Literary Love

by Gabrielle Vigot

  “Well,” said Beauchamp, “we shall see our friend!”

  “Yes, indeed!” replied Debray. “That worthy prince. Deuce take those Italian princes!”

  “A man, too, who could boast of Dante for a genealogist, and could reckon back to the ‘Divine Comedy.’”

  “A nobility of the rope!” said Chateau-Renaud phlegmatically.

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

  “My dear fellow, I think we should ask you that question; you know such news much better than we do. Did you see the president at the minister’s last night?”

  “Yes.”

  “What did he say?”

  “Something which will surprise you.”

  “Oh, make haste and tell me, then; it is a long time since that has happened.”

  “Well, he told me that Benedetto, who is considered a serpent of subtlety and a giant of cunning, is really but a very commonplace, silly rascal, and altogether unworthy of the experiments that will be made on his phrenological organs after his death.”

  “Bah,” said Beauchamp, “he played the prince very well.”

  “Yes, for you who detest those unhappy princes, Beauchamp, and are always delighted to find fault with them; but not for me, who discover a gentleman by instinct, and who scent out an aristocratic family like a very bloodhound of heraldry.”

  “Then you never believed in the principality?”

  “Yes.—in the principality, but not in the prince.”

  “Not so bad,” said Beauchamp; “still, I assure you, he passed very well with many people; I saw him at the ministers’ houses.”

  “Ah, yes,” said Chateau-Renaud. “The idea of thinking ministers understand anything about princes!”

  “There is something in what you have just said,” said Beauchamp, laughing.

  “But,” said Debray to Beauchamp, “if I spoke to the president, you must have been with the procureur.”

  “It was an impossibility; for the last week M. de Villefort has secluded himself. It is natural enough; this strange chain of domestic afflictions, followed by the no less strange death of his daughter”—

  “Strange? What do you mean, Beauchamp?”

  “Oh, yes; do you pretend that all this has been unobserved at the minister’s?” said Beauchamp, placing his eyeglass in his eye, where he tried to make it remain.

  “My dear sir,” said Chateau-Renaud, “allow me to tell you that you do not understand that manoeuvre with the eyeglass half so well as Debray. Give him a lesson, Debray.”

  “Stay,” said Beauchamp, “surely I am not deceived.”

  “What is it?”

  “It is she!”

  “Whom do you mean?”

  “They said she had left.”

  “Mademoiselle Eugenie?” said Chateau-Renaud; “has she returned?”

  “No, but her mother.”

  “Madame Danglars? Nonsense! Impossible!” said Chateau-Renaud; “only ten days after the flight of her daughter, and three days from the bankruptcy of her husband?”

  Debray colored slightly, and followed with his eyes the direction of Beauchamp’s glance. “Come,” he said, “it is only a veiled lady, some foreign princess, perhaps the mother of Cavalcanti. But you were just speaking on a very interesting topic, Beauchamp.”

  “I?”

  “Yes; you were telling us about the extraordinary death of Valentine.”

  “Ah, yes, so I was. But how is it that Madame de Villefort is not here?”

  “Poor, dear woman,” said Debray, “she is no doubt occupied in distilling balm for the hospitals, or in making cosmetics for herself or friends. Do you know she spends two or three thousand crowns a year in this amusement? But I wonder she is not here. I should have been pleased to see her, for I like her very much.”

  “And I hate her,” said Chateau-Renaud.

  “Why?”

  “I do not know. Why do we love? Why do we hate? I detest her, from antipathy.”

  “Or, rather, by instinct.”

  “Perhaps so. But to return to what you were saying, Beauchamp.”

  “Well, do you know why they die so multitudinously at M. de Villefort’s?”

  “‘Multitudinously’ is good,” said Chateau-Renaud.

  “My good fellow, you’ll find the word in Saint-Simon.”

  “But the thing itself is at M. de Villefort’s; but let’s get back to the subject.”

  “Talking of that,” said Debray, “Madame was making inquiries about that house, which for the last three months has been hung with black.”

  “Who is Madame?” asked Chateau-Renaud.

  “The minister’s wife, pardieu!”

  “Oh, your pardon! I never visit ministers; I leave that to the princes.”

  “Really, You were only before sparkling, but now you are brilliant; take compassion on us, or, like Jupiter, you will wither us up.”

  “I will not speak again,” said Chateau-Renaud; “pray have compassion upon me, and do not take up every word I say.”

  “Come, let us endeavor to get to the end of our story, Beauchamp; I told you that yesterday Madame made inquiries of me upon the subject; enlighten me, and I will then communicate my information to her.”

  “Well, gentlemen, the reason people die so multitudinously (I like the word) at M. de Villefort’s is that there is an assassin in the house!”

  The two young men shuddered, for the same idea had more than once occurred to them. “And who is the assassin;” they asked together.

  “Young Edward!” A burst of laughter from the auditors did not in the least disconcert the speaker, who continued,—”Yes, gentlemen; Edward, the infant phenomenon, who is quite an adept in the art of killing.”

  “You are jesting.”

  “Not at all. I yesterday engaged a servant, who had just left M. de Villefort—I intend sending him away tomorrow, for he eats so enormously, to make up for the fast imposed upon him by his terror in that house. Well, now listen.”

  “We are listening.”

  “It appears the dear child has obtained possession of a bottle containing some drug, which he every now and then uses against those who have displeased him. First, M. and Madame de Saint-Meran incurred his displeasure, so he poured out three drops of his elixir—three drops were sufficient; then followed Barrois, the old servant of M. Noirtier, who sometimes rebuffed this little wretch—he therefore received the same quantity of the elixir; the same happened to Valentine, of whom he was jealous; he gave her the same dose as the others, and all was over for her as well as the rest.”

  “Why, what nonsense are you telling us?” said Chateau-Renaud.

  “Yes, it is an extraordinary story,” said Beauchamp; “is it not?”

  “It is absurd,” said Debray.

  “Ah,” said Beauchamp, “you doubt me? Well, you can ask my servant, or rather him who will no longer be my servant tomorrow, it was the talk of the house.”

  “And this elixir, where is it? what is it?”

  “The child conceals it.”

  “But where did he find it?”

  “In his mother’s laboratory.”

  “Does his mother then, keep poisons in her laboratory?”

  “How can I tell? You are questioning me like a king’s attorney. I only repeat what I have been told, and like my informant I can do no more. The poor devil would eat nothing, from fear.”

  “It is incredible!”

  “No, my dear fellow, it is not at all incredible. You saw the child pass through the Rue Richelieu last year, who amused himself with killing his brothers and sisters by sticking pins in their ears while they slept. The generation who follow us are very precocious.”

  “Come, Beauchamp,” said Chateau-Renaud, “I will bet anything you do not believe a word of all you have been telling us.”

  “I do not see the Count of Monte Cristo here.”

  “He is worn out,” said Debray; “besides, he could not well appear in public, since he has bee
n the dupe of the Cavalcanti, who, it appears, presented themselves to him with false letters of credit, and cheated him out of 100,000. francs upon the hypothesis of this principality.”

  “By the way, M. de Chateau-Renaud,” asked Beauchamp, “how is Morrel?”

  “Ma foi, I have called three times without once seeing him. Still, his sister did not seem uneasy, and told me that though she had not seen him for two or three days, she was sure he was well.”

  “Ah, now I think of it, the Count of Monte Cristo cannot appear in the hall,” said Beauchamp.

  “Why not?”

  “Because he is an actor in the drama.”

  “Has he assassinated any one, then?”

  “No, on the contrary, they wished to assassinate him. You know that it was in leaving his house that M. de Caderousse was murdered by his friend Benedetto. You know that the famous waistcoat was found in his house, containing the letter which stopped the signature of the marriage-contract. Do you see the waistcoat? There it is, all blood-stained, on the desk, as a testimony of the crime.”

  “Ah, very good.”

  “Hush, gentlemen, here is the court; let us go back to our places.” A noise was heard in the hall; the sergeant called his two patrons with an energetic “hem!” and the doorkeeper appearing, called out with that shrill voice peculiar to his order, ever since the days of Beaumarchais, “The court, gentlemen!”

  Chapter 22. The Indictment.

  The judges took their places in the midst of the most profound silence; the jury took their seats; M. de Villefort, the object of unusual attention, and we had almost said of general admiration, sat in the armchair and cast a tranquil glance around him. Every one looked with astonishment on that grave and severe face, whose calm expression personal griefs had been unable to disturb, and the aspect of a man who was a stranger to all human emotions excited something very like terror.

  “Gendarmes,” said the president, “lead in the accused.”

  At these words the public attention became more intense, and all eyes were turned towards the door through which Benedetto was to enter. The door soon opened and the accused appeared. The same impression was experienced by all present, and no one was deceived by the expression of his countenance. His features bore no sign of that deep emotion which stops the beating of the heart and blanches the cheek. His hands, gracefully placed, one upon his hat, the other in the opening of his white waistcoat, were not at all tremulous; his eye was calm and even brilliant. Scarcely had he entered the hall when he glanced at the whole body of magistrates and assistants; his eye rested longer on the president, and still more so on the king’s attorney. By the side of Andrea was stationed the lawyer who was to conduct his defence, and who had been appointed by the court, for Andrea disdained to pay any attention to those details, to which he appeared to attach no importance. The lawyer was a young man with light hair whose face expressed a hundred times more emotion than that which characterized the prisoner.

  The president called for the indictment, revised as we know, by the clever and implacable pen of Villefort. During the reading of this, which was long, the public attention was continually drawn towards Andrea, who bore the inspection with Spartan unconcern. Villefort had never been so concise and eloquent. The crime was depicted in the most vivid colors; the former life of the prisoner, his transformation, a review of his life from the earliest period, were set forth with all the talent that a knowledge of human life could furnish to a mind like that of the procureur. Benedetto was thus forever condemned in public opinion before the sentence of the law could be pronounced. Andrea paid no attention to the successive charges which were brought against him. M. de Villefort, who examined him attentively, and who no doubt practiced upon him all the psychological studies he was accustomed to use, in vain endeavored to make him lower his eyes, notwithstanding the depth and profundity of his gaze. At length the reading of the indictment was ended.

  “Accused,” said the president, “your name and surname?” Andrea arose. “Excuse me, Mr. President,” he said, in a clear voice, “but I see you are going to adopt a course of questions through which I cannot follow you. I have an idea, which I will explain by and by, of making an exception to the usual form of accusation. Allow me, then, if you please, to answer in different order, or I will not do so at all.” The astonished president looked at the jury, who in turn looked at Villefort. The whole assembly manifested great surprise, but Andrea appeared quite unmoved. “Your age?” said the president; “will you answer that question?”

  “I will answer that question, as well as the rest, Mr. President, but in its turn.”

  “Your age?” repeated the president.

  “I am twenty-one years old, or rather I shall be in a few days, as I was born the night of the 27th of September, 1817.” M. de Villefort, who was busy taking down some notes, raised his head at the mention of this date. “Where were you born?” continued the president.

  “At Auteuil, near Paris.” M. de Villefort a second time raised his head, looked at Benedetto as if he had been gazing at the head of Medusa, and became livid. As for Benedetto, he gracefully wiped his lips with a fine cambric pocket-handkerchief. “Your profession?”

  “First I was a forger,” answered Andrea, as calmly as possible; “then I became a thief, and lately have become an assassin.” A murmur, or rather storm, of indignation burst from all parts of the assembly. The judges themselves appeared to be stupefied, and the jury manifested tokens of disgust for cynicism so unexpected in a man of fashion. M. de Villefort pressed his hand upon his brow, which, at first pale, had become red and burning; then he suddenly arose and looked around as though he had lost his senses—he wanted air.

  “Are you looking for anything, Mr. Procureur?” asked Benedetto, with his most ingratiating smile. M. de Villefort answered nothing, but sat, or rather threw himself down again upon his chair. “And now, prisoner, will you consent to tell your name?” said the president. “The brutal affectation with which you have enumerated and classified your crimes calls for a severe reprimand on the part of the court, both in the name of morality, and for the respect due to humanity. You appear to consider this a point of honor, and it may be for this reason, that you have delayed acknowledging your name. You wished it to be preceded by all these titles.”

  “It is quite wonderful, Mr. President, how entirely you have read my thoughts,” said Benedetto, in his softest voice and most polite manner. “This is, indeed, the reason why I begged you to alter the order of the questions.” The public astonishment had reached its height. There was no longer any deceit or bravado in the manner of the accused. The audience felt that a startling revelation was to follow this ominous prelude.

  “Well,” said the president; “your name?”

  “I cannot tell you my name, since I do not know it; but I know my father’s, and can tell it to you.”

  A painful giddiness overwhelmed Villefort; great drops of acrid sweat fell from his face upon the papers which he held in his convulsed hand.

  “Repeat your father’s name,” said the president. Not a whisper, not a breath, was heard in that vast assembly; every one waited anxiously.

  “My father is king’s attorney,” replied Andrea calmly.

  “King’s attorney?” said the president, stupefied, and without noticing the agitation which spread over the face of M. de Villefort; “king’s attorney?”

  “Yes; and if you wish to know his name, I will tell it,—he is named Villefort.” The explosion, which had been so long restrained from a feeling of respect to the court of justice, now burst forth like thunder from the breasts of all present; the court itself did not seek to restrain the feelings of the audience. The exclamations, the insults addressed to Benedetto, who remained perfectly unconcerned, the energetic gestures, the movement of the gendarmes, the sneers of the scum of the crowd always sure to rise to the surface in case of any disturbance—all this lasted five minutes, before the doorkeepers and magistrates were able to restore silence.
In the midst of this tumult the voice of the president was heard to exclaim,—”Are you playing with justice, accused, and do you dare set your fellow-citizens an example of disorder which even in these times has never been equalled?”

  Several persons hurried up to M. de Villefort, who sat half bowed over in his chair, offering him consolation, encouragement, and protestations of zeal and sympathy. Order was re-established in the hall, except that a few people still moved about and whispered to one another. A lady, it was said, had just fainted; they had supplied her with a smelling-bottle, and she had recovered. During the scene of tumult, Andrea had turned his smiling face towards the assembly; then, leaning with one hand on the oaken rail of the dock, in the most graceful attitude possible, he said: “Gentlemen, I assure you I had no idea of insulting the court, or of making a useless disturbance in the presence of this honorable assembly. They ask my age; I tell it. They ask where I was born; I answer. They ask my name, I cannot give it, since my parents abandoned me. But though I cannot give my own name, not possessing one, I can tell them my father’s. Now I repeat, my father is named M. de Villefort, and I am ready to prove it.”

  There was an energy, a conviction, and a sincerity in the manner of the young man, which silenced the tumult. All eyes were turned for a moment towards the procureur, who sat as motionless as though a thunderbolt had changed him into a corpse. “Gentlemen,” said Andrea, commanding silence by his voice and manner; “I owe you the proofs and explanations of what I have said.”

  “But,” said the irritated president, “you called yourself Benedetto, declared yourself an orphan, and claimed Corsica as your country.”

  “I said anything I pleased, in order that the solemn declaration I have just made should not be withheld, which otherwise would certainly have been the case. I now repeat that I was born at Auteuil on the night of the 27th of September, 1817, and that I am the son of the procureur, M. de Villefort. Do you wish for any further details? I will give them. I was born in No. 28, Rue de la Fontaine, in a room hung with red damask; my father took me in his arms, telling my mother I was dead, wrapped me in a napkin marked with an H and an N, and carried me into a garden, where he buried me alive.”