Urbain Grandier | Page 6

was absorbed in the attempt to make himself so agreeable that
his name would appear in Barot's will. This being so, the mocking
words which were rained down on Barot spattered not only himself but
also all those who had sided with him in the quarrel, and thus added
considerably to the tale of Urbain's enemies.
About this epoch a still graver event took place. Amongst the most
assiduous frequenters of the confessional in his church was a young and
pretty girl, Julie by name, the daughter of the king's attorney,
Trinquant--Trinquant being, as well as Barot, an uncle of Mignon. Now
it happened that this young girl fell into such a state of debility that she
was obliged to keep her room. One of her friends, named Marthe
Pelletier, giving up society, of which she was very fond, undertook to
nurse the patient, and carried her devotion so far as to shut herself up in
the same room with her. When Julie Trinquant had recovered and was
able again to take her place in the world, it came out that Marthe
Pelletier, during her weeks of retirement, had given birth to a child,
which had been baptized and then put out to nurse. Now, by one of
those odd whims which so often take possession of the public mind,
everyone in Loudun persisted in asserting that the real mother of the
infant was not she who had acknowledged herself as such--that, in short,
Marthe Pelletier had sold her good name to her friend Julie for a sum of
money; and of course it followed as a matter about which there could
be no possible doubt, that Urbain was the father.
Trinquant hearing of the reports about his daughter, took upon himself
as king's attorney to have Marthe Pelletier arrested and imprisoned.
Being questioned about the child, she insisted that she was its mother,
and would take its maintenance upon herself. To have brought a child
into the world under such circumstances was a sin, but not a crime;
Trinquant was therefore obliged to set Marthe at liberty, and the abuse
of justice of which he was guilty served only to spread the scandal
farther and to strengthen the public in the belief it had taken up.

Hitherto, whether through the intervention of the heavenly powers, or
by means of his own cleverness, Urbain Grandier had come out victor
in every struggle in which he had engaged, but each victor had added to
the number of his enemies, and these were now so numerous that any
other than he would have been alarmed, and have tried either to
conciliate them or to take precautions against their malice; but Urbain,
wrapped in his pride, and perhaps conscious of his innocence, paid no
attention to the counsels of his most faithful followers, but went on his
way unheeding.
All the opponents whom till now Urbain had encountered had been
entirely unconnected with each other, and had each struggled for his
own individual ends. Urbain's enemies, believing that the cause of his
success was to be found in the want of cooperation among themselves,
now determined to unite in order to crush him. In consequence, a
conference was held at Barot's, at which, besides Barot himself,
Meunier, Trinquant, and Mignon took part, and the latter had also
brought with him one Menuau, a king's counsel and his own most
intimate friend, who was, however, influenced by other motives than
friendship in joining the conspiracy. The fact was, that Menuau was in
love with a woman who had steadfastly refused to show him any favour,
and he had got firmly fixed in his head that the reason for her else
inexplicable indifference and disdain was that Urbain had been
beforehand with him in finding an entrance to her heart. The object of
the meeting was to agree as to the best means of driving the common
enemy out of Loudon and its neighbourhood.
Urbain's life was so well ordered that it presented little which his
enemies could use as a handle for their purpose. His only foible seemed
to be a predilection for female society; while in return all the wives and
daughters of the place, with the unerring instinct of their sex, seeing,
that the new priest was young, handsome, and eloquent, chose him,
whenever it was possible, as their spiritual director. As this preference
had already offended many husbands and fathers, the decision the
conspirators arrived at was that on this side alone was Grandier
vulnerable, and that their only chance of success was to attack him
where he was weakest. Almost at once, therefore, the vague reports

which had been floating about began to attain a certain definiteness:
there were allusions made, though no name was mentioned, to a young
girl in Loudun;