“Do you think he would be capable of writing the letter?”
“No, he would rather have stuck his knife into me. Besides, he was ignorant of the details stated in the denunciation. I had not mentioned them to anyone.”
“Stay a moment. Did Danglars know Fernand?”
“No. Oh, yes, I remember now. On the eve of my betrothal, I saw them together in old Pamphile’s tavern. Danglars was friendly and jocular, but Fernand looked pale and agitated. A tailor, named Caderousse, whom I know very well, was with them. He was quite drunk though.”
“Do you want to know something else?” asked the abbé laughing.
“Yes, since you seem to be able to fathom every mystery. Tell me why I was only submitted to one examination, and why I was condemned without trial.”
“This is a more serious matter,” was the reply. “What we have just done for your two friends is mere child’s play by comparison. You must give me the most precise details. Who examined you?”
“The Deputy.”
“Did you tell him everything?”
“Yes, everything.”
“Did his manner towards you change at all in the course of the examination?”
“He certainly did appear disturbed when he read the compromising letter. He seemed quite upset at my misfortune.”
“Are you quite sure he was so perturbed on your account?”
“At any rate he gave me one great proof of his sympathy. He burnt the letter, my one incriminating document, before my very eyes.”
“Ah! This man may have been a greater scoundrel than you imagine. The Deputy’s conduct was too sublime to be natural. To whom was the letter addressed?”
“To Monsieur Noirtier, thirteen, Rue Coq Héron, Paris.”
“Can you think of any selfish motive the Deputy might have had in destroying the letter?”
“I do not know of any, but he may have had some reason, for he made me promise two or three times that, in my own interest, I would not speak to anyone of the letter, and he made me swear that I would not utter the name of the person to whom it was addressed.”
“Noirtier?” the abbé repeated. “Noirtier? . . . I knew a Noirtier at the Court of the old Queen of Etruria, a man who was a Girondist during the Revolution. What was the Deputy’s name?”
“De Villefort.”
The abbé burst into loud laughter. Dantès looked at him in stupefaction. “What is the matter?” he said.
“Only that I have a clear and complete understanding of everything now. Poor blind young man! This Noirtier was no other than the Deputy’s father.”
“His father?” Dantès cried out.
“Yes, his father, who styles himself Noirtier de Villefort,” the abbé replied.
Dantès now began to see clearly, and many details which had been incomprehensible to him up to this moment now began to assume their real significance. Villefort’s change of demeanour during the examination, the burning of the letter, the exacted oath, the magistrate’s almost supplicating voice which seemed to implore rather than to threaten, all passed through his mind. A cry broke from his lips and he staggered like a drunken man; then rushing toward the opening which led to his cell, he called out: “I must be alone to think this over.”
Reaching his cell he fell on his bed, and here the turnkey found him in the evening, motionless, his eyes staring into space, his features drawn.
During these hours of meditation, which had passed like so many seconds, he had formed a terrible resolution and taken a fearful oath.
At length a voice roused him from his reverie; it was the voice of Faria, who had come to invite Dantès to have his supper with him. The young man followed him. His face had lost that drawn look it had worn, and instead there was a determined, almost radiant expression which clearly denoted that he had taken a resolution. The abbé looked at him attentively.
“I almost regret having helped you in your researches and having told you what I did,” he said.
“Why?”
“Because I have instilled into your heart a feeling that previously held no place there—vengeance.”
Dantès smiled and said: “Let us speak of something else.”
The abbé looked at him again and shook his head sadly; but he did what his companion asked him and spoke of other matters.
Dantès listened to his words with admiring attention. At first he spoke of things and ideas of which the young man had no comprehension until later on; like the aurora borealis which lights the navigator of the northern seas on his way, he showed the young man new landscapes and horizons illuminated by fantastic lights, and Dantès realized what happiness it would bring to an intelligent being to follow this exalted mind to those moral, philosophical, or social heights to which he was wont to soar.
“You must impart to me a little of your knowledge,” Dantès said, “otherwise an ignoramus like myself will only be a bore to you. I am sure that you must prefer solitude to a companion without education such as I am. If you do what I ask, I promise to speak no more of escaping.”
“Alas, my good friend,” said the abbé smiling, “human knowledge is very limited, and when I have taught you mathematics, physics, history, and the three or four living languages I speak, you will know all that I know. It will not take more than two years to give you the knowledge I possess.”
“Two years?” exclaimed Dantès. “Do you really think you can teach me all these things in two years? What will you teach first? I am anxious to begin. I am thirsting for knowledge.”
That selfsame evening the two prisoners drew up a plan for the younger man’s education and began to put it into execution the next day. Dantès had a prodigious memory and a great facility for assimilation. The mathematical turn of his mind gave him aptitude for all kinds of calculation, while the sense of poetry that is in every sailor gave life to dryness of figures and severity of lines.
Whether it was that the distraction afforded him by his study had taken the place of liberty, or because he adhered strictly to the promise given to the abbé, he made no further reference to escaping, and the days passed rapidly, each day adding to his store of knowledge. At the end of the year he was a different man. Dantès noticed, however, that in spite of his companionship, the Abbé Faria seemed to lose some of his animation with each succeeding day. It seemed as though there was something on his mind. At times he would become wrapt in thought, sigh unconsciously, then suddenly rise and, with his arms crossed over his breast, gloomily pace his cell. One day, all at once, he ceased his incessant wandering and exclaimed: “If only there were no sentry!”
“Have you found a means of escape then?” asked Dantès excitedly.
“Yes, provided that the sentry in the gallery is both deaf and blind.”
“He shall be deaf and he shall be blind,” answered the young man in such a determined way that it frightened the abbé.
“No! No!” he cried out. “I will have no bloodshed.”
Dantès wanted to pursue the subject, but the abbé shook his head and refused to answer any more questions. Three months passed.
“Are you strong?” the abbé one day asked Dantès.
Without replying Dantès picked up the chisel, bent it into the shape of a horse-shoe and straightened it out again.
“Will you promise not to kill the sentry except as a last resource?”
“Yes, on my honour.”
“Then we may accomplish our task,” was the reply.
“How long will it be before we can accomplish it?”
“At least a year.”
“Shall we begin at once?”
“Without any delay. Here is my plan.”
The abbé showed Dantès a drawing he had made. It was a plan of his own cell, that of Dantès, and the passage joining them. In the middle of this passage they would bore a tunnel, like those used in mines. This tunnel would lead the prisoners under the gallery where the sentry was on duty; arrived there, a large excavation would be made by loosening one of the flagstones with wh
ich the floor of the gallery was paved; at a given moment the stone would give way under the soldier’s weight and he would disappear into the excavation below. Dantès would throw himself upon him before he had recovered from the shock of the fall and while he was still unable to defend himself. He would gag and blindfold him, and then the two prisoners would jump through one of the windows, climb down the outside wall by means of the rope-ladder the abbé had made, and they would be saved!
Dantès clapped his hands, and his eyes shone with joy. It was such a simple plan that it was bound to succeed.
That same day the two miners commenced operations with renewed vigour after their long rest.
At the end of fifteen months the hole was made, the excavation was completed under the gallery, and the two prisoners could distinctly hear the measured tread of the sentry. They were obliged to wait for a dark, moonless night for the success of their plans, and their one fear was that the flagstone might give way under the soldier’s heavy tread sooner than they desired. To guard against this, they decided to prop the stone up with a kind of beam they had found in the foundations. Dantès was busy putting it into position when he suddenly heard the abbé cry out in pain. He rushed to him and found him standing in the middle of the room, his face ghastly pale, his hands clenched, and the perspiration streaming down his forehead.
“Good heavens!” cried Dantès. “Whatever has happened? What ails you?”
“Quick! quick!” the abbé replied. “Listen to me!”
Dantès looked at Faria’s livid face. His eyes had deep lines under them, his lips were white, and his very hair seemed to stand on end.
“Oh! What is the matter with you?” Dantès cried terror-stricken.
“All is over with me! A terrible disease, it may even be mortal, is about to attack me. I feel it coming. I was seized with it the year before my imprisonment. There is only one remedy for it. Run quickly to my cell and raise the foot of my bed. It is hollow, and you will find in it a little glass bottle half filled with a red liquid. Bring it to me. No, I might be found here; help me back to my cell while I still have the strength. Who knows what may happen while the attack lasts?”
In a flash Dantès realized that his hopes of escape were now dashed to the ground; nevertheless he did not lose his head. He crept into the tunnel dragging his luckless companion after him, and with infinite trouble helped him to his cell and placed him on the bed.
“Thank you,” the abbé said, trembling in every limb as though he had just stepped out of freezing water. “I am seized with a cataleptic fit. It may be that I shall not move or make a sound; on the other hand, I may stiffen, foam at the mouth and shriek. Try not to let them hear me, for if they do, they might change my cell and we should be separated for ever. When you see me motionless, cold, and to all appearances dead, then and not until then force my teeth apart with the knife, and pour eight to ten drops of the liquid down my throat and I shall perhaps revive.”
“Perhaps?” exclaimed Dantès grief-stricken.
“Help! Help!” the abbé cried. “I am . . . I am dy—”
The attack was so sudden and so violent that the unfortunate prisoner was unable to finish the word. His features became distorted, his eyes dilated, his mouth twisted, his cheeks took on a purple hue; he struggled, foamed at the mouth, moaned and groaned. This lasted for two hours, then stretching himself out in a last convulsion, he became livid and lay as inert as a block of wood, whiter and colder than marble, more crushed than a reed trampled underfoot.
Edmond waited until life seemed to have departed from the abbé’s body and he apparently lay cold in death; then, taking the knife, with great difficulty he forced the blade between the clenched teeth. He carefully poured ten drops of the red liquid down his friend’s throat and waited.
An hour elapsed and still the abbé made not the slightest movement. Dantès began to fear he had waited too long before administering the remedy, and stood anxiously gazing at him. At last a faint colour spread over his cheeks, his eyes, which had remained open in a fixed stare, now began to see, a slight sigh escaped his lips, and he began to move.
“He is saved! he is saved!” Dantès exclaimed.
The abbé could not yet speak, but he pointed with visible anxiety toward the door. Dantès listened and heard the gaoler’s footsteps. He jumped up, darted toward the opening which he entered, replacing the flagstone after him, and regained his cell.
An instant later the gaoler entered and, as usual, found his prisoner sitting on his bed.
Scarcely had he turned his back, scarcely had the sound of his footsteps in the passage outside died away, when Dantès, too anxious to eat anything, hastened back to the abbé’s cell by the same way he had come a few seconds before. Faria had regained consciousness, but he was still lying stretched on his bed helpless and inert.
“I little thought I should see you again,” he said.
“Why?” asked the young man. “Did you think you were going to die?”
“No, but everything is ready for your flight, and I thought you would go.”
“Without you?” he exclaimed. “Did you really think I was capable of such a base action?”
“I see now that I was mistaken. But, alas! I feel very weak and worn.”
“Take courage, your strength will return,” said Dantès, seating himself on the bedside and taking the abbé’s hands.
Faria shook his head.
“My first fit lasted but half an hour, leaving only a feeling of hunger; I could even get up alone. To-day, I can move neither my right leg nor my arm; my head feels heavy, which proves a rush of blood to the brain. The third attack will leave me entirely paralysed or else it will kill me.”
“No, no, I assure you, you will not die. When you have your third attack, if you have one, you will be at liberty.”
“My friend,” the old man said, “you are mistaken. The attack I have just had has condemned me to perpetual imprisonment. Before fleeing, one must be able to walk.”
“Well then, we will wait a week, a month, two months if necessary; during that time you will regain your strength. All is ready for our escape, we have but to choose the day and hour. The day you feel strong enough to swim, we will put our plan into execution.”
“I shall swim no more,” Faria said. “My arm is paralysed not for one day only, but for ever. Raise it yourself and you will soon know by the weight of it.”
The young man did as he was bid and the arm fell back heavy and lifeless.
“You are convinced now, I expect,” Faria said. “Believe me, I know what I am saying; I have thought about it unceasingly ever since I had the first attack. I have been expecting this, for it runs in the family. My father, as well as my grandfather, died after the third attack. The physician who prepared this medicine for me has predicted the same fate for me.”
“The physician has made a mistake,” Dantès cried out. “As for your paralysis, that will not trouble me in the least. I shall swim the sea with you on my shoulders.”
“My son,” the abbé said, “you are a sailor and a swimmer, and should therefore know that a man could not possibly make more than fifty strokes with such a load on his back. I shall stay here till the hour of my deliverance has struck, the hour of my death. But you, my son, flee, escape! You are young, lithe, strong; trouble not about me . . . I give you back your word!”
“Very well,” said Dantès, “in that case I shall stay here too!” Rising and solemnly stretching one hand over the old man, he said: “By all that I deem most holy, I swear that I shall not leave you till death takes one of us!”
Faria looked up at this noble-minded, simple young man, and read in the expression on his face, now animated by a feeling of pure devotion, the sincerity of his affection and the loyalty of his oath.
“So be it,” said the sick man, “I accept. Thank you.” Then holding out to him his hand, he said: “It may be that you will be rewarded for this unselfish devotion, but as I cannot leave, and you will not, w
e must fill in the tunnel under the gallery. The soldier might notice that that particular spot is hollow and call the inspector’s attention to it. We should then be found out and separated. Go and do it at once; unfortunately I cannot help you. Spend the whole night on the task if necessary, and come to me again in the morning after the gaoler has made his visit. I shall have something important to tell you.”
Dantès took the abbé’s hand and was rewarded with a smile. With a feeling of deep respect, the young man then left his old friend in obedience to his wishes.
Chapter XIV
THE TREASURE
The next morning when Dantès entered the cell of his friend in captivity, he found him sitting up with a resigned expression on his face. In the ray of light which entered his cell by the narrow window, he held in his left hand, the only one he could use now, a piece of paper which, from being continuously rolled up very tightly, had taken on a cylindrical shape. Without saying a word, he showed it to Dantès.
“What is this?” the young man asked.
“Look at it well,” the abbé said, smiling. “This paper, my friend—I can tell you everything now for I have tried you—this piece of paper is my treasure, half of which belongs to you from this day forward.”
“Your treasure?” Dantès stammered.
Faria smiled.
“Yes,” he said. “You are a noble-hearted lad, Dantès, but I know by the way you shuddered and turned pale what is passing in your mind. This treasure really exists, and though it has not been my lot to possess it, you will one day be the owner of it all.”
“My friend, your attack has tired you, will you not rest a little?” said Dantès. “If you wish, I will listen to your story to morrow; to-day I only want to nurse you back to health, nothing more. Besides,” he continued, “a treasure is not a very pressing matter for us just now, is it?”
“Very pressing indeed,” replied the old man. “How do we know that I shall not be seized with the third attack to-morrow or the day after? Remember that then all will be over. Yes, it is true. I have often thought with bitter joy of these riches, which are vast enough to make the fortunes of ten families, and which my persecutors will never enjoy. This has been my vengeance, and in the despair of my captivity I have lived on it during the long nights spent in my dungeon. But now that I have forgiven them all, for love of you, now that I see you full of youth and with a bright future before you, now that I think of all the happiness which will result to you from this disclosure, I tremble at any delay in securing to one so worthy as you the possession of such an enormous buried treasure.”
Count of Monte Cristo (abridged) (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) Page 12