ce taken by
the lay sister Claire who had already made her debut in the mother
superior's room.

Hardly had she entered the choir than she uttered a groan, but as soon
as they placed her on the little bed on which the other nuns had lain,
she gave way to uncontrollable laughter, and cried out between the
paroxysms--

"Grandier, Grandier, you must buy some at the market."

Barre at once declared that these wild and whirling words were a proof
of possession, and approached to exorcise the demon; but Sister Claire
resisted, and pretending to spit in the face of the exorcist, put out
her tongue at him, making indecent gestures, using a word in harmony
with her actions. This word being in the vernacular was understood by
everyone and required no interpretation.

The exorcist then conjured her to give the name of the demon who was in
her, and she replied--

"Grandier."

But Barre by repeating his question gave her to understand that she had
made a mistake, whereupon she corrected herself and said--

"Elimi."

Nothing in the world could induce her to reveal the number of evil
spirits by whom Elimi was accompanied, so that Barre, seeing that it was
useless to press her on this point, passed on to the next question.

"Quo pacto ingressus est daemon" (By what pact did the demon get in?).

"Duplex" (Double), returned Sister Claire.

This horror of the ablative, when the ablative was absolutely necessary,
aroused once more the hilarity of the audience, and proved that Sister
Claire's devil was just as poor a Latin scholar as the superior's, and
Barre, fearing some new linguistic eccentricity on the part of the evil
spirit, adjourned the meeting to another day.

The paucity of learning shown in the answers of the nuns being
sufficient to convince any fairminded person that the whole affair was a
ridiculous comedy, the bailiff felt encouraged to persevere until he
had unravelled the whole plot. Consequently, at three o'clock in the
afternoon, he returned to the convent, accompanied by his clerk, by
several magistrates, and by a considerable number of the best known
people of Loudun, and asked to see the superior. Being admitted, he
announced to Barre that he had come to insist on the superior being
separated from Sister Claire, so that each could be exorcised apart.
Barre dared not refuse before such a great number of witnesses,
therefore the superior was isolated and the exorcisms begun all over
again. Instantly the