The Golden Dog [235]
was blown over, sat down in the chair opposite Angelique, and placing one hand on the knee of her listener, as if to hold her fast, began the terrible recital.
She gave Angelique a graphic, minute, and not untrue account of all she had done at Beaumanoir, dwelling with fierce unction on the marvellous and sudden effects of the aqua tofana, not sparing one detail of the beauty and innocent looks of her victim; and repeating, with a mocking laugh, the deceit she had practised upon her with regard to the bouquet as a gift from the Intendant.
Angelique listened to the terrible tale, drinking it in with eyes, mouth, and ears. Her countenance changed to a mask of ugliness, wonderful in one by nature so fair to see. Cloud followed cloud over her face and eyes as the dread recital went on, and her imagination accompanied it with vivid pictures of every phase of the diabolical crime.
When La Corriveau described the presentation of the bouquet as a gift of Bigot, and the deadly sudden effect which followed its joyous acceptance, the thoughts of Caroline in her white robe, stricken as by a thunderbolt, shook Angelique with terrible emotion. But when La Corriveau, coldly and with a bitter spite at her softness, described with a sudden gesticulation and eyes piercing her through and through, the strokes of the poniard upon the lifeless body of her victim, Angelique sprang up, clasped her hands together, and, with a cry of woe, fell senseless upon the floor.
"She is useless now," said La Corriveau, rising and spurning Angelique with her foot. "I deemed she had courage to equal her wickedness. She is but a woman after all,--doomed to be the slave of some man through life, while aspiring to command all men! It is not of such flesh that La Corriveau is made!"
La Corriveau stood a few moments, reflecting what was best to be done.
All things considered, she decided to leave Angelique to come to of herself, while she made the best of her way back to the house of Mere Malheur, with the intention, which she carried out, of returning to St. Valier with her infamous reward that very day.
CHAPTER XLII.
"LET'S TALK OF GRAVES AND WORMS AND EPITAPHS."
About the hour that La Corriveau emerged from the gloomy woods of Beauport, on her return to the city, the night of the murder of Caroline, two horsemen were battering at full speed on the highway that led to Charlebourg. Their dark figures were irrecognizable in the dim moonlight. They rode fast and silent, like men having important business before them, which demanded haste; business which both fully understood and cared not now to talk about.
And so it was. Bigot and Cadet, after the exchange of a few words about the hour of midnight, suddenly left the wine, the dice, and the gay company at the Palace, and mounting their horses, rode, unattended by groom or valet, in the direction of Beaumanoir.
Bigot, under the mask of gaiety and indifference, had felt no little alarm at the tenor of the royal despatch, and at the letter of the Marquise de Pompadour concerning Caroline de St. Castin.
The proximate arrival of Caroline's father in the Colony was a circumstance ominous of trouble. The Baron was no trifler, and would as soon choke a prince as a beggar, to revenge an insult to his personal honor or the honor of his house.
Bigot cared little for that, however. The Intendant was no coward, and could brazen a thing out with any man alive. But there was one thing which he knew he could not brazen out or fight out, or do anything but miserably fail in, should it come to the question. He had boldly and wilfully lied at the Governor's council-table-- sitting as the King's councillor among gentlemen of honor--when he declared that he knew not the hiding-place of Caroline de St. Castin. It would cover him with eternal disgrace, as a gentleman, to be detected in such a flagrant falsehood. It would ruin him as a courtier in the favor of the great Marquise should she discover that, in spite of his denials of the fact, he had harbored and concealed the missing
She gave Angelique a graphic, minute, and not untrue account of all she had done at Beaumanoir, dwelling with fierce unction on the marvellous and sudden effects of the aqua tofana, not sparing one detail of the beauty and innocent looks of her victim; and repeating, with a mocking laugh, the deceit she had practised upon her with regard to the bouquet as a gift from the Intendant.
Angelique listened to the terrible tale, drinking it in with eyes, mouth, and ears. Her countenance changed to a mask of ugliness, wonderful in one by nature so fair to see. Cloud followed cloud over her face and eyes as the dread recital went on, and her imagination accompanied it with vivid pictures of every phase of the diabolical crime.
When La Corriveau described the presentation of the bouquet as a gift of Bigot, and the deadly sudden effect which followed its joyous acceptance, the thoughts of Caroline in her white robe, stricken as by a thunderbolt, shook Angelique with terrible emotion. But when La Corriveau, coldly and with a bitter spite at her softness, described with a sudden gesticulation and eyes piercing her through and through, the strokes of the poniard upon the lifeless body of her victim, Angelique sprang up, clasped her hands together, and, with a cry of woe, fell senseless upon the floor.
"She is useless now," said La Corriveau, rising and spurning Angelique with her foot. "I deemed she had courage to equal her wickedness. She is but a woman after all,--doomed to be the slave of some man through life, while aspiring to command all men! It is not of such flesh that La Corriveau is made!"
La Corriveau stood a few moments, reflecting what was best to be done.
All things considered, she decided to leave Angelique to come to of herself, while she made the best of her way back to the house of Mere Malheur, with the intention, which she carried out, of returning to St. Valier with her infamous reward that very day.
CHAPTER XLII.
"LET'S TALK OF GRAVES AND WORMS AND EPITAPHS."
About the hour that La Corriveau emerged from the gloomy woods of Beauport, on her return to the city, the night of the murder of Caroline, two horsemen were battering at full speed on the highway that led to Charlebourg. Their dark figures were irrecognizable in the dim moonlight. They rode fast and silent, like men having important business before them, which demanded haste; business which both fully understood and cared not now to talk about.
And so it was. Bigot and Cadet, after the exchange of a few words about the hour of midnight, suddenly left the wine, the dice, and the gay company at the Palace, and mounting their horses, rode, unattended by groom or valet, in the direction of Beaumanoir.
Bigot, under the mask of gaiety and indifference, had felt no little alarm at the tenor of the royal despatch, and at the letter of the Marquise de Pompadour concerning Caroline de St. Castin.
The proximate arrival of Caroline's father in the Colony was a circumstance ominous of trouble. The Baron was no trifler, and would as soon choke a prince as a beggar, to revenge an insult to his personal honor or the honor of his house.
Bigot cared little for that, however. The Intendant was no coward, and could brazen a thing out with any man alive. But there was one thing which he knew he could not brazen out or fight out, or do anything but miserably fail in, should it come to the question. He had boldly and wilfully lied at the Governor's council-table-- sitting as the King's councillor among gentlemen of honor--when he declared that he knew not the hiding-place of Caroline de St. Castin. It would cover him with eternal disgrace, as a gentleman, to be detected in such a flagrant falsehood. It would ruin him as a courtier in the favor of the great Marquise should she discover that, in spite of his denials of the fact, he had harbored and concealed the missing