of her friend, where she resolved to stay until she
accomplished the secret and cruel deed she had undertaken to perform.