‘Because, to my mind, the match may depend on the question that is uppermost in our thoughts just now.’
‘What!’ Albert exclaimed, reddening. ‘Do you think Monsieur Danglars…’
‘I’m merely asking how your marriage plans stand. For heaven’s sake, don’t try to read anything more into my words than I intend, and don’t give them more significance than they actually have!’
‘No,’ Albert said. ‘The engagement has been broken off.’
‘Good,’ said Beauchamp. Then, seeing that his friend was about to relapse into melancholy, he said: ‘Come on, Albert, take my advice and let’s go out. A ride round the Bois in a phaeton or on horseback will take your mind off things. Then we’ll come back and have lunch somewhere, you can go off to your business and I’ll go back to mine.’
‘Good idea,’ said Albert. ‘But let’s walk. I think it would do me good to tire myself out a little.’
‘Certainly,’ said Beauchamp; and the two friends set out, on foot, down the boulevard. When they got to the Madeleine, Beauchamp said: ‘Why, since we’re going in this direction, let’s go and see the Count of Monte Cristo. He’ll take your mind off things. He’s a wonderful person for raising one’s spirits, because he never asks questions: in my opinion, people who don’t ask too many questions give the best consolation.’
‘Yes,’ said Albert, ‘let’s go and see the count. I like him.’
LXXXV
THE JOURNEY
Monte Cristo gave a cry of joy on seeing the two young men together. ‘Ah, ah!’ he said. ‘Well, now, I hope that it’s all over, cleared up and settled?’
‘Yes,’ said Beauchamp. ‘Some ridiculous rumours which came from nowhere and which, if they were to be repeated now, I should be the first to challenge. So, let’s say no more about it.’
‘Albert will tell you that that was my advice to him,’ said the count, before adding: ‘Now, as it happens, you find me after what I think is the most detestable morning I’ve ever spent.’
‘What are you doing?’ Albert asked. ‘Arranging your papers, apparently?’
‘My papers! Thank heavens, no! My papers are always perfectly arranged, since I have none. I’m putting some order into the papers of Monsieur Cavalcanti.’
‘Monsieur Cavalcanti?’ Beauchamp asked.
‘Yes, don’t you know?’ said Morcerf. ‘He’s a young man the count is launching.’
‘Not at all,’ said Monte Cristo. ‘Let’s be quite clear about it, I’m not launching anyone, least of all Monsieur Cavalcanti.’
‘And he’s going to marry Mademoiselle Danglars in my stead and place – which,’ Albert continued, forcing a smile, ‘as you can well imagine, my dear Beauchamp, is a cruel blow to me.’
‘What! Cavalcanti to marry Mademoiselle Danglars?’ Beauchamp asked.
‘What do I hear?’ said Monte Cristo. ‘Have you been away in the back of beyond? And you a journalist, the bedfellow of Rumour? Parisian society is talking of nothing else.’
‘Were you responsible for this marriage, Count?’ Beauchamp asked.
‘I? Hush, scribbler, don’t even whisper such a thing! I go a-match-making? Never! You don’t know me. On the contrary, I opposed it as strongly as I could; I refused to make the formal request.’
‘Oh, I understand,’ said Beauchamp. ‘For the sake of our friend Albert, here?’
‘For my sake!’ said the young man. ‘Oh, no, not a bit of it! The count will support me when I say that I always begged him, on the contrary, to break off the engagement, which has now fortunately been broken off. The count claims that he is not the person I should thank, so, like the ancient Romans, I’ll raise an altar “To the Unknown God”.’
‘Listen,’ said Monte Cristo, ‘so little is this to do with me that I have fallen out both with the father-in-law and with the young man. The only one still to hold me in some affection, when she saw the extent to which I was disinclined to make her renounce her precious liberty, is Mademoiselle Eugénie, who doesn’t appear to me to have a marked vocation for the married state.’
‘And you say this marriage is about to take place?’
‘Yes, in spite of everything I could say. I don’t know the young man myself, though they say he is rich and comes from a good family; but that’s just hearsay as far as I’m concerned. I repeated all this, time and again, to Monsieur Danglars but he is besotted with his Luccan. I even told him about what seems to me a more serious fact, namely that the young man was kidnapped, carried off by gypsies or mislaid by his tutor, I’m not sure which. What I do know is that his father lost sight of him for ten years, and God only knows what he did during that time. Well, none of that made any difference. I have been asked to write to the major, to request some papers from him: here they are. I’m sending them on, but at the same time, like Pilate, I wash my hands of it.’
‘What about Mademoiselle d’Armilly?’ Beauchamp asked. ‘How does she feel about you, now that you’re taking her pupil away?’
‘I really can’t tell, though it seems she is leaving for Italy. Madame Danglars mentioned her to me and asked me for some letters of recommendation to impresarios. I gave her a note for the director of the Teatro Valle, who owes me a favour. But what’s wrong, Albert? You seem quite miserable. Could you perhaps be in love with Mademoiselle Danglars without realizing it?’
‘Not as far as I know,’ Albert said with a melancholy smile. Beauchamp began to study the pictures.
‘You’re certainly not in your usual good humour,’ Monte Cristo went on. ‘Come, now: what’s the matter?’
‘I’ve got a headache,’ Albert said.
‘In that case, my dear Viscount, I have an infallible remedy to suggest, one that has always worked for me whenever I have suffered some annoyance or other.’
‘What is that?’ the young man asked.
‘Travel.’
‘Really?’ Albert said.
‘Really. And since at the moment I have a lot that is bothering me, I’m going to travel. Would you like us to go together?’
‘You, Count?’ said Beauchamp. ‘Something bothering you? What can it be?’
‘Huh! You speak very lightly about it, as you may; but I’d like to see you with a judicial enquiry going on in your house!’
‘An enquiry! What enquiry?’
‘The one that Monsieur Villefort is engaged in against my lovable assassin, some kind of bandit who had escaped from prison, it seems.’
‘That’s right,’ said Beauchamp. ‘I read about it in the papers. Who is this Caderousse?’
‘Pooh! It appears he is a Provençal. Monsieur de Villefort had heard speak of him when he was in Marseille, and Monsieur Danglars recalls seeing him. The result is that the crown prosecutor is taking the matter very much to heart and that the prefect of police is apparently extremely interested in it; and the result of all this interest, for which no one could be more grateful than I am, is that for the past fortnight they have rounded up every bandit they could find in Paris and its suburbs, and sent them here, alleging that they are Monsieur Caderousse’s murderers. And the result of that will be that in three months, if it continues, there will not be a thief or an assassin in the whole fine kingdom of France who does not know the plan of my house like the back of his hand. So I’ve decided to abandon it to them entirely and go as far away as the earth can carry me. Come on, Viscount, I’m taking you with me.’
‘Certainly.’
‘So, it’s agreed?’
‘Yes, but where?’
‘I told you: where the air is pure, noise sleeps and, however proud one may be, one feels humble and small. It pleases me to be humbled in that way, since like Augustus they call me master of the universe.’1
‘So, to cut a long story short, where are you going?’
‘To the sea, Viscount, to the sea. You must understand, I’m a sailor. As a child I was rocked in the arms of the old ocean and on the breast of the beautiful Amphitrite. I played with the green robe of the first and t
he azure robe of the second. I love the sea as one may love a mistress, and when I have not seen her for a long time I pine for her.’
‘Let’s go, Count, let’s go!’
‘To the sea?’
‘Yes.’
‘You accept, then?’
‘I do.’
‘Well, Viscount, this evening in my courtyard there will be a britzka2 in which one can lie flat out, as on a bed. Four post-horses will be harnessed to this britzka. Monsieur Beauchamp, it will easily hold four. Would you like to join us? Let me take you!’
‘No, thank you. I have just come back from the sea.’
‘What? From the sea?’
‘Yes, more or less. I’ve just been on a little journey to the Borro-mean islands.’
‘Well? Come, even so,’ said Albert.
‘No, my dear Morcerf, you must realize that if I refuse, it’s because it cannot be done. In any case,’ he said, lowering his voice, ‘I must stay in Paris, if only to keep an eye on the newspaper’s postbox.’
‘Oh, you’re a fine and good friend,’ Albert said. ‘Yes, you’re right. Watch and wait, Beauchamp, and try to find out who was responsible for this revelation.’ The two friends took leave of one another; their final handshake implied all that their lips could not express in front of a third person.
‘Excellent young man, Beauchamp!’ Monte Cristo exclaimed after the journalist had left. ‘Don’t you think so, Albert?’
‘Oh, yes, a man of heart, I can vouch for it. I love him with all my soul. But, now we are alone, though I’m not bothered too much one way or the other, where are we going?’
‘To Normandy, if you agree.’
‘Perfect. Well out in the country? No visitors, no neighbours?’
‘We shall have the company of horses for riding, dogs for hunting and a boat for fishing, that’s all.’
‘Just what I need. I must inform my mother, and then I’m all yours.’
‘But will they let you?’ Monte Cristo asked.
‘Let me what?’
‘Come to Normandy.’
‘Why? Aren’t I free?’
‘Free to go where you wish, alone, I know, since I met you on an escapade in Italy.’
‘Well, then?’
‘But are you free to come with the man called the Count of Monte Cristo?’
‘You have a short memory, Count.’
‘Why is that?’
‘Didn’t I tell you how much my mother likes you?’
‘Woman is often fickle, said François I; and woman is like the waves, said Shakespeare.3 One was a great king, the other a great poet, so they must have known women.’
‘Yes, women. But my mother is not “women”, she is a woman.’
‘A poor foreigner might perhaps be forgiven his failure to understand all the subtleties of your language…’
‘What I mean is that my mother is not prodigal with her feelings, but, once she has given them, it is for ever.’
‘Oh, really?’ said Monte Cristo, with a sigh. ‘And do you think she does me the honour of granting me any feeling other than entire indifference?’
‘Listen! I’ve said it before, and I repeat: you must really be a very unusual and superior being.’
‘Oh?’
‘Yes, because my mother is captivated – I won’t say, by curiosity, but by the interest you have aroused in her. When we are together, you are the only subject of our conversation.’
‘And did she tell you to beware of this Manfred?’
‘No, on the contrary, she told me: “Morcerf, I think the count is a noble creature; try to win his affection.” ’
Monte Cristo turned away and sighed. ‘Really?’ he asked.
‘So you understand,’ Albert continued, ‘far from disapproving of my journey, she will applaud it with all her heart, since it conforms with her daily instructions to me.’
‘Very well, then,’ said Monte Cristo. ‘We’ll meet this evening. Be here at five o’clock. We’ll get there at midnight, or one.’
‘What! To Le Tréport?’
‘There or near it.’
‘It only takes you eight hours to cover forty-eight leagues?’
‘That’s a lot, even so.’
‘You most certainly are a man of miracles, and you will not only succeed in going faster than the railway, which is not too difficult, especially in France, but even go faster than the telegraph.’
‘However that may be, Viscount, it will still take us seven or eight hours to get there, so be on time.’
‘Don’t worry. I’ve nothing else to do between now and then, except to get ready.’
‘Five o’clock, then?’
‘Five o’clock.’
Albert left. Monte Cristo, after having nodded to him with a smile, remained for a moment lost in thought, as though meditating profoundly. At last, passing a hand across his forehead, as if to brush away his reverie, he went to the bell and rang it twice. At this signal, Bertuccio came in.
‘Monsieur Bertuccio,’ the count said, ‘it will not be tomorrow, or the day after, as I originally thought, but this evening that I leave for Normandy. From now until five o’clock gives you more time than you need. Alert the ostlers at the first relay. Monsieur Morcerf will accompany me. Now, go!’
Bertuccio obeyed and a groom sped towards Pontoise with a warning that the post-chaise would be coming by at exactly six o’clock. The ostler at Pontoise sent an express messenger to the next relay, and so on. Six hours later, every relay along the route was prepared.
Before leaving, the count went up to see Haydée and announced his departure; he told her where he was going and put his whole household under her orders.
Albert arrived on time. The journey, gloomy at first, was lightened by the physical effects of speed. Morcerf had never imagined travelling so fast.
‘I must agree,’ said Monte Cristo, ‘that it is impossible to move forward at all, when your mail travels at two leagues an hour, and you have this ridiculous law that forbids one traveller to overtake another without asking his permission – which means that a sick or ill-humoured traveller has the right to hold up any number of light-hearted and healthy persons on the road behind him. I avoid these handicaps by travelling with my own postilion and my own horses – don’t I, Ali?’
At this the count, leaning out of the window, gave a little shout of encouragement which lent wings to the horses: they were no longer galloping, they flew. The carriage thundered along the regal highway and every head turned to watch this flaming meteor go by. Ali, repeating the shout, showing his white teeth and wrapping his powerful hands around the reins flecked with foam, spurred on the horses, whose fine manes were spreading in the wind. Ali, child of the desert, was here in his element and, through the dust he stirred up around him, with his black face, shining eyes and snow-white burnous, he seemed like the genie of the simoun and the god of the whirlwind.
‘This is a pleasure I had not previously experienced,’ said Morcerf. ‘The pleasure of speed!’ And the last trace of gloom vanished from his brow, as though the air that they were cleaving in their path had brushed the clouds aside.
‘Where in the world did you find such horses?’ Albert asked. ‘Did you have them bred specially?’
‘Just so,’ the count replied. ‘Six years ago, I came across a stallion in Hungary, famous for its speed. I bought it, I don’t know how much it cost; Bertuccio paid for it. In that same year, it had thirty-two offspring. We shall be able to inspect that entire generation of children from the one father. Each one is alike, black, without a single blemish except a star on the forehead: this privileged member of the stud had his mares chosen for him, like the favourites of a pasha.’
‘Admirable! But tell me, Count, what do you do with all these horses?’
‘As you see, I travel with them.’
‘But you won’t always be travelling?’
‘When I have no further need of them, Bertuccio will sell them. He claims he will make thirty or forty th
ousand francs on the deal.’
‘There won’t be a king in Europe rich enough to buy them from you!’
‘Then he must sell them to some simple vizier in the East, who will empty his treasury to pay for them and restock it by bastonading his subjects.’
‘Count, might I tell you something that has occurred to me?’
‘What is it?’
‘That, after you, Monsieur Bertuccio must be the richest individual in Europe.’
‘Well, there you are wrong, Viscount. I am sure that if you were to turn out Bertuccio’s pockets, you wouldn’t find two sous to rub together.’
‘Why’s that?’ the young man asked. ‘Is this Monsieur Bertuccio such a prodigy? Please, my dear Count, don’t test my credulity too far or, I warn you, I shall cease to believe you.’
‘There are never any prodigies with me, Albert. Figures and facts, that’s all. So, consider this puzzle: a steward steals, but why does he steal?’
‘Pooh! It’s in his nature, I think,’ said Albert. ‘He steals because he has to.’
‘No, you’re wrong. He steals because he has a wife and children, and ambitions for himself and his family. Above all, he steals because he is never quite sure that he will not leave his master and he wants to provide for the future. Now, Monsieur Bertuccio is alone in the world. He dips into my purse without telling me, and he is sure that I shall never dismiss him.’
‘How can he be sure?’
‘Because I shall never find anyone better.’
‘You’re going round in circles, all based on supposition.’
‘Not at all: these are certainties. To me, a good servant is one over whom I have the power of life or death.’
‘And do you have the power of life or death over Bertuccio?’ Albert asked.
‘Yes,’ the count said curtly. Some words end a conversation like a steel door falling. The count’s ‘Yes’ was one of those words.
The remainder of the journey continued at the same pace. The thirty-two horses, divided into eight relays, covered the forty-eight leagues in eight hours. In the middle of the night they arrived at the gateway to a fine park. The porter was awake and holding the gates open. He had been alerted by the ostler from the last relay.