To them, deserted houses are always haunted, if not by spirits at least by the memory of evil deeds.
The master of this house of dread was held in awe by the citizens to whom he was a word, a name to be spoken lowly, even when respect tinctured the utterance.

Stories concerning the marquis had come from Paris and Perigny, and travel, the good gossip, had distorted acts of mere eccentricity into deeds of violence and wickedness.

The nobility, however, did not share the popular belief.

They beheld in the marquis a great noble whose right to his title ran back to the days when a marquisate meant the office of guarding the marshes and frontiers for the king.

Besides, the marquis had been the friend of two kings, the lover of a famous beauty, the husband of the daughter of a Savoy prince.