Ironically, Louis had been introduced to Mlle de Fontanges by Athénaïs herself. She was growing concerned about the attention the king was paying to another lady, the widow Scarron, who had been appointed as governess to her children by Louis. While Mlle de Fontanges was beautiful, Athénaïs knew that this was not enough to hold Louis’s interest for long, and she did not see the much younger lady as a threat.58 Louis, however, was enchanted. By March it was believed that he would make a conquest of Mlle de Fontanges, if he had not done so already; for, as Bussy-Rabutin put it, “kings who desire do not sigh for long.”59
For a while, Athénaïs was unaware of just how far Louis would take his latest fancy. He used her preoccupation with gambling to slip away to the Palais-Royal for secret trysts with his new mistress. In time, however, Athénaïs realized her error, and Louis and she had a blazing quarrel. He was tired of her temper, her jealousy, and her excessive gaming, which he found distasteful at a time when his people were overburdened with taxation. It was believed that Louis used the approaching Eastertide, always a time when his conscience was pricked, as a pretext to send Athénaïs away from court.60
Mademoiselle, however, noted that Louis had looked “extremely afflicted” by Athénaïs’s departure, suggesting he had sent her away against his inclination. As it was, he declined to take the sacraments that Easter; instead he shut himself away and saw few people. When he later went to the queen’s apartments, “he had his eyes red, as though he had been weeping,” while Athénaïs’s retreat provoked much opinion at court.61 Mademoiselle saw her as she was visiting her children in Paris, and she asked her if she intended to return to Versailles, but Athénaïs only laughed. As it was, Athénaïs, who had left for Paris on March 15, returned after a few days, only to leave again. This pattern of behavior continued for several weeks until Louis hit upon the perfect solution.
The usual golden handshake for a discarded mistress was to make her a duchess, allowing her to live comfortably on the revenues of her new estates. In Athénaïs’s case, Louis could not elevate her without also making her husband a duke. He decided instead to grant her a favor she had long coveted but which he had always denied her. He appointed her superintendent of the queen’s household. This post came with a good stipend and granted Athénaïs the rank of honorary duchess with the right to sit on a tabouret in the queen’s presence.62 The present incumbent, Mme de Soissons, who had held the post since 1660, was pensioned off with a payment of 200 thousand écus.63 Athénaïs’s faith deepened; she became increasingly involved in charitable works, and there is no reason to believe that her devotion was anything but sincere.64
Bussy-Rabutin notes that Athénaïs spoke often with a priest, Père César, and it was even rumored that she might return to her husband, an eventuality that Père de La Chaise was working to bring about. She visited her children often, but whenever Louis saw her, it was always in the presence of Philippe.65
In the summer of 1679, it was believed that Mlle de Fontanges was pregnant with Louis’s child, although this proved not to be the case.66 Still, Louis remained passionately in love with her; he was enchanted by her little quirks and faux pas. Out hunting one day, she swept into a low-hanging branch, which pulled off her hat and sent her hair tumbling about her shoulders. She nonchalantly swept it up into a knot on the top of her head and tied it with a ribbon. Louis loved the new “style,” and of course the ladies of the court began to wear their hair à la Fontanges.67 On another occasion, she entered a ballroom and, looking neither left nor right, made straight for Louis without even noticing the queen, an incident that gave the king much amusement.68
While the new affair invoked the fury of Athénaïs, few people knew much about it, for Louis took pleasure in the mystery.69 “Never have the king’s amours been conducted more secretly than those of mademoiselle de Fontanges,” wrote Bussy-Rabutin.70 Try as they might, courtiers were not even certain where the new mistress was lodged; in fact, as Primi Visconti had discerned, a suite of rooms had been especially prepared for her above the king’s rooms at Saint-Germain.71
When Louis went to mass on New Year’s Day 1680, Mlle de Fontanges also attended, displaying her status as maîtresse déclarée by wearing a dress that was made of the same material as Louis’s coat, trimmed with a blue ribbon to match his sash.72 However, she was absent from the next court event, the wedding of Mlle de Blois, Louis’s daughter by Louise de La Vallière. It later emerged that she had been pregnant but had miscarried. A few weeks later, however, she had recovered sufficiently to accompany Louis and the whole court as they went to meet the new dauphine. Mlle de Fontanges travelled like a duchess in a beautiful new carriage drawn by eight horses: two more than Athénaïs ever had.73
When the end came, it came swiftly. At Easter, significantly, Louis made Mlle de Fontanges a duchess with a pension of 80 thousand livres before sending her away to the Abbey de Maubuisson, which Louis had presented to her sister. Although Athénaïs was angry that her rival had been elevated to a position she could never enjoy, others correctly saw the move as an indication that Louis was tiring of his latest mistress. She really had nothing to keep the king’s interest alive, no conversation, no wit; she had only her stunning good looks, but even they had begun to fade following her miscarriage, from which she never fully recovered. Mme de Sévigné noted how she remained at Maubuisson, weak with fever and suffering a considerable loss of blood, she had even begun to swell: “her beautiful face is a little bloated.”74 She was, as Mme de Sévigné put it, “wounded in the service” of the king.75 As Louis sent the prior Trimont de Cabrières76 to treat Mlle de Fontanges, Athénaïs’s fall from grace was almost complete: “The king does not look at her,” announced Bussy-Rabutin, “and you may believe that the courtiers follow this example.”77
Behind the scenes, however, Louis was under pressure to repudiate Mlle de Fontages. The pope had ordered his confessor, Père de La Chaise, to resign if she was to return to court.78 Louis ignored the threat, and an apparently cured Mlle de Fontanges returned to court a few weeks later. Louis rushed to be with her, and their relationship resumed as before. Unfortunately, her condition deteriorated once more, and by the beginning of July, Louis’s passion had cooled to the point of indifference. Within two weeks, she was back with her sister, who had transferred to Chelles. She continued to travel in the style her rank afforded her, and she had everything she could want except her health and the king’s love.
It was now, just after Easter, when Louis paid court to a new and mysterious lady, Olympe de Piennes de Brouilly. A rich heiress, she was only nineteen or twenty years old, and very beautiful. When she danced at a recent carnival ballet, she captured the hearts of all the courtiers, including the aged duc de la Ferté, who even abandoned gluttony and drinking for her; but the duke was married, and Olympe could take her pick when it came to lovers.
One day, Mlle de Piennes came to Saint-Cloud with her two younger sisters and her aunt. They had come on the pretext of visiting Françoise, Mme Scarron, but the true purpose of their visit was a secret tryst between Olympe and the king, who had arrived on the pretext of visiting his brother. Françoise, who was fond of the young lady, had prepared a sumptuous meal for her guests. As they sat down to eat, Louis suddenly appeared, looking stern and pretending to wonder what they were doing there, while the court played along with the game. Louis then threw off his frown and took Mlle de Piennes to a window, where he could speak privately with her. That spring and early summer, the two enjoyed a brief affair, with one of Louis’s servants driving to Paris each morning to bring her to Versailles and returning her to her home each evening.79
At the beginning of September, Mlle de Fontanges expressed fears that she had been poisoned. Although she returned to court, she kept to her room, rarely visited by the king, and there she remained until the following March. With her health steadily worsening, she withdrew to the convent of Port Royal. Louis would inquire after her progress three times a week, but by now it was obvious to all that
she had not much longer to live. Louis granted her an honor unique among his mistresses: he visited her as she lay on her deathbed. Looking into the once beautiful face of this woman, who was still only twenty years old, the tears coursed down his face. She died shortly after he left, and Louis paid for annual services in her memory.80
That Mlle de Fontanges believed herself to have been the victim of poison was disturbing, and people spoke about it in whispered tones throughout the court. Louis tried to prevent a postmortem, but Mlle de Fontanges’s family insisted that an examination be held. As it turned out, the doctors who carried out the postmortem found that she had died of natural causes; accounts vary, but some disease of the lungs was indicated, possibly tuberculosis or cancer, and her condition was worsened by her constant loss of blood following her miscarriage.81 Louis, however, was right to be wary. Mademoiselle de Fontanges had died at the height of the Affaire des Poisons, which had haunted Paris for some years.82
NINETEEN
The Affair of the Poisons
It all started in 1666, when Antoine Dreux d’Aubray, civil lieutenant of the city of Paris, died. He was followed to his grave four years later by his sons, Antoine and François, who died within three months of each other. They had been the victims of Dreux d’Aubray’s daughter, Marie-Madeleine de Gobelin, marquise de Brinvilliers,1 who managed to evade justice for several years before being arrested, tried, and hanged in 1676. Then there was the agonizing death, in the summer of 1670, of Henriette, duchesse d’Orléans, who believed to the end that she had been poisoned.2 However, it was upon the arrest of Catherine Montvoisin, known as la Voisin, that the Affaire des Poisons can truly be said to have begun.
La Voisin was a diviner who specialized in palmistry, astrology, and physiognomy; she also sold perfumes and cures for various minor ailments, no doubt made from the many plants she collected. She also carried out abortions. Primi Visconti, himself a celebrated diviner,3 said that la Voisin was visited by most of the ladies of Paris.4 Some consulted her to see what the future held for them, others to acquire potions to clear a complexion or to obtain powders to make a man fall in love with them. La Voisin also helped ladies who fell pregnant with an unwanted baby, or who wished to rid themselves of an undesired husband.
La Voisin became wealthy on the proceeds of her craft and lived a comfortable life, but her husband was a drunken brute who routinely abused her. She spoke often of her desire to get rid of him, and while her friends advised her simply to murder him, she knew that option would not be so easy. The main obstacle to this course of action was her husband’s friendship with the public executioner. He had promised Montvoisin that if he were to die unexpectedly, he would order a postmortem.5
Apparently a devout Christian, la Voisin believed her powers had come from God, and she rejoiced that the souls of the fetuses she had aborted were saved by baptism. When two of her former associates were arrested and interrogated by Gabriel-Nicolas de La Reynie, chief of the Paris police, they gave him enough information to allow him to draw up a list of some four hundred names, among them that of la Voisin. She was arrested on March 12, 1679, as she left mass, and she joined the growing number of diviners and witches to be imprisoned at the château de Vincennes, on the eastern outskirts of Paris.
Louis appointed a special commission to try those arrested in the poisons affair. He did this for several good reasons, one of which was to relieve the regular courts, which were already pressed by other cases. Louis expected, or feared, that certain unsavory details would emerge during the trials, and it was easier to contain them if the investigations were confined to a special commission. Similarly, there was the fear that persons from the highest stratum of society might be implicated in the affair, and Louis wished their involvement to be kept secret.6 Lastly, a specially appointed commission would be less vulnerable to pressure from interested parties, and so would better be able to maintain its objectivity.7 It would sit in the Paris Arsenal, from which it took its name—the Chambre de l’Arsenal—although it soon came to be known as the Chambre Ardente, or ‘Burning Chamber,’ for it sat in a chamber hung with black cloth and lit with torches. The usual sentence for poisonings and witchcraft was death by burning.
The Chambre Ardente would be presided over by La Reynie,8 who, with Colbert,9 countersigned the establishing letters patent on April 7, 1679. Three days later, its first sessions were held. Over the next two years, the Chambre would interrogate 442 people, of whom 367 would go on to be arrested. Of these arrests, 218 would be sustained. Thirty-six prisoners would be condemned to death, and some would be tortured10 prior to execution; two prisoners would die of natural causes while in prison; five would be condemned to the galleys; twenty-three would be exiled. Lastly, at least one prisoner would commit suicide, or attempt to, while in prison. Many of the guilty, however, had powerful accomplices in high places, and their cases would never come to trial.11
On more than one occasion, Louis felt the need to interfere in the process. He warned the comtesse de Soissons, her friend, the marquise d’Alluye, and several other high-ranking courtiers that their names had been mentioned by prisoners at Vincennes. This gave them time to leave Paris, and some went abroad until the panic died down, while others went into hiding in obscure parts of France. Then several prisoners named someone very close to the king indeed—Athénaïs de Montespan.
Athénaïs was mentioned in connection with an old case, which involved la Voisin and two of her accomplices, a sorcerer known as Lesage, the ‘Wise One,’ and François Mariette, a young priest of the Church of Saint-Séverin who was also a sorcerer. They testified that from the year 1667, Athénaïs was in the hands of la Voisin, whom she had consulted for help to make Louis fall in love with her.12 Shortly after this, following a disagreement over money, Lesage and Mariette parted from la Voisin, and Athénaïs turned to them instead. Under interrogation, they alleged that Athénaïs had taken part in a ritual during which Mariette, wearing his stole and using holy water, had read the gospel of the Kings while Lesage burned incense. Athénaïs recited a spell written for her by the two men. According to Lesage, Athénaïs also wanted to bring about the death of Louise de La Vallière, but Mariette refuted this, saying she merely wanted Louise to be sent away from court.
On another occasion, a special mass was performed for Athénaïs. She brought two pigeons’ hearts to a chapel at Saint-Séverin, and the two hearts were passed beneath the chalice during the ritual. Lesage asserted that a consecrated wafer was also used in the rite, but this was again denied by Mariette.
Following this mass, another two or three were enacted in the same chapel. One of these was said by Lesage to have included a spell that used the bones of a dead man, the purpose of which was to cause the death of Louise de La Vallière. Mariette denied this once again, insisting that Athénaïs’s purpose had been to secure Louise’s dismissal from court.
When they were arrested in 1668, Mariette was sentenced to banishment for nine years, while Lesage was sent to the galleys. His sentence was commuted in 1674, which, coincidentally or otherwise, was the same year that Louise left court for good. Athénaïs’s involvement had been overlooked at the time, only to be reopened during the poisons affair.
Lesage and Mariette were not the only ones to claim to have assisted Athénaïs. A sorcerer named Françoise Filastre asked Bellier, a diviner, to carry something to a lady of the court. Bellier refused, believing that she would be hanged if caught. Her fears suggest that this was to have been a love potion to be given to Louis, or possibly poison to be administered to Mlle de Fontanges.13 La Filastre denied these allegations, insisting she had only wanted to know Athénaïs so she could use their acquaintance to earn 10 thousand écus. However, a Norman peasant, Philippe Galet, confessed to having supplied la Filastre with love potions, made with bread and cantharides, which were handed to Mme de Montespan.14 This, Galet recalled, took place in 1675, which coincided rather neatly with the time Louis became ill with an attack of the vapors and headaches. The v
apors was a relatively new condition, which became very fashionable at court once Louis was diagnosed with it. It produced some alarming symptoms, including depression, an increase in the watery humors, fever, inflamed eyes and face, a bitter taste in the mouth, and weakness in the legs.15
Much of this information had come from the testimony of Marie Marguerite Montvoisin, the daughter of la Voisin, who had been arrested on January 20, 1680. Suicidally depressed and very afraid, she had said little until after the execution of her mother on February 22, either in an attempt to protect her mother, or out of fear of what she thought her mother might do to her if she said anything about her activities. Louis, who was spending the summer inspecting the fortifications on his newly established borders, was kept informed of all the proceedings of the Chambre Ardente, and on August 2, 1680, he wrote to La Reynie:
Having seen the declaration made on the 12th of last month by Marguerite Monvoisin, prisoner at my castle of Vincennes, I write you this letter to inform you of my intention that you should devote all possible care to elucidate the facts contained in the said declaration—that you should take care to have written down in separate reports the examinations, confrontations, and everything concerning the inquiry that may be made of the said declaration, and that meanwhile you defer reporting to my royal Chamber sitting at the Arsenal the depositions of Romani and Bertrand.16
Louis was right to be concerned, for a sinister pattern was forming. Marguerite Montvoisin’s evidence suggested that whenever Athénaïs feared she was losing Louis’s love, she would turn to la Voisin and others for help. She would obtain love powders, which she would then give to Louis, slipping them into his food or drink without his knowledge,17 but an even more shocking revelation was to come.
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