Jasper County Democrat, Volume 14, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 September 1911 — Under a Curse [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Under a Curse

A New Orleans Girl Is Led to Commit a Crime Unconsciously

By DOROTHEA HALE

New Orleans during the early part of the nineteenth century was a gay city of a foreign type. It was a miniature Paris. The people, mostly of French extraction, were ready to dance or fight with equal zest. They were all high strung and the slightest provocatiou was sufficient to send two men off to a wood on the outskirts of the city, where they settled the matter with weapons. There came at this time from France an old gentleman, Francois Desoix, and his daughter Antoinette. Whether or no, she having been born not long after the ill fated queen of France lost her head," Antoinette’s father, who was a stanch royalist, gave her the name in honor of the sovereign be adored I cannot say. Nevertheless, this story indicates that there was a malign influence hanging over Antoinette Desolx. It was generally understood that Desoix dropped a title on leaving France and that he was an emigre—one of those royalists who fled at the time of the revolution to save their heads.| His wife had died abroad, and his daughter was his only consolation. She had been born and lived in the south of France, and her nature partook of the climate. Later she and her father had lived in Paris. In those days certain functions were in vogue in American cities that have long ago passed out. Soirees were given by the proprietors of hotels and were attended by the elite. At one of these which took place at the St. Charles hotel Antoinette Desolx, who was always attended by her venerable father, was the belle of the evening. A trifle under the medium height, slender of figure, a pronounced brunette, she was rather a petite than a grand

beauty. Her principal power lay in her eyes, into which she could throw almost any kind of expression. Three young men were her principal attendants at the St. Charles ball— Edouard Durier, Antoine Marcel and Paul Chambers. The first two were French, as their names indicate. The third was a native of Virginia. Durier enjoyed the reputation—at that time an enviable one—of having killed more men under the code duello than any man in Louisiana. No one knew which of these attendants upon Antoinette Desoix was favored by her. The men at least were ignorant, but the women who observed her said that Chambers was the favorite. Nevertheless, at this ball she chose to bestow her smiles on Antoine Marcel. Chambers, who was very much in love with her, found it difficult to confine his expressions of discontent to her, showing considerable -antagonism to his rival. While Marcel was waltzing with Antoinette, Chambers, who was crossing the ballroom, unintentionally got in the couples’ way. Marcel, who took the matter as an affront, bumped against him. As soon as the dance was over Chambers sent Marcel a challenge. It would seem to us in this less quarrelsome age that a collision in a ballroom was a very senseless cause for two men to try to shoot or stab each other. The episode was not the real cause; It was rivalry for the favor of a woman —a woman who knew well which of the men she preferred, but would not make It known. The trouble having started was destined to be come more complicated. The bumping between Marcel and Chambers occurred early In the evening. Mlle. Desoix was perfectly aware Of what had taken place and the results of the bumping. It happened that for the next dance fthe vras engaged to Edouard Durier. While sailing over the floor with him she saw Marcel looking at her. ; Raising her eyes to Durier she threw into them one of , those expressions she could call up at will, this time Indicating adoration. Marcel chose a partner and. spinning on the floor with her, crossed the path of Durier and Mlle. Desoix. with the result of another bump. Durier considered it an accident, which It really was. and did not notice it

*M. Marcel,” said Antoinette, “is very careless tonight I do not see why, because I choose to dance with you, he should show his spleen in that way.” “Do you mean. Mademoiselle, that he got in our way purposely?" There was no reply to this, so Durier acted on the principle that silence gives consent, and as soon as he had finished the dance he sent a demand for an apology to Marcel. The latter was in no mood to. apologize to the man who had, so suddenly supplanted him, so there was another duel on the tapis—two duels, the pretended cause of each being a bumping. Fate decided to complicate matter! still further between the three rivals. After the last dance Mlle. Desolx while still on the arm of Durier in passing Paul Chambers smiled on him. He at once advanced and asked her for the next dance. While Chambers and Antoinette were gliding over the waxed floor another bump occurred. Whether it was accidental or not there is no way of knowing, but one thing is certain—it was not in the program of Mlle. Desoix. Durier and Chambers, both dancing, collided back to back. Durier turned and, seeing that another of mademoiselle’s cavaliers had bumped him, took it for granted that he, too, intended to insult him. Thoroughly angered, after the dance he sent a demand for an apology couched in such terms that no true man could apologize and (at that time) maintain his self respect. The duels resulting at these functions were usually fought after the ball. Just before the dancing ended a group of young men went to a room upstairs to take measures for fighting out the affairs that had occurred during the evening. It was found that Marcel and Chambers had a bump to settle and Durier had a bump to wipe out with each one of them. The question was which should fight first. The seconds were constituted an executive body to consider the matter and decide it on its merits. They concluded to arrange it according to priority of bumps. Marcel and Chambers had made the first bump; therefore the first fight should take place between them. Whichever lived should settle the next bump with Durier. This and the preliminaries to the fights having been settled, carriages were called and the party were driven to the dueling wood to meet at dawn, which was already breaking. Marcel, being the challenged party, chose pistols. He was a better shot than Chambers and calculated on a victory. But he knew that whoever won in this first encounter was sure to be killed by Durier. This took away his nerve, and he missed his man. Chambers shot him through the heart, killing him instantly. This left Chambers to settle the next bump with Durier, who magnanimously left the choice of weapons with his opponent. Chambers chose pistols. The two had taken position and the signal was abodt to be given when the rattle of wheels was heard, a carriage swung into the wood and Antoinette Desoix stepped out. The first object that met her eye was the dead body of Marcel. With a shudder she turned quickly from it to the two men ready to fight. They looked at her in unaffected surprise. “Gentlemen,” she said, “I have a confession to make. By piquing you, Mr. Chambers, 1 intentionally caused an enmity between you and him”— pointing with an agonized expression toward the body of Marcel. “Then, to save you, Mr. Chambers, I brought on a quarfel between him and M. Durier, knowing that M. Durier was invincible and expecting that he would cancel the fight betw’een you and M. Marcel. The collision between you two gentlement was accidental, neither I nor any one else being accountable for It. I implore you to end the matter here.” There was a silence for some moments, which Durier broke. “What say you, Mr. Chambers?” Chambers did not reply at once. He was thinking. Finally he said to the girl: “Had you come in time to prevent the first fight all would have been well. As it is, neither M. Durier nor myself can honorably permit one of us three men concerned to suffer alone. We must proceed.” In vain the girl Implored them to desist. The seconds begged her to leave the ground. She would not. Chambers called for the signal.. It was given. Two shots rang out together. Chambers fell dead and Durier mortally wounded. Antoinette gave a shriek and fell in a heap. The story of how Antoinette Desoix, yielding to a feminine idiosyncracy to pique the one man she loved, placed him in a position where she was liable to lose him, then brought about a quarrel between his opponent and a man who would be quite sure to put that opponent out of the way, gradually permeated New Orleans society. Some thought her demented, some considered her a fury, some merely a woman who had become entangled by her own petty foibles. The case, peculiar though it was, caused only a ripple on the gay society of New Orleans, and Mlle. Desoix- and her triple duel were soon forgotten. Her father, upon whom when a boy the execution of the queen, for whom Antoinette had been napjed. had produced so marked an effect, had a different feeling from all these. In the blood his daughter had spilled he saw a curse resting upon her in the name she bore. He placed her In a convent, from which she never emerged. There through long years she expiated what she never ceased to consider her crime. She never could understand how she had been led into its commission.

SHOT HIM THROUGH THE HEART.