"It is well," she said. "Depend on it, I shall refresh your memory; and soon too. I will be revenged, though my own heart bleeds for it."
She then hastened away; and I, feeling the rash folly I had committed, and fearing I had irreparably injured my husband's cause, was forced to let the kind jailor conduct me to his own apartment, in order that I might recover myself before I went to Pendarves. I found him more cheerful, and also more affectionate in his manner towards me. He had been reading a letter, which he hastily put into his pocket; yet not so soon but that my quick eye discovered in the address the hand of La Beauvais. It was this renewal of intercourse, then, that had made him cheerful! But why then was he more affectionate to me? I have since resolved that question to my satisfaction.
No one likes to give up any power once possessed. Pendarves had flattered himself La Beauvais fondly loved him; and his bitter grief at her apparent desertion of him, arose from wounded pride, and the fear of having lost his power over her, more than from pining affection. But she had written to him; she was trying to gain admittance to his prison:—his wounded vanity therefore was at rest on one point, and the sight of me was grateful because it ministered to it in another.
But I did not, could not reason then: I only felt; and what with jealousy, and what with my fears for his life, now, I thought, endangered by me, I was ill and evidently wretched the whole time I staid. But Seymour's manner to me was most soothing, and even tender. At that moment I could better have borne indifference from him; for I was conscious that I had weakly given way to the feelings of an injured jealous woman, and had thereby probably given the seal to his fate!
Glad was I when the jailor summoned me; for I was anxious to tell De Walden the folly which I had committed; and I saw that Seymour was hurt at the cold and hurried manner in which I bade him farewell.
When I saw De Walden, he told me that he had called in vain on La Beauvais hitherto; but would try again and again. On hearing what had passed between us he became alarmed, but declared that he could not have forgiven me if I had spoken or acted otherwise. That day some of the tyrant's creatures were in our shop, and one of them desired to see the other shop-woman, declaring Alice was not pretty enough to wait on them; and that they were resolved the next time they came to see la belle Angloise.—But every other fear was soon swallowed up in one.
Juan overheard that night in the Thuilleries gardens, that the Englishman Pendarves would be brought before the tribunal the day after the next, and there was no doubt of his being executed with several others directly ! ! !
The moment, the dreaded moment was now indeed at hand, and how was it to be averted? De Walden heard this intelligence also, and came to me immediately. But all hope seemed vain, because he was to be condemned to satisfy private wishes, and not because any public wrong could be proved against him; and he left me in utter despair. But he also left me to reflect; and the result was a determination to act resolutely and immediately, and to risk the event. Suffice, that I called my faithful servants into my room, reminded them of that fidelity and obedience to me which they had vowed to my poor mother on her death-bed, and told them the hour for them to prove their attachment and fulfil their vow was now arrived. This solemn adjuration was answered by as solemn assurances to obey me in whatever I required of them. I first required that they should keep all I was now going to say, and all they or I were going to do, profoundly secret from De Walden. I saw Juan recoil at this; but I was firm, and he swore himself to secrecy. I then unfolded to them my scheme, and had to encounter tears, entreaties urged on bended knee, that I would give up my rash design, and consider myself. But they might as well have talked to the winds. "I feel," said I, "by the suddenness of this proceeding, that my treatment of La Beauvais has done this, and it is my duty, at all risks to myself, to save my husband from the death to which I have hurried him." The faithful creatures were silenced, but not convinced. Still, finding they could not prevent my purpose, and that I declared I would cry "Vive le Roi," that I might die with my husband, they prepared in mournful obedience to consult with me on the best means of accomplishing my wishes.
My plan was this: I resolved to ask permission to take a last farewell of Pendarves at night, after I had seen him in the morning, and then change clothes with him, and remain in his stead.
"And as Benoit was ill in bed this evening, when you went," said I, "there is no likelihood that he will be well to-morrow; so my plan cannot injure him. Therefore, let us be prepared to execute what I have designed, directly."