Barbier, one of the chief instigators of the plot, had known Antonia when she was in M. de Challe's service. On his return from a conference held at Thonon, he cast his eyes upon her to carry out the guilty designs formed by him and his accomplices. At Geneva, as in England, it was a woman whom the misguided priests selected to strike the blow which they hoped would destroy the Reformation. Neither of those wretched women was deprived of all moral sentiment; but the heated imaginations of the maid of Kent and of Antonia, and their unhealthy sensibility, made them embrace enthusiastically the schemes of wicked and crafty men. Barbier accosted the woman Vax, spoke to her of the preachers, and of the ills which threatened Holy Church; and when he thought he had sufficiently prepared the ground, he represented to her the great service she would do to religion, if she freed Geneva from the heretics. 'If any suspicions should be aroused,' he added, 'you will only have to remove to Canon Gruet's, secretary to Monseigneur of Maurienne.' Antonia hesitated. Some monks of the abbey of Ambournay, in Bresse, whom she had known, and who were then at Geneva, got round her, and endeavored to persuade her that such an action would merit the glory of heaven. She appeared sensible to their persuasions, and yet the deed was repugnant to her. To decide her, Barbier took her to D'Orsière, a canon held in great esteem. 'Act, act boldly,' said the canon; 'you need not be anxious.' The unhappy woman yielded.[496] The next step was to prepare the means: by representing her as a poor woman who fled to Geneva for the Gospel, they contrived to get her admitted into Claude Bernard's house, where Farel, Viret, and Froment lodged. Bernard's heart was touched, and he engaged Antonia to wait upon his three guests, who took their meals apart. She knew so well how to play her part, that she was in fact regarded as one of the more fervent seekers of the Gospel. To procure poison was not difficult: she had lived for some time with Michael Vallot, the apothecary, and continued to go there. One day she paid him a visit, and, at a propitious moment, caught up some poison in a box and ran away.