Alexandre Dumas

Marquise Brinvillier Alexandre Dumas

In 1665, the Marquise de Brinvilliers got to know the Chevalier de Sainte-Croix, a friend of her husband. Very quickly, the two young people become lovers. Their conduct is such that the father of the Marchioness, lest the disorders of her daughter's life tarnish her respectability, obtains a stamp letter against Sainte-Croix. Incarcerated in the Bastille, he finds himself in the same cell as Exili, an Italian master in the art of poisons who introduces him to his science. On his release from prison, he finds the Marquise who will use her lover's knowledge of poisons to make a fortune. Thus she will poison herself or successively poison her father and two brothers, while an attempt against her sister fails. At the same time, Sainte-Croix trades its poisons with those who need them. There are more and more strange and unexplained deaths and Parisians are starting to worry about them. It was then that Sainte-Croix died in his research laboratory while breathing in the scent of a poison. During the investigation, papers compromising the marquise are updated. She took refuge in a convent in Liège before being tricked out of it by a police officer disguised as a priest in love. Despite the evidence against her, she denies everything, including under torture, which does not prevent her from being sentenced to death. Mr. Pirot, doctor of medicine and priest, will manage to make him confess his crimes by promising him absolution at the time of his death. He will also support her in the event until she has her head severed.