The Three Musketeers (Translated by Richard Pevear) - Alexandre Dumas [264]
“This order does not apply to me,” Milady replied coldly, “since it bears another name than mine.”
“A name? And do you have one?”
“I have your brother’s.”
“You’re mistaken, my brother is only your second husband, and the first is still living. Tell me his name, and I will put it in place of Charlotte Backson. No?…You don’t want to?…You keep silent? Very well, you’ll be locked up under the name of Charlotte Backson!”
Milady remained silent, only this time it was not from affectation, but from terror: she believed the order was ready to be carried out; she thought Lord de Winter had moved up his departure; she believed she was condemned to leave that same night. In her mind all was lost for a moment, when all at once she noticed that the order bore no signature.
The joy she felt at this discovery was so great that she was unable to conceal it.
“Yes, yes,” said Lord de Winter, who noticed what was going on inside her, “yes, you’re looking for the signature, and you’re saying to yourself: all is not lost, since this act is unsigned; they’re showing it to me in order to frighten me, that’s all. You’re mistaken: tomorrow this order will be sent to Lord Buckingham; the day after tomorrow it will come back signed by his hand and bearing his seal; and twenty-four hours later, I promise you, it will begin to be carried out. Farewell, Madame, that is all I had to say to you.”
“And I will reply to you, Monsieur, that this abuse of power, that this exile under a false name, is an infamy.”
“Would you prefer to be hanged under your real name, Milady? You know that English law is inexorable on the abuse of marriage. Explain yourself frankly: though my name, or rather my brother’s name, is mixed up in all this, I will risk the scandal of a public trial to be sure of being rid of you at a stroke.”
Milady did not reply, but turned pale as a corpse.
“Oh, I see you find peregrination preferable! Splendid, Madame, and there is an old proverb which says that youth is shaped by travel. By heaven, you’re not wrong, after all, and life is good! That’s why I’m not anxious to have you take it from me. It remains, then, to settle the matter of the five shillings. I’m being a bit parsimonious, am I not? That’s because I’m not anxious to have you corrupt your guards. Besides, you will always have your charms to seduce them. Use them, then, if your failure with Felton hasn’t disgusted you with attempts of that sort.”
“Felton hasn’t talked,” Milady said to herself, “nothing’s lost yet.”
“And now, Madame, good-bye to you. Tomorrow I will come to announce to you the departure of my messenger.”
Lord de Winter stood up, bowed ironically to Milady, and left.
Milady drew her breath: she still had four days ahead of her; four days were enough for her to finish seducing Felton.
A terrible idea then came to her, that Lord de Winter might send Felton himself to have the order signed by Buckingham. In that way, Felton would escape her, and for the prisoner to succeed, the magic of a continuous seduction was necessary.
Yet, as we have said, one thing reassured her: Felton had not talked.
She had no wish to seem alarmed by Lord de Winter’s threats, so she sat down at the table and ate.
Then, as she had done the evening before, she knelt and recited her prayers aloud. As on the evening before, the soldier ceased pacing and stopped to listen.
Soon she heard lighter footsteps than the sentry’s, which came from the end of the corridor and stopped outside her door.
“It’s he,” she said.
And she began the same religious singing which, the evening before, had excited Felton so violently.
But, though her sweet, full, and sonorous voice vibrated more harmoniously and heartbreakingly than ever, the door remained shut. It seemed to Milady, in one of those furtive glances that she cast at the peephole, that she glimpsed the young man’s burning eyes through the tight grating; but whether this was a reality or a vision, this time he had enough control over himself