surround herself with the effigies of those she had killed by the unguent. Marguerite de Valois, Queen of
Navarre, carried constantly with her the embalmed hearts of a dozen or more lovers who had died for
her. She had not slain those men-but she knew she had been the cause of their deaths as surely as
though she had strangled them with her own hands. The psychological principle involved in Queen
Marguerite's collection of hearts and Madame Mandilip's collection of dolls is one and the same."
He had not sat down; still in that strained voice he repeated: "I asked you if you called the killing of the
witch an illusion."
I said: "You make it very uncomfortable for me, Ricori-staring at me like that…and I am answering your
question. I repeat it is possible that in her own mind she was at times the victim of the same illusions she
induced in the minds of others. That at times she, herself, thought the dolls were alive. That in this strange