wind smote and rattled the windows of the chapel and
the ante-room, as if the legions of hell had flung themselves against
the walls of the chateau. There was a rush and clatter in the chimney of
the ante-room's vast, empty fireplace, and through the din Marguerite,
as her failing limbs sank under her and she slithered down in a heap
against the chapel door, seemed to hear a burst of exultantly cruel
satanic laughter. With chattering teeth and burning eyes she sat
huddled, listening in terror. The child began to cry again, more
violently, more piteously; then, quite suddenly, there was a little
choking cough, a gurgle, the chink of metal against earthenware, and
silence.

When some moments later the squat figure of La Voisin emerged from the
chapel, Marguerite was back in the shadows, hunched on the settle to
which she had crawled. She saw that her mother now carried a basin under
her arm, and she did not need the evidence of her eyes to inform her of
the dreadful contents that the witch was bearing away in it.

Meanwhile in the chapel the ineffably blasphemous rites proceeded. To
the warm human blood which had been caught in the consecrated chalice,
Guibourg had added, among other foulnesses, powdered cantharides, the
dust of desiccated moles, and the blood of bats. By the addition of
flour he had wrought the ingredients into an ineffable paste, and over
this, through the door, which La Voisin had left ajar, Marguerite heard
his voice pronouncing the dread words of Transubstantiation.

Marguerite's horror mounted until it threatened to suffocate her. It
was as if some hellish miasma, released by Guibourg's monstrous
incantations, crept through to permeate and poison the air she breathed.

It would be a half-hour later when Madame de Montespan at last came out.
She was of a ghastly pallor, her limbs shook and trembled under her as
she stepped forth, and there was a wild horror in her staring eyes. Yet
she contrived to carry herself almost defiantly erect, and she spoke
sharply to the half-swooning Desceillets, who staggered after her.

She took her departure from that unholy place bearing with her the
host compounded of devilish ingredients which when dried and reduced to
powder was to be administered to the King to ensure the renewal of his
failing affection for her.

The Marchioness contrived that a creature of her own, an officer of
the buttery in her pay, should introduce it into the royal soup. The
immediate