The Count of Monte Cristo (Unabridged Penguin) (57 page)

When Franz regained consciousness, the outside world seemed like a continuation of his dream: he felt himself to be in a tomb where barely a single ray of sunshine, like a look of pity, could penetrate. He reached out and felt stone. He sat up and found that he was lying, wrapped in his burnous, on a bed of dry heather, soft and sweet-smelling.

His visions had all ended and the statues, as though they had been no more than mere figments risen from their tombs during his sleep, had fled when he awoke.

He took a few steps towards the point from which daylight was coming; the calm of reality was succeeding to the feverishness of dreams. He saw that he was in a cave, walked towards the opening and through the arched door observed blue sky and azure sea. The air and the water sparkled in the rays of the morning sun; on the shore, the sailors were chattering and laughing where they sat; and, ten yards out to sea, the boat bobbed gracefully at anchor.

For a short while he enjoyed the cool breeze on his forehead, listening to the muffled sound of the waves against the shore, where they left a lace pattern of silvery white foam on the rocks. He abandoned himself, without attempting to analyse it, to the divine charm of natural things, especially when one can enjoy them after a fantastic dream. Then, little by little, this outside life, with its calm, its purity and its grandeur, recalled the improbability of his dream, and memories began to flood back.

He remembered arriving on the island, being introduced to the chief of the smugglers, then an underground palace full of marvels, an excellent dinner and a spoonful of hashish. But, confronted by the reality of daylight, it seemed to him that all this had happened at least a year ago, so large did his dream loom in mind and so immediate did it seem. Thus, from time to time, his imagination took one of the shadow figures who had lit up his night with their kisses, and made her sit amongst the sailors, or walk across a rock or stand in the rocking boat. In any case, his head was quite clear and his body perfectly rested. There was no heaviness in his brain but, on the contrary, a certain general feeling of well-being and an ability to absorb the air and the sun that was greater than ever.

So it was with a light heart that he went down to join his sailors. As soon as they saw him, they rose and the master came across.

‘Milord Sinbad,’ he said, ‘requested us to convey his compliments to Your Excellency, and asked us to express his regret at not being able to bid Your Excellency farewell. He hopes that you will excuse him when you know that he has urgent business in Malaga.’

‘So, my dear Gaetano,’ Franz said, ‘all this is real then: there was a man who welcomed me to this island, treated me royally and left while I was asleep?’

‘So real is he that you can see his little yacht speeding off under full sail. If you want to take your spyglass, you will quite probably recognize your host himself in the midst of his crew.’

As he said this, Gaetano pointed towards a little boat steering a course for the southern tip of Corsica.

Franz took out his glass, adjusted the focus and turned it towards the point indicated. Gaetano was quite right. The mysterious stranger was standing on the stern of the boat, facing in his direction and, like Franz, with a spyglass in his hand. His dress was the same as the one in which he had appeared to his guest on the previous evening, and he was waving goodbye with his handkerchief.

Franz pulled out his own handkerchief and returned the greeting by waving it in the same manner. A moment later, a small puff of smoke appeared from the stern of the boat, detached itself from the vessel and rose in a graceful arc towards the sky, after which Franz heard the faint sound of a shot.

‘There! Did you hear that?’ said Gaetano. ‘He is bidding you farewell.’

The young man took his rifle and fired it in the air, but without much expectation that the noise would reach the yacht at that distance from the shore.

‘What would Your Excellency like us to do?’ said Gaetano.

‘Firstly, to light me a torch.’

‘Ah, yes! I understand. You want to look for the entrance to the enchanted dwelling. With great pleasure, Excellency: if it amuses you, I shall give you the torch you ask for. I, too, once had the same idea as you, and I gave in to it three or four times, but eventually I abandoned the attempt. Giovanni,’ he added, ‘light a torch and bring it to His Excellency.’

Giovanni obeyed. Franz took the torch and went into the underground cavern, followed by Gaetano.

He recognized the place where he had woken up by his bed of heather, which was still crumpled. But, however much he ran the torch over the walls of the cavern, he could find nothing except traces of smoke, showing where others had investigated before him in vain.

However, he did not leave a single foot of the granite wall un-examined, even though it was as impenetrable as futurity. He did not notice a single crack without putting the blade of his knife into it, or a lump jutting out of the surface without pressing it, in the hope that it would give way; but all was futile and he spent two hours on this fruitless search. After that, he gave up. Gaetano was triumphant.

When Franz returned to the shore, the yacht was only a little white dot on the horizon. He tried his glass, but even with that it was impossible to make anything out.

Gaetano reminded him that he had come here to hunt the goats, something that he had completely forgotten. He took his gun and began to scour the island like a man accomplishing a duty rather than one enjoying a pleasure; after a quarter of an hour, he had killed a goat and two kids. But, though the goats were as wild and
shy as chamois, they bore too great a resemblance to the domestic variety and Franz did not consider them true game.

And anyway, there were far more powerful ideas on his mind. Since the previous evening he had effectively been the hero of a tale from the
Thousand and One Nights
, and he was irresistibly drawn back to the cave. So, even though the first investigation had failed, he began a second one, after telling Gaetano to have the two kids roasted. This second visit must have lasted a fairly long time because, when he returned, the kid was cooked and the meal was ready.

Franz sat down on the spot where, the evening before, they had come to invite him to supper with this mysterious host; and he could still see the little yacht, like a seagull rocking on the crest of a wave, continuing on its path to Corsica.

‘But, Gaetano,’ he said, ‘you informed me that Milord Sinbad was heading for Malaga, while it seems to me that he is going directly towards Porto Vecchio.’

‘Don’t you remember,’ the master said, ‘my telling you that, with his crew, there were for the time being two Corsican bandits?’

‘Of course! So is he going to put them off on the coast?’

‘Just as you say. Ah,’ Gaetano exclaimed, ‘there’s a man who doesn’t fear either God or the devil, so they say, and who would go fifty leagues out of his way to help a poor soul.’

‘That sort of help could get him into trouble with the authorities of the country where he performs this kind of philanthropic deed,’ Franz said.

‘Huh! The authorities!’ said Gaetano. ‘What does he care about the authorities? He couldn’t give a damn for them! Let them just try to catch him. To start with, his yacht is not a ship, it’s a bird, and he could gain three knots on a frigate for every twelve. Then he has only to put off at the coast himself. He would find plenty of friends of his own there.’

What was most clear in all this was that Milord Sinbad, Franz’s host, had the honour to be associated with every smuggler and bandit on every coast around the Mediterranean, which could only make his position seem even more peculiar. As for Franz, there was nothing further to keep him on Monte Cristo, since he had lost all hope of finding the secret of the cavern; so he hastened to finish his lunch, while ordering the men to prepare the boat for when he was ready.

Half an hour later, he was on board.

He cast a final glance at the yacht. It was about to vanish into the Gulf of Porto Vecchio. He gave the signal to depart.

At the moment when his boat set off, the yacht disappeared.

With it vanished the last link with the reality of the previous night: the supper, Sinbad, the hashish and the statues – all were beginning for Franz to merge into a single dream.

The boat sailed all day and all night. The next morning, at sunrise, it was the island of Monte Cristo itself that had disappeared.

Once Franz had landed, he put aside all memory of recent events, at least temporarily, in order to complete his personal and social affairs in Florence and concentrate on joining his friend, who was waiting in Rome. So he left for there, and on the Saturday evening arrived by stage-coach on the Piazza della Dogana.

As we mentioned earlier, the apartment was already reserved, so there was nothing to be done except to repair to Signor Pastrini’s establishment. This was less easy than it sounds: the streets were jammed with people and Rome was already a prey to the dull, feverish hum that precedes great events. And in Rome there are four great events in the year: carnival, Holy Week, Corpus Christi and the Feast of Saint Peter.

The rest of the year, the city slumps back into its melancholic apathy, a limbo between life and death, which makes it comparable to a kind of stopping-place between this life and the next; but a sublime stopping-place, full of character and poetry, that Franz had experienced five or six times before, and which each time he had found more marvellous and more fantastic than the last.

At length he managed to make his way through the swelling and increasingly expectant crowd, and reached the hotel. At his first request, he was told, with that impertinence which is peculiar to cab-drivers when they have already been booked and innkeepers whose establishments are full, that there was no more room for him in the Hôtel de Londres, whereupon he sent his card up to Signor Pastrini and asked to be announced to Albert de Morcerf. This tactic succeeded and Signor Pastrini hurried down in person, begging pardon for having kept His Excellency waiting, scolding his staff, snatching the candlestick from the hand of the guide who had already taken charge of the traveller, and preparing to conduct him to Albert, when the latter himself came to meet them.

The apartment they had rented consisted of two little rooms and
a study. Both bedrooms overlooked the street, a feature that Signor Pastrini emphasized, as enormously enhancing their worth. The remainder of the floor was rented to a very rich gentleman, believed to be a Sicilian or a Maltese: the hotelier could not say precisely to which of the two nations the traveller belonged. He was called the Count of Monte Cristo.

‘Very well, Signor Pastrini,’ said Franz, ‘but we shall immediately need some kind of supper for this evening and a barouche for tomorrow and the following days.’

‘As to the supper,’ said the innkeeper, ‘you shall have it at once; but regarding the barouche…’

‘What! What, regarding the barouche?’ Albert exclaimed. ‘Hold on now, one moment! We are not joking, Signor Pastrini! We shall need a barouche.’

‘Monsieur,’ said the innkeeper, ‘everything possible will be done to procure one for you. I cannot say more than that.’

‘And when shall we know?’ asked Franz.

‘Tomorrow morning,’ answered the innkeeper.

‘Damnation!’ said Albert. ‘All this means is that we shall pay dearer for it. You know how it goes: from Drake or Aaron – twenty-five francs on ordinary days, and thirty or thirty-five on Sundays and holidays. Add five francs a day as your own fee, and we are in for a round forty francs.’

‘I very much fear that the gentlemen would not be able to find such a vehicle for double that amount.’

‘Well, then, find some horses and harness them to my own. It is a little the worse for wear after the journey, but no matter.’

‘You won’t find any horses.’

Albert looked at Franz like a man who has just been given an incomprehensible answer.

‘Do you understand this, Franz? No horses! But what about post-horses, aren’t there any of those?’

‘All hired a fortnight ago; all that is left are those which are absolutely essential for the mail.’

‘What do you say to that?’ asked Franz.

‘I say that, when something is beyond my comprehension, I am in the habit of not wasting any more time on it, but of turning to something else. Is the supper ready, Signor Pastrini?’

‘Yes, Excellency.’

‘Well, then, let’s dine first of all.’

‘But what about the barouche and the horses?’ asked Franz.

‘Don’t worry about them, my dear friend, they will come of their own accord. It is simply a matter of finding a price.’

At which, Morcerf, with that admirable philosophy that believes nothing impossible so long as it feels its purse to be fat and its wallet full, supped, went to bed, fell instantly fast asleep and dreamt that he was prancing through the carnival with a carriage and six horses.

The next morning Franz was the first to wake up and, as soon as he was awake, rang. The tinkling of the bell could still be heard when Signor Pastrini in person came in.

‘So! It is just as I thought yesterday,’ the innkeeper said triumphantly, without even waiting for Franz to put the question to him, ‘when I didn’t want to promise you anything, Excellency. Your search has begun too late: there is not a single carriage to be had in Rome – for the final three days, of course.’