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Section 1 of Celebrated Crimes, Volume 8, Part 3, of the Marquise de Gange. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Celebrated Crimes, Volume 8, Part 3, of the Marquise de Gange, by Alexandre Dumas, translated by George Burnham Ives. Section 1. Toward the close of the year 1657, a very plain carriage, with no arms painted on it, stopped,

about eight o'clock one evening before the door of a house in the rue Hautefeuille, at which two other coaches were already standing. A lackey at once got down to open the carriage door, but a sweet, though rather tremulous, voice stopped him, saying, Wait, while I see whether this is the place. Then a head, muffled so closely in a black satin mantle that no feature could be distinguished,

was thrust from one of the carriage windows, and looking around, seemed to seek for some decisive sign on the house front. The unknown lady appeared to be satisfied by her inspection, for she turned back to her companion. It is here, said she. There is the sign. As a result of this certainty, the carriage door was opened. The two women alighted, and after having once more raised their eyes to a strip of wood, some six or eight feet long by two broad, which was nailed above the windows of the second story and bore the inscription, Madame Boisson, midwife, stole quickly into a passage, the door of which was unfastened, and in which there was just so much light as enabled persons passing in or out to find their eyes. way along the narrow winding stair that led from the ground floor to the fifth story.

The two strangers, one of whom appeared to be of far higher rank than the other, did not stop, as might have been expected, at the door corresponding with the inscription that had guided them, but on the contrary went on to the next floor. Here, upon the landing, was a kind of dwarf, oddly dressed after the fashion of sixteenth-century Venetian buffoons, who, when he saw the two women coming, stretched out a wand, as though to prevent them from going

farther, and asked what they wanted. To consult the spirit, replied the woman of the sweet and tremulous voice. Come in and wait, returned the dwarf, lifting a panel of tapestry and ushering the two women into a waiting room. The women obeyed, and remained for about half an hour, seeing and hearing nothing. At last the door, concealed by the tapestry, was suddenly opened. A voice uttered the words, Enter! And the two women were introduced into a second room,

hung with black, and lighted solely by a three-branched lamp that hung from the ceiling. The door closed behind them, and the clients found themselves face to face with the Sybil. She was a woman of about twenty-five or twenty-six, who, unlike other women, evidently desired to appear older than she was. She was dressed in black, her hair hung in plates, her neck, arms, and feet were bare. The belt at her waist was clasped by a large garnet which threw out somber fires.

In her hand she held a wand, and she was raised on a sort of platform, which stood for the tripod of the ancients, and from which came acrid and penetrating fumes. She was, moreover, fairly handsome, although her features were common, the eyes only accepted. And these, by some trick of the toilet, no doubt looked inordinately large, and like the garnet in her belt, emitted strange lights. When the two visitors came in, they found the soothsayer leaning her forehead on her hand as though absorbed in thought. Fearing to rouse her from her ecstasy, they waited in silence until it should please her to change her position.

At the end of ten minutes, she raised her head, and seemed only now to become aware that two persons were standing before her. What is wanted of me again? she asked. and shall I have rest only in the grave forgive me madam said the sweet voice unknown but I am wishing to know silence said the sybil in a solemn voice I will not know your affairs it is to the spirit that you must address yourself he is a jealous spirit who forbids his secrets to be

shared. I can but pray to him for you, and obey his will. At these words she left her tripod, passed into an adjoining room, and soon returned, looking even paler and more anxious than before, and carrying in one hand a burning, chafing dish, and the other a red paper. The three flames of the lamp grew fainter at the same moment, and the room was left lighted up only by the chafing dish. Every object now assumed a fantastic air that did not fail to disquiet the two visitors,

but it was too late to draw back. The soothsayer placed the chafing dish in the middle of the room, presented the paper to the young woman who had spoken, and said to her, Write down what you wish to know. And the woman took the paper with a steadier hand than might have been expected,

seated herself at a table, and wrote, Am I young? "'Am I beautiful? Am I maid, wife, or widow? This is for the past. Shall I marry or marry again? Shall I live long, or shall I die young? This is for the future.' Then, stretching out her hand to the soothsayer, she asked,

"'What am I to do now with this?' "'Roll that letter around this ball,' answered the other, handing to the unknown a little ball of virgin wax. "'Both ball and letter will be consumed in the flame before your eyes. The spirit knows your secrets already. In three days you will have the answer.' The unknown did as the sybil bade her. Then the latter took from her hands the ball and the paper

in which it was wrapped, and went and threw both into the chafing-pan. And now all is done as it should be, said the soothsayer. Komus! The dwarf came in. See the lady to her coach.

And the stranger left a purse upon the table and followed Komus. He conducted her and her companion, who was only a confidential maid, down a back staircase used as an exit and leading into a different street from that by which the two women had come in. But the coachman, who had been told beforehand of this circumstance, was awaiting them at the door, and they had only to step into their carriage which bore them rapidly away in the direction of the Rue Daphine.

Three days later, according to the promise given her, the fair unknown when she awakened, found on the table beside her a letter in an unfamiliar handwriting. it was addressed, to the beautiful Provencal, and contained these words, You are young, you are beautiful, you are a widow, this is for the present, you will marry again, you will die young, and by a violent death, this is for the future,

the spirit. The answer was written upon a paper like that upon which the questions had been set down. The Marquise turned pale, and uttered a faint cry of terror. The answer was so perfectly correct in regard to the past, as to call up a fear that it might be equally accurate in regard to the future. The truth is that the unknown lady wrapped in a mantle whom we have escorted into the modern Sybil's cavern was no other than the beautiful Marie de Rassan, who, before her

marriage had borne the name of Mademoiselle de Chateaubloch, from that of an estate belonging to her maternal grandfather, Monsieur Joannis de Nocheresse, who owned a fortune of five to six hundred thousand livres. At the age of thirteen, that is to say in 1649, she had married the Marquis de Castellan, a gentleman of very high birth who claimed to be descended from John of Castile, the son of Pedro the Cruel, and from Juana de Castro, his mistress. Proud of his young wife's

beauty, the Marquis de Castellan, who was an officer of the King's Galley, had hastened to present her at court. Louis XIV, who at the time of her presentation was barely twenty years old, was struck by her enchanting face, and to the great despair of the famous beauties of the day, danced with her three times in one evening. Finally, as a crowning touch to her reputation,

the famous Christina of Sweden, who was then at the French court, said of her that she had never, in any of the kingdoms through which she had passed, seen anything equal to the beautiful Provençal.

This praise had been so well received that the name of the beautiful Provençal had clung to Madame de Castellan, and she was everywhere known by it. This favor of Louis XIV, and this summing up of Christina's, had been enough to bring the

Marquise de Castellan instantly into fashion, and Mignard, who had just received a patent of nobility, and been made painter to the king, put the seal to her celebrity by asking leave to paint her portrait. That portrait still exists, and gives a perfect notion of the beauty which it represents. But as the portrait is far from our reader's eyes, we will content ourselves by repeating in its own original words the one given in 1667 by the author of a pamphlet published at

Rouen under the following title, True and Principal Circumstances of the Deplorable Death of Madame the Marquise de Gange. Note, it is from this pamphlet, and from the account of the death of Madame the Marquise de Gange, formerly Marquise de Castellan, that we have borrowed the principal circumstances of this tragic story. To these documents we must add, that we may not be constantly referring our readers to original sources, these celebrated trials by Guillaume

de Pitaval, the life of Marie de Rassan, and the letters galant of Madame Desnoyers. her complexion which was of a dazzling whiteness was illumined by not too brilliant a red and art itself could not have arranged more skillfully the gradations by which this red joined and merged into the whiteness of the complexion the brilliance of her face was heightened by the decided blackness of her hair growing as though drawn by a painter of the finest taste around a well-proportioned

brow. Her large, well-opened eyes were of the same hue as her hair, and shone with a soft and piercing flame that rendered it impossible to gaze upon her steadily. The smallness, the shape, the turn of her mouth, and the beauty of her teeth were incomparable. The position and the regular proportion of her nose added to her beauty such an air of dignity, as inspired a respect for her equal to the love that might be inspired by her beauty. The rounded contour of her face,

produced by a becoming plumpness, exhibited all the vigor and freshness of health. To complete her charms, her glances, the movements of her lips and of her head, appeared to be guided by the graces. Her shape corresponded to the beauty of her face. Lastly, her arms, her hands, her bearing and her gait were such that nothing further could be wished to complete the agreeable presentment of a beautiful woman. Note, all her contemporaries indeed are in agreement as to her

marvelous beauty. Here is a second portrait of the Marquise, delineated in a style and manner still more characteristic of that period. You will remember that she had a complexion smoother and finer than a mirror, that her whiteness was so well commingled with the lively blood as to produce an exact admixture never beheld elsewhere, and imparting to her countenance the tenderest animation, her eyes and hair were blacker than jet, her eyes, I say, of which the

gaze could scarce, from their excess of luster, be supported, which have been celebrated as a miracle of tenderness and sprightliness, which have given rise a thousand times to the finest compliments of the day, and have been the torment of many a rash man, must excuse me if I do not pause longer to praise them in a letter, how her mouth was the feature of her face which compelled the most critical to a vow that they had seen none of equal perfection, and that by its shape,

its smallness and its brilliance. It might furnish a pattern for all those others whose sweetness and charms had been so highly vaunted. Her nose conformed to the fair proportion of all her features. It was, that is to say, the finest in the world. The whole shape of her face was perfectly round, and of so charming a fullness that such an assemblage of beauties was never before seen together. The expression of this head was one of unparalleled sweetness, and of a majesty

which she softened rather by disposition than by study. Her figure was opulent, her speech agreeable, her step noble, her demeanor easy, her temper sociable, her wit devoid of malice, and founded upon great goodness of heart. It is easy to understand that a woman thus endowed

could not, in a court where gallantry was more pursued than in any other spot in the world, escape the calumnies of rivals. Such calumnies, however, never produced any

result, so correctly, even in the absence of her husband, did the marquise contrive to conduct herself. Her cold and serious conversation, rather

concise than lively, rather solid than brilliant, contrasted indeed with the light turn, the capricious and fanciful expressions employed by the wits of that time. The consequence was that those who had failed to succeed with her tried to spread a report that the Marquise was merely a beautiful idol, virtuous with the virtue of a statue. But though such things might be said and repeated in the absence of the Marquise,

from the moment that she appeared in a drawing room, from the moment that her beautiful eyes and sweet smile added their indefinable expression to those brief, hurried, and sensible words that fell from her lips, the most prejudiced came back to her and were forced to own that God had never before created anything that so nearly touched perfection. She was thus in the enjoyment of a triumph that backbiters failed to shake, and that scandal vainly sought to tarnish, when news came

of the wreck of the French galleys in Sicilian waters, and of the death of the Marquis de Castellan, who was in command. The Marquis, on this occasion, as usual, displayed the greatest piety and propriety, although she had no very violent passion for her husband, with whom she had spent scarcely one of the seven years during which their marriage had lasted. On receipt of the news, she went at once into retreat, going to live with Madame Dampousse, her mother-in-law,

and ceasing not only to receive visitors, but also to go out. Six months after the death of her husband, the Marquise received letters from her grandfather, Monsieur Joigny de Nocher, begging her to come and finish her time of mourning at Avignon. Having been fatherless, almost from childhood, Mademoiselle de Chateaublanck had been brought up by this good old man, whom she loved dearly. She hastened accordingly to accede to his invitation, and prepared

everything for her departure. This was at the moment when La Voixin, still a young woman, and far from having the reputation which she subsequently acquired, was yet beginning to be talked of. Several friends of the Marquise de Castellan had been to consult her and had received strange predictions from her, some of which, either through the art of her who framed them, or through some odd concurrence of circumstances, had come true. The Marquise could not resist the

curiosity with which the various tales that she had heard of this woman's powers had inspired her, and some days before setting out for Avignon, she made the visit which we have narrated. What answer she received to her questions we have seen. The Marquise was not superstitious, yet this fatal prophecy impressed itself upon her mind and left behind a deep trace, which neither the pleasure of revisiting her native place,

nor the affection of her grandfather, nor the fresh admiration which she did not fail to receive, could succeed in removing. Indeed, this fresh admiration was a weariness to the Marquise, and before long she begged leave of her grandfather to retire into a convent and to spend there the last three months of her mourning. It was in that place, and it was with the warmth of these poor cloistered maidens,

that she heard a man spoken of for the first time, whose reputation for beauty, as a man, was equal to her own as a woman. This favorite of nature was the sieur de Lennide, Marquis de Gange, Baron of Languedoc, and Governor of Saint-André in the Diocese of Ouse. The Marquise heard of him so often, and it was so frequently declared to her that nature seemed to have formed them for each other,

that she began to allow admission to a very strong desire of seeing him. Doubtless, the sieur de Lennide, stimulated by similar suggestions, had conceived a great wish to meet the Marquise, for having got Monsieur de Nocher, who no doubt regretted her prolonged retreat, to entrust him with a commission for his granddaughter, he came to the convent parlor and asked for the fair recluse.

She, although she had never seen him, recognized him at the first glance, for having never seen so handsome a cavalier as he who now presented himself before her, she thought this could be no other than the Marquis de Gange, of whom people had so often spoken to her. That which was to happen, happened.

The Marquise de Castellan and the Marquise de Gange could not look upon each other without loving. Both were young, the Marquise was noble and in good position, the Marquise was rich, everything in the match therefore seemed suitable, and indeed it was deferred only for the space of time necessary to complete the year of mourning, and the marriage was celebrated toward the beginning of the year 1558. The Marquis was twenty years of age, and the Marquis twenty-two.

The beginnings of this union were perfectly happy. The Marquis was in love for the first time, and the Marquis did not remember ever to have been in love. A son and a daughter came to complete their happiness, or the Marquis had forgotten entirely the fatal prediction, or, if she occasionally thought of it now, it was to wonder that she could ever have believed in it. Such happiness is not of this world, and when by chance it lingers here a while,

it seems sent rather by the anger than by the goodness of God. Better indeed would it be for him who possesses and who loses it, never to have known it.