Locusta — The Count of Monte Cristo

Valentine lies alone after midnight while distant clocks strike and her own pulse races faster than the seconds. Monte Cristo's scratch on the library door tells her he still watches; she nearly rings for help but shame at his luminous eye keeps her silent. For thirty terrible minutes she feigns sleep, imagining poison swapped for steel, until half past twelve brings a creak from Edward's room.

Madame de Villefort enters in a white dressing-gown, whispers Valentine's name twice, and pours a liquor from a phial into the glass. Valentine glimpses the fair arm of a woman of twenty-five who spreads death around her, forces her eyes shut when her stepmother leans close, and does not cry out. When the count reappears, Valentine admits she saw but cannot believe.

Monte Cristo names a simple narcotic instead of brucine and tastes what was poured. He explains the pursuit: two hundred thousand livres a year block Edward from inheriting, so the Saint-Mérans died, Noirtier was nearly killed when he made Valentine his heir, and the brown-cloaked lesson in aqua tofana at Perugia ripened in her stepmother's brain. Valentine would rather die a hundred times than denounce Madame de Villefort and prays she may live for Noirtier and Maximilian.

The count covers her bare shoulders, gives a pea-sized pastille from his emerald box, and tells her to fear nothing even in a coffin if she trusts his vigil as she trusts Providence. Valentine swallows and promises not to fear. He watches her fall asleep, empties three parts of the narcotic into the fireplace so servants will think she drank, and leaves her sleeping like an angel while the household prepares to believe her doomed.