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Updated: May 29, 2025
I saw its airy, slight framework above me, some ten yards to my right, as I crouched with my back against the wall of the King's cell. I made out a window two yards my side of it and nearly on the same level. That, if Johann spoke true, must belong to the duke's apartments; and on the other side, in about the same relative position, must be Madame de Mauban's window.
I marked Antoinette de Mauban's graceful figure, and, though her face was in shadow, the fine outline of her head was revealed against the light behind. I longed to cry softly, "Remember!" but I dared not and happily, for a moment later a man came up and stood by her.
No fanciful supposition, for the Duc de Mauban was as well known an astronomer as student of history and philanthropist. When the Emperor mentioned de Mauban's name Philip wondered where he had heard it before. Something in the sound of it was associated with his past, he knew not how.
"I don't know who that comes from," she said. "Read it." I knew in a moment. There was no signature at all this time, but the handwriting was the same as that which had told me of the snare in the summer-house: it was Antoinette de Mauban's. "I have no cause to love you," it ran, "but God forbid that you should fall into the power of the duke. Accept no invitations of his.
Touched as I was by Madame de Mauban's appeal, I seemed as powerless to befriend her as I had proved to help the King. Michael bade me defiance; and although he too had been seen outside the walls, with more disregard for appearances than he had hitherto shown, he did not take the trouble to send any excuse for his failure to wait on the King.
The duke's room remained inscrutable behind its shutters. The light burnt steadily in Madame de Mauban's window. Then I heard the faintest, faintest sound: it came from behind the door which led to the drawbridge on the other side of the moat. It but just reached my ear, yet I could not be mistaken as to what it was. It was made by a key being turned very carefully and slowly. Who was turning it?
No fanciful supposition, for the Duc de Mauban was as well known an astronomer as student of history and philanthropist. When the Emperor mentioned de Mauban's name Philip wondered where he had heard it before. Something in the sound of it was associated with his past, he knew not how.
At the same moment and on this hinged the plan a woman's cry was to ring out loud and shrill from Antoinette de Mauban's chamber. Again and again she was to cry: "Help, help! Michael, help!" and then to utter the name of young Rupert Hentzau. Then, as we hoped, Michael, in fury, would rush out of his apartments opposite, and fall alive into the hands of Sapt.
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