CIX. Les assises.

CIX

The Assizes.

The Benedetto case, as it was then called at the Palais and in society, had produced an enormous sensation. A habitué of the Café de Paris, of the boulevard de Gand and of the Bois de Boulogne, the false Cavalcanti, during the time he remained in Paris and during the two or three months that his splendor had lasted, had made a host of acquaintances. The newspapers had related the various stages of the defendant's life, both his elegant life and his life on the chain-gang; the result was the liveliest curiosity, especially among those who had personally known Prince Andrea Cavalcanti; and so it was chiefly those who were determined to risk everything to go and see M. Benedetto, the murderer of his chain-mate, on the prisoners' bench.

To many people, Benedetto was, if not a victim, at least a miscarriage of justice: they had seen M. Cavalcanti senior in Paris, and they expected to see him reappear to claim his illustrious offspring. A good number of persons who had never heard speak of the famous Polish lady with whom he had landed at the Count of Monte Cristo's were struck by the dignified air, the gentlemanliness and the worldly knowledge shown by the old patrician, who, it must be said, seemed a perfect nobleman every time he did not speak and did not do arithmetic.

As for the accused himself, many people remembered having seen him so amiable, so handsome, so prodigal, that they preferred to believe in some machination on the part of an enemy, such as one finds in this world, where great fortunes raise the means of doing evil and good to the height of the marvelous, and power to the height of the unheard-of.

Everyone therefore hurried to the session of the court of assizes, some to savor the spectacle, others to comment upon it. From seven o'clock in the morning there was a queue at the gate, and an hour before the opening of the session the room was already full of privileged persons.

Before the entry of the court, and even often after, a courtroom, on days of great trials, very much resembles a salon where many people recognize one another, accost each other when they are near enough not to lose their places, make signs to each other when they are separated by too great a crowd of commoners, lawyers and gendarmes.

It was one of those magnificent autumn days that sometimes compensate us for an absent or shortened summer; the clouds that M. de Villefort had seen in the morning streak the rising sun had dissipated as if by magic, and left shining in all its purity one of the last, one of the gentlest days of September.

Beauchamp, one of the kings of the press, and consequently having his throne everywhere, ogled to the right and to the left. He caught sight of Château-Renaud and Debray, who had just won the good graces of a police sergeant, and who had decided him to place himself behind them instead of masking them, as was his right. The worthy officer had scented the minister's secretary and the millionaire; he showed himself full of consideration for his noble neighbors and even permitted them to go pay a visit to Beauchamp, promising them to keep their places.

"Well," said Beauchamp, "we are come then to see our friend?"

"Oh! my God, yes," replied Debray, "that worthy prince! The devil take Italian princes, indeed!"

"A man who had had Dante for genealogist, and who went back to The Divine Comedy!"

"Nobility of the rope," said Château-Renaud phlegmatically.

"He will be condemned, will he not?" asked Debray of Beauchamp.

"Why, my dear fellow," answered the journalist, "it seems to me that is what you must be asked: you know better than the rest of us the air of the office; did you see the president at the last evening of your minister?"

"Yes."

"What did he say to you?"

"Something that will astonish you."

"Ah! speak quickly then, dear friend, it is so long since anything of that sort has been told me."

"Well, he told me that Benedetto, whom they regard as a phoenix of subtlety, as a giant of cunning, is but a very subordinate rogue, very silly, and quite unworthy of the experiments that will be made after his death upon his phrenological organs."

"Bah!" said Beauchamp; "and yet he played the prince passably enough."

"For you, Beauchamp, who detest those unhappy princes and who are delighted to find them ill-bred, but not for me, who scent the gentleman by instinct and who raises an aristocratic family, whatever it may be, like a true hound of the coat-of-arms."

"So you never believed in his principality?"

"In his principality? yes... in his princedom? no."

"Not bad," said Debray; "I assure you however that for anyone but you he might pass... I have seen him at the ministers'."

"Ah! yes," said Château-Renaud, "as if your ministers knew a prince when they saw one!"

"There is something in what you just said, Château-Renaud," replied Beauchamp, bursting into laughter; "the phrase is short, but pleasant. I ask your permission to use it in my report."

"Take it, dear M. Beauchamp," said Château-Renaud; "take it; I give you my phrase for what it is worth."

"But," said Debray to Beauchamp, "if I spoke to the president, you must have spoken to the king's attorney, you?"

"Impossible; for a week M. de Villefort has been in hiding; it is quite natural: that strange succession of domestic griefs crowned by the strange death of his daughter..."

"The strange death! What do you mean by that, Beauchamp?"

"Oh! yes, pretend ignorance, on the pretext that all that passes in the robe nobility," said Beauchamp, applying his eyeglass to his eye and forcing it to stay there alone.

"My dear sir," said Château-Renaud, "permit me to tell you that, for the eyeglass, you are not in Debray's class. Debray, give M. Beauchamp a lesson."

"Why," said Beauchamp, "I am not mistaken."

"What is it?"

"It is she."

"Who, she?"

"She was said to have left."

"Mlle Eugénie?" asked Château-Renaud; "would she have already returned?"

"No, but her mother."

"Mme Danglars?"

"Come now!" said Château-Renaud, "impossible; ten days after her daughter's flight, three days after her husband's bankruptcy!"

Debray reddened slightly and followed the direction of Beauchamp's gaze.

"Come now!" said he, "it is a veiled woman, an unknown lady, some foreign princess, the mother of Prince Cavalcanti perhaps; but you were saying, or rather you were about to say, some very interesting things, Beauchamp, it seems to me."

"I?"

"Yes. You were speaking of the strange death of Valentine."

"Ah! yes, that is true; but why then is not Mme de Villefort here?"

"Poor dear woman!" said Debray, "she is no doubt occupied in distilling balm-mint water for the hospitals, and in composing cosmetics for herself and her friends. You know she spends two or three thousand crowns a year on that amusement, so it is said. To the point, you are right, why is she not here, Mme de Villefort? I should have been very glad to see her; I like that woman very much."

"And I," said Château-Renaud, "I detest her."

"Why?"

"I do not know. Why does one love? why does one detest? I detest her by antipathy."

"Or by instinct, as always."

"Perhaps... But let us return to what you were saying, Beauchamp."

"Well," resumed Beauchamp, "are you not curious to know, gentlemen, why they die so thick and fast in the Villefort house?"

"Thick and fast is pretty," said Château-Renaud.

"My dear fellow, the word is in Saint-Simon."

"But the thing is in M. de Villefort's house; let us go on then."

"Upon my word!" said Debray, "I confess I do not lose sight of that house draped in mourning for three months and only the day before yesterday, on account of Valentine, my wife was speaking to me of it."

"What wife?..." asked Château-Renaud.

"The minister's wife, by heaven!"

"Ah! pardon," said Château-Renaud, "I do not go to the ministers', I leave that to the princes."

"You were only handsome, you are becoming resplendent, baron; have pity on yourself, or you will burn us like another Jupiter."

"I shall say no more," said Château-Renaud; "but the devil, have pity on me, do not give me the rejoinder."

"Come, let us try to get to the end of our dialogue, Beauchamp; I was saying to you then that my wife asked me the day before yesterday for information on that; instruct me, I will instruct her."

"Well, gentlemen, if they die so thick and fast, I maintain the word, in the Villefort house, it is that there is a murderer in the house!"

The two young men started, for more than once the same idea had come to them.

"And who is this murderer?" they asked.

"Young Edouard."

A burst of laughter from the two listeners in no way disconcerted the speaker, who continued:

"Yes, gentlemen, young Edouard, a phenomenal child, who already kills like father and mother."

"Is this a jest?"

"Not at all; I took on yesterday a servant who comes from M. de Villefort's: listen well to this."

"We are listening."

"And whom I shall send away tomorrow, because he eats enormously to recover from the fast of terror he imposed on himself there. Well, it appears that this dear child laid hands on some bottle of drug which he uses from time to time against those who displease him. First it was good papa and good mama de Saint-Méran who displeased him, and he poured them three drops of his elixir: three drops suffice; then it was the brave Barrois, old servant of good papa Noirtier, who from time to time rough-handled the amiable mischief you know. The amiable mischief poured him three drops of his elixir. So it was with poor Valentine, who did not rough-handle him, she, but of whom he was jealous: he poured her three drops of his elixir, and for her as for the others all was over."

"But what the devil of a tale are you telling us?" said Château-Renaud.

"Yes," said Beauchamp, "a tale from the other world, is it not?"

"It is absurd," said Debray.

"Ah!" resumed Beauchamp, "there you are already seeking dilatory pleas! The devil! ask my servant, or rather him who tomorrow will be no longer my servant: it was the talk of the house."

"But this elixir, where is it? what is it?"

"Why! the child hides it."

"Where did he get it?"

"In his mother's laboratory."

"His mother then has poisons in her laboratory?"

"How should I know! you come asking me questions like a king's attorney. I repeat what I was told, that is all; I cite my author: I can do no more. The poor devil ate no more for fright."

"It is incredible!"

"But no, my dear, it is not incredible at all, you saw last year that child of the rue de Richelieu, who amused himself by killing his brothers and sisters by thrusting a pin into their ear while they slept. The generation that follows us is very precocious, my dear."

"My dear," said Château-Renaud, "I wager you do not believe a single word of what you are telling us?... But I do not see the Count of Monte Cristo; how is it he is not here?"

"He is blasé, he," said Debray, "and then he will not wish to appear before everyone, he who was the dupe of all the Cavalcantis, who came to him, it appears, with false letters of credence; so that he is out a hundred thousand francs mortgaged on the principality."

"By the way, M. de Château-Renaud," asked Beauchamp, "how is Morrel?"

"Upon my word," said the gentleman, "this is the third time I go to his house, and no more of Morrel than on my hand. Yet his sister did not seem uneasy, and she told me with a very good face that she had not seen him either for two or three days, but that she was certain he was well."

"Ah! I think of it! the Count of Monte Cristo cannot come into the room," said Beauchamp.

"Why so?"

"Because he is an actor in the drama."

"Has he also murdered someone?" asked Debray.

"But no, it is he, on the contrary, whom they tried to assassinate. You know well it was on leaving his house that that good M. de Caderousse was assassinated by his little Benedetto. You know well it is at his house that famous waistcoat was found in which was the letter that came to disturb the signing of the contract. Do you see the famous waistcoat? It is there all bloody, on the desk, as a piece of evidence."

"Ah! very well."

"Hush! gentlemen, here is the court; to our places!"

Indeed a great noise was heard in the courtroom; the police sergeant called his two protégés by an energetic hem! and the usher, appearing on the threshold of the deliberation room, cried in that shrill voice that ushers already had in the time of Beaumarchais:

"The court, gentlemen!"

“Stories of the world, in your language.”