the two sisters
answered, as with one voice, 'Urbanus.' He was about to continue, when
Monsieur du Lude, taking out of his pocket, with an air of veneration,
a small gold box, said that he had in it a relic left by his ancestors,
and that though not doubting the fact of the possession, he wished to
test it. Father Lactantius seized the box with delight, and hardly had
he touched the foreheads of the two sisters with it when they made great
leaps and twisted about their hands and feet. Lactantius shouted forth
his exorcisms; Barre threw himself upon his knees with all the old
women; and Mignon and the judges applauded. The impassible Laubardemont
made the sign of the cross, without being struck dead for it! When
Monsieur du Lude took back his box the nuns became still. 'I think,'
said Lactantius, insolently, 'that--you will not question your relics
now.' 'No more than I do the possession,' answered Monsieur du Lude,
opening his box and showing that it was empty. 'Monsieur, you mock us,'
said Lactantius. I was indignant at these mummeries, and said to him,
'Yes, Monsieur, as you mock God and men.' And this, my dear friend, is
the reason why you see me in my seven-league boots, so heavy that they
hurt my legs, and with pistols; for our friend Laubardemont has ordered
my person to be seized, and I don't choose it to be seized, old as it
is."

"What, is he so powerful, then?" cried Cinq-Mars.

"More so than is supposed--more so than could be believed. I know that
the possessed Abbess is his niece, and that he is provided with an order
in council directing him to judge, without being deterred by any appeals
lodged in Parliament, the Cardinal having prohibited the latter from
taking cognizance of the matter of Urbain Grandier."

"And what are his offences?" asked the young man, already deeply
interested.

"Those of a strong mind and of a great genius, an inflexible will which
has irritated power against him, and a profound passion which has driven
his heart and him to commit the only mortal sin with which I believe
he can be reproached; and it was only by violating the sanctity of his
private papers, which they tore from Jeanne d'Estievre, his mother, an
old woman of eighty, that they discovered his love for the beautiful
Madeleine de Brou. This girl had refused to marry, and wished to take
the veil. May that veil have concealed from her the spectacle of this
day! The eloquence of Grandier and his angelic beauty drove the