Word: loudun
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Dates: during 1950-1950
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...devil is active in Châtellerault, in Chinon and in Domfront, but above all he is active in Loudun...
...devil is active in Chatellerault, in Chinon and in Domfront, but above all he is active in Loudun." So said Rabelais four centuries ago; at least, that's what the people of Loudun say he said. Some people suspect that Loudun, a town of 5,313 in western France, is still a little proud of its reputation for casual wickedness. "I think," said a bookseller of Loudun last week, "it is because of our fine white wines. One can drink liters, like water, but suddenly it hits like a coup de fusil and even the old feel young...
Stranger in the House. One of the few citizens of Loudun who seemed beyond suspicion of any intrigue was slim, soft-spoken Marie Besnard, a matron of 53, who owned six houses in the town, the local White Horse inn, and a number of thriving stud farms. Marie had acquired property the easy way through the deaths of a succession of relatives and her purse strings were always loosened when M. le Curé came to call with a worthy charity in mind. Marie, said the people of Loudun, was "the only woman in town who could go to communion...
...Even Loudun's glib gossips found their tongues slow to wag when, soon after the war, the unassailable Marie Besnard was apparently attracted by a handsome German hired hand and. ex-prisoner of war 30 years her junior. Marie's husband, Leon Besnard, began spending more & more time in the town's bistros and complaining bitterly that he was no longer master in his own home...
Evidence in the Graveyard. Last May, while widowed Marie leaned and sobbed on the arm of a nun at the graveside, and all of Loudun watched, Léon Besnard's body was disinterred, turned over to a laboratory in Marseille. Within a few days Loudun heard the shocking news. Léon had died of a massive dose of arsenic. In the Palais de Justice in Poitiers, a grim little juge d'instruction asked Marie Besnard how the poison got into her husband. She had no idea; but at least one neighbor seemed to remember that Marie...