Directly she was alone she tried to choke back the poison, by forcing a lock of her hair down her throat; then, clad only in her nightdress, she clambered to the window and let herself drop to the ground, lying nearly eight yards below. That the exits and doors were all watched she had little enough doubt; but by the aid of a servant, who let her out by a stable door, she gained the fields. The two men caught sight of her, and pursuing her to a farmhouse where she had sought refuge, they represented her as a mad-woman, and the chevalier hunted her from room to room of the house, till he trapped her in a remote chamber, where he stabbed her with his sword, dealing two thrusts in the breast, and five in the back, as she turned in the last endeavour to escape. Part of the sword-blade had remained in her shoulder, so violent was the blow. The piercing cries of the unhappy lady now brought a crowd of the people of the neighbourhood round the place; and among them the abbé, who had remained without to prevent any effort on her part to escape. Anxious to see whether she was dead, he presented his pistol at her, but it missed fire. This drew upon him the attention of the crowd, and they rushed to capture him; but with a desperate struggle he got away. The marquise lived for nineteen days after this fearful scene; but all hope of life was gone. The corroding poison had done its fell work. Her husband was with her in her last moments, and she strove in her dying agonies to clear him of complicity in the foul murder; but the evidence against him was too strong, and the Parliament of Toulouse condemned him to confiscation of his property, degradation from his rank of nobility, and perpetual banishment. The chevalier escaped to Malta, where he soon after died, fighting against the Turks. The abbé fled to Holland, and assuming another name, his identity was lost. It is said that this horrible crime was but the prologue to many subsequent iniquitous adventures in which he was the prime mover. The sentence of being broken on the wheel which was passed on these two criminals, and was too good for them, they thus contrived to evade. Their execrable record lives among the long list of Causes Celébres of the time.[5] CHAPTER XVI A _Lettre de Cachet_—Mazarin’s dying Counsel—Madame Scarron continues to Receive—Fouquet’s intentions and what came of them—The Squirrel and the Snake—The Man in the Iron Mask—An Incommoding Admirer—“Calice cher, ou le parfum n’est plus”—The Roses’ Sepulchre.