Captivity: the Fifth Day — The Three Musketeers

Milady has a half-triumph and measures what still stands. Court men fell fast. Felton does not. Austerity and religion have shut the usual doors. She has made a breach with false virtue and beauty, but she has only two days. Once Buckingham signs the exile order under a false name, Lord de Winter will put her on a ship. Exile would strip the power she lives by. She can return later. She cannot bear days spent going down, or a return after the cardinal has fallen and D'Artagnan has been paid. If she comes back empty, the cardinal will say she should not have let herself be taken. Felton is the one beam left. At nine Lord de Winter sounds the bars in silence. At midnight Felton lies to the sentinel: he has orders to watch a woman who may harm herself. She hears the lie and names it.

He promised a knife. She asks for it at once. He has reflected and will not share that sin. She says she has nothing to say to a man who does not keep his word. The refusal works. He draws the knife. She tests the point and gives it back. He lays it on the table. Then she begins as his sister. Young, handsome, she resisted snares until one evening her enemy mixed a narcotic in her water. She woke in a round chamber with no door, a splendid prison lit from the ceiling. Night came. A globe of fire dropped through the glass, a table rose with supper, and a man stood a few paces from her.

That man had hunted her for a year. He said the dishonour was already done in her sleep, and he offered his fortune for her love. She seized a knife and promised him her death if he took one more step. He left, smiling. The next day she trusted a marble fountain. At supper the water tasted wrong. Half a glass left her awake inside a sleeping body. She heard him mock Puritans who tire their lovers, then fell. When she woke she reached for the knife and found a worse thought: vengeance. She tells Felton this as if it were her crime. On the third night she plays Judith and strikes his breast. A coat of mail bends the blade. He turns cold when she swears she will denounce him to the king and to God. She refuses food. He offers liberty for silence. She swears on the cross to name him a murderer and a thief of honour.

He answers with a means for the last extremity: something that will close her mouth, or make no one believe her. She laughs. He gives her until tomorrow evening: silence and riches, or infamy. She tells him to leave before she dashes her head against the wall. Felton leans on a piece of furniture. Milady watches him with a demon's joy. His strength may fail before the recital is done. She has not yet given the man's name. She has given Felton a story that already asks for an avenger.