World Literature Classics Library: The Count of Monte Cristo

Chapter 124 Prosecutor's Office (2)
"This Corsican openly threatened me with revenge. He followed me all the way from Nîmes to Paris. It was this Corsican who hid himself in the garden and then came and attacked me. He saw me. Digging the grave, and saw me bury the boy. He may not be able to find out who you are, and maybe he already knows who you are... Will he not come to the door one day and say something to replace this terrible thing Keep it secret, so as to blackmail you? If he learns that he stabbed me with a dagger but didn't die, isn't this blackmail just a soft knife for his revenge? So the most important thing is first of all, and no matter what, we must leave the past behind All traces are erased, I have to erase all tangible traces, and the vivid past can only be kept in my heart. It is for this reason that I canceled the rental contract, and it is for this reason that I rushed here again , and it is for this reason that I stand guard here.

"Night fell, but I waited quietly until it was completely dark. I didn't light the lamp, and I was still waiting in that room. There was a gust of wind outside, and the window curtains in the room fluttered. I always felt as if I saw someone The spy hid behind the curtain and couldn't help shivering again and again. I thought I heard you moaning on the bed behind me, but I didn't dare to turn around and take a look. There was silence all around, and my heart was pounding. , I just felt that my heart was beating so violently that my wound seemed to be open again. At last I heard all the sounds in the country quiet down one by one, and I knew that there was nothing to worry about anymore. would be heard, so I decided to go downstairs.

"Listen, Elmina, I don't think I'm more timid than other people, but when I took out the little key for the staircase door from my bosom--we used to think of this little key as a treasure, You want it to be tied to a gold ring, when I opened the stair door, when I looked through the window and saw the moon in the sky dimly, and sprinkled a long ghostly trail on the steps of the spiral staircase. When the pale white light was on, I couldn't help but cling to the wall and almost shouted. I felt like I was going crazy, but I finally calmed down and walked down the stairs step by step. At this time, the only thing I couldn't control was My own is trembling knees. I have to hold on to the handrail of the stairs tightly, and if I let go, I will fall headlong.

"I went down to the door of the stairs, and there was a shovel outside against the wall, and I took a lantern that could be shaded, and stopped in the middle of the lawn, and lit the lamp, and then I went on. It was the end of November, and the green leaves in the garden had fallen. The big trees seemed to be skeletons with long, thin arms, and the dead leaves on the gravel path rustled under my feet. With my heart in my mouth, I took out a pistol from my pocket and held it tightly in my hand as I walked towards the bushes. From time to time I thought I saw the figure of the Corsican wandering among the branches.

"I took a long look at the bushes with a lantern, and the bushes were empty. I looked around again, and I was indeed alone in the garden. The night was dark, and I could only hear an owl hooting mournfully, as if calling Night ghost, there is silence all around except for this cry. I hang my lantern on a branch, which was fixed when I dug a hole in this place a year ago. Keep it in mind. The grass in this place has grown a dense layer after a summer, and no one has come to trim it since autumn, but I saw a place where the grass is relatively sparse. Obviously, this is where I dug the soil. So I started digging, and the moment I had been waiting for for a year finally came.

"So, full of hope, I dug hard and turned over the clumps of grass, always thinking that the tip of my shovel would touch something hard, but there was nothing! But the hole I dug was already the same as before. The dig was twice as big. I wondered if I was confused and misremembered the place, so I went over every detail I could think of. A biting wind whizzed through the bare branches, and then The sweat was still dripping from my brow. I remember stepping on the dirt that had just been filled back into the pit when I was stabbed by the dagger. I was stepping on the dirt that day with my hand on a gorse tree. Behind me A pile of rocks for walking and resting, because when I fell down, my hand slipped from the gorse branch, and I still felt the cold stone. Now I have the gorse tree on my right, and the rocks behind it, I stood at the original position and fell down on purpose, then stood up and dug again, and made the hole wider and wider. But nothing was dug, and no matter how hard I dug, I couldn’t dig anything! The box was gone .”

"That box is gone?" Mrs. Tangla was so panicked that she couldn't breathe, she just murmured.

"Don't think I gave up after this search," continued Villefort. "No, I went on to search the whole wood. I think the assassin who killed me dug up the wooden box again, thinking it was some treasure. , so he wanted to steal it and took it away, but later he found out that he had made a mistake, he dug a hole himself, and buried the box. But nothing was found in the woods, and I had another idea, he wouldn’t be like this Be careful, just throw the box in any corner. If so, I can only find it after dawn, and I will go upstairs and return to my room, and I will talk about it after dawn.”

"Oh, my god!"

"As soon as it was light, I went downstairs again. I first searched in the woods, hoping to find clues that I hadn't noticed in the night. The soil I dug up was more than 20 feet square and two feet deep. I did all the digging by myself in an hour, but to no avail. I found nothing. I thought where the box might have been thrown, so I looked for it on the assumption that it might be there. On the road leading to the small gate, but I searched and searched for the same result as the first search, and found nothing, my heart was cold, and I went back to the woods, but there is no hope in the woods!"

"Oh!" Madame Tangera shouted, "It's driving people crazy!"

"For a time I wished I had been mad," said Villefort, "but I wasn't blessed with it. I regained my strength, thought it over calmly, and asked myself, why did that man take the dead baby away? "

"You said it a long time ago," Mrs. Tangla continued, "this is to leave evidence."

"Oh, no! On second thought, ma'am, it's impossible. The body can't stay in the house for a year. It has to be told to the judge, and it has to be testified, but none of these things happened."

"Ah! So..." Elmina was shocked and asked.

"So, it may be an extra problem, and the situation is more serious, more unlucky, and more terrifying to us. It may be that the child did not die, and the assassin saved him."

Madame Donglas gave a terrible shriek, and seized Villefort's hands. "My child is not dead!" she said. "You buried my child alive, sir! You buried my child without knowing whether he was dead or alive! Ah!" Madame Tanglar stood up suddenly. , rushed towards the prosecutor, tightly grasped his wrists with both hands, and stood in front of him almost aggressively.

"How can I know? I'm just saying this to you casually." Villefort replied, his eyes had become fixed, and it seemed that such a powerful man had reached the point of despair. The point of insanity.

"Ah! my child, my poor child!" cried the baroness, throwing herself down on her chair, and sobbing, covering her mouth with her handkerchief.

Villefort calmed down, knowing that in order to divert the storm that hit him out of maternal love, Madame Tangra must be as frightened as he is now. "You must understand, therefore, that if this is the case," said Villefort, getting up, going up to the baroness, and saying in a low voice, "we are at the end of the road, the boy is alive, and someone knows he is alive, someone He has us in. Since Monte Cristo says he has dug up a dead child in our presence, but the child is not there, he has us in."

"God, God is upholding justice, and God is avenging the wronged souls!" Mrs. Tangla murmured.

Villefort said nothing, but shouted like a growl.

"But what about this child, what's the matter with this child, sir?" Mrs. Tanglar asked, with the tone of a stubborn mother.

"Oh, how I have spared no effort to find him!" replied Villefort, clutching his arm. "How many nights have I been unable to sleep, calling out to him again and again! How often have I dreamed that I will be rich in the world." , can buy a million secrets from a million people, and find my own secrets in them! Finally one day I picked up the shovel for the hundredth time, and asked myself for the hundredth time that the Corsican could put the child What. To a desperado, the child is a liability after all, and perhaps he finds it alive and throws him in the river."

"Oh, it's impossible!" Madam Tangla shouted, "A person can kill for revenge, but he won't drown a child on purpose!"

"It may be so," continued Villefort, "that the child has been sent to the nursery."

"Oh, yes, yes!" cried the baroness, "there is my child, sir!"

"I hurried to the Yuying Hall and found out that on that night, that is, on the night of September 9, someone put a child on the round cabinet for accepting children in the Yuying Hall. It fell off in half, leaving the baron's diadem and an H on it."

"That's right, that's right," exclaimed Madame Tangera, "I wear the emblem on my handkerchief and shawl. Monsieur Nargona is a baron, and my own name is Hermina (Hermina is French. Spelled Hermine, with the initial H being the letter in the logo.). Thank you, my God! My child is not dead!"

"Yes, he is not dead."

"That's what you told me, and I'm so glad you said that, you're not afraid, sir! Where is he? Where is my child?"

Villefort shrugged. "How do I know? Do you really think I know, and tell it all the way through like a playwright or a novelist? No, no, unfortunately, I don't know either. Six months before I went to the Foundling In the appearance of the moon, a woman went to claim the child first, she had the other half of the gauze used as a swaddle as evidence, and she met all the claim requirements stipulated by the law, and the Foundling Hall handed over the child to her."

"But you should find out who this woman is, and you should find her."

"Don't you think about what I do? I reasoned that criminal proceedings were needed, and sent the most astute spies and the most experienced police to investigate. They followed up to find Xia Long, but as soon as they found Xia Long, the clues were cut off. "

"broken?"

"Yes, the clue is broken, completely broken."

When Mrs. Tangla heard this story, whenever there were ups and downs, she sometimes sighed, sometimes cried, and sometimes exclaimed. "And that's the end of it?" she said. "That's all you have?"

"Oh, no way!" said Villefort, "I have been searching, investigating, and inquiring all the time, only a little less for the last two or three years. But to-day I will re-investigate, more determinedly than ever. Work harder. Just watch, I will find out the truth, because now I not only feel that I can't bear it with my conscience, but also because I am afraid that something will happen, so I have to find out."

"But," continued Madame Donglas, "the Count of Monte Cristo does not know these things; otherwise, I think he would not be as friendly as he is now."

"Oh, the evil of the human heart is unfathomable," said Villefort. "The evil of the human heart is greater than the goodness of God. Have you noticed how this man's eyes are fixed on him when he talks to us?"

"No."

"But you've paid some attention to him, haven't you?"

"That's true. He's a weird person, and there's nothing else. Only one thing left a deep impression on me. At the dinner party that day, he entertained us with delicious food and wine, but he didn't touch at all. When the food came, he always didn't eat his own portion."

"Yes! Yes! I noticed that too. If I'd known what I see now, I'd have given up nothing. I really thought he was trying to poison us."

"You are suspicious, you can see clearly yourself."

"Yes, I may be wrong. But you should take my word for it, this man must have other plans. So I want you to come to me, so I want to talk to you, so I want to remind you that any Everyone must be on their guard, especially him. Please tell me," continued Villefort, who had been ignoring the baroness before, but now fixed his eyes on her, "you are not afraid of anyone. Didn't you mention our relationship?"

"Never told anyone."

"You know what I mean," continued Villefort, in a friendly tone; "when I say no one, excuse me for emphasizing it again, I mean no one in society, do I?"

"Ah, yes, I know exactly what you mean," said Mrs. Donglas, flushing. "Never talk about it, I can swear to you."

"Generally you don't record everything during the day at night, do you? Do you keep a diary?"

"No. Why, my whole life has been mortal stuff, and I forget as I go."

"Do you talk aloud in your sleep, do you know that?"

"I slept like a child, don't you remember?"

The baroness blushed, and Villefort turned pale.

"It is true," said Villefort, in that low voice.It's barely audible.

"What is to be done?" asked the baroness.

"Very well! I understand what to do," said Villefort; "in a week's time I shall know who this M. Monte Cristo is, where he comes from, where he is going, and why We told about him digging up dead babies from his garden."

Villefort said these words in such a way that the count would have shuddered to hear them.Then Villefort firmly grasped the hand which the Baroness held out to him with great reluctance, and respectfully escorted her to the door.Mrs. Tanglar hired another carriage, went to the alley in front of the New Bridge, and then walked through the alley to find her own carriage. The driver was dozing peacefully on the seat and waiting for her.

(End of this chapter)