She Stands Accused

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After reminding her that Rose Tessier's sickness had increased
after taking a tisane that Helene had prepared the President
asked if it was not the fact that she alone had looked after
Rose.

``No,'' Helen replied. ``Everybody was meddling. All I did was
put the tisane on to boil. I have suffered a great deal,'' she
added gratuitously. ``The good God will give me grace to bear up
to the end. If I have not died of my sufferings in prison it is
because God's hand has guided and sustained me.''

With that in parenthesis, let us return to the evidence of the
witnesses on the second day of the trial. A great deal of it had
to do with deaths on which, under the prescription, no charge
could be made against Helene, and with thefts that equally could
not be the subject of accusation.

Dr Galzain, of Ponivy, who, eighteen years before, had performed
the autopsy on Le Drogo, cure of Guern, testified that though he
had then been puzzled by the pathological conditions, he was now
prepared to say they were consistent with arsenical poisoning.

Martel, a pharmacist, brother of the doctor who had attended Le
Drogo, spoke of his brother's suspicions, suspicions which had
recurred on meeting with the cases at Bubry. They had been
diverted by the lavishly affectionate attendance Helene had given
to the sufferers.

Relatives of the victims of Locmine told of Helene's predictions
of death, and of her plaints that death followed her everywhere.
They also remarked on the very kind ministrations of Helene.

Dr Toussaint, doctor at Locmine, and son to the house in which
Helene had for a time been servant, told of his perplexity over
the symptoms in the cases of the Widow Lorey and the youth
Leboucher. In 1835 he had been called in to see Helene herself,
who was suffering from an intermittent fever. Next day the fever
had disappeared. He was told that she had been dosing herself,
and he was shown a packet which had been in her possession. It
contained substances that looked like kermes-mineral,[30] some
saffron, and a white powder that amounted to perhaps ten grammes.
He had disliked Helene at first sight. She had not been long in
his mother's service when his mother's maid-companion (Anne
Eveno), who also had no liking for Helene, fell ill and died.
His father fell violently ill in turn, seemed to get better, and
looked like recovering. But inexplicable complications
supervened, and his father died suddenly of a haemorrhage of the
intestinal canal. His sister Julie, who had been the first to
fall sick, also seemed to recover, but after the death of the
father had a relapse. In his idea Helene, having cured herself,
was able to drug the invalids in her care. The witness ordered
her to be kept completely away from the sufferers, but one night
she contrived to get the nurses out of the way. A confrere he
called in ordered bouillon to be given. Helene had charge of the
kitchen, and it was she who prepared the bouillon. It was she
who administered it. Three hours later his sister died in agony.

[30] Or, simply, kermes--a pharmaceutical composition, containing
antimony and sodium sulphates and oxide of antimony--formerly
used as an expectorant.

The witness suggested an autopsy. His family would not agree.
The pious behaviour of Helene put her beyond suspicion, but he
took it on himself to dismiss her. During the illness of his
father, when Helene herself was ill, he went reluctantly to see
her, being told that she was dying. Instead of finding her in
bed he came upon her making some sort of white sauce. As soon as
he appeared she threw herself into bed and pretended to be
suffering intense pain. A little later he asked to see the
sauce. It had disappeared.

He had advised his niece to reserve his sister's evacuations.
His niece replied that Helene was so scrupulously tidy that such
vessels were never left about, but were taken away at once to be
emptied and cleaned. ``I revised my opinion of the woman after
she had gone,'' added the witness. ``I thought her very well
behaved.''

HELENE. I never had any drugs in my possession--never. When I
had fever I took the powders given me by the doctor, but I did
not know what they were!

THE PRESIDENT. Why did you say yesterday that nothing was ever
found in your luggage?

HELENE. I didn't remember.

THE PRESIDENT. What were you doing with the saffron? Wasn't it
in your possession during the time you were in Seglien?

HELENE. I was taking it for my blood.

THE PRESIDENT. And the white powder--did it also come from
Seglien?

HELENE [energetically]. Never have I had white powder in my
luggage! Never have I seen arsenic! Never has anyone spoken to
me of arsenic!

Upon this the President rightly reminded her that she had said
only that morning that her aunt had talked to her of arsenic at
Seglien, and had warned her of its lethal qualities. ``You deny
the existence of that white powder,'' said the President,
``because you know it was poison. You put it away from you with
horror!''

The accused several times tried to answer this charge, but
failed. Her face was beaded with moisture.

THE PRESIDENT. Had you or had you not any white powder at
Losmine?

HELENE. I can't say if I still had fever there.

THE PRESIDENT. What was that powder? When did you first have
it?

HELENE. I had taken it at Locmine. Somebody gave it to me for
two sous.

THE PRESIDENT. Why didn t you say so at the beginning, instead
of waiting until you are confounded by the witness? [To Dr
Toussaint] What would the powder be, monsieur? What powder
would one prescribe for fever?

DR TOUSSAINT. Sulphate of quinine; but that's not what it was.

Questioned by the advocate for the defence, the witness said he
would not affirm that the powder he saw was arsenic. His present
opinion, however, was that his father and sister had died from
injections of arsenic in small doses.

A witness from Locmine spoke of her sister's two children
becoming ill after taking chocolate prepared by the accused. The
latter told her that a mob had followed her in the street,
accusing her of the deaths of those she had been servant to.

Then came one of those curious samples of `what the soldier said'
that are so often admitted in French criminal trials as evidence.
Louise Clocher said she had seen Helene on the road between Auray
and Lorient in the company of a soldier. When she told some one
of it people said, ``That wasn't a soldier! It was the devil you
saw following her!''

One rather sympathizes with Helene in her protest against this
testimony.

From Ploermel, Auray, Lorient, and other places doctors and
relatives of the dead came to bear witness to Helene's cooking
and nursing activities, and to speak of the thefts she had been
found committing. Where any suspicion had touched Helene her
piety and her tender care of the sufferers had disarmed it. The
astonishing thing is that, with all those rumours of `white
livers' and so on, the woman could proceed from place to place
within a few miles of each other, and even from house to house in
the same towns, leaving death in her tracks, without once being
brought to bay. Take the evidence of M. Le Dore, son-in-law of
that Mme Hetel who died in Auray, His mother-in-law became ill
just after Helene's reputation was brought to his notice. The
old lady died next day.

``The day following the revelation,'' said M. Le Dore, ``I put
Helene out. She threw herself on the ground uttering fearsome
yells. The day's meal had been prepared. I had it thrown out,
and put Helene herself to the door with her luggage, INTO WHICH
SHE HASTILY STOWED A PACKET. Mme Hetel died next day in fearful
agony.''

I am responsible for the italicizing. It is hard to understand
why M. Le Dore did no more than put Helene to the door. He was
suspicious enough to throw out the meal prepared by Helene, and
he saw her hastily stow a packet in her luggage. But, though he
was Mayor of Auray, he did nothing more about his mother-in-law's
death. It is to be remarked, however, that the Hetels themselves
were against the brusque dismissal of Helene. She had
``smothered the mother with care and attentions.''

But one gets perhaps the real clue to Helene's long immunity from
the remark made in court by M. Breger, son-in-law of that Lorient
couple, M. and Mme Dupuyde-Lome. He had thought for a moment of
suspecting Helene of causing the child's death and the illness of
the rest of the family, but ``there seemed small grounds. What
interest had the girl in cutting off their lives?''

It is a commonplace that murder without motive is the hardest to
detect. The deaths that Helene Jegado contrived between 1833 and
1841, twenty-three in number, and the six attempts at murder
which she made in that length of time, are, without exception,
crimes quite lacking in discoverable motive. It is not at all on
record that she had reason for wishing to eliminate any one of
those twenty-three persons. She seems to have poisoned for the
mere sake of poisoning. Save to the ignorant and superstitious,
such as followed her in the streets to accuse her of having a
``white liver'' and a breath that meant death, she was an
unfortunate creature with an odd knack of finding herself in
houses where `accidents' happened. Time and again you find her
being taken in by kindly people after such `accidents,' and made
an object of sympathy for the dreadful coincidences that were
making her so unhappy. It was out of sympathy that the Widow
Lorey, of Locmine, took Helene into her house. On the widow's
death the niece arrived. In court the niece described the scene
on her arrival. ``Helene embraced me,'' she said. ``'Unhappy
me!' she wept. `Wherever I go everybody dies!' I pitied and
consoled her.'' She pitied and consoled Helene, though they were
saying in the town that the girl had a white liver and that her
breath brought death!

Where Helene had neglected to combine her poisoning with detected
pilfering the people about her victims could see nothing wrong in
her conduct. Witness after witness --father, sister, husband,
niece, son-in-law, or relation in some sort to this or that
victim of Helene's--repeated in court, ``The girl went away with
nothing against her.'' And even those who afterwards found
articles missing from their household goods: ``At the same time
I did not suspect her probity. She went to Mass every morning
and to the evening services. I was very surprised to find some
of my napkins among the stuff Helene was accused of stealing.''
``I did not know of Helene's thefts until I was shown the objects
stolen,'' said a lady of Vannes. ``Without that proof I would
never have suspected the girl. Helene claimed affiliation with a
religious sisterhood, served very well, and was a worker.''

It is perhaps of interest to note how Helene answered the
testimony regarding her thieving proclivities. Mme Lejoubioux,
of Vannes, said her furnishing bills went up considerably during
the time Helene was in her service. Helene had purloined two
cloths.

Helene: ``That was for vengeance. I was furious at being sent
away.

Sieur Cesar le Clerc and Mme Gauthier swore to thefts from them
by Helene.

Helene: ``I stole nothing from Mme Gauthier except one bottle of
wine. If I commit a larceny it is from choler. WHEN I'M FURIOUS
I STEAL!''

It was when Helene began to poison for vengeance that retribution
fell upon her. Her fondness for the bottle started to get her
into trouble. It made her touchy. Up to 1841 she had poisoned
for the pleasure of it, masking her secret turpitude with an
outward show of piety, of being helpful in time of trouble. By
the time she arrived in Rennes, in 1848, after seven years during
which her murderous proclivities seem to have slept, her
character as a worker, if not as a Christian, had deteriorated.
Her piety, in the face of her fondness for alcohol and her
slovenly habits, and against her now frequently exhibited bursts
of temper and ill-will, appeared the hypocrisy it actually was.
Her essays in poisoning now had purpose and motive behind them.
Nemesis, so long at her heels, overtook her.

% III

It is not clear in the accounts available to me just what
particular murders by poison, what attempts at poisoning, and
what thefts Helene was charged with in the indictment at Rennes.
Twenty-three poisonings, six attempts, and a number of thefts had
been washed out, it may be as well to repeat, by the prescription
legale. But from her arrival in Rennes, leaving the thefts out
of account, her activities had accounted for the following: In
the Rabot household one death (Albert, the son) and three
illnesses (Rabot, Mme Rabot, the mother-in-law); in the Ozanne
establishment one death (that of the little son), in the hotel of
the Roussells one death (that of Perrotte Mace) and one illness
(that of the Veuve Roussell); at the Bidards two deaths (Rose
Tessier and Rosalie Sarrazin). In this last establishment there
was also one attempt at poisoning which I have not yet mentioned,
that of a young servant, named Francoise Huriaux, who for a short
time had taken the place of Rose Tessier. We thus have five
deaths and five attempts in Rennes, all of which could be
indictable. But, as already stated, the indictment covered three
deaths and three attempts.

It is hard to say, from verbatim reports of the trial, where the
matter of the indictment begins to be handled. It would seem
from the evidence produced that proof was sought of all five
deaths and all five attempts that Helene was supposed to be
guilty of in Rennes. The father of the boy Ozanne was called
before the Rabot witnesses, though the Rabot death and illnesses
occurred before the death of the Ozanne child. We may, however,
take the order of affairs as dealt with in the court. We may see
something of motive on Helene's part suggested in M. Ozanne's
evidence, and an indication of her method of covering her crime.

M. Ozanne said that Helene, in his house, drank eau de vie in
secret, and, to conceal her thefts, filled the bottle up with
cider. He discovered the trick, and reproached Helene for it.
She denied the accusation with vigour, and angrily announced her
intention of leaving. Mme Ozanne took pity on Helene, and told
her she might remain several days longer. On the Tuesday
following the young child became ill. The illness seemed to be a
fleeting one, and the father and mother thought he had recovered.
On the Saturday, however, the boy was seized by vomiting, and the
parents wondered if they should send for the doctor. ``If the
word was mine,'' said Helene, who had the boy on her knees, ``and
the child as ill as he looks, I should not hesitate.'' The
doctor was sent for about noon on Sunday. He thought it only a
slight illness. Towards evening the child began to complain of
pain all over his body. His hands and feet were icy cold. His
body grew taut. About six o'clock the doctor came back. ``My
God!'' he exclaimed. ``It's the croup!'' He tried to apply
leeches, but the boy died within a few minutes. Helene hastened
the little body into its shroud.

Helene, said Ozanne, always talked of poison if anyone left their
food. ``Do you think I'm poisoning you?'' she would ask.

A girl named Cambrai gave evidence that Helene, coming away from
the cemetery after the burial of the child, said to her, ``I am
not so sorry about the child. Its parents have treated me
shabbily.'' The witness thought Helene too insensitive and
reproached her.

``That's a lie!'' the accused shouted. ``I loved the child!''

The doctor, M. Brute, gave evidence next. He still believed the
child had died of a croup affection, the most violent he had ever
seen. The President questioned him closely on the symptoms he
had seen in the child, but the doctor stuck to his idea. He had
seen nothing to make him suspect poisoning.

The President: ``It is strange that in all the cases we have
under review the doctors saw nothing at first that was serious.
They admit illness and prescribe mild remedies, and then,
suddenly, the patients get worse and die.''

M. Victor Rabot was called next. To begin with, he said,
Helene's services were satisfactory. He had given her notice
because he found her stealing his wine. Upon this Helene showed
the greatest discontent, and it was then that Mme Rabot fell ill.
A nurse was put in charge of her, but Helene found a way to get
rid of her. Helene had no love for his child. The child had a
horror of the servant, because she was dirty and took snuff. In
consequence Helene had a spite against the boy. Helene had never
been seen eating any of the dishes prepared for the family, and
even insisted on keeping certain of the kitchen dishes for her
own use.

At the request of his father-in-law Helene had gone to get a
bottle of violet syrup from the pharmacist. The bottle was not
capped. His father-in-law thought the syrup had gone bad,
because it was as red as mulberry syrup, and refused to give it
to his daughter (Mme Rabot). The bottle was returned to the
pharmacist, who remarked that the colour of the syrup had
changed, and that he did not recognize it as his own.

Mme Rabot having corroborated her husband's evidence, and told of
Helene's bad temper, thieving, and disorderliness, Dr Vincent
Guyot, of Rennes, was called.

Dr Guyot described the illness of the boy Albert and its result.
He then went on to describe the illness of Mme Rabot. He and his
confreres had attributed her sickness to the fact that she was
enceinte, and to the effect of her child's death upon her while
in that condition. A miscarriage of a distressing nature
confirmed the first prognosis. But later he and his confreres
saw reason to change their minds. He believed the boy had been
poisoned, though he could not be certain. The mother, he was
convinced, had been the victim of an attempt at poisoning, an
opinion which found certainty in the case of Mme Briere. If Mme
Rabot's pregnancy went some way in explaining her illness there
was nothing of this in the illness of her mother. The
explanation of everything was in repeated dosing of an arsenical
substance.

The witness had also attended Mme Roussell, of the Bout-du-Monde
hotel. It was remarkable that the violent sickness to which this
lady was subject for twenty days did not answer to treatment, but
stopped only when she gave up taking food prepared for her by
Helene Jegado.

He had also looked after Perrotte Mace. Here also he had had
doubts of the nature of the malady; at one time he had suspected
pregnancy, a suspicion for which there were good grounds. But
the symptoms that later developed were not consistent with the
first diagnosis. When Perrotte died he and M. Revault, his
confrere, thought the cause of death would be seen as poison in
an autopsy. But the post-mortem was rejected by the parents.
His feeling to-day was that Mme Roussell's paralysis was due to
arsenical dosage, and that Perrotte had died of poisoning.
Helene, speaking to him of Perrotte, had said, ``She's a chest
subject. She'll never get better!'' And she had used the same
phrase, ``never get better,'' with regard to little Rabot.

M. Morio, the pharmacist of Rennes from whom the violet syrup was
bought, said that Helene had often complained to him about Mme
Roussell. During the illness of the Rabot boy she had said that
the child was worse than anyone imagined, and that he would never
recover. In the matter of the violet syrup he agreed it had come
back to him looking red. The bottle had been put to one side,
but its contents had been thrown away, and he had therefore been
unable to experiment with it. He had found since, however, that
arsenic in powder form did not turn violet syrup red, though
possibly arsenic in solution with boiling water might produce the
effect. The change seen in the syrup brought back from M.
Rabot's was not to be accounted for by such fermentation as the
mere warmth of the hand could bring about.

Several witnesses, interrupted by denials and explanations from
the accused, testified to having heard Helene say that neither
the Rabot boy nor his mother would recover.

The evidence of M. Roussell, of the Bout-du-Monde hotel, touched
on the illnesses of his mother and Perrotte. He knew nothing of
the food prepared by Helene; nor had the idea of poison occurred
to him until her arrest. Helene's detestable character, her
quarrels with other servants, and, above all, the thefts of wine
he had found her out in were the sole causes of her dismissal.
He had noticed that Helene never ate with the other domestics.
She always found an excuse for not doing so. She said she had
stomach trouble and could not hold down her food.

The Veuve Roussell had to be helped into court by her son. She
dealt with her own illness and with the death of Perrotte. Her
illness did not come on until she had scolded Helene for her bad
ways.

Dr Revault, confrere of Guyot, regretted the failure to perform a
post-mortem on the body of Perrotte. He had said to Roussell
that if Perrotte's illness was analogous to cholera it was,
nevertheless, not that disease. He believed it was due to a
poison.

The President: ``Chemical analysis has proved the presence of
arsenic in the viscera of Perrotte. Who administered that
arsenic, the existence of which was so shrewdly foreseen by the
witness? Who gave her the arsenic? [To Helene] Do you know?
Was it not you that gave it her, Helene?''

At this Helene murmured something unintelligible, but, gathering
her voice, she protested, ``I have never had arsenic in my hands,
Monsieur le President--never!''

Something of light relief was provided by Jean Andre, the
cabinet-making ostler of Saint-Gilles, he for whose attention
Helene had been a rival with Perrotte Mace.

``The service Helene gave was excellent. So was mine. She
nursed Perrotte perfectly, but said it was in vain, because the
doctors were mishandling the disease. She told me one day that
she was tired of service, and that her one wish was to retire.''

``Did you attach a certain idea to the confidence about
retiring?''

``No!'' Andre replied energetically.

``You were in hospital. When you came back, did Helene take good
care of you?''

``She gave me bouillon every morning to build me up.''

``The bouillon she gave you did you no harm?''

``On the contrary, it did me a lot of good.''

``Wasn't the accused jealous of Perrotte--that good-looking girl
who gave you so much of her favour?''

``In her life Perrotte was a good girl. She never was out of
sorts for a moment--never rubbed one the wrong way.''

``Didn't Helene say to you that Perrotte would never recover?''

``Yes, she said that. `She's a lost woman,' she said; `the
doctors are going the wrong way with the disease.'

``All the same,'' Andre went on, ``Helene never ate with us. She
worked night and day, but ate in secret, I believe. Anyhow, a
friend of mine told me he'd once seen her eating a crust of
bread, and chewing some other sort of food at the same time. As
for me--I don't know; but I don't think you can live without
eating.''

``I couldn't keep down what I ate,'' Helene interposed. ``I took
some bouillon here and there; sometimes a mouthful of
bread--nothing in secret. I never thought of Andre in
marriage--not him more than another. That was all a joke.''

A number of witnesses, friends of Perrotte, who had seen her
during her illness, spoke of the extreme dislike the girl had
shown for Helene and for the liquids the latter prepared for her.
Perrotte would say to Helene, ``But you're dirty, you ugly
Bretonne!'' Perrotte had a horror of bouillon: ``Ah--these
vegetable soups! I've had enough of them! It was what Helene
gave me that night that made me ill!'' The witnesses did not
understand all this, because the accused seemed to be very good
to her fellow-servant. At the bedside Helene cried, ``Ah! What
can I do that will save you, my poor Perrotte?'' When Perrotte
was dying she wanted to ask Helene's pardon. Embracing the dying
girl, the accused replied, ``Ah! There's no need for that, my
poor Perrotte. I know you didn't mean anything.''

A witness telling of soup Helene had made for Perrotte, which the
girl declared to have been poisoned, it was asked what happened
to the remainder of it. The President passed the question to
Helene, who said she had thrown it into the hearth.

% IV

The most complete and important testimony in the trial was given
by M. Theophile Bidard, professor to the law faculty of Rennes.

The facts he had to bring forward, he said, had taken no
significance in his mind until the last of them transpired. He
would have to go back into the past to trace them in their proper
order.

He recalled the admission of Helene to his domestic staff and the
good recommendations on which he had engaged her. From the first
Helene proved herself to have plenty of intelligence, and he had
believed that her intelligence was combined with goodness of
heart. This was because he had heard that by her work she was
supporting two small children, as well as her poor old mother,
who had no other means of sustenance.

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