XLIV. La vendetta.

XLIV

The Vendetta.

“Where does your lordship the count wish me to take up the story?” asked Bertuccio.

“Why, wherever you please,” said Monte Cristo, “since I know absolutely nothing about it.”

“And yet I thought that the Abbé Busoni had told Your Excellency…”

“Yes, some details no doubt, but seven or eight years have gone by since then, and I have forgotten it all.”

“Then I may, without fear of wearying Your Excellency…”

“Go on, Mr. Bertuccio, go on; you will serve me as an evening newspaper.”

“The events go back to 1815.”

“Ah! ah!” said Monte Cristo, “that was not yesterday, 1815.”

“No, sir, and yet the slightest details are as present to my memory as if it were only the next day. I had a brother, an elder brother, who was in the service of the Emperor. He had become a lieutenant in a regiment composed entirely of Corsicans. This brother was my only friend; we had been left orphans, I at five years old, he at eighteen; he had brought me up as if I had been his son. In 1814, under the Bourbons, he had married; the Emperor returned from the island of Elba, my brother at once took up service again, and, slightly wounded at Waterloo, he retired with the army behind the Loire.”

“But this is the history of the Hundred Days that you are telling me, Mr. Bertuccio,” said the count, “and it is already written, if I am not mistaken.”

“Pardon me, Excellency, but these first details are necessary, and you promised me to be patient.”

“Go on! go on! I am but a man of my word.”

“One day, we received a letter; I should tell you that we lived in the little village of Rogliano, at the extremity of the Cape of Corsica: this letter was from my brother; he told us that the army was disbanded and that he was returning by Châteauroux, Clermont-Ferrand, Le Puy and Nîmes; if I had any money, he begged me to send it to him at Nîmes, at the house of an innkeeper known to us both, with whom I had some dealings.”

“Of smuggling,” rejoined Monte Cristo.

“Why, my God, my lord count, it must be done.”

“Certainly, go on then.”

“I tenderly loved my brother, I told you so, Excellency; so I resolved not to send him the money, but to carry it to him myself. I possessed a thousand francs, I left five hundred with Assunta, who was my sister-in-law; I took the other five hundred, and set out for Nîmes. It was an easy thing, I had my boat, a cargo to take on board at sea; everything favored my plan. But the cargo being taken in, the wind became contrary, so that we were four or five days without being able to enter the Rhône. At last we got in; we went up as far as Arles; I left the boat between Bellegarde and Beaucaire, and took the road to Nîmes.”

“We are coming to it, are we not?”

“Yes, sir: excuse me, but, as Your Excellency will see, I am telling you only what is absolutely necessary. Now, it was the time when the famous massacres of the South were taking place. There were two or three brigands there called Trestaillon, Truphemy and Graffan, who cut the throats in the streets of all those suspected of Bonapartism. No doubt, my lord count, you have heard of these murders?”

“Vaguely; I was far from France at that time. Continue.”

“On entering Nîmes, one literally walked in blood; at every step one met corpses: the assassins, organized in bands, killed, pillaged and burned.”

“At the sight of this carnage, a shudder seized me, not for myself; I, a simple Corsican fisherman, had not much to fear; on the contrary, that time was our good time, for us smugglers, but for my brother, for my brother a soldier of the Empire, returning from the army of the Loire with his uniform and his shoulder-straps, and who consequently had everything to fear.

“I ran to our innkeeper. My presentiments had not deceived me: my brother had arrived at Nîmes the day before, and at the very door of him to whom he came to ask hospitality, he had been assassinated.

“I did all in the world to know the murderers; but no one dared tell me their names, so much were they dreaded. I then thought of that French justice of which I had heard so much, which fears nothing, it, and I presented myself at the king’s attorney’s.”

“And this king’s attorney was named Villefort?” asked Monte Cristo negligently.

“Yes, Excellency: he had just come from Marseille, where he had been deputy. His zeal had won him promotion. He was, it was said, one of the first who had announced to the government the landing from the island of Elba.”

“Then,” resumed Monte Cristo, “you presented yourself at his house.”

“—Sir, I said to him, my brother was assassinated yesterday in the streets of Nîmes, I know not by whom, but it is your mission to know. You are here the chief of justice, and it is for justice to avenge those whom she has not known how to defend.

“—And what was your brother? asked the king’s attorney….

“—Lieutenant in the Corsican battalion.

“—A soldier of the usurper, then?

“—A soldier of the French armies.

“—Well, he replied, he has used the sword and has perished by the sword.

“—You are mistaken, sir; he perished by the dagger.

“—What would you have me do about it? answered the magistrate.

“—But I told you: I wish you to avenge him.

“—And of whom?

“—Of his assassins.

“—Do I know them, I?

“—Have them sought out.

“—What for? Your brother will have had some quarrel and fought a duel. All these old soldiers give way to excesses which succeeded with them under the Empire, but which turn out badly for them now; now, our people of the South love neither soldiers nor excesses.

“—Sir, I replied, it is not for myself that I entreat you. I shall weep or avenge myself, that is all; but my poor brother had a wife. If some misfortune befell me in my turn, this poor creature would die of hunger, for my brother’s labor alone kept her alive. Obtain a small pension for her from the government.

“—Each revolution has its catastrophes, answered M. de Villefort; your brother has been the victim of this one, it is a misfortune, and the government owes nothing to your family for that. If we had to judge all the vengeances which the partisans of the usurper exercised upon the partisans of the king when in their turn they disposed of power, your brother would perhaps be condemned to death today. What is accomplished is a perfectly natural thing, for it is the law of reprisals.

“—What! sir, I cried, is it possible that you speak thus to me, you, a magistrate!…

“—All these Corsicans are mad, upon my word of honor! answered M. de Villefort; and they still believe their compatriot is emperor. You mistake the time, my dear fellow; you should have come to say that to me two months ago. Today it is too late; begone then, and if you do not go, I shall have you shown out.

“I looked at him for a moment to see, by a fresh supplication, if there were anything to hope. This man was of stone. I approached him:

“—Well, I said to him in a half-voice, since you know the Corsicans, you must know how they keep their word. You find that they did well to kill my brother who was a Bonapartist, because you are a royalist, you; well, I, who am also a Bonapartist, I declare one thing to you: it is that I shall kill you, you. From this moment I declare the vendetta to you; so keep yourself well, and guard yourself as best you can, for the first time we find ourselves face to face, it will be that your last hour has come.

“And thereupon, before he had recovered from his surprise, I opened the door and fled.”

“Ah! ah!” said Monte Cristo, “with your honest face, you do such things, Mr. Bertuccio, and to a king’s attorney, too! Fie! and did he at least know what that word vendetta meant?”

“He knew it so well that from that moment he no longer went out alone and shut himself up at home, having me sought everywhere. Happily I was so well hidden that he could not find me. Then fear took him, he trembled to remain longer at Nîmes; he solicited his change of residence, and, as he was indeed an influential man, he was appointed to Versailles; but, as you know, there is no distance for a Corsican who has sworn to avenge himself on his enemy, and his carriage, however well driven it was, never had more than half a day’s advance over me, who nevertheless followed it on foot.

“The important thing was not to kill him, a hundred times I had found the opportunity; but he must be killed without being discovered and above all without being arrested. Henceforth I no longer belonged to myself: I had to protect and nourish my sister-in-law. For three months I watched M. de Villefort; for three months he did not take a step, a movement, a walk, that my eye did not follow him where he went. At last, I discovered that he came mysteriously to Auteuil: I followed him again and saw him enter this house where we are, only, instead of entering like everyone else by the great street door, he came either on horseback or in a carriage, left carriage or horse at the inn, and entered by that little door which you see there.”

Monte Cristo made a sign with his head which proved that in the midst of the darkness he indeed distinguished the entrance pointed out by Bertuccio.

“I no longer needed to remain at Versailles, I settled at Auteuil and informed myself. If I wished to take him, it was evidently there that I must lay my snare.

“The house belonged, as the concierge told Your Excellency, to M. de Saint-Méran, Villefort’s father-in-law. M. de Saint-Méran lived at Marseille; consequently this country-house was useless to him; also it was said that he had just let it to a young widow known only under the name of the baroness.

“Indeed, one evening, looking over the wall, I saw a young and beautiful woman walking alone in this garden, which no foreign window overlooked; she frequently looked toward the little door, and I understood that that evening she awaited M. de Villefort. When she was near enough to me that, despite the darkness, I could distinguish her features, I saw a beautiful young woman of eighteen to nineteen years, tall and blonde. As she was in a simple dressing-gown and nothing confined her waist, I could remark that she was with child and that her pregnancy even appeared advanced.

“Some moments after, the little door was opened; a man entered; the young woman ran as fast as she could to meet him, they threw themselves into each other’s arms, kissed tenderly and regained the house together.

“This man was M. de Villefort. I judged that on going out, especially if he went out at night, he must cross the garden alone in its whole length.

“And,” asked the count, “have you since learned the name of this woman?”

“No, Excellency,” answered Bertuccio; “you will see that I had not time to learn it.”

“Continue.”

“That evening,” resumed Bertuccio, “I might perhaps have killed the king’s attorney; but I did not yet know the garden well enough in all its details. I feared not to kill him outright, and, if anyone ran to his cries, not to be able to flee. I put off the matter to the next meeting, and, so that nothing should escape me, I took a little room looking out on the street along which the garden wall ran.

“Three days after, toward seven o’clock in the evening, I saw leave the house a servant on horseback who took at a gallop the road leading to the route of Sèvres; I presumed he was going to Versailles. I was not mistaken. Three hours after, the man returned all covered with dust; his errand was done.

“Ten minutes after, another man on foot, wrapped in a cloak, opened the little garden door, which closed again upon him.

“I went down rapidly. Although I had not seen Villefort’s face, I recognized him by the beating of my heart: I crossed the street, I gained a boundary-stone placed at the angle of the wall and by the help of which I had looked into the garden a first time.

“This time I was not content to look, I drew my knife from my pocket, I assured myself the point was well sharpened, and I jumped over the wall.

“My first care was to run to the door; he had left the key inside, taking the simple precaution of turning the lock twice.

Nothing therefore hindered my flight on that side. I set myself to study the localities. The garden formed a long square, a lawn of fine English grass spread in the middle, at the corners of this lawn were clumps of trees with thick foliage and all intermingled with autumn flowers.

“To go from the house to the little door, or from the little door to the house, whether he entered or went out, M. de Villefort was obliged to pass near one of these clumps.

“It was the end of September; the wind blew strongly: a little pale moon, and veiled at every instant by big clouds which glided rapidly across the sky, whitened the sand of the walks leading to the house, but could not pierce the darkness of these thick clumps in which a man might remain hidden without fear of being perceived.

“I hid in that nearest which Villefort must pass; scarcely was I there, than, amid the gusts of wind which bent the trees above my head, I thought I distinguished something like groans. But you know, or rather you do not know, my lord count, that he who awaits the moment to commit a murder always thinks he hears dull cries borne upon the air. Two hours passed during which, several times, I thought I heard the same groans. Midnight struck.

“As the last stroke was still vibrating, lugubrious and sonorous, I perceived a light illuminating the windows of the secret staircase by which we went down just now.

“The door opened, and the man in the cloak reappeared. It was the terrible moment; but for so long I had prepared myself for this moment, that nothing in me faltered: I drew my knife, opened it and held myself ready.

“The man in the cloak came straight to me, but as he advanced into the open space, I thought I remarked that he held a weapon in his right hand: I was afraid, not of a struggle, but of a failure. When he was but a few steps from me, I recognized that what I had taken for a weapon was nothing else than a spade.

“I had not yet been able to guess for what purpose M. de Villefort held a spade in his hand, when he stopped on the edge of the clump, cast a look around him, and began to dig a hole in the earth. It was then that I perceived there was something in his cloak, which he had just deposited on the lawn to be freer in his movements.

“Then, I confess, a little curiosity slipped into my hatred: I wished to see what Villefort came to do there; I remained motionless, breathless, I waited.

“Then an idea had come to me, which was confirmed in seeing the king’s attorney draw from his cloak a small chest two feet long and six to eight inches wide.

“I let him deposit the chest in the hole, on which he pushed back the earth; then, on this fresh earth, he pressed his feet to make disappear the trace of the nocturnal work. I then sprang upon him and plunged my knife into his breast saying to him:

“—I am Giovanni Bertuccio! your death for my brother, your treasure for his widow: you see well that my vengeance is more complete than I hoped.

“I know not if he heard these words; I do not believe it, for he fell without uttering a cry; I felt the floods of his blood rebound burning upon my hands and face; but I was drunk, I was in delirium; this blood refreshed me instead of burning me. In a second, I had unearthed the little chest with the help of the spade; then, so that one should not see that I had carried it off, I filled up the hole in my turn, threw the spade over the wall, sprang out by the door, which I double-locked on the outside and of which I carried away the key.”

“Good!” said Monte Cristo, “it was, as I see, a little assassination doubled with theft.”

“No, Excellency,” answered Bertuccio, “it was a vendetta followed by restitution.”

“And the sum was round, at least?”

“It was not money.”

“Ah! yes, I remember,” said Monte Cristo, “did you not speak of a child?”

“Exactly, Excellency. I ran to the river, I sat on the bank, and, eager to know what the chest contained, I sprang the lock with my knife.

“In a cloth of fine batiste was wrapped a child just born; his empurpled face, his violet hands announced that he must have succumbed to an asphyxia caused by natural ligatures rolled around his neck; however, as he was not yet cold, I hesitated to throw him into that water which flowed at my feet. Indeed, at the end of a moment I thought I felt a slight beating near the region of the heart; I disengaged his neck from the cord which enveloped it, and, as I had been a nurse at the hospital of Bastia, I did what a physician would have done in like circumstance, that is to say, that I courageously insufflated air into his lungs, which, after a quarter of an hour of unheard-of efforts, I saw breathe, and I heard a cry escape from his chest.

“In my turn, I uttered a cry, but a cry of joy. God does not then curse me, said I to myself, since he permits me to give back life to a human creature in exchange for the life I have taken from another!

“And what did you do then with this child?” asked Monte Cristo; “it was rather embarrassing baggage for a man who needed to flee.”

“Also I had not for an instant the idea of keeping him. But I knew there existed at Paris a foundling hospital where they receive these poor creatures. In passing the barrier, I declared having found this child on the road and I inquired. The chest was there bearing witness; the batiste cloths indicated that the child belonged to rich parents; the blood with which I was covered could as well belong to the child as to any other individual. No objection was made me; I was shown the hospital, which was situated at the end of the rue d’Enfer, and, after taking the precaution to cut the cloth in two, so that one of the two letters which marked it continued to envelop the body of the child, I deposited my burden in the turn, rang and fled at full speed. Fifteen days after, I was back at Rogliano, and I said to Assunta:

“—Comfort yourself, my sister; Israël is dead, but I have avenged him.

“Then she asked me the explanation of these words, and I recounted to her all that had passed.

“—Giovanni, said Assunta to me, you should have brought back this child, we would have stood to him in place of the parents he has lost, we would have called him Benedetto, and in favor of this good action God would have blessed us indeed.

“For all answer I gave her the half of the cloth which I had kept, so as to claim the child if we were richer.

“And with what letters was this cloth marked?” asked Monte Cristo.

“With an H and an N surmounted by a baronial twist.”

“I believe, God forgive me! that you use terms of heraldry, Mr. Bertuccio! Where the devil did you make your heraldic studies?”

“At your service, my lord count, where one learns all things.”

“Continue, I am curious to know two things.”

“Which, my lord?”

“What became of this little boy; did you not tell me it was a little boy, Mr. Bertuccio?”

“No, Excellency; I do not recall having spoken of that.”

“Ah! I thought I had heard, I must have been mistaken.”

“No, you were not mistaken, for it was indeed a little boy; but Your Excellency desired, she said, to know two things: what is the second?”

“The second was the crime of which you were accused when you asked for a confessor, and that the Abbé Busoni went to find you upon that request in the prison of Nîmes.”

“Perhaps this tale will be very long, Excellency.”

“What matters? it is scarcely ten o’clock, you know that I do not sleep, and I suppose that on your side you have no great desire to sleep.”

Bertuccio bowed and resumed his narration.

“Half to chase the memories which besieged me, half to provide for the needs of the poor widow, I returned with ardor to that smuggler’s trade, become easier by the relaxation of the laws which always follows revolutions. The coasts of the South, above all, were badly guarded, because of the eternal riots which took place, now at Avignon, now at Nîmes, now at Uzès. We profited by this kind of truce which was granted us by the government to link relations with all the coast. Since the assassination of my brother in the streets of Nîmes, I had not wished to re-enter that city. It resulted from this that the innkeeper with whom we did business, seeing that we would no longer come to him, had come to us and had founded a branch of his inn on the road from Bellegarde to Beaucaire, under the sign of the Pont du Gard. We had thus, whether on the side of Aigues-Mortes, or at the Martigues, or at Bouc, a dozen depots where we deposited our merchandise and where, if need be, we found a refuge against the customs officers and the gendarmes. It is a trade which pays much, that of smuggler, when one applies to it a certain intelligence seconded by some vigor; as for me, I lived in the mountains having now a double reason to fear gendarmes and customs officers, seeing that any appearance before the judges could bring on an inquiry, that this inquiry is always an excursion into the past, and that in my past, to me, one could now meet something graver than cigars entered in contraband or barrels of brandy circulating without passports. Also, preferring a thousand times death to an arrest, I accomplished astonishing things, which, more than once, gave me this proof, that the too great care we take of our body is almost the only obstacle to the success of those of our projects which need a rapid decision and a vigorous and determined execution. Indeed, once one has made the sacrifice of his life, one is no longer the equal of other men, or rather other men are no longer your equals, and whoever has taken this resolution feels, at the very instant, his forces decupled and his horizon enlarged.”

“Philosophy, Mr. Bertuccio!” interrupted the count; “but you have then done a little of everything in your life?”

“Oh! pardon, Excellency!”

“No! no! it is that philosophy at half past ten in the evening is a little late. But I have no other observation to make, seeing that I find it exact, which one cannot say of all philosophies.”

“My journeys thus became more and more extended, more and more fruitful. Assunta was a good manager, and our little fortune rounded itself. One day that I was leaving for a journey:

“—Go, she said, and at your return I have a surprise for you.

“I questioned her in vain: she would tell me nothing and I left.

“The journey lasted near six weeks; we had been to Lucca to load oil, and to Leghorn to take English cottons; our landing was made without adverse event, we realized our profits and came back all joyful.

“On re-entering the house, the first thing I saw in the most apparent place of Assunta’s chamber, in a sumptuous cradle relative to the rest of the apartment, was a child of seven to eight months. I uttered a cry of joy. The only moments of sadness that I had felt since the assassination of the king’s attorney had been caused me by the abandonment of this child. It goes without saying that of remorse for the assassination itself I had none.

“The poor Assunta had guessed all: she had profited by my absence, and, furnished with the half of the cloth, having inscribed, so as not to forget it, the precise day and hour when the child had been deposited at the foundling hospital, she had gone to Paris and had herself claimed him. No objection had been made her, and the child had been given to her.

“Ah! I confess, my lord count, that at seeing this poor creature sleeping in his cradle, my breast swelled, and that tears came from my eyes.

“—Truly, Assunta, I cried, you are a worthy woman, and Providence will bless you.

“This,” said Monte Cristo, “is less exact than your philosophy; it is true that it is only faith.”

“Alas! Excellency,” resumed Bertuccio, “you are right, and it was this very child whom God charged with my punishment. Never did a more perverse nature declare itself more prematurely, and yet one cannot say he was ill brought up, for my sister treated him like the son of a prince; he was a boy of a charming figure, with eyes of a light blue like those tones of Chinese faience which harmonize so well with the milky white of the general tone; only his hair of too vivid a blond gave his face a strange character, which doubled the vivacity of his glance and the malice of his smile. Unfortunately there is a proverb which says that the red-haired is all good or all bad; the proverb did not lie for Benedetto, and from his youth he showed himself all bad. It is true also that the gentleness of his mother encouraged his first leanings; the child, for whom my poor sister went to the town market, situated four or five leagues from there, to buy the first fruits and the most delicate sweetmeats, preferred to the oranges of Palma and the preserves of Genoa the chestnuts stolen from the neighbor in crossing the hedges, or the apples dried in his garret, while he had at his disposal the chestnuts and apples of our orchard.

“One day, Benedetto might have been five or six years old, the neighbor Wasilio, who, according to the habits of our country, locked up neither his purse nor his jewels, for, my lord count knows as well as anyone, in Corsica there are no thieves, the neighbor Wasilio complained to us that a louis had disappeared from his purse; it was thought he had counted wrong, but he pretended to be sure of his fact. That day Benedetto had left the house since the morning, and it was a great uneasiness with us, when in the evening we saw him return dragging a monkey which he had found, he said, all chained at the foot of a tree.

“For a month the passion of the wicked child, who knew not what to imagine, was to have a monkey. A mountebank who had passed at Rogliano, and who had several of these animals whose exercises had much amused him, had no doubt inspired him with this unhappy fancy.

“—One does not find monkeys in our woods, I said to him, and above all chained monkeys; confess to me then how you procured this one.

“Benedetto maintained his lie, and accompanied it with details which did more honor to his imagination than to his truthfulness; I grew irritated, he began to laugh; I threatened him, he took two steps backward.

“—You cannot beat me, he said, you have not the right, you are not my father.

“We never knew who had revealed to him this fatal secret, which we had however hidden from him with so much care; be that as it may, this reply, in which the child revealed himself wholly, almost terrified me, my raised arm fell indeed without touching the guilty one; the child triumphed, and this victory gave him such audacity that from that moment all the money of Assunta, whose love seemed to increase for him as he was less worthy of it, passed into caprices she knew not how to combat, into follies she had not the courage to prevent. When I was at Rogliano, things went still tolerably well; but as soon as I was gone, it was Benedetto who had become master of the house, and all turned to ill. Aged scarcely eleven years, all his comrades were chosen among young men of eighteen or twenty, the worst subjects of Bastia and Corte, and already, for some mischievous tricks which merited a more serious name, justice had given us warnings.

“I was frightened; any information could have fatal consequences: I was just about to be forced to withdraw from Corsica for an important expedition. I reflected long, and, in the presentiment of avoiding some misfortune, I decided to take Benedetto with me. I hoped that the active and hard life of a smuggler, the severe discipline of the vessel, would change this character ready to corrupt itself, if it were not already frightfully corrupted.

“I drew Benedetto aside then and made him the proposition to follow me, surrounding this proposition with all the promises which can seduce a child of twelve years.

“He let me go to the end, and when I had finished, bursting with laughter:

“—Are you mad, my uncle? said he (he called me thus when he was in good humor); I change the life I lead for that you lead, my good and excellent idleness for the horrible work you have imposed on yourself! pass the night in the cold, the day in the heat; hide continually; when one shows oneself receive musket-shots, and all that to gain a little money! Money, I have as much as I want! mother Assunta gives me some when I ask her. You see then well that I should be an imbecile if I accepted what you propose to me.

“I was stupefied at this audacity and this reasoning. Benedetto returned to play with his comrades, and I saw him from afar showing me to them as an idiot.”

“Charming child!” murmured Monte Cristo.

“Oh! if he had been mine,” answered Bertuccio, “if he had been my son, or at least my nephew, I should have well brought him back to the right path, for conscience gives strength. But the idea that I was going to beat a child whose father I had killed made all correction impossible for me. I gave good advice to my sister, who, in our discussions, continually took the defense of the little wretch, and as she confessed to me that several times fairly considerable sums had been missing to her, I indicated to her a place where she could hide our little treasure. As for me, my resolution was taken. Benedetto knew perfectly how to read, write and count, for when he wished to apply himself by chance to work, he learned in a day what others learned in a week. My resolution, I say, was taken; I was to engage him as secretary on some long-course vessel, and, without warning him of anything, have him taken one fine morning and transported on board; in this way, and by recommending him to the captain, all his future depended on himself. This plan arranged, I left for France.

“All our operations were to be executed this time in the gulf of Lion, and these operations became more and more difficult, for we were in 1829. Tranquillity was perfectly re-established, and consequently the service of the coasts had become more regular and more severe than ever. This surveillance was still momentarily increased by the fair of Beaucaire, which had just opened.

“The beginnings of our expedition were executed without hindrance. We moored our boat, which had a double bottom in which we hid our contraband merchandise, amid a quantity of boats which bordered the two banks of the Rhône, from Beaucaire to Arles. Arrived there, we began to unload nightly our prohibited merchandise, and to pass it into the city by means of the people who were in relations with us, or the innkeepers at whose houses we made deposits. Whether success had rendered us imprudent, or we were betrayed, one evening, toward five o’clock in the afternoon, as we were about to sit down to our draught of wine, our little cabin-boy ran up quite terrified saying he had seen a squad of customs officers directing themselves toward us. It was not precisely the squad which frightened us: every instant, above all at that moment, whole companies roamed on the banks of the Rhône; but it was the precautions which, according to the child, this squad took not to be seen. In an instant we were on foot, but it was already too late; our boat, evidently the object of the search, was surrounded. Among the customs officers, I remarked some gendarmes; and, as timid at the sight of these as I was brave ordinarily at the sight of any other military body, I went down into the hold, and, slipping through a port-hole, let myself sink into the river, then swam between two waters, breathing only at long intervals, so well that I gained without being seen a trench which had just been made, and which communicated from the Rhône to the canal which runs from Beaucaire to Aigues-Mortes. Once arrived there, I was saved, for I could follow this trench without being seen. I gained then the canal without accident. It was not by chance and without premeditation that I had followed this road; I have already spoken to Your Excellency of an innkeeper of Nîmes who had established on the road from Bellegarde to Beaucaire a little hostelry.

“Yes,” said Monte Cristo, “I remember perfectly. This worthy man, if I am not mistaken, was even your associate.”

“That is it,” answered Bertuccio; “but for seven or eight years, he had ceded his establishment to a former tailor of Marseille who, after ruining himself in his trade, had wished to try to make his fortune in another. It goes without saying that the little arrangements we had made with the first proprietor were maintained with the second; it was then to this man that I counted on asking asylum.

“And how was this man called?” asked the count, who appeared to begin to take some interest in the recital of Bertuccio.

“He was called Gaspard Caderousse, he was married to a woman of the village of La Carconte, and whom we knew under no other name than that of her village; she was a poor woman attacked by marsh fever, who was going dying of languor. As for the man, he was a robust fellow of forty to forty-five years, who more than once had, in difficult circumstances, given us proofs of his presence of mind and of his courage.”

“And you say,” asked Monte Cristo, “that these things took place toward the year….”

“1829, my lord count.”

“In what month?”

“In the month of June.”

“At the beginning or the end.”

“It was the 3rd in the evening.”

“Ah!” said Monte Cristo, “the 3rd of June 1829… Good, continue.”

“It was then to Caderousse that I counted on asking asylum; but, as usual, and even in ordinary circumstances, we did not enter at his house by the door opening on the road, I resolved not to derogate from this custom, I straddled the garden hedge, I glided creeping through the stunted olives and wild fig-trees, and gained, in fear that Caderousse might have some traveler in his inn, a kind of loft in which more than once I had passed the night as well as in the best bed. This loft was separated from the common room on the ground floor of the inn only by a partition of planks in which openings had been made for our convenience, so that from there we could watch for the opportune moment to make known that we were in the neighborhood. I counted, if Caderousse were alone, to warn him of my arrival, finish at his house the meal interrupted by the appearance of the customs officers, and profit by the storm which was preparing to regain the banks of the Rhône and assure myself of what had become of the boat and those who manned it. I glided then into the loft and well for me it was, for at that very moment Caderousse was re-entering his house with a stranger.

“I held myself still and waited, not with the intention of surprising the secrets of my host, but because I could do otherwise; besides, ten times the same thing had already happened.

“The man who accompanied Caderousse was evidently a stranger to the South of France: he was one of those itinerant merchants who come to sell jewels at the fair of Beaucaire and who, during the month that this fair lasts, where flock merchants and buyers from all parts of Europe, sometimes do business for a hundred or a hundred fifty thousand francs.

“Caderousse entered briskly and first. Then seeing the lower room empty as usual and simply guarded by his dog, he called his wife.

“—Ho! la Carconte, said he, that worthy priest had not deceived us; the diamond was good.

“A joyful exclamation was heard, and almost immediately the stair creaked under a step made heavy by weakness and disease.

“—What do you say? asked the woman paler than a dead woman.

“—I say that the diamond was good, that here is monsieur, one of the first jewelers of Paris, who is ready to give us fifty thousand francs for it. Only, to be sure that the diamond is well ours, he asks that you recount to him, as I have already done, in what miraculous way the diamond fell into our hands. Meanwhile, monsieur, sit down, if you please, and as the weather is close, I am going to fetch something to refresh you.

“The jeweler was examining attentively the interior of the inn and the poverty visibly those who were about to sell him a diamond which seemed to come from a prince’s case.

“—Tell me, madame, said he, wishing no doubt to profit by the husband’s absence so that no sign on the part of the latter might influence the wife, and to see if the two accounts would tally well one with the other.

“—Eh! my God, said the woman with volubility, it is a blessing from heaven which we were far from expecting. Imagine, my dear sir, that my husband was linked in 1814 or 1815 with a sailor named Edmond Dantès: this poor lad, whom Caderousse had completely forgotten, had not forgotten him, and left him at his death the diamond you have just seen.

“—But how had he become possessor of this diamond? asked the jeweler. He had it then before entering prison?

“—No, sir, answered the woman, but in prison he made, it appears, the acquaintance of a very rich Englishman; and as in prison his chamber companion fell ill, and Dantès took the same care of him as if he had been his brother, the Englishman, on leaving captivity, left to the poor Dantès, who, less happy than he, died in prison, this diamond which he bequeathed to us in his turn at his death, and which he charged the worthy abbé who came this morning to deliver to us.

“—It is the same thing, murmured the jeweler, and, after all, the story may be true, all improbable as it seems at first. There is then only the price on which we are not agreed.

“—How! not agreed, said Caderousse; I thought you had consented to the price I asked for it.

“—That is to say, resumed the jeweler, that I offered forty thousand francs.

“—Forty thousand! cried la Carconte; we shall certainly not give it for that price. The abbé told us it was worth fifty thousand francs, and without the setting still.

“—And how was this abbé called? asked the indefatigable questioner.

“—The Abbé Busoni, answered the woman.

“—He was then a foreigner?

“—He was an Italian from the environs of Mantua, I believe.

“—Show me this diamond, resumed the jeweler, that I may see it a second time; often one judges stones badly at first sight.”

“Caderousse drew from his pocket a little case of black shagreen, opened it and passed it to the jeweler. At the sight of the diamond, which was as large as a small hazel-nut, I remember it as if I still saw it, the eyes of la Carconte sparkled with cupidity.”

“And what did you think of all that, Mr. listener at doors?” asked Monte Cristo; “did you give faith to this fine fable?”

“Yes, Excellency; I did not regard Caderousse as a wicked man, and I believed him incapable of having committed a crime or even a theft.”

“That does more honor to your heart than to your experience, Mr. Bertuccio. Had you known this Edmond Dantès of whom he spoke?”

“No, Excellency; I had never heard speak of him until then, and I have never heard speak of him again since but once by the Abbé Busoni himself, when I saw him in the prisons of Nîmes.”

“Good! continue.”

“The jeweler took the ring from Caderousse’s hands, and drew from his pocket a little steel pincers and a little pair of brass balances; then, loosening the gold clasps which held the stone in the ring, he made the diamond come out of its socket, and weighed it minutely in the balances.

“—I will go as far as forty-five thousand francs, said he, but I will not give a sou more; besides, as that was what the diamond was worth, I have taken just that sum on me.

“—Oh! never mind that, said Caderousse, I will return with you to Beaucaire to seek the other five thousand francs.

“—No, said the jeweler returning the ring and the diamond to Caderousse; no, it is not worth more, and yet I am sorry to have offered that sum, seeing that there is in the stone a flaw which I had not seen at first; but no matter, I have but one word, I said forty-five thousand francs, I do not go back on it.

“—At least put the diamond back in the ring, said la Carconte sharply.

“—That is just, said the jeweler.

“And he replaced the stone in the bezel.

“—Good, good, good, said Caderousse putting the case back in his pocket, it will be sold to another.

“—Yes, resumed the jeweler, but another will not be as easy as I; another will not content himself with the information you have given me; it is not natural that a man like you possess a diamond of fifty thousand francs; he will go warn the magistrates, it will be necessary to find the Abbé Busoni again, and abbés who give diamonds of two thousand louis are rare; justice will begin by laying hands on it, they will send you to prison, and if you are recognized innocent, that they let you out after three or four months of captivity, the ring will have got lost in the clerk’s office, or they will give you a false stone which will be worth three francs instead of a diamond worth fifty thousand, fifty-five thousand perhaps, but which, you will agree, my brave man, one runs certain risks in buying.”

“Caderousse and his wife interrogated each other with a look.

“—No, said Caderousse, we are not rich enough to lose five thousand francs.

“—As you wish, my dear friend, said the jeweler; I had however, as you see, brought fine money.

“And he drew from one of his pockets a handful of gold which he made shine before the dazzled eyes of the innkeeper, and, from the other, a packet of bank-bills.

“A rude combat was visibly delivered in the mind of Caderousse: it was evident that this little shagreen case which he turned and returned in his hand did not seem to him to correspond in value to the enormous sum which fascinated his eyes. He turned toward his wife.

“—What say you of it? he asked her very low.

“—Give, give, said she; if he returns to Beaucaire without the diamond, he will denounce us! and, as he says, who knows if we shall ever be able to lay hand again on the Abbé Busoni.

“—Well, be it, said Caderousse, take then the diamond for forty-five thousand francs; but my wife wants a gold chain, and I a pair of silver buckles.

“The jeweler drew from his pocket a long flat box which contained several samples of the objects asked for.

“—Here, said he, I am round in business; choose.

“The woman chose a gold chain which might be worth five louis, and the husband a pair of buckles which might be worth fifteen francs.

“—I hope you will not complain, said the jeweler.

“—The abbé had said it was worth fifty thousand francs, murmured Caderousse.

“—Come, come, give then! What a terrible man! resumed the jeweler drawing the diamond from his hands, I count him forty-five thousand francs, two thousand five hundred livres of rent, that is to say a fortune such as I should like well to have one, I, and he is not yet content.

“—And the forty-five thousand francs, asked Caderousse in a raucous voice; come, where are they?

“—There they are, said the jeweler.

“And he counted on the table fifteen thousand francs in gold and thirty thousand francs in bank-bills.

“—Wait that I light the lamp, said la Carconte, it is no longer light enough, and one might make a mistake.

“Indeed, night had come during this discussion, and, with the night, the storm which had been threatening for half an hour. One heard the thunder roll sullenly in the distance; but neither the jeweler, nor Caderousse, nor la Carconte, seemed to occupy themselves with it, all three being possessed by the demon of gain. Myself, I experienced a strange fascination at the sight of all this gold and all these bills. It seemed to me that I was dreaming, and, as happens in a dream, I felt myself chained to my place.

“Caderousse counted and recounted the gold and the bills, then he passed them to his wife, who counted and recounted them in her turn.

“During this time, the jeweler made the diamond sparkle under the rays of the lamp, and the diamond threw flashes which made him forget those which, precursors of the storm, began to inflame the windows.

“—Well, is the count right? asked the jeweler.

“—Yes, said Caderousse; give the pocket-book and seek a bag, Carconte.

“La Carconte went to a cupboard and came back bringing an old leather pocket-book, from which one drew some greasy letters in place of which one put the bills, and a bag in which were locked two or three crowns of six livres, which probably composed the whole fortune of the miserable household.

“—There, said Caderousse, though you have perhaps raised us some ten thousand francs, will you sup with us? it is with good heart.

“—Thanks, said the jeweler, it must be getting late, and I must return to Beaucaire; my wife would be uneasy”; he drew his watch. “Zounds! he cried, nearly nine o’clock, I shall not be at Beaucaire before midnight. Adieu, my little children; if by chance there come back to you some Busoni abbés, think of me.

“—In eight days, you will no longer be at Beaucaire, said Caderousse, since the fair ends next week.

“—No, but that does nothing; write to me at Paris, to M. Joannès, at the Palais-Royal, galerie de Pierre, No. 45, I will make the journey expressly if it is worth the while.

“A clap of thunder resounded, accompanied by a flash so violent that it almost effaced the light of the lamp.

“—Oh! oh! said Caderousse, you are going to leave in such weather?

“—Oh! I have no fear of thunder, said the jeweler.

“—And of thieves? asked la Carconte. The road is never very safe during the fair.

“—Oh! as for thieves, said Joannès, here is for them.

“And he drew from his pocket a pair of little pistols loaded to the muzzle.

“—Here, said he, are dogs which bark and bite at the same time: that is for the first two who might have a mind to your diamond, father Caderousse.

“Caderousse and his wife exchanged a dark look. It appeared that they had at the same time some terrible thought.

“—Then, good journey! said Caderousse.

“—Thanks! said the jeweler.

“He took his cane which he had placed against an old buffet, and went out. At the moment when he opened the door, such a gust of wind entered that it nearly extinguished the lamp.

“—Oh! said he, it is going to be fine weather, and two leagues of country to do in such weather!

“—Stay, said Caderousse, you will sleep here.

“—Yes, stay, said la Carconte in a trembling voice, we will take good care of you.

“—No indeed, I must go sleep at Beaucaire. Adieu.”

“Caderousse went slowly to the threshold.

“—It is neither sky nor earth, said the jeweler already outside the house. Must one take to the right or to the left?

“—To the right, said Caderousse; there is no mistaking, the road is bordered with trees on each side.

“—Good, I have it, said the voice almost lost in the distance.

“—Shut the door then, said la Carconte, I do not like open doors when it thunders.

“—And when there is money in the house, is it not? said Caderousse giving a double turn to the lock.

“He re-entered, went to the cupboard, drew out the bag and the pocket-book, and both set themselves to recount for the third time their gold and their bills. I have never seen expression like to those two faces which this meager lamp illuminated with cupidity. The woman above all was hideous; the feverish trembling which habitually animated her had redoubled. Her pale face had become livid; her hollow eyes flamed.

“—Why then, asked she in a muffled voice, had you offered him to sleep here?

“—But, answered Caderousse shuddering, for… for that he might not have the trouble of returning to Beaucaire.

“—Ah! said the woman with an expression impossible to render, I thought it was for something else, I.

“—Woman! woman! cried Caderousse, why have you such ideas, and why having them do you not keep them to yourself?

“—All the same, said la Carconte after an instant of silence, you are not a man.

“—How so? said Caderousse.

“—If you had been a man, he would not have gone out.

“—Woman!

“—Or else he would not arrive at Beaucaire.

“—Woman!

“—The road makes a bend and he is obliged to follow the road, whereas along the canal there is a path which shortens.

“—Woman, you offend the Good God. Hark….

“Indeed, one heard a frightful clap of thunder at the same time that a bluish flash inflamed the whole room, and the thunder, decreasing slowly, seemed to withdraw as regretfully from the accursed house.

“—Jesus! said la Carconte crossing herself.

“At the same instant, and in the midst of that silence of terror which usually follows claps of thunder, one heard knock at the door.

“Caderousse and his wife started and looked at each other terrified.

“—Who goes there? cried Caderousse rising and gathering into a single heap the gold and bills scattered on the table and which he covered with his two hands.

“—Me! said a voice.

“—Who, you?

“—And pardieu! Joannès the jeweler.

“—Well, what did you say then, resumed la Carconte with a frightful smile, that I offended the Good God!… Behold the Good God who sends him back to us.

“Caderousse fell back pale and panting on his chair. La Carconte, on the contrary, rose, and went with a firm step to the door which she opened.

“—Come in, dear M. Joannès, said she.

“—My faith, said the jeweler streaming with rain, it seems the devil does not wish that I return to Beaucaire this evening. The shortest follies are the best, my dear M. Caderousse; you offered me hospitality, I accept it and return to sleep at your house.”

Caderousse stammered some words wiping the sweat which ran on his forehead. La Carconte reclosed the door with a double turn behind the jeweler.

“Stories of the world, in your language.”