cupboard. She declared that the greater part of them she had never seen; but she identified some of them as belonging to herself.
"Only," said she, "I cannot conceive how they could be found in a cupboard in the room of Madame Précorbin. If they were indeed found there, I certainly did not place them there. I cannot understand it."
Upon this discovery a general investigation was made into the past life of this girl. They examined all the parties with whom she had lived, but nothing was elicited beyond the fact that in one family she had for a short time been suspected of having appropriated some valueless articles.
Finally, the woman Lefèvre, the shop keeper of whom Victoire on the 4th of August bought the piece of orange-colored cloth, being asked by a friend of Madame Duparc if she had not missed anything, deposed, but not under oath, that a piece of orange-colored cloth had disappeared from her store. She was told that she would find it at the house of Madame Duparc among the effects of the girl Salmon.
The examination ended, M. de Bretteville the procureur rendered an opinion that Victoire Salmon was guilty of having poisoned Beaulieu, and strongly suspected of having mingled arsenic in the food eaten by the family of Duparc at dinner on the 7th of August; also strongly suspected of having stolen divers articles belonging to the Duparcs and a piece of orange-colored cloth belonging to the woman Lefèvre.
For punishment for these crimes she should be condemned to make the amende honorable and be burned alive.
On the 18th of April, 1782, a judgment was rendered conforming to these conclusions of the procureur-général, and sentence was accordingly pronounced.
Victoire was crushed by this accusation and by this sentence. There remained to her only a last resource,—an appeal to the Parliament of Rouen, an appeal which justice itself interposed in the name of the condemned. She was transferred to the prison at Rouen to await a second judgment.
The 17th of May the Parliament of Rouen confirmed the sentence of Caen, and ordered that the condemned should be taken back to Caen for execution.
Victoire, however, was ignorant of the supreme peril which menaced her life. Deprived of counsel, of a defender, judged in secret, she relied upon her innocence. Whether through a refinement of cruelty or an illegal and weak compassion, one of the jailers was ordered to tell the poor girl that the sentence of the judges of Caen was set aside, and that a new trial would be had, and that for this purpose she was to be taken back to Caen.
"Ah!" cried she, in a transport of joy, "I was sure the judgment would be set aside."
Light-hearted, she returned to her, cell, where she made herself some cabbage soup; she had not been able to eat before, that day.
After her repast she went out into the prison yard. A prisoner approached her: "Well, I hear that your case has been decided."
"Yes, the judgment is set aside. I am to have a new trial; that will end differently. I am going back to Caen."
"My girl, they are deceiving you. You are condemned to be burned alive; you are sent back to Caen to be executed. I tell you the truth."
At this brutal revelation Victoire staggered, her face grew deathly pale, she clasped her hands convulsively and cried, "Ah, great God, how horrible!" Then she fell unconscious. They took her up and carried her into a room opening upon the prison yard.
There, by chance, were three priests who had come to visit a prisoner. When Victoire recovered, the sight of these three men at once suggested to her that they had come to announce her sentence, and in despair she cried: "Alas, my God! Gentlemen, I am innocent, and I am lost. Must I die in such a manner? Is there no longer any justice?"
