The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas [some good books to read TXT] 📗

“Will you see the register at once,” asked the governor, “or proceed to the other cell?”

“Let us visit them all,” said the inspector. “If I once went up those stairs. I should never have the courage to come down again.”

“Ah, this one is not like the other, and his madness is less affecting than this one’s display of reason.”

“What is his folly?”

“He fancies he possesses an immense treasure. The first year he offered government a million of francs for his release; the second, two; the third, three; and so on progressively. He is now in his fifth year of captivity; he will ask to speak to you in private, and offer you five millions.”

“How curious!—what is his name?”

“The Abbé Faria.”

“No. 27,” said the inspector.

“It is here; unlock the door, Antoine.”

The turnkey obeyed, and the inspector gazed curiously into the chamber of the mad abbé, as the prisoner was usually called.

In the centre of the cell, in a circle traced with a fragment of plaster detached from the wall, sat a man whose tattered garments scarcely covered him. He was drawing in this circle geometrical lines, and seemed as much absorbed in his problem as Archimedes was when the soldier of Marcellus slew him. He did not move at the sound of the door, and continued his calculations until the flash of the torches lighted up with an unwonted glare the sombre walls of his cell; then, raising his head, he perceived with astonishment the number of persons present. He hastily seized the coverlet of his bed, and wrapped it round him.

“What is it you want?” said the inspector.

“I, monsieur,” replied the abbé with an air of surprise,—“I want nothing.”

“You do not understand,” continued the inspector; “I am sent here by government to visit the prison, and hear the requests of the prisoners.”

“Oh, that is different,” cried the abbé; “and we shall understand each other, I hope.”

“There, now,” whispered the governor, “it is just as I told you.”

“Monsieur,” continued the prisoner, “I am the Abbé Faria, born at Rome. I was for twenty years Cardinal Spada’s secretary; I was arrested, why, I know not, toward the beginning of the year 1811; since then I have demanded my liberty from the Italian and French government.”

“Why from the French government?”

“Because I was arrested at Piombino, and I presume that, like Milan and Florence, Piombino has become the capital of some French department.”

“Ah,” said the inspector, “you have not the latest news from Italy?”

“My information dates from the day on which I was arrested,” returned the Abbé Faria; “and as the emperor had created the kingdom of Rome for his infant son, I presume that he has realized the dream of Machiavelli and Cæsar Borgia, which was to make Italy a united kingdom.”

“Monsieur,” returned the inspector, “Providence has changed this gigantic plan you advocate so warmly.”

“It is the only means of rendering Italy strong, happy, and independent.”

“Very possibly; only I am not come to discuss politics, but to inquire if you have anything to ask or to complain of.”

“The food is the same as in other prisons,—that is, very bad; the lodging is very unhealthful, but, on the whole, passable for a dungeon; but it is not that which I wish to speak of, but a secret I have to reveal of the greatest importance.”

“We are coming to the point,” whispered the governor.

“It is for that reason I am delighted to see you,” continued the abbé, “although you have disturbed me in a most important calculation, which, if it succeeded, would possibly change Newton’s system. Could you allow me a few words in private.”

“What did I tell you?” said the governor.

“You knew him,” returned the inspector with a smile.

“What you ask is impossible, monsieur,” continued he, addressing Faria.

“But,” said the abbé, “I would speak to you of a large sum, amounting to five millions.”

“The very sum you named,” whispered the inspector in his turn.

“However,” continued Faria, seeing that the inspector was about to depart, “it is not absolutely necessary for us to be alone; the governor can be present.”

“Unfortunately,” said the governor, “I know beforehand what you are about to say; it concerns your treasures, does it not?” Faria fixed his eyes on him with an expression that would have convinced anyone else of his sanity.

“Of course,” said he; “of what else should I speak?”

“Mr. Inspector,” continued the governor, “I can tell you the story as well as he, for it has been dinned in my ears for the last four or five years.”

“That proves,” returned the abbé, “that you are like those of Holy Writ, who having eyes see not, and having ears hear not.”

“My dear sir, the government is rich and does not want your treasures,” replied the inspector; “keep them until you are liberated.” The abbé’s eyes glistened; he seized the inspector’s hand.

“But what if I am not liberated,” cried he, “and am detained here until my death? this treasure will be lost. Had not government better profit by it? I will offer six millions, and I will content myself with the rest, if they will only give me my liberty.”

“On my word,” said the inspector in a low tone, “had I not been told beforehand that this man was mad, I should believe what he says.”

“I am not mad,” replied Faria, with that acuteness of hearing peculiar to prisoners. “The treasure I speak of really exists, and I offer to sign an agreement with you, in which I promise to lead you to the spot where you shall dig; and if I deceive you, bring me here again,—I ask no more.”

The governor laughed. “Is the spot far from here?”

“A hundred leagues.”

“It is not ill-planned,” said the governor. “If all the prisoners took it into their heads to travel a hundred leagues, and their guardians consented to accompany them, they would have a capital chance of escaping.”

“The scheme is well known,” said the inspector; “and the abbé’s plan has not even the merit of originality.”

Then turning to Faria, “I inquired if you are well fed?” said he.

“Swear to me,” replied Faria, “to free me if what I tell you prove true, and I will stay here while you go to the spot.”

“Are you well fed?” repeated the inspector.

“Monsieur, you run no risk, for, as I told you, I will stay here; so there is no chance of my escaping.”

“You do not reply to my question,” replied the inspector impatiently.

“Nor you to mine,” cried the abbé. “You will not accept my gold; I will keep it for myself. You refuse me my liberty; God will give it me.” And the abbé, casting away his coverlet, resumed his place, and continued his calculations.

“What is he doing there?” said the inspector.

“Counting his treasures,” replied the governor.

Faria replied to this sarcasm with a glance of profound contempt. They went out. The turnkey closed the door behind them.

“He was wealthy once, perhaps?” said the inspector.

“Or dreamed he was, and awoke mad.”

“After all,” said the inspector, “if he had been rich, he would not have been here.”

So the matter ended for the Abbé Faria. He remained in his cell, and this visit only increased the belief in his insanity.

Caligula or Nero, those treasure-seekers, those desirers of the impossible, would have accorded to the poor wretch, in exchange for his wealth, the liberty he so earnestly prayed for. But the kings of modern times, restrained by the limits of mere probability, have neither courage nor desire. They fear the ear that hears their orders, and the eye that scrutinizes their actions. Formerly they believed themselves sprung from Jupiter, and shielded by their birth; but nowadays they are not inviolable.

It has always been against the policy of despotic governments to suffer the victims of their persecutions to reappear. As the Inquisition rarely allowed its victims to be seen with their limbs distorted and their flesh lacerated by torture, so madness is always concealed in its cell, from whence, should it depart, it is conveyed to some gloomy hospital, where the doctor has no thought for man or mind in the mutilated being the jailer delivers to him. The very madness of the Abbé Faria, gone mad in prison, condemned him to perpetual captivity.

The inspector kept his word with Dantès; he examined the register, and found the following note concerning him:

Edmond Dantès:

Violent Bonapartist; took an active part in the return from Elba.

The greatest watchfulness and care to be exercised.

This note was in a different hand from the rest, which showed that it had been added since his confinement. The inspector could not contend against this accusation; he simply wrote, Nothing to be done.

This visit had infused new vigor into Dantès; he had, till then, forgotten the date; but now, with a fragment of plaster, he wrote the date, 30th July, 1816, and made a mark every day, in order not to lose his reckoning again. Days and weeks passed away, then months—Dantès still waited; he at first expected to be freed in a fortnight. This fortnight expired, he decided that the inspector would do nothing until his return to Paris, and that he would not reach there until his circuit was finished, he therefore fixed three months; three months passed away, then six more. Finally ten months and a half had gone by and no favorable change had taken place, and Dantès began to fancy the inspector’s visit but a dream, an illusion of the brain.

At the expiration of a year the governor was transferred; he had obtained charge of the fortress at Ham. He took with him several of his subordinates, and amongst them Dantès’ jailer. A new governor arrived; it would have been too tedious to acquire the names of the prisoners; he learned their numbers instead. This horrible place contained fifty cells; their inhabitants were designated by the numbers of their cell, and the unhappy young man was no longer called Edmond Dantès—he was now number 34.

Chapter 15. Number 34 and Number 27

Dantès passed through all the stages of torture natural to