The Count of Monte Cristo. Alexandre Dumas
we may enjoy it without remorse.”
“And you say this treasure amounts to———”
“Two millions of Roman crowns; nearly thirteen millions of our money.”
“Impossible!” said Dantès, staggered at the enormous amount.
“Impossible! and why?” asked the old man. “The Spada family was one of the oldest and most powerful families of the fifteenth century; and in these times, when all speculation and occupation were wanting, those accumulations of gold and jewels were by no means rare; there are at this day Roman families perishing of hunger, though possessed of nearly a million in diamonds and jewels, handed down as heirlooms, and which they cannot touch.”
Edmond thought he was in a dream—he wavered between incredulity and joy.
“I have only kept this secret so long from you,” continued Faria, “that I might prove you, and then surprise you. Had we escaped before my attack of catalepsy, I should have conducted you to Monte Cristo; now,” he added, with a sigh, “it is you who will conduct me thither. Well! Dantès, you do not thank me?”
“This treasure belongs to you, my dear friend,” replied Dantès, “and to you only. I have no right to it. I am no relation of yours.”
“You are my son, Dantès,” exclaimed the old man. “You are the child of my captivity. My profession condemns me to celibacy. God has sent you to me to console, at one and the same time, the man who could not be a father and the prisoner who could not get free.”
And Faria extended the arm of which alone the use remained to him to the young man, who threw himself upon his neck and wept bitterly.
NOW THAT THIS treasure which had so long been the object of the abbé’s meditations could ensure the future happiness of him whom Faria really loved as a son, it had doubled its value in his eyes, and every day he expatiated on the amount, explaining to Dantès all the good which with thirteen or fourteen millions of francs a man could do in these days to his friends; and then Dantès’ countenance became gloomy, for the oath of vengeance he had taken recurred to his memory, and he reflected how much ill in these times a man with thirteen or fourteen millions could do to his enemies.
The abbé did not know the Isle of Monte Cristo, but Dantès knew it, and had often passed it, situated twenty-five miles from Pianosa, between Corsica and the Isle of Elba, and had once touched at it. This island was, always had been, and still is, completely deserted. It is a rock of almost conical form, which seems as though produced by some volcanic effort from the depth to the surface of the ocean.
Dantès traced a plan of the island to Faria, and Faria gave Dantès advice as to the means he should employ to recover the treasure.
But Dantès was far from being as enthusiastic and confident as the old man. It was past a question now that Faria was not a lunatic, and the way in which he had achieved the discovery, which had given rise to the suspicion of his madness, increased his admiration of him; but at the same time he could not believe that that deposit, supposing it had ever existed, still existed, and though he considered the treasure as by no means chimerical, he yet believed it was no longer there.
However, as if fate resolved on depriving the prisoners of their last chance, and making them understand that they were condemned to perpetual imprisonment, a new misfortune befell them; the gallery on the seaside, which had long been in ruins, was rebuilt. They had repaired it completely, and stopped up, with vast masses of stone, the hole Dantès had partly filled in. But for this precaution, which it will be remembered the abbé had made to Edmond, the misfortune would have been still greater, for their attempt to escape would have been detected, and they would undoubtedly have been separated. Thus, a fresh and even stronger door was closed upon them.
“You see,” said the young man, with an air of sorrowful resignation, to Faria, “that God deems it right to take from me even what you call my devotion to you. I have promised you to remain for ever with you, and now I could not break my promise if I would. I shall no more have the treasure than you, and neither of us will quit this prison. But my real treasure is not that, my dear friend, which awaits me beneath the sombre rocks of Monte Cristo, but it is your presence, our living together five or six hours a day, in spite of our gaolers; it is those rays of intelligence you have elicited from my brain, the languages you have implanted in my memory, and which spring there with all their philological ramifications. These different sciences that you have made so easy to me by the depth of the knowledge you possess of them, and the clearness of the principles to which you have reduced them,—this is my treasure, my beloved friend, and with this you have made me rich and happy. Believe me, and take comfort, this is better for me than tons of gold and cases of diamonds, even were they not as problematical as the clouds we see in the morning floating over the sea which we take for terra firma, and which evaporate and vanish as we draw near to them. To have you as long as possible near me, to hear your eloquent voice which I trust embellishes my mind, strengthens my soul, and makes my whole frame capable of great and terrible things, if I should ever be free, so fills my whole existence, that the despair to which I was just on the point of yielding when I knew you, has no longer any hold over me: and this—this is my fortune—not chimerical but actual. I owe you my real good, my present happiness; and all the sovereigns of the earth, were they Cæsar Borgias, could not deprive me of this.”
Thus, if not actually happy, yet the days these two unfortunates passed together went quickly. Faria, who for so long a time had kept silence as to the treasure, now perpetually talked of it. As he had said, he remained paralysed in the right arm and the left leg, and had given up all hope of ever enjoying it himself. But he was continually thinking over some means of escape for his young companion, and he enjoyed it for him. For fear the letter might be some day lost or abstracted, he compelled Dantès to learn it by heart, and he thus knew it from one end to the other.
Then he destroyed the second portion, assured that if the first were seized, no one would be able to penetrate its real meaning. Whole hours sometimes passed whilst Faria was giving instructions to Dantès—instructions which were to serve him when he was at liberty. Then, once free, from the day and hour and moment when he was so, he could have but one only thought, which was, to gain Monte Cristo by some means, and remain there alone under some pretext which would give no suspicions, and once there to endeavour to find the wonderful caverns, and search in the appointed spot. The appointed spot, be it remembered, being the farthest angle in the second opening.
In the meanwhile the hours passed, if not rapidly, at least tolerably. Faria, as we have said, without having recovered the use of his hand and foot, had resumed all the clearness of his understanding; and had gradually, besides the moral instructions we have detailed taught his youthful companion the patient and sublime duty of a prisoner, who learns to make something from nothing. They were thus perpetually employed. Faria, that he might not see himself grow old; Dantès, for fear of recalling the almost extinct past which now only floated in his memory like a distant light wandering in the night. All went on as if in existences in which misfortune has deranged nothing, and which glide on mechanically and tranquilly beneath the eye of Providence.
But beneath this superficial calm there were in the heart of the young man, and, perhaps, in that of the old man, many repressed desires, many stifled sighs, which found vent when Faria was left alone, and when Edmond returned to his cell.
One night Edmond awoke suddenly, believing he heard some one calling him.
He opened his eyes and tried to pierce through the gloom.
His name, or rather a plaintive voice, which essayed to pronounce his name, reached him.
“Alas!” murmured Edmond, “can it be?”
He moved his bed, drew up the stone, rushed into the passage, and reached the opposite extremity; the secret entrance was open.
By the light of the wretched and wavering lamp, of which we have spoken,