In fact, Milady still held the harmless weapon in her clenched hand; but these last words, this supreme insult, relaxed her hands, her strength, and even her will.  The knife fell to the ground.

“You were right, my Lord,” said Felton, with a tone of profound disgust which sounded to the very bottom of the heart of Milady, “you were right, my Lord, and I was wrong.”

And both again left the room.

But this time Milady lent a more attentive ear than the first, and she heard their steps die away in the distance of the corridor.

“I am lost,” murmured she; “I am lost!  I am in the power of men upon whom I can have no more influence than upon statues of bronze or granite; they know me by heart, and are steeled against all my weapons.  It is, however, impossible that this should end as they have decreed!”

In fact, as this last reflection indicated—­this instinctive return to hope—­sentiments of weakness or fear did not dwell long in her ardent spirit.  Milady sat down to table, ate from several dishes, drank a little Spanish wine, and felt all her resolution return.

Before she went to bed she had pondered, analyzed, turned on all sides, examined on all points, the words, the steps, the gestures, the signs, and even the silence of her interlocutors; and of this profound, skillful, and anxious study the result was that Felton, everything considered, appeared the more vulnerable of her two persecutors.

One expression above all recurred to the mind of the prisoner:  “If I had listened to you,” Lord de Winter had said to Felton.

Felton, then, had spoken in her favor, since Lord de Winter had not been willing to listen to him.

“Weak or strong,” repeated Milady, “that man has, then, a spark of pity in his soul; of that spark I will make a flame that shall devour him.  As to the other, he knows me, he fears me, and knows what he has to expect of me if ever I escape from his hands.  It is useless, then, to attempt anything with him.  But Felton—­ that’s another thing.  He is a young, ingenuous, pure man who seems virtuous; him there are means of destroying.”

And Milady went to bed and fell asleep with a smile upon her lips.  Anyone who had seen her sleeping might have said she was a young girl dreaming of the crown of flowers she was to wear on her brow at the next festival.

53 Captivity:  The second day

Milady dreamed that she at length had d’Artagnan in her power, that she was present at his execution; and it was the sight of his odious blood, flowing beneath the ax of the headsman, which spread that charming smile upon her lips.

She slept as a prisoner sleeps, rocked by his first hope.

In the morning, when they entered her chamber she was still in bed.  Felton remained in the corridor.  He brought with him the woman of whom he had spoken the evening before, and who had just arrived; this woman entered, and approaching Milady’s bed, offered her services.