Under these circumstances what course was Gilles to pursue, and what could he do to retrieve his fallen fortunes? He required money, he was spending more than his income; he was selling off his property and reducing his principal in the vain attempt to liquidate his debts and provide for his present expenses. He did not have strength of character to adopt a rigorous reduction of expenses and live on a moderate and conservative plan; indeed, such would hardly have been natural. The great man of a neighbourhood, who, having been entrusted with large sums of money; or the banker or trader who, being deeply indebted, endeavours to restore his broken fortunes by retrenchment of expenditures, only precipitates the catastrophe he seeks to avert. The ostensibly rich man who proposes to make himself better able to meet the demands of his business by disposing of his horses and carriage, closing up his houses, selling his yacht, giving fewer entertainments to his friends, instead of proving himself successful and inviting confidence in his ability to pull through, will prove the architect of his own doom. Therefore, what was Gilles de Retz to do? What he did, was to rely upon the success of his scheme for the discovery of the Philosopher’s Stone, in the hope to thus replenish his empty coffers.
CHAPTER IV
Gilles’s Crimes
Gilles’s Abduction of Children—His Familiars—Château Tiffauges—First Process against Gilles—Warrant—Arrest and Imprisonment—Château de Nantes.
Beginning in the year 1432, a district comprising a large portion of western France, including the southern part of the Province of Brittany, the western part of the Province of Maine, and the northern part of the Province of Poitou, became excited by an undefined fear which, increased by its uncertainty and vagueness, produced in the people a feeling akin to terror. It was not the fear of war, for the people had had an intimate acquaintance with war for many years; nor was it the fear of an epidemic nor of sudden death; and it was not easy to tell with exactness what it was. It was so indefinite that belief in it was at first refused. It was considered by many to be the result of superstition; some declared it to be something of the vampire race which by some sort of resurrection had changed its horrible character so that it did not wait to prey upon the dead, but made its attacks upon the living, choosing young children and maidens, and timing the place and manner of attack so that not only was there no defence, but there was also no opportunity for pursuit or recovery.
Michelet (Histoire de France) describes it as a beast of extermination, unseen, unknown, unnatural, indescribable, invisible, supernatural, omnipresent, possessed of powers of disappearance on the instant, and so of escape, dissolving into thin air. It was believed by many to be a physical manifestation of the Evil One. It made its appearance in one place on one day and at another place the next day, and at a distant place the next; it was here to-night and far away in the morning; it ravaged the country, spreading terror, and leaving in its track not simply fear and mourning, but the torture of insanity and death. There was a mixture of enchantment, of impossibility, about the performance which left it to be accounted for only upon the principle of legerdemain, magic, the black art, and the presence of the devil. On all sides, right and left, east and west, north and south, within this terror-stricken district, sometimes each day for a week, sometimes not again for a month, then not for three, and again not for six months or more, but subject to these intervals, came the story from one section to the other, of the disappearance, as though by enchantment, of a child or children of tender age. No apparent distinction of sex was made, but the subjects of attack were always young, say from six to sixteen years; old enough to go about the farm or from one farm to another, possibly from one village to another, when, without warning, apparently without cause, without the slightest evidence as to the means used, and without leaving the slightest trace of the tragedy, suddenly a child was gone. No one knew or could find in what direction it had gone, or how it had been taken. All that the terror-stricken parents and family knew was that their child was here to-day, and now he or she was not—it was playing about the door only a half-hour since; now it was gone, gone as completely as though swallowed by the earth.
No one knew where the blow would fall next; no one knew whether his family circle was to be invaded, his house stricken, his child taken. Every care and watchfulness was employed, consultations were had between the stricken parents, the officers of the law were consulted, and all that was known—apparently all that could be discovered—was that their children were here yesterday, engaged in their little plays or about their own little duties around the house or on the farm, and in a moment, though the most rigorous and extensive search was made, they were gone—gone absolutely, gone beyond possibility of recovery, gone in numbers, gone from every part of the district mentioned, and no sign or trace left of their fate. Fear, fright, terror, took possession of all, and this, mixed with sorrow and grief, broke many a heart, sent many a loving mother in insanity to the grave. The peasants who, by reason of their age and strength supposed themselves to be safe, walked lightly, as though afraid to put their feet upon the ground; spoke in low voices as if afraid to trust themselves in ordinary tones, and everything throughout the country was done with bated breath as if in the presence of the dead.
The peasants, superstitious at the best of times, were now overcome with fear and gave themselves up a prey to the idea of enchantment and magic, and could only account for the disappearance of their loved ones by the presence of the arch-enemy of mankind, against whom they had no means of fighting, and whose assaults upon their devoted children they had no means of resisting. The frightened parents were tortured by the uncertainty of the fate that had overcome their loved ones. “Are they dead?” “Have they been taken to the realms above or to the tortures below?” “Are they in prison?” “Are they still living?” “Are they never to be seen again?” “Might they not be in a distant part of the country enduring pains and tortures?” “Might they not, even now, be weeping and screaming themselves half mad and demanding the presence and comfort of their mother?” “In what direction should we go?” “Has nobody seen them?” “Has search been made?” “In what direction have we yet to go?” No answer came to all these questions. The fate of the children was an impenetrable mystery.