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

announced Baptistin.

A black satin stock, fresh from the maker’s hands, gray moustaches, a bold eye, a major’s uniform, ornamented with three medals and five crosses⁠—in fact, the thorough bearing of an old soldier⁠—such was the appearance of Major Bartolomeo Cavalcanti, that tender father with whom we are already acquainted. Close to him, dressed in entirely new clothes, advanced smilingly Count Andrea Cavalcanti, the dutiful son, whom we also know. The three young people were talking together. On the entrance of the newcomers, their eyes glanced from father to son, and then, naturally enough, rested on the latter, whom they began criticising.

“Cavalcanti!” said Debray.

“A fine name,” said Morrel.

“Yes,” said Château-Renaud, “these Italians are well named and badly dressed.”

“You are fastidious, Château-Renaud,” replied Debray; “those clothes are well cut and quite new.”

“That is just what I find fault with. That gentleman appears to be well dressed for the first time in his life.”

“Who are those gentlemen?” asked Danglars of Monte Cristo.

“You heard⁠—Cavalcanti.”

“That tells me their name, and nothing else.”

“Ah! true. You do not know the Italian nobility; the Cavalcanti are all descended from princes.”

“Have they any fortune?”

“An enormous one.”

“What do they do?”

“Try to spend it all. They have some business with you, I think, from what they told me the day before yesterday. I, indeed, invited them here today on your account. I will introduce you to them.”

“But they appear to speak French with a very pure accent,” said Danglars.

“The son has been educated in a college in the south; I believe near Marseilles. You will find him quite enthusiastic.”

“Upon what subject?” asked Madame Danglars.

“The French ladies, madame. He has made up his mind to take a wife from Paris.”

“A fine idea that of his,” said Danglars, shrugging his shoulders. Madame Danglars looked at her husband with an expression which, at any other time, would have indicated a storm, but for the second time she controlled herself.

“The baron appears thoughtful today,” said Monte Cristo to her; “are they going to put him in the ministry?”

“Not yet, I think. More likely he has been speculating on the Bourse, and has lost money.”

“M. and Madame de Villefort,” cried Baptistin.

They entered. M. de Villefort, notwithstanding his self-control, was visibly affected, and when Monte Cristo touched his hand, he felt it tremble.

“Certainly, women alone know how to dissimulate,” said Monte Cristo to himself, glancing at Madame Danglars, who was smiling on the procureur, and embracing his wife.

After a short time, the count saw Bertuccio, who, until then, had been occupied on the other side of the house, glide into an adjoining room. He went to him.

“What do you want, M. Bertuccio?” said he.

“Your excellency has not stated the number of guests.”

“Ah, true.”

“How many covers?”

“Count for yourself.”

“Is everyone here, your excellency?”

“Yes.”

Bertuccio glanced through the door, which was ajar. The count watched him. “Good heavens!” he exclaimed.

“What is the matter?” said the count.

“That woman⁠—that woman!”

“Which?”

“The one with a white dress and so many diamonds⁠—the fair one.”

“Madame Danglars?”

“I do not know her name; but it is she, sir, it is she!”

“Whom do you mean?”

“The woman of the garden!⁠—she that was enceinte⁠—she who was walking while she waited for⁠—”

Bertuccio stood at the open door, with his eyes starting and his hair on end.

“Waiting for whom?”

Bertuccio, without answering, pointed to Villefort with something of the gesture Macbeth uses to point out Banquo.

“Oh, oh!” he at length muttered, “do you see?”

“What? Who?”

“Him!”

“Him!⁠—M. de Villefort, the king’s attorney? Certainly I see him.”

“Then I did not kill him?”

“Really, I think you are going mad, good Bertuccio,” said the count.

“Then he is not dead?”

“No; you see plainly he is not dead. Instead of striking between the sixth and seventh left ribs, as your countrymen do, you must have struck higher or lower, and life is very tenacious in these lawyers, or rather there is no truth in anything you have told me⁠—it was a fright of the imagination, a dream of your fancy. You went to sleep full of thoughts of vengeance; they weighed heavily upon your stomach; you had the nightmare⁠—that’s all. Come, calm yourself, and reckon them up⁠—M. and Madame de Villefort, two; M. and Madame Danglars, four; M. de Château-Renaud, M. Debray, M. Morrel, seven; Major Bartolomeo Cavalcanti, eight.”

“Eight!” repeated Bertuccio.

“Stop! You are in a shocking hurry to be off⁠—you forget one of my guests. Lean a little to the left. Stay! look at M. Andrea Cavalcanti, the young man in a black coat, looking at Murillo’s Madonna; now he is turning.”

This time Bertuccio would have uttered an exclamation, had not a look from Monte Cristo silenced him.

“Benedetto?” he muttered; “fatality!”

“Half-past six o’clock has just struck, M. Bertuccio,” said the count severely; “I ordered dinner at that hour, and I do not like to wait”; and he returned to his guests, while Bertuccio, leaning against the wall, succeeded in reaching the dining-room. Five minutes afterwards the doors of the drawing-room were thrown open, and Bertuccio appearing said, with a violent effort, “The dinner waits.”

The Count of Monte Cristo offered his arm to Madame de Villefort. “M. de Villefort,” he said, “will you conduct the Baroness Danglars?”

Villefort complied, and they passed on to the dining-room.

LXIII The Dinner

It was evident that one sentiment affected all the guests on entering the dining-room. Each one asked what strange influence had brought them to this house, and yet astonished, even uneasy though they were, they still felt that they would not like to be absent. The recent events, the solitary and eccentric position of the count, his enormous, nay, almost incredible fortune, should have made men cautious, and have altogether prevented ladies visiting a house where there was no one of their own sex to receive them; and yet curiosity had been enough to lead them to overleap the bounds of prudence and decorum.

And all present, even including Cavalcanti and his son, notwithstanding the stiffness of the one and the carelessness of the other, were thoughtful, on finding themselves assembled at the house of this incomprehensible man. Madame Danglars had