achery;
but Buckingham was incapable of going to any excess against a woman,
particularly if that woman was supposed to have acted from a feeling of
jealousy.

This supposition appeared to her most reasonable. It seemed to her that
they wanted to revenge the past, and not to anticipate the future. At
all events, she congratulated herself upon having fallen into the
hands of her brother-in-law, with whom she reckoned she could deal very
easily, rather than into the hands of an acknowledged and intelligent
enemy.

"Yes, let us chat, brother," said she, with a kind of cheerfulness,
decided as she was to draw from the conversation, in spite of all the
dissimulation Lord de Winter could bring, the revelations of which she
stood in need to regulate her future conduct.

"You have, then, decided to come to England again," said Lord de Winter,
"in spite of the resolutions you so often expressed in Paris never to
set your feet on British ground?"

Milady replied to this question by another question. "To begin with,
tell me," said she, "how have you watched me so closely as to be aware
beforehand not only of my arrival, but even of the day, the hour, and
the port at which I should arrive?"

Lord de Winter adopted the same tactics as Milady, thinking that as his
sister-in-law employed them they must be the best.

"But tell me, my dear sister," replied he, "what makes you come to
England?"

"I come to see you," replied Milady, without knowing how much she
aggravated by this reply the suspicions to which d'Artagnan's letter had
given birth in the mind of her brother-in-law, and only desiring to gain
the good will of her auditor by a falsehood.

"Ah, to see me?" said de Winter, cunningly.

"To be sure, to see you. What is there astonishing in that?"

"And you had no other object in coming to England but to see me?"

"No."

"So it was for me alone you have taken the trouble to cross the
Channel?"

"For you alone."

"The deuce! What tenderness, my sister!"

"But am I not your nearest relative?" demanded Milady, with a tone of
the most touching ingenuousness.

"And my only heir, are you not?" said Lord de Winter in his turn, fixing
his eyes on those of Milady.

Whatever command she had over herself, Milady could not help starting;
and as in pronouncing the last words Lord de Winter placed his hand upon
the arm of his sister, this start did not escape him.

In fact, the blow was direct and severe. The first idea t