LXXXVIII. L'insulte.

LXXXVIII

The Insult.

At the banker's door, Beauchamp stopped Morcerf.

"Listen," he said to him, "just now, at M. Danglars's, I told you that it was of M. de Monte-Cristo you must ask an explanation?"

"Yes, and we are going to him."

"A moment, Morcerf; before going to the count's, reflect."

"On what would you have me reflect?"

"On the gravity of the step."

"Is it graver than going to M. Danglars's?"

"Yes; M. Danglars was a man of money, and you know that men of money know too well the capital they risk to fight easily. The other, on the contrary, is a gentleman, at least in appearance; but do you not fear, beneath the gentleman, to meet the bravo?"

"I fear but one thing, that of finding a man who will not fight."

"Oh! be easy," said Beauchamp, "that one will fight. I even fear one thing, that he will fight too well; take care!"

"Friend," said Morcerf with a fine smile, "that is what I ask; and the happiest thing that could happen to me is to be killed for my father: that will save us all."

"Your mother will die of it!"

"Poor mother!" said Albert, passing his hand over his eyes, "I know it well; but better she should die of that than die of shame."

"Are you quite decided, Albert?"

"Yes."

"Go then! But do you think we shall find him?"

"He was to return a few hours after me, and certainly he will have returned."

They went up, and had themselves driven to number 30, Avenue des Champs-Élysées.

Beauchamp wished to go down alone, but Albert observed to him that this affair, being out of the ordinary rules, permitted him to depart from the etiquette of the duel.

The young man acted in all this for so holy a cause, that Beauchamp had nothing else to do but yield to all his wishes: he therefore gave in to Morcerf and contented himself with following him.

Albert sprang from the porter's lodge to the threshold in a single bound. It was Baptistin who received him.

The count had indeed just arrived, but he was in the bath, and had forbidden receiving anyone in the world.

"But, after the bath?" asked Morcerf.

"Monsieur will dine."

"And after dinner?"

"Monsieur will sleep an hour."

"Then?"

"Then he will go to the Opera."

"Are you sure of it?" asked Albert.

"Perfectly sure; monsieur has ordered his horses for eight o'clock precisely."

"Very well," replied Albert, "that is all I wished to know."

Then, turning toward Beauchamp:

"If you have anything to do, Beauchamp, do it at once; if you have an engagement this evening, put it off till tomorrow. You understand that I count on you to go to the Opera. If you can, bring me Château-Renaud."

Beauchamp took advantage of the permission and left Albert after promising to come for him at a quarter to eight.

Back at his own house, Albert informed Franz, Debray, and Morrel of his wish to see them that very evening at the Opera.

Then he went to visit his mother, who, since the events of the previous day, had ordered her door shut and kept to her room. He found her in bed, crushed by the grief of that public humiliation.

The sight of Albert produced on Mercédès the effect that might be expected; she pressed her son's hand and burst into sobs. These tears, however, relieved her.

Albert remained for an instant standing and mute near his mother's face. One could see, by his pale countenance and knit brows, that his resolution of vengeance was blunting more and more in his heart.

"Mother," asked Albert, "do you know any enemy of M. de Morcerf?"

Mercédès trembled; she had noticed that the young man had not said: of my father.

"My friend," said she, "people in the count's position have many enemies they do not know. Besides, the enemies one knows are not, as you know, the most dangerous."

"Yes, I know that, and therefore I appeal to all your discernment. Mother, you are so superior a woman that nothing escapes you!"

"Why do you say that to me?"

"Because you had noticed, for example, that on the evening of the ball we gave, M. de Monte-Cristo would take nothing in our house."

Mercédès, raising herself all trembling on her fever-burned arm:

"M. de Monte-Cristo!" she cried, "and what relation would that have with the question you ask me?"

"You know, mother, M. de Monte-Cristo is almost an Oriental, and Orientals, to keep full liberty of vengeance, never eat or drink with their enemies."

"M. de Monte-Cristo, our enemy, do you say, Albert?" resumed Mercédès, growing paler than the sheet that covered her. "Who told you that? why? You are mad, Albert. M. de Monte-Cristo has had for us nothing but politeness. M. de Monte-Cristo saved your life; it is you yourself who presented him to us. Oh! I beg you, my son, if you had such an idea, dismiss it; and if I have a recommendation to make to you, I would say more, if I have a prayer to address to you, keep well with him."

"Mother," replied the young man with a dark look, "you have your reasons for telling me to spare this man."

"I!" cried Mercédès, blushing with the same rapidity with which she had paled, and becoming almost immediately paler still than before.

"Yes, no doubt, and that reason, is it not," resumed Albert, "that this man can do us no harm?"

Mercédès shuddered; and fixing on her son a searching glance:

"You speak strangely to me," said she to Albert, "and you have singular prejudices, it seems to me. What then has the count done to you? Three days ago you were with him in Normandy; three days ago I looked at him and you looked at him yourself as your best friend."

An ironical smile passed over Albert's lips. Mercédès saw that smile, and with her double instinct of woman and mother she guessed all; but, prudent and strong, she hid her trouble and her tremblings.

Albert let the conversation drop; at the end of an instant the countess renewed it.

"You came to ask me how I was," said she, "I will answer you frankly, my friend, that I do not feel well. You should install yourself here, Albert; you would keep me company; I need not to be alone."

"Mother," said the young man, "I should be at your orders, and you know with what happiness, if a pressing and important affair did not force me to leave you all the evening."

"Ah! very well," replied Mercédès with a sigh, "go, Albert, I will not make you a slave to your filial piety."

Albert pretended not to hear, bowed to his mother, and went out. Scarcely had the young man closed the door than Mercédès called a trusted servant and ordered him to follow Albert wherever he should go during the evening, and to come report it to her instantly.

Then she rang for her maid, and, feeble as she was, had herself dressed to be ready for any event.

The mission given to the lackey was not difficult to execute. Albert returned home and dressed himself with a sort of severe care. At ten minutes to eight Beauchamp arrived: he had seen Château-Renaud, who had promised to be at the orchestra before the curtain rose.

Both got into Albert's coupé, who, having no reason to hide where he was going, said aloud:

"To the Opera!"

In his impatience, he had anticipated the rising of the curtain. Château-Renaud was at his stall: forewarned of all by Beauchamp, Albert had no explanation to give him. The conduct of this son seeking to avenge his father was so simple, that Château-Renaud did not attempt to dissuade him in any way, and contented himself with renewing to him the assurance that he was at his disposal.

Debray had not yet arrived, but Albert knew he rarely missed an Opera performance. Albert wandered in the theatre until the curtain rose. He hoped to meet Monte-Cristo, either in the corridor or on the stairs. The bell called him to his seat, and he came to sit in the orchestra, between Château-Renaud and Beauchamp.

But his eyes never left that between-columns box which, during the whole of the first act, seemed obstinately to remain closed.

At length, as Albert, for the hundredth time, consulted his watch, at the beginning of the second act, the door of the box opened, and Monte-Cristo, dressed in black, entered and leaned on the rail to look into the house; Morrel followed him, seeking his sister and brother-in-law with his eyes. He caught sight of them in a box on the second tier, and made them a sign.

The count, casting his circular glance over the house, perceived a pale face and flashing eyes which seemed avidly to draw his gaze; he well recognized Albert, but the expression he remarked on that troubled face no doubt advised him not to have recognized him. Without then making any movement that betrayed his thought, he sat down, drew his opera-glass from its case, and looked through it in another direction.

But, without seeming to see Albert, the count never lost sight of him, and, when the curtain fell at the end of the second act, his infallible and sure glance followed the young man leaving the orchestra accompanied by his two friends.

Then, the same head reappeared at the panes of a front box, opposite his own. The count felt the storm coming toward him, and when he heard the key turn in the lock of his box, though he was at that very moment speaking to Morrel with his most smiling face, the count knew what to expect, and he had prepared himself for all.

The door opened.

Only then did Monte-Cristo turn and perceive Albert, livid and trembling; behind him were Beauchamp and Château-Renaud.

"Why!" he cried, with that kindly politeness which usually distinguished his greeting from the banal civilities of the world, "here is my cavalier arrived at his goal! Good evening, M. de Morcerf."

And the face of this man, so singularly master of himself, expressed the most perfect cordiality.

Morrel then alone recalled the letter he had received from the viscount, in which, without other explanation, the latter begged him to be at the Opera; and he understood that something terrible was about to happen.

"We do not come here to exchange hypocritical politenesses or false semblances of friendship," said the young man; "we come to demand an explanation of you, monsieur le comte."

The young man's trembling voice could hardly pass between his clenched teeth.

"An explanation at the Opera?" said the count with that calm tone and that penetrating glance by which one recognizes, in this double character, the man eternally sure of himself. "Little familiar as I am with Parisian habits, I should not have thought, monsieur, that this was where explanations were asked."

"However, when people have themselves concealed," said Albert, "when one cannot reach them under pretext that they are in the bath, at table, or in bed, one must address oneself where one meets them."

"I am not difficult to meet," said Monte-Cristo, "for yesterday still, monsieur, if I remember well, you were at my house."

"Yesterday, monsieur," said the young man, whose head was becoming confused, "I was at your house because I did not know who you were."

And in pronouncing these words, Albert had raised his voice so that the persons placed in the neighboring boxes might hear him, as well as those passing in the corridor. Thus the persons in the boxes turned round, and those in the corridor stopped behind Beauchamp and Château-Renaud at the noise of this altercation.

"Where do you come from then, monsieur?" said Monte-Cristo without the least apparent emotion. "You do not seem to enjoy your good sense."

"Provided I understand your perfidies, monsieur, and that I succeed in making you understand that I mean to avenge myself, I shall be reasonable enough," said Albert furiously.

"Monsieur, I do not understand you," replied Monte-Cristo, "and, even if I understood you, you would still be speaking too loud. I am here in my own house, monsieur, and I alone have the right to raise my voice above the others. Leave, monsieur!"

And Monte-Cristo pointed to the door for Albert with an admirable gesture of command.

"Ah! I shall soon make you leave your house!" rejoined Albert, crushing in his convulsive hands his glove, which the count did not lose sight of.

"Good, good!" said Monte-Cristo phlegmatically; "you are picking a quarrel with me, monsieur; I see that; but a piece of advice, vicomte, and bear it well in mind: it is a bad custom to make a noise in provoking. Noise does not become everyone, M. de Morcerf."

At this name, a murmur of astonishment passed like a shiver among the hearers of this scene. Since the day before, the name of Morcerf had been on every lip.

Albert better than all, and first of all, understood the allusion, and made a gesture to fling his glove in the count's face; but Morrel seized his wrist, while Beauchamp and Château-Renaud, fearing the scene might pass the limit of a provocation, held him from behind.

But Monte-Cristo, without rising, inclining his chair, merely extended his hand, and seizing between the young man's clenched fingers the damp and crushed glove:

"Monsieur," he said with a terrible accent, "I hold your glove as thrown, and I will send it back to you rolled round a bullet. Now, leave my house, or I call my servants and have you thrown out at the door."

Drunk, bewildered, his eyes bloodshot, Albert drew back two steps.

Morrel took advantage of it to close the door.

Monte-Cristo took up his opera-glass again and resumed looking through it, as if nothing extraordinary had just happened.

This man had a heart of bronze and a face of marble. Morrel leaned to his ear.

"What have you done to him?" said he.

"I? nothing, personally at least," said Monte-Cristo.

"Yet this strange scene must have a cause?"

"The adventure of the Count of Morcerf exasperates the unhappy young man."

"Have you any part in it?"

"It is through Haydée that the Chamber was informed of his father's treason."

"Indeed," said Morrel, "I was told, but I had not wished to believe it, that this Greek slave I saw with you here, in this very box, was the daughter of Ali-Pacha."

"It is the truth, however."

"Oh! my God!" said Morrel, "I understand it all then, and this scene was premeditated."

"How so?"

"Yes, Albert wrote to me to be at the opera this evening; it was to make me witness the insult he meant to offer you."

"Probably," said Monte-Cristo with his imperturbable tranquillity.

"But what will you do with him?"

"With whom?"

"With Albert!"

"With Albert?" resumed Monte-Cristo in the same tone; "what I shall do with him, Maximilien? As true as you are here and as I press your hand, I shall kill him tomorrow before ten o'clock in the morning. That is what I shall do with him."

Morrel, in his turn, took Monte-Cristo's hand in both of his, and he trembled in feeling that cold and calm hand.

"Ah! count," said he, "his father loves him so!"

"Do not tell me such things!" cried Monte-Cristo with the first movement of anger he seemed to feel; "I should make him suffer!"

Morrel, stupefied, let fall Monte-Cristo's hand.

"Count! count!" said he.

"Dear Maximilien," interrupted the count, "listen to how adorably Duprez sings that phrase: _O Mathilde! idol of my soul._ See, I was the first to discover Duprez at Naples and I applauded first. Bravo! bravo!"

Morrel understood there was nothing more to say, and he waited.

The curtain, which had risen at the end of Albert's scene, fell again almost immediately. There was a knock at the door.

"Come in," said Monte-Cristo, without his voice betraying the least emotion.

Beauchamp appeared.

"Good evening, M. Beauchamp," said Monte-Cristo, as if he saw the journalist for the first time that evening; "pray sit down."

Beauchamp bowed, entered, and sat.

"Monsieur," he said to Monte-Cristo, "I was just now accompanying, as you may have seen, M. de Morcerf."

"Which means," resumed Monte-Cristo laughing, "that you probably have just dined together. I am glad to see, M. Beauchamp, that you are more sober than he."

"Monsieur," said Beauchamp, "Albert had, I confess, the fault of losing his temper, and I come on my own account to offer you apologies. Now that my apologies are made, mine, understand, M. le comte, I come to tell you that I believe you too much a man of honor to refuse to give me some explanation as to your relations with the people of Janina; then I shall add two words on this young Greek."

Monte-Cristo made with lip and eye a little gesture commanding silence.

"Come!" added he, laughing, "there are all my hopes destroyed."

"How so?" asked Beauchamp.

"Doubtless, you hasten to give me a reputation for eccentricity: I am, according to you, a Lara, a Manfred, a Lord Ruthwen; then, the moment of seeing me eccentric past, you spoil your type, you try to make of me a commonplace man. You want me common, vulgar; you ask me for explanations in short. Come, come! M. Beauchamp, you are joking."

"However," resumed Beauchamp with haughtiness, "there are occasions when probity commands..."

"M. Beauchamp," interrupted the strange man, "what commands M. le Comte de Monte-Cristo is M. le Comte de Monte-Cristo. Thus not a word of all that, if you please. I do what I will, M. Beauchamp, and, believe me, it is always very well done."

"Monsieur," replied the young man, "honest men are not paid with that coin; honor requires guarantees."

"Monsieur, I am a living guarantee," resumed Monte-Cristo impassive, but whose eyes kindled with threatening flashes. "We have both in our veins blood we are willing to shed; that is our mutual guarantee. Carry that answer to the viscount, and tell him that tomorrow, before ten o'clock, I shall have seen the color of his."

"There remains for me then," said Beauchamp, "but to settle the arrangements of the combat."

"That is perfectly indifferent to me, monsieur," said the Count of Monte-Cristo; "it was therefore useless to come disturb me at the spectacle for so little. In France, one fights with the sword or pistol; in the colonies, one takes the carbine; in Arabia, one has the dagger. Tell your client that, though insulted to be eccentric to the end, I leave him the choice of weapons, and that I accept all without discussion, without contest; all, understand you well? all, even the combat by way of lot, which is always stupid. But I, it is another thing: I am sure to win."

"Sure to win!" repeated Beauchamp, looking at the count with a startled eye.

"Eh! certainly," said Monte-Cristo, slightly shrugging his shoulders. "Without that I should not fight with M. de Morcerf. I shall kill him, it must be, that will be. Only, by a word this evening at my house, indicate to me the weapon and the hour; I do not like to be kept waiting."

"Pistols, at eight in the morning in the Bois de Vincennes," said Beauchamp, disconcerted, not knowing if he had to do with a presumptuous braggart or a supernatural being.

"Very well, monsieur," said Monte-Cristo. "Now that all is settled, leave me to hear the spectacle, I pray you, and tell your friend Albert not to return this evening: he would harm himself with all his brutalities of bad taste. Let him go home and sleep."

Beauchamp went out quite astonished.

"Now," said Monte-Cristo, turning toward Morrel, "I count on you, do I not?"

"Certainly," said Morrel, "and you may dispose of me, count; however..."

"What?"

"It would be important, count, that I should know the true cause..."

"That is to say, you refuse me?"

"Not at all."

"The true cause, Morrel?" said the count; "this young man himself walks in blindness and does not know it. The true cause is known only to me and to God; but I give you my word of honor, Morrel, that God, who knows it, will be for us."

"That suffices, count," said Morrel. "Who is your second witness?"

"I know no one in Paris to whom I would do that honor but you, Morrel, and your brother-in-law Emmanuel. Do you think Emmanuel would render me this service?"

"I answer to you for him as for myself, count."

"Good! that is all I need. Tomorrow, at seven in the morning at my house, is it not?"

"We shall be there."

"Hush! here is the curtain rising, let us listen. I have the habit of not losing a note of this opera; it is such adorable music, that of _William Tell_!"}

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