strange shudder
when she heard the proposal. Remembrance of the prediction made to her
returned immediately to her mind. The recent and ill explained attempt
to poison her, too, very naturally added to her fears.

Without directly and positively suspecting her brothers-in-law of
that crime, she knew that in them she had two implacable enemies. This
journey to a little town, this abode in a lonely castle, amid new,
unknown neighbours, seemed to her of no good omen; but open opposition
would have been ridiculous. On what grounds, indeed, could she base
resistance? The marquise could only own her terrors by accusing her
husband and her brothers-in-law. And of what could she accuse them? The
incident of the poisoned cream was not a conclusive proof. She resolved
accordingly to lock up all her fears in her heart, and to commit herself
to the hands of God.

Nevertheless, she would not leave Avignon without signing the will which
she had contemplated making ever since M. de Nocheres' death. A notary
was called in who drew up the document. The Marquise de Ganges made her
mother, Madame de Rossan, her sole inheritor, and left in her charge
the duty of choosing between the testatrix's two children as to which of
them should succeed to the estate. These two children were, one a boy of
six years old, the other a girl of five. But this was not enough for
the marquise, so deep was her impression that she would not survive
this fatal journey; she gathered together, secretly and at night, the
magistrates of Avignon and several persons of quality, belonging to the
first families of the town, and there, before them, verbally at first,
declared that, in case of her death, she begged the honourable witnesses
whom she had assembled on purpose, not to recognise as valid, voluntary,
or freely written anything except the will which she had signed the
day before, and affirmed beforehand that any later will which might be
produced would be the effect of fraud or of violence. Then, having made
this verbal declaration, the marquise repeated it in writing, signed the
paper containing it, and gave the paper to be preserved by the honour of
those whom she constituted its guardians. Such a precaution, taken with
such minute detail, aroused the lively curiosity of her hearers. Many
pressing questions were put to the marquise, but nothing could be
extracted from her except that she had reasons for her action which she
could not declare. The cause of t