“On Thursday, this poor prince, after tilting at the ring, supped, feeling well. At midnight, he was seized with a very violent vomiting, which lasted till morning. All Friday he kept his bed. In the evening, he supped, and having slept well, he rose on Saturday morning, dined at table, and then played at chess. He rose from his chair, and walked up and down his chamber, chatting with one and the other. All at once, he said: ‘Give me my chair; I feel a great weakness.’ Scarcely was he seated when he lost the power of speech, and immediately expired. The effects of poison at once became apparent.
“It is incredible the consternation which this has caused in that part of the country. I am starting at daybreak to travel thither with all speed. I see myself on the way to encounter much danger. Pray to God for me earnestly. If I escape it, it must be because it is He who had protected me. Up to the grave, to which I am perhaps nearer than I think, I shall remain your faithful slave. Good-night, my soul; I kiss your hands a thousand times.”[123]
Next morning, the King of Navarre set out for Saint-Jean-d’Angely, “to console my cousin, Madame la Princesse, and to prevent our enemies from profiting by our losses and misfortunes and by my absence.”[124] On the second day of his journey, however, he was met by a courier, with intelligence which convinced him that the bereaved princess was an object of something very different from sympathy.
“There arrived yesterday,” he writes to his Corisande, “the one at midday, the other in the evening, two couriers. The first reported that Belcastel, the page of Madame la Princesse,[125] and her first valet de chambre[126] had fled, immediately after seeing their master dead. They found two horses worth two hundred écus at an inn in the faubourg, where they had been kept for a fortnight, and each had a wallet full of money. On being questioned, the innkeeper stated that it was a person named Brilland who had given him the horses, and that he came every day to tell him to treat them well; that if he gave four measures of oats to the other horses, he was to give them eight, and that he would pay double. This Brilland is a man whom Madame la Princesse had placed in her Household and given the charge of everything. He was immediately arrested. He confesses to have given one thousand écus to the page and to have purchased the horses, by his mistress’s order, to go to Italy.
CHARLOTTE CATHERINE DE LA TRÉMOILLE, PRINCESSE DE CONDÉ
FROM AN ENGRAVING BY MIGER, AFTER THE PAINTING BY LE MONNIER
“The second courier confirms all this, and says further that Brilland was compelled to write a letter to the valet de chambre, who was known to be at Poitiers, in which he requested him to come two hundred paces from the gate, as he wished to speak to him.[127] Immediately, the ambuscade which was there seized him, and he was brought to Saint-Jean. He has not yet been interrogated, but he said to those who were bringing him: ‘Ah! what a wicked woman Madame [the Princesse de Condé] is! Let them arrest her treasurer; I will tell everything frankly.’ This was done. That is all that is known up to the present. Remember what I have told you at other times. I am seldom deceived in my judgments. A bad woman is a dangerous animal (une dangereuse beste). All these poisoners are Papists. It was from them that the lady received her instructions. I have discovered an assassin for myself. God will protect me, and I will tell you more about it soon.... My soul, I am very well in body, but very afflicted in mind. Love me, and let me see that you do; that will be a great consolation for me.”[128]
The King of Navarre did not carry out his original intention of proceeding straight to Saint-Jean-d’Angely, for, on reaching Pons, he turned aside to La Rochelle, and it was not until the evening of 29 March that he reached the scene of the tragedy. The probable reason for this delay was his wish to avoid committing himself until further light had been thrown upon the affair.
The princess, although, of course, under close supervision, was still nominally at liberty, for Fiefbrun, to whom, in his capacity of bailiff of Saint-Jean-d’Angely, Henri had entrusted the conduct of the inquiry, was a devoted servant of the Condés and was naturally very reluctant to take any definite steps against her. But, on his arrival, he found public opinion in the town so hostile to the lady that he felt obliged to order her arrest.