I was obliged to lean against the door; I was suddenly incapable of movement. Fortunately I recovered myself. My two watch-dogs noticed nothing.
The following day I came down to dinner escorted by the doctor and my companion. The waiter who usually attended on us was a little late and was finishing laying the table. Ordinarily he hardly dared look at me, but I now saw that his eyes were speaking to me. At the same time he passed and re-passed his hand over the tablecloth. He first made a fold, and afterwards he arranged and rearranged the linen. I seated myself and, at the same moment, I carelessly touched the spot the waiter had seemed to indicate. I heard a crackling of paper underneath the cloth....
My two keepers were discussing Wagner; they talked on ordinary topics. They could see me approving their banalities with a gracious smile, and they redoubled their eloquence. I profited by this to seize and hide the letter so cleverly placed within my reach between the tablecloth and the table.
I read the letter--I devoured its contents--as soon as I was alone in my room. It was from whom I guessed! It announced my approaching liberty. It gave me explanations of what had been done and what still had to be done in order to effect my escape from my long torture. I was to answer in the same way. I could rely on the waiter.
This is how a daily correspondence began between the count and myself. I very soon knew what measures I should have to take, what attitude to adopt, what necessary preparations to make, whom to fear and whom to trust.
The night watchman had been gained over on our side. This brave man, like the waiter, ran a grave risk. No one will ever know the extent of the devotion which the frightful persecution to which I was a victim has evoked and still evokes!
At last I received the eagerly awaited note, which said: "_It will be to-morrow_."
To-morrow! To-morrow! I had only another day to wait, and then I should be free.... This was in August, 1904. For seven years I had been in captivity; I had lived among lunatics, and I had been treated as a lunatic.
One thought alone froze my blood: the count would, no doubt, make his appearance. And I remembered that quite recently my "lady-in-waiting" had shown me a revolver, and coldly warned me that she had orders--from whom?--to shoot any would-be rescuer.