e, but they restored him to
consciousness by dashing cold water in his face, whereupon he moaned,
turning to M. de Laubardemont--

"In pity, sir, put me to death at once! I am only a man, and I cannot
answer for myself that if you continue to torture me so I shall not give
way to despair."

"Then sign this, and the torture shall cease," answered the commissioner
royal, offering him a paper.

"My father," said Urbain, turning towards the Franciscan, "can you assure
me on your conscience that it is permissible for a man, in order to
escape suffering, to confess a crime he has never committed?"

"No," replied the monk; "for if he die with a lie on his lips he dies in
mortal sin."

"Go on, then," said Grandier; "for having suffered so much in my body, I
desire to save my soul."

As Pere Lactance drove in the sixth wedge Grandier fainted anew.

When he had been revived, Laubardemont called upon him to confess that a
certain Elisabeth Blanchard had been his mistress, as well as the girl
for whom he had written the treatise against celibacy; but Grandier
replied that not only had no improper relations ever existed between
them, but that the day he had been confronted with her at his trial was
the first time he had ever seen her.

At the seventh wedge Grandier's legs burst open, and the blood spurted
into Pere Lactance's face; but he wiped it away with the sleeve of his
gown.

"O Lord my God, have mercy on me! I die!" cried Grandier, and fainted
for the fourth time. Pere Lactance seized the opportunity to take a
short rest, and sat down.

When Grandier had once more come to himself, he began slowly to utter a
prayer, so beautiful and so moving that the provost's lieutenant wrote it
down; but de Laubardemont noticing this, forbade him ever to show it to
anyone.

At the eighth wedge the bones gave way, and the marrow oozed out of the
wounds, and it became useless to drive in any more wedges, the legs being
now as flat as the boards that compressed them, and moreover Pere
Lactance was quite worn out.

Grandier was unbound and laid upon the flagged floor, and while his eyes
shone with fever and agony he prayed again a second prayer--a veritable
martyr's prayer, overflowing with faith and enthusiasm; but as he ended
his strength failed, and he again became unconscious. The provost's
lieutenant forced a little wine between his lips, which brought him to;
then he made an act of contrition, renounced Satan and all his