She advanced with a haughty air to the little door of the tower; this door stood open, and eight soldiers had just been posted in the pillared room on the ground floor.
She faced these soldiers boldly; Clelia counted on speaking to the serjeant who would be in charge of them: this man was absent, Clelia rushed on to the little iron staircase which wound in a spiral round one of the pillars; the soldiers looked at her with great stupefaction but, evidently on account of her lace shawl and her hat, dared not say anything to her.
On the first landing there was no one; but, when she reached the second, at the entrance to the corridor which, as the reader may remember, was closed by three barred gates and led to Fabrizio's cell, she found a turnkey who was a stranger to her, and said to her with a terrified air:
"He has not dined yet."
"I know that," said Clelia haughtily.
The man dared not stop her.
Twenty paces farther, Clelia found sitting upon the first of the six wooden steps which led to Fabrizio's cell, another turnkey, elderly and very cross, who said to her firmly:
"Signorina, have you an order from the governor?"
"Do you mean to say that you do not know me?"
Clelia, at that moment, was animated by a supernatural force, she was beside herself.
"I am going to save my husband," she said to herself.
While the old turnkey was exclaiming:
"But my duty does not allow me… ."
Clelia hastened up the six steps; she hurled herself against the door: an enormous key was in the lock; she required all her strength to make it turn.
At that moment, the old turnkey, who was half intoxicated, seized the hem of her gown, she went quickly into the room, shut the door behind her, tearing her gown, and, as the turnkey was pushing the door to follow her, closed it with a bolt which lay to her hand.
She looked into the cell and saw Fabrizio seated at a small table upon which his dinner was laid.
She dashed at the table, overturned it, and, seizing Fabrizio by the arm, said to him:
"Hai mangiato?"
This use of the singular form delighted Fabrizio.
In her confusion, Clelia forgot for the first time her feminine reserve, and let her love appear.
Fabrizio had been going to begin the fatal meal; he took her in his arms and covered her with kisses.
"This dinner was poisoned," was his thought: "if I tell her that I have not touched it, religion regains its hold, and Clelia flies.
If, on the other hand, she regards me as a dying man, I shall obtain from her a promise not to leave me.
She wishes to find some way of breaking off her abominatele marriage and here chance offers us one: the gaolers will collect, they will break down the door, and then, there will be such a scandal that perhaps the Marchese Crescenzi will fight shy, and the marriage be broken off."
During the moment of silence occupied by these reflexions Fabrizio felt that already Clelia was seeking to free herself from his embrace.
"I feel no pain as yet," he said to her, "but presently it will prostrate me at your feet; help me to die."
"O my only friend!" was her answer, "I will die with thee."
She clasped him in her arms with a convulsive movement.
She was so beautiful, half unclad and in this state of intense passion, that Fabrizio could not resist an almost unconscious impulse.
No resistance was offered him.
In the enthusiasm of passion and generous instincts which follows an extreme happiness, he said to her fatuously:
"I must not allow an unworthy falsehood to soil the first moments of our happiness: but for your courage, I should now be only a corpse, or writhing in atrocious pain, but I was going to begin my dinner when you came in, and I have not touched these dishes at all."
Fabrizio dwelt upon these appalling images to conjure away the indignation which he could already read in Clelia's eyes.
She looked at him for some moments, while two violent and conflicting sentiments fought within her, then flung herself into his arms.
They heard a great noise in the corridor, the three iron doors were violently opened and shut, voices shouted.
"Ah! If I had arms!" cried Fabrizio; "they made me give them up before they would let me in.
No doubt they are coming to kill me.
Farewell, my Clelia, I bless my death since it has been the cause of my happiness."
Clelia embraced him and gave him a little dagger with an ivory handle, the blade of which was scarcely longer than that of a pen-knife.
"Do not let yourself be killed," she said to him, "and defend yourself to the last moment; if my uncle the Priore hears the noise, he is a man of courage and virtue, he will save you."
So saying she rushed to the door.
"If you are not killed," she said with exaltation, holding the bolt of the door in her hand and turning her head towards him, "let yourself die of hunger rather than touch anything.
Carry this bread always on you."
The noise came nearer, Fabrizio seized her round the body, stepped into her place by the door, and, opening it with fury, dashed down ' the six steps of the wooden staircase.
He had in his hand the little dagger with the ivory handle, and was on the point of piercing with it the waistcoat of General Fontana, Aide-de-Camp to the Prince, who recoiled with great alacrity, crying in a panic:
"But I am coming to save you, Signor del Dongo."
Fabrizio went up the six steps, called into the cell:
"Fontana has come to save me"; then, returning to the General, on the wooden steps, discussed matters coldly with him.
He begged him at great length to pardon him a movement of anger.
"They wished to poison me; the dinner that is there on my table is poisoned; I had the sense not to touch it, but I may admit to you that this procedure has given me a shock.