The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas (best book club books .TXT) 📕

thing⁠—a shepherdess watching her flock, clad in a cashmere grown, with earrings and necklace of pearls, diamond pins, and buttons of sapphires, emeralds, and rubies. He would, no doubt, have believed that he had returned to the times of Florian, and would have declared, on reaching Paris, that he had met an Alpine shepherdess seated at the foot of the Sabine Hill.

“At the end of a quarter of an hour Vampa quitted the grotto; his costume was no less elegant than that of Teresa. He wore a vest of garnet-colored velvet, with buttons of cut gold; a silk waistcoat covered with embroidery; a Roman scarf tied round his neck; a cartridge-box worked with gold, and red and green silk; sky-blue velvet breeches, fastened above the knee with diamond buckles; garters of deerskin, worked with a thousand arabesques, and a hat whereon hung ribbons of all colors; two watches hung from his girdle, and a splendid poniard was in his belt.

“Teresa uttered a cry of admiration. Vampa in this attire resembled a painting by Léopold Robert or Schnetz. He had assumed the entire costume of Cucumetto. The young man saw the effect produced on his betrothed, and a smile of pride passed over his lips.

“ ‘Now,’ he said to Teresa, ‘are you ready to share my fortune, whatever it may be?’

“ ‘Oh, yes!’ exclaimed the young girl enthusiastically.

“ ‘And follow me wherever I go?’

“ ‘To the world’s end.’

“ ‘Then take my arm, and let us on; we have no time to lose.’

“The young girl did so without questioning her lover as to where he was conducting her, for he appeared to her at this moment as handsome, proud, and powerful as a god. They went towards the forest, and soon entered it.

“We need scarcely say that all the paths of the mountain were known to Vampa; he therefore went forward without a moment’s hesitation, although there was no beaten track, but he knew his path by looking at the trees and bushes, and thus they kept on advancing for nearly an hour and a half. At the end of this time they had reached the thickest part of the forest. A torrent, whose bed was dry, led into a deep gorge. Vampa took this wild road, which, enclosed between two ridges, and shadowed by the tufted umbrage of the pines, seemed, but for the difficulties of its descent, that path to Avernus of which Virgil speaks. Teresa had become alarmed at the wild and deserted look of the plain around her, and pressed closely against her guide, not uttering a syllable; but as she saw him advance with even step and composed countenance, she endeavored to repress her emotion.

“Suddenly, about ten paces from them, a man advanced from behind a tree and aimed at Vampa.

“ ‘Not another step,’ he said, ‘or you are a dead man.’

“ ‘What, then,’ said Vampa, raising his hand with a gesture of disdain, while Teresa, no longer able to restrain her alarm, clung closely to him, ‘do wolves rend each other?’

“ ‘Who are you?’ inquired the sentinel.

“ ‘I am Luigi Vampa, shepherd of the San-Felice farm.’

“ ‘What do you want?’

“ ‘I would speak with your companions who are in the glade at Rocca Bianca.’

“ ‘Follow me, then,’ said the sentinel; ‘or, as you know your way, go first.’

“Vampa smiled disdainfully at this precaution on the part of the bandit, went before Teresa, and continued to advance with the same firm and easy step as before. At the end of ten minutes the bandit made them a sign to stop. The two young persons obeyed. Then the bandit thrice imitated the cry of a crow; a croak answered this signal.

“ ‘Good!’ said the sentry, ‘you may now go on.’

“Luigi and Teresa again set forward; as they went on Teresa clung tremblingly to her lover at the sight of weapons and the glistening of carbines through the trees. The retreat of Rocca Bianca was at the top of a small mountain, which no doubt in former days had been a volcano⁠—an extinct volcano before the days when Remus and Romulus had deserted Alba to come and found the city of Rome.

“Teresa and Luigi reached the summit, and all at once found themselves in the presence of twenty bandits.

“ ‘Here is a young man who seeks and wishes to speak to you,’ said the sentinel.

“ ‘What has he to say?’ inquired the young man who was in command in the chief’s absence.

“ ‘I wish to say that I am tired of a shepherd’s life,’ was Vampa’s reply.

“ ‘Ah, I understand,’ said the lieutenant; ‘and you seek admittance into our ranks?’

“ ‘Welcome!’ cried several bandits from Ferrusino, Pampinara, and Anagni, who had recognized Luigi Vampa.

“ ‘Yes, but I came to ask something more than to be your companion.’

“ ‘And what may that be?’ inquired the bandits with astonishment.

“ ‘I come to ask to be your captain,’ said the young man.

“The bandits shouted with laughter.

“ ‘And what have you done to aspire to this honor?’ demanded the lieutenant.

“ ‘I have killed your chief, Cucumetto, whose dress I now wear; and I set fire to the villa San-Felice to procure a wedding-dress for my betrothed.’

“An hour afterwards Luigi Vampa was chosen captain, vice Cucumetto, deceased.”

“Well, my dear Albert,” said Franz, turning towards his friend; “what think you of citizen Luigi Vampa?”

“I say he is a myth,” replied Albert, “and never had an existence.”

“And what may a myth be?” inquired Pastrini.

“The explanation would be too long, my dear landlord,” replied Franz.

“And you say that Signor Vampa exercises his profession at this moment in the environs of Rome?”

“And with a boldness of which no bandit before him ever gave an example.”

“Then the police have vainly tried to lay hands on him?”

“Why, you see, he has a good understanding with the shepherds in the plains, the fishermen of the Tiber, and the smugglers of the coast. They seek for him in the mountains, and he is on the waters; they follow him on the waters, and he is on the open sea; then they pursue him, and he has suddenly taken refuge in the islands, at Giglio, Giannutri,