Chapter XXXIV: Weird Sisters edit
Fanchon walked into the house to see her uncle Dodier. When she was gone, the countenance of La Corriveau put on a dark and terrible expression. Her black eyes looked downwards, seeming to penetrate the very earth, and to reflect in their glittering orbits the fires of the underworld.
She stood for a few moments, buried in deep thought, with her arms tightly folded across her breast. Her fingers moved nervously, as they kept time with the quick motions of her foot, which beat the ground.
"It is for death, and no lost jewels, that girl sends for me!" muttered La Corriveau through her teeth, which flashed white and cruel between her thin lips. "She has a rival in her love for the Intendant, and she will lovingly, by my help, feed her with the manna of St. Nicholas! Angelique des Meloises has boldness, craft, and falseness for twenty women, and can keep secrets like a nun. She is rich and ambitious, and would poison half the world rather than miss the thing she sets her mind on. She is a girl after my own heart, and worth the risk I run with her. Her riches would be endless should she succeed in her designs; and with her in my power, nothing she has would henceforth be her own,--but mine! mine! Besides," added La Corriveau, her thoughts flashing back to the fate which had overtaken her progenitors, Exili and La Voisin, "I may need help myself, some day, to plead with the Intendant on my own account,--who knows?"
A strange thrill ran through the veins of La Corriveau, but she instantly threw it off. "I know what she wants," added she. "I will take it with me. I am safe in trusting her with the secret of Beatrice Spara. That girl is worthy of it as Brinvilliers herself."
La Corriveau entered her own apartment. She locked the door behind her, drew a bunch of keys from her bosom, and turned towards a cabinet of singular shape and Italian workmanship which stood in a corner of the apartment. It was an antique piece of furniture, made of some dark oriental wood, carved over with fantastic figures from Etruscan designs by the cunning hand of an old Italian workman, who knew well how to make secret drawers and invisible concealments for things dangerous and forbidden.
It had once belonged to Antonio Exili, who had caused it to be made, ostensibly for the safe-keeping of his cabalistic formulas and alchemic preparations, when searching for the philosopher's stone and the elixir of life, really for the concealment of the subtle drugs out of which his alembics distilled the aqua tofana and his crucibles prepared the poudre de succession.
In the most secret place of all were deposited, ready for use, a few vials of the crystal liquid, every single drop of which contained the life of a man, and which, administered in due proportion of time and measure, killed and left no sign, numbering its victim's days, hours, and minutes, exactly according to the will and malignity of his destroyer.
La Corriveau took out the vials, and placed them carefully in a casket of ebony not larger than a woman's hand. In it was a number of small flaskets, each filled with pills like grains of mustard- seed, the essence and quintessence of various poisons, that put on the appearance of natural diseases, and which, mixed in due proportion with the aqua tofana, covered the foulest murders with the lawful ensigns of the angel of death.
In that box of ebony was the sublimated dust of deadly nightshade, which kindles the red fires of fever and rots the roots of the tongue. There was the fetid powder of stramonium, that grips the lungs like an asthma; and quinia, that shakes its victims like the cold hand of the miasma of the Pontine marshes. The essence of poppies, ten times sublimated, a few grains of which bring on the stupor of apoplexy; and the sardonic plant, that kills its victim with the frightful laughter of madness on his countenance.
The knowledge of these and many more cursed herbs, once known to Medea in the Colchian land, and transplanted to Greece and Rome with the enchantments of their use, had been handed, by a long succession of sorcerers and poisoners, down to Exili and Beatrice Spara, until they came into the possession of La Corriveau, the legitimate inheritrix of this lore of hell.
Before closing the cabinet, La Corriveau opened one more secret drawer, and took out, with a hesitating hand, as if uncertain whether to do so or no, a glittering stiletto, sharp and cruel to see. She felt the point of it mechanically with her thumb; and, as if fascinated by the touch, placed it under her robe. "I may have need of it," muttered she, "either to save myself OR to make sure of my work on another. Beatrice Spara was the daughter of a Sicilian bravo, and she liked this poignard better than even the poisoned chalice."
La Corriveau rose up now, well satisfied with her foresight and preparation. She placed the ebony casket carefully in her bosom, cherishing it like an only child, as she walked out of the room with her quiet, tiger-like tread. Her look into the future was pleasant to her at this moment. There was the prospect of an ample reward for her trouble and risk, and the anticipated pleasure of practising her skill upon one whose position she regarded as similar to that of the great dames of the Court, whom Exili and La Voisin had poisoned during the high carnival of death, in the days of Louis XIV.
She was now ready, and waited impatiently to depart.
The goodman Dodier brought the caleche to the door. It was a substantial, two-wheeled vehicle, with a curious arrangement of springs, made out of the elastic wood of the hickory. The horse, a stout Norman pony, well harnessed, sleek and glossy, was lightly held by the hand of the goodman, who patted it kindly as an old friend; and the pony, in some sort, after an equine fashion, returned the affection of its master.
La Corriveau, with an agility hardly to be expected from her years, seated herself beside Fanchon in the caleche, and giving her willing horse a sharp cut with the lash for spite, not for need,--goodman Dodier said, only to anger him,--they set off at a rapid pace, and were soon out of sight at the turn of the dark pine-woods, on their way to the city of Quebec.
Angelique des Meloises had remained all day in her house, counting the hours as they flew by, laden with the fate of her unsuspecting rival at Beaumanoir.
Night had now closed in; the lamps were lit, the fire again burned red upon the hearth. Her door was inexorably shut against all visitors. Lizette had been sent away until the morrow; Angelique sat alone and expectant of the arrival of La Corriveau.
The gay dress in which she had outshone all her sex at the ball on the previous night lay still in a heap upon the floor, where last night she had thrown it aside, like the robe of innocence which once invested her. Her face was beautiful, but cruel, and in its expression terrible as Medea's brooding over her vengeance sworn against Creusa for her sin with Jason. She sat in a careless dishabille, with one white arm partly bare. Her long golden locks flowed loosely down her back and touched the floor, as she sat on her chair and watched and waited for the coming footsteps of La Corriveau. Her lips were compressed with a terrible resolution; her eyes glanced red as they alternately reflected the glow of the fire within them and of the fire without. Her hands were clasped nervously together, with a grip like iron, and lay in her lap, while her dainty foot marked the rhythm of the tragical thoughts that swept like a song of doom through her soul.
The few compunctious feelings which struggled up into her mind were instantly overborne by the passionate reflection that the lady of Beaumanoir must die! "I must, or she must--one or other! We cannot both live and marry this man!" exclaimed she, passionately. "Has it come to this: which of us shall be the wife, which the mistress? By God, I would kill him too, if I thought he hesitated in his choice; but he shall soon have no choice but one! Her death be on her own head and on Bigot's--not on mine!"
And the wretched girl strove to throw the guilt of the sin she premeditated upon her victim, upon the Intendant, upon fate, and, with a last subterfuge to hide the enormity of it from her own eyes, upon La Corriveau, whom she would lead on to suggest the crime and commit it!--a course which Angelique tried to believe would be more venial than if it were suggested by herself! less heinous in her own eyes, and less wicked in the sight of God.
"Why did that mysterious woman go to Beaumanoir and place herself in the path of Angelique des Meloises?" exclaimed she angrily. "Why did Bigot reject my earnest prayer, for it was earnest, for a lettre de cachet to send her unharmed away out of New France?"
Then Angelique sat and listened without moving for a long time. The clock ticked loud and warningly. There was a sighing of the wind about the windows, as if it sought admittance to reason and remonstrate with her. A cricket sang his monotonous song on the hearth. In the wainscot of the room a deathwatch ticked its doleful omen. The dog in the courtyard howled plaintively as the hour of midnight sounded upon the Convent bell, close by. The bell had scarcely ceased ere she was startled by a slight creaking like the opening of a door, followed by a whispering and the rustle of a woman's garments, as of one approaching with cautious steps up the stair. A thrill of expectation, not unmingled with fear, shot through the breast of Angelique. She sprang up, exclaiming to herself, "She is come, and all the demons that wait on murder come with her into my chamber!" A knock followed on the door. Angelique, very agitated in spite of her fierce efforts to appear calm, bade them come in.
Fanchon opened the door, and, with a courtesy to her mistress, ushered in La Corriveau, who walked straight into the room and stood face to face with Angelique.
The eyes of the two women instantly met in a searching glance that took in the whole look, bearing, dress, and almost the very thoughts of each other. In that one glance each knew and understood the other, and could trust each other in evil, if not in good.
And there was trust between them. The evil spirits that possessed each of their hearts shook hands together, and a silent league was sworn to in their souls before a word was spoken.
And yet how unlike to human eye were these two women!--how like in God's eye, that sees the heart and reads the Spirit, of what manner it is! Angelique, radiant in the bloom of youth and beauty, her golden hair floating about her like a cloud of glory round a daughter of the sun, with her womanly perfections which made the world seem brighter for such a revelation of completeness in every external charm; La Corriveau, stern, dark, angular, her fine-cut features crossed with thin lines of cruelty and cunning, no mercy in her eyes, still less on her lips, and none at all in her heart, cold to every humane feeling, and warming only to wickedness and avarice: still these women recognized each other as kindred spirits, crafty and void of conscience in the accomplishment of their ends.
Had fate exchanged the outward circumstances of their lives, each might have been the other easily and naturally. The proud beauty had nothing in her heart better than La Corriveau, and the witch of St. Valier, if born in luxury and endowed with beauty and wealth, would have rivalled Angelique in seductiveness, and hardly fallen below her in ambition and power.
La Corriveau saluted Angelique, who made a sign to Fanchon to retire. The girl obeyed somewhat reluctantly. She had hoped to be present at the interview between her aunt and her mistress, for her curiosity was greatly excited, and she now suspected there was more in this visit than she had been told.
Angelique invited La Corriveau to remove her cloak and broad hat. Seating her in her own luxurious chair, she sat down beside her, and began the conversation with the usual platitudes and commonplaces of the time, dwelling longer upon them than need was, as if she hesitated or feared to bring up the real subject of this midnight conference.
"My Lady is fair to look on. All women will admit that; all men swear to it!" said La Corriveau, in a harsh voice that grated ominously, like the door of hell which she was opening with this commencement of her business.
Angelique replied only with a smile. A compliment from La Corriveau even was not wasted upon her; but just now she was on the brink of an abyss of explanation, looking down into the dark pit, resolved, yet hesitating to make the plunge.
"No witch or witchery but your own charms is needed, Mademoiselle," continued La Corriveau, falling into the tone of flattery she often used towards her dupes, "to make what fortune you will in this world; what pearl ever fished out of the sea could add a grace to this wondrous hair of yours? Permit me to touch it, Mademoiselle!"
La Corriveau took hold of a thick tress, and held it up to the light of the lamp, where it shone like gold. Angelique shrank back as from the touch of fire. She withdrew her hair with a jerk from the hand of La Corriveau. A shudder passed through her from head to foot. It was the last parting effort of her good genius to save her.
"Do not touch it!" said she quickly; "I have set my life and soul on a desperate venture, but my hair--I have devoted it to our Lady of St. Foye; it is hers, not mine! Do not touch it, Dame Dodier."
Angelique was thinking of a vow she had once made before the shrine of the little church of Lorette. "My hair is the one thing belonging to me that I will keep pure," continued she; "so do not be angry with me," she added, apologetically.
"I am not angry," replied La Corriveau, with a sneer. "I am used to strange humors in people who ask my aid; they always fall out with themselves before they fall in with La Corriveau."
"Do you know why I have sent for you at this hour, good Dame Dodier?" asked Angelique, abruptly.
"Call me La Corriveau; I am not good Dame Dodier. Mine is an ill name, and I like it best, and so should you, Mademoiselle, for the business you sent me for is not what people who say their prayers call good. It was to find your lost jewels that Fanchon Dodier summoned me to your abode, was it not?" La Corriveau uttered this with a suppressed smile of incredulity.
"Ah! I bade Fanchon tell you that in order to deceive her, not you! But you know better, La Corriveau! It was not for the sake of paltry jewels I desired you to come to the city to see me at this hour of midnight."
"I conjectured as much!" replied La Corriveau, with a sardonic smile which showed her small teeth, white, even, and cruel as those of a wildcat. "The jewel you have lost is the heart of your lover, and you thought La Corriveau had a charm to win it back; was not that it, Mademoiselle?"
Angelique sat upright, gazing boldly into the eyes of her visitor. "Yes, it was that and more than that I summoned you for. Can you not guess? You are wise, La Corriveau, you know a woman's desire better than she dare avow it to herself!"
"Ah!" replied La Corriveau, returning her scrutiny with the eyes of a basilisk; a green light flashed out of their dark depths. "You have a lover, and you have a rival, too! A woman more potent than yourself, in spite of your beauty and your fascinations, has caught the eye and entangled the affections of the man you love, and you ask my counsel how to win him back and how to triumph over your rival. Is it not for that you have summoned La Corriveau?"
"Yes, it is that, and still more than that!" replied Angelique, clenching her hands hard together, and gazing earnestly at the fire with a look of merciless triumph at what she saw there reflected from her own thoughts distinctly as if she looked at her own face in a mirror.
"It is all that, and still more than that,--cannot you guess yet why I have summoned you here?" continued Angelique, rising and laying her left hand firmly upon the shoulder of La Corriveau, as she bent her head and whispered with terrible distinctness in her ear.
La Corriveau heard her whisper and looked up eagerly. "Yes, I know now, Mademoiselle,--you would kill your rival! There is death in your eye, in your voice, in your heart, but not in your hand! You would kill the woman who robs you of your lover, and you have sent for La Corriveau to help you in the good work! It is a good work in the eyes of a woman to kill her rival! but why should I do that to please you? What do I care for your lover, Angelique des Meloises?"
Angelique was startled to hear from the lips of another, words which gave free expression to her own secret thoughts. A denial was on her lips, but the lie remained unspoken. She trembled before La Corriveau, but her resolution was unchanged.
"It was not only to please me, but to profit yourself that I sent for you!" Angelique replied eagerly, like one trying to outstrip her conscience and prevent it from overtaking her sin. "Hark you! you love gold, La Corriveau! I will give you all you crave in return for your help,--for help me you shall! you will never repent of it if you do; you will never cease to regret it if you do not! I will make you rich, La Corrivean! or else, by God! do you hear? I swear it! I will have you burnt for a witch, and your ashes strewn all over St. Valier!"
La Corriveau spat contemptuously upon the floor at the holy name. "You are a fool, Angelique des Meloises, to speak thus to me! Do you know who and what I am? You are a poor butterfly to flutter your gay wings against La Corriveau; but still I like your spirit! women like you are rare. The blood of Exili could not have spoken bolder than you do; you want the life of a woman who has kindled the hell-fire of jealousy in your heart, and you want me to tell you how to get your revenge!"
"I do want you to do it, La Corriveau, and your reward shall be great!" answered Angelique with a burst of impatience. She could beat about the bush no longer.
"To kill a woman or a man were of itself a pleasure even without the profit," replied La Corriveau, doggedly. "But why should I run myself into danger for you, Mademoiselle des Meloises? Have you gold enough to balance the risk?"
Angelique had now fairly overleaped all barriers of reserve. "I will give you more than your eyes ever beheld, if you will serve me in this matter, Dame Dodier!"
"Perhaps so, but I am getting old and trust neither man nor woman. Give a pledge of your good faith, before you speak one word farther to me on this business, Mademoiselle des Meloises." La Corriveau held out her double hands significantly.
"A pledge? that is gold you want!" replied Angelique. "Yes, La Corriveau; I will bind you to me with chains of gold; you shall have it uncounted, as I get it,--gold enough to make you the richest woman in St. Valier, the richest peasant-woman in New France."
"I am no peasant-woman," replied La Corriveau, with a touch of pride, "I come of a race ancient and terrible as the Roman Caesars! But pshaw! what have you to do with that? Give me the pledge of your good faith and I will help you."
Angelique rose instantly, and, opening the drawer of an escritoire, took out a long silken purse filled with louis d'or, which peeped and glittered through the interstices of the net-work. She gave it with the air of one who cared nothing for money.
La Corriveau extended both hands eagerly, clutching as with the claws of a harpy. She pressed the purse to her thin bloodless lips, and touched with the ends of her bony fingers the edges of the bright coin visible through the silken net.
"This is indeed a rare earnest-penny!" exclaimed La Corriveau. "I will do your whole bidding, Mademoiselle; only I must do it in my own way. I have guessed aright the nature of your trouble and the remedy you seek. But I cannot guess the name of your false lover, nor that of the woman whose doom is sealed from this hour."
"I will not tell you the name of my lover," replied Angelique. She was reluctant to mention the name of Bigot as her lover. The idea was hateful to her. "The name of the woman I cannot tell you, even if I would," added she.
"How, Mademoiselle? you put the death-mark upon one you do not know?"
"I do not know her name. Nevertheless, La Corriveau, that gold, and ten times as much, are yours, if you relieve me of the torment of knowing that the secret chamber of Beaumanoir contains a woman whose life is death to all my hopes, and disappointment to all my plans.
The mention of Beaumanoir startled La Corriveau.
"The lady of Beaumanoir!" she exclaimed, "whom the Abenaquis brought in from Acadia? I saw that lady in the woods of St. Valier, when I was gathering mandrakes one summer day. She asked me for some water in God's name. I cursed her silently, but I gave her milk. I had no water. She thanked me. Oh, how she thanked me! nobody ever before thanked La Corriveau so sweetly as she did! I, even I, bade her a good journey, when she started on afresh with her Indian guides, after asking me the distance and direction of Beaumanoir."
This unexpected touch of sympathy surprised and revolted Angelique a little.
"You know her then! That is rare fortune, La Corriveau," said she; "she will remember you, you will have less difficulty in gaining access to her and winning her confidence."
La Corriveau clapped her hands, laughing a strange laugh, that sounded as if it came from a deep well.
"Know her? That is all I know; she thanked me sweetly. I said so, did I not? but I cursed her in my heart when she was gone. I saw she was both beautiful and good,--two things I hate."
"Do you call her beautiful? I care not whether she be good, that will avail nothing with him; but is she beautiful, La Corriveau? Is she fairer than I, think you?"
La Corriveau looked at Angelique intently and laughed. "Fairer than you? Listen! It was as if I had seen a vision. She was very beautiful, and very sad. I could wish it were another than she, for oh, she spoke to me the sweetest I was ever spoken to since I came into the world."
Angelique ground her teeth with anger. "What did you do, La Corriveau? Did you not wish her dead? Did you think the Intendant or any man could not help loving her to the rejection of any other woman in the world? What did you do?"
"Do? I went on picking my mandrakes in the forest, and waited for you to send for La Corriveau. You desire to punish the Intendant for his treachery in forsaking you for one more beautiful and better!"
It was but a bold guess of La Corriveau, but she had divined the truth. The Intendant Bigot was the man who was playing false with Angelique.
Her words filled up the measure of Angelique's jealous hate, and confirmed her terrible resolution. Jealousy is never so omnipotent as when its rank suspicions are fed and watered by the tales of others.
"There can be but one life between her and me!" replied the vehement girl; "Angelique des Meloises would die a thousand deaths rather than live to feed on the crumbs of any man's love while another woman feasts at his table. I sent for you, La Corriveau, to take my gold and kill that woman!"
"Kill that woman! It is easily said, Mademoiselle; but I will not forsake you, were she the Madonna herself! I hate her for her goodness, as you hate her for her beauty. Lay another purse by the side of this, and in thrice three days there shall be weeping in the Chateau of Beaumanoir, and no one shall know who has killed the cuckquean of the Chevalier Intendant!"
Angelique sprang up with a cry of exultation, like a pantheress seizing her prey. She clasped La Corriveau in her arms and kissed her dark, withered cheek, exclaiming, "Yes, that is her name! His cuckquean she is; his wife she is not and never shall be!--Thanks, a million golden thanks, La Corriveau, if you fulfil your prophecy! In thrice three days from this hour, was it not that you said?"
"Understand me!" said La Corriveau, "I serve you for your money, not for your liking! but I have my own joy in making my hand felt in a world which I hate and which hates me!" La Corriveau held out her hands as if the ends of her fingers were trickling poison. "Death drops on whomsoever I send it," said she, "so secretly and so subtly that the very spirits of air cannot detect the trace of the aqua tofana."
Angelique listened with amaze, yet trembled with eagerness to hear more. "What! La Corriveau, have you the secret of the aqua tofana, which the world believes was burnt with its possessors two generations ago, on the Place de Greve?"
"Such secrets never die," replied the poisoner; "they are too precious! Few men, still fewer women, are there who would not listen at the door of hell to learn them. The king in his palace, the lady in her tapestried chamber, the nun in her cell, the very beggar on the street, would stand on a pavement of fire to read the tablets which record the secret of the aqua tofana. Let me see your hand," added she abruptly, speaking to Angelique.
Angelique held out her hand; La Corriveau seized it. She looked intently upon the slender fingers and oval palm. "There is evil enough in these long, sharp spatulae of yours," said she, "to ruin the world. You are worthy to be the inheritrix of all I know. These fingers would pick fruit off the forbidden tree for men to eat and die! The tempter only is needed, and he is never far off! Angelique des Meloises, I may one day teach you the grand secret; meantime I will show you that I possess it."