"It is not that which worries me," answered La Reynie in a preoccupied voice. "It is the unanswered questions that consume me. Who supplied her with the poisons she used? Whom else did her supplier supply? What other people have shared in these appalling crimes? Paris is full of rumors. We may only have grasped the tail of a much larger conspiracy. And yet she will not talk, and tomorrow she will be beyond all answers."

"Then I may a.s.sume that you will conduct the question extraordinaire personally?"

"It is Louvois's express wish. His Majesty takes a personal interest. I have prepared a list of questions myself from this...doc.u.ment...you acquired so brilliantly."

Deep below ground level, the stone walls oozed damp. Even in July, the room was perpetually cold. A fire burned on the hearth, and next to it was a mattress on which to revive a failing victim for the next round of questioning. A physician sat ready with brandy and restoratives on the bench next to the table at which the clerk made the official transcript of the interrogation.

"Troisieme coin," ordered La Reynie in a pa.s.sionless voice, and the executioner's a.s.sistant poured the third immense jug of water through a funnel into the marquise's mouth. Stripped and stretched across a trestle, she was already bloated beyond recognition.

"Your lover, Saint-Croix-to whom else did he supply poisons?" asked the Lieutenant General of Police. The clerk's pen scratched as he took down the question. The Marquise de Brinvilliers groaned. The physician took her pulse.

"Continue," he said.

"What other persons, male or female, did he supply with poison?" persisted La Reynie.

"How should I know? I only know that he loved me alone. Oh, dozens. Yes, dozens. But he is dead. He never told me."

"You know the names. Give me the names."

"You'll burst me. So many pots of water for my small body. You disgrace my rank. For that I will never forgive you, canaille." Her voice was weak. La Reynie leaned close to hear her response.

"The names, Madame."

"Oh, I know so many," she whispered. "I could drag half of Paris down with me, if I wanted to. But I'll not give you the names. You police live only to bring your betters down. I'll never give you the satisfaction. Do you know who I am? I am a d'Aubray!" Her eyes lit for a moment with insane fury.

"Quatrieme coin," ordered the chief of police, his face hard.

By the huitieme coin, the marquise had still revealed nothing.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Since the sensation caused by my prediction of Madame de Montespan's return to favor the summer before, I had been taken up by the most fashionable salons in town. Now for the past year I had hardly ever eaten or slept at home, and hostesses s.n.a.t.c.hed me up to enliven every social event with my now-celebrated wit. And so it was on a bright summer afternoon on the sixteenth of July in 1676 that I was crammed with a half dozen others into a window, rented at great expense by one of my patronesses, that overlooked the Place de Greve. It was the execution of the season, and as a result, windows and balconies overlooking the scaffold, or even just along the route of the tumbril, fetched a much higher premium than usual. The square itself and the streets into it were packed solid with humanity, and those of the n.o.blesse who had come too late to rent window s.p.a.ce were constrained to watch from their carriages, where the view was not half as good.

"And all for poisoning a tiresome little husband she had," said my hostess with a sigh. "Really, that La Reynie is entirely too savage-Oh, look. There is the Princesse de Carignan in her carriage!" and she waved her handkerchief at her. The Marquise de Brinvilliers had been all the fashion for the last several weeks; the Comtesse de Soissons herself had brought a group of sightseers to the Conciergerie to watch the condemned woman led to her last Ma.s.s. But the marquise, still unrepentant, had turned and mocked the comtesse's morbid curiosity before she had vanished again into the prison. Now all of Versailles had come into the city for the edifying spectacle of her beheading and burning as an amusing change from their routine of cards, plays, and water festivals.

"I'll certainly breathe easier when that wicked woman is burned," announced the abbe who accompanied us.

"Actually, you'll be breathing her," I pointed out in a sour voice, for hypocrites annoy me. My hostess let out a little shriek of amus.e.m.e.nt.

"Ah, what wit, Marquise! Why, we might all take in a little bit of her evil! Even you, my dear Abbe." Oh, bother. Without a doubt, another witticism to go the rounds of the court. How tired I was growing of hearing my own bon mots come back to me, all shopworn, with someone else's name attached.

The roar of the crowd beneath the windows announced the arrival of the tumbril at last from Notre Dame, where the condemned woman had made the amende honorable. Weak from the dawn's water torture, the Marquise de Brinvilliers lay back on the piled straw and wood that was to burn her corpse, clutching a crucifix to her bosom, her eyes distended and rolling with terror. She had on the plain, loose shift of the condemned and a little white muslin cap over her loose hair. The executioner stood behind her in the cart, his big two-handed sword hidden from her view. Her confessor leaned over her, exhorting her, though no one could hear his words. A guard of archers surrounded the cart, trying to beat back the crowd, but even so, the tumbril made slow progress. As she rolled her head from side to side, she spied a horseman, half hidden by the archers, accompanying the cart, and started back, making the sign of the devil's horns at him. Her confessor redoubled his efforts, and she turned her head away from the sight of the horseman.

"Why, it's Desgrez, riding there-he always makes sure to see a case through to the end, doesn't he?" said one of the gentlemen accompanying us.

"Desgrez? Oh, yes, it was he that captured her where she was hiding abroad, I do believe. He tracked her for years. At least, that's what I heard. In disguise. He discovered the written confession she'd made."

"Clever devil, isn't he? It's not many that can catch a poisoner. Most of them get away with it."

"Those and the doctors-otherwise, we'd all live as long as Methuselah, wouldn't we?" My hostess's husband, the Comte de Longueval, laughed too heartily at his own joke.

"Probably so...say, do you think he'll have it off at one stroke? I'll lay a wager of five louis it takes him two."

"Done. That's Samson himself down there, not an a.s.sistant, and he could take the head off an ox at one blow. Who am I to turn down a gift of five louis?"

The executioner led her up the stairs of the scaffold, and for a moment she stood, staring up at the crowded windows, and seemed to catch my eye for an instant, before she looked away. Then the executioner cut her long hair away from her neck, and blindfolded her. I closed my eyes, not to open them until a heavy thump told me the thing was done. The archers, striking out with their halberds, cleared a s.p.a.ce where wood, straw, and oil could be made into an immense bonfire. The pieces of the corpse were piled on top of the heaped wood and torches applied to the straw.

"That was an easy five louis. You never even saw him hesitate. What did I tell you? Samson never fails. They say he has a Ma.s.s said before each execution, to make his hand sure." There was the clink of coin changing hands and a half-annoyed exclamation from Madame de Longueval.

"My dear friends, no differences. I am famished for a bite of supper. And there's really nothing of interest to see now. I suppose she'll burn all night." The comtesse's mind was not of the sort to contemplate anything very long. The last thing I noted from the window was Desgrez, still on horseback, commanding the guard that surrounded the funeral pyre. Already the fickle crowd was proclaiming her a martyr. Now Desgrez would be there all night, too, to keep the crowd from stealing fragments of the body for resale as holy relics. The King's justice required that all the ashes be dumped in the Seine, and Desgrez was not only a persistent, but a literal-minded fellow.

The dispersing crowd kept us from our carriage, which was waiting in a nearby street. Pushing through the press of people, an enterprising printer's boy was selling broadsides in doggerel recounting the day's events and the numerous crimes of the woman whose body was being reduced to cinders in the Place de Greve. Suddenly I remembered Grandmother. In her memory, I'll have one, I thought.

"Hey! You, boy, what have you got there?" I shook my walking stick in the air to get his attention.

"'The Remarkable Crimes and Execution of Madame de Brinvilliers,' ill.u.s.trated, for only two sous, Grandmother. Guaranteed to give satisfaction," cried the street urchin.

"Oh, I must have one," cried a lady nearby.

"Oh, boy! Come here at once," called out a gentleman. The crowd pushed in around him, s.n.a.t.c.hing up the broadsides. By the time he turned to me, the supply in his bag was gone.

"Don't be disappointed, Grandmother. I've got a whole box full in the doorway over there-I'll get one for you right away." And as he turned to renew his supply, I saw a heavy box of broadsides, cheap pamphlets, and used books set in the arch of a nearby doorway, watched over by a man entirely enveloped in a black cloak with a wide black hat pulled down to cover his face. An odd outfit for a balmy summer evening. Clearly, I thought, he does not want to be recognized.

"Oh, you have books, too?"

"Just a few, Grandmother. Look for yourself." I peered into the box. Several slender volumes ent.i.tled Parna.s.se Satyrique, ten sous each. I threw back my veil to see better. Marvelous. A witty rhymed libelle on the amours of the court, most magnificently detailed. I could feel myself blushing. The man in the cloak had stepped back into the shadows, and I sensed his stare burrowing into the back of my neck. How embarra.s.sing. I pulled down my veil to hide my confusion and s.n.a.t.c.hed up another book to conceal the malicious little volume I coveted.

"These two, and the broadside," I said hurriedly and threw the boy a gold louis as I fled to rejoin the company with which I had come.

"Oh, how horrid! The ink is smearing on my hands!" exclaimed Madame de Corbon, as she settled into the carriage seat. "Here-fold this broadside up for me, my friend, and put it in your pocket." As her gentleman companion complied, I folded my copy and tucked it away, along with my books, in the little bag I carried. An evening's pleasant reading.

"Why, what a clever idea, Madame de Morville! You have a veritable pharmacy in that bag! What mystical purpose do all those bottled potions serve?" Madame de Corbon was never less than annoying. But when one has just been a guest at a poisoner's execution, it is best not to arouse needless suspicion.

"We ancient people must resort to more artificial aids than you young creatures if we are to get about in society," I said, doing my best to look owlish. "Besides a handkerchief and a bottle of scent, I have here a restorative cordial and a pot of rouge to relieve the pallor that is the result of a tragic life extended beyond the dark and welcome comfort of the tomb." As Madame de Corbon inspected the rouge pot, I offered the company the cordial, which they declined.

"To each his own-eh, Madame de Morville?" said the Comte de Longueval, offering his gold enameled snuffbox around. "Myself, I prefer something a little livelier than an old lady's cordial." The countess took snuff, as did Madame de Corbon. If you knew what was in this cordial, you might reconsider, I thought, as I took a dose while the rest of the company wielded their handkerchiefs.

"You look dreamy, Madame de Morville." The familiar slow, slippery feeling was stealing away the horrors of the day.

"I am reminiscing about my youth. Did you know that I was present at the famous joust where King Henri Deux died? I was just a slip of a girl. Ah, what a handsome, romantic king-although of course, surpa.s.sed by our present monarch..." The conversation turned agreeably to the question of how to measure gallantry in the great figures of history. In my pleasantly drugged state, it seemed to blend in a soothing sort of mindless music. I almost regretted it when the carriage halted in the great cour d'honneur of the Hotel Soissons.