On the bed, at full length, and faintly illuminated by the pale light
that came from the window, lay a sack of canvas, and under its rude
folds was stretched a long and stiffened form; it was Faria's last
winding-sheet,--a winding-sheet which, as the turnkey said, cost so
little. Everything was in readiness. A barrier had been placed between
Dantes and his old friend. No longer could Edmond look into those
wide-open eyes which had seemed to be penetrating the mysteries of
death; no longer could he clasp the hand which had done so much to make
his existence blessed. Faria, the beneficent and cheerful companion,
with whom he was accustomed to live so intimately, no longer breathed.
He seated himself on the edge of that terrible bed, and fell into
melancholy and gloomy revery.
Alone--he was alone again--again condemned to silence--again face to
face with nothingness! Alone!--never again to see the face, never again
to hear the voice of the only human being who united him to earth! Was
not Faria's fate the better, after all--to solve the problem of life at
its source, even at the risk of horrible suffering? The idea of suicide,
which his friend had driven away and kept away by his cheerful presence,
now hovered like a phantom over the abbe's dead body.
"If I could die," he said, "I should go where he goes, and should
assuredly find him again. But how to die? It is very easy," he went on
with a smile; "I will remain here, rush on the first person that opens
the door, strangle him, and then they will guillotine me." But excessive
grief is like a storm at sea, where the frail bark is tossed from the
depths to the top of the wave. Dantes recoiled from the idea of so
infamous a death, and passed suddenly from despair to an ardent desire
for life and liberty.
"Die? oh, no," he exclaimed--"not die now, after having lived and
suffered so long and so much! Die? yes, had I died years ago; but now to
die would be, indeed, to give way to the sarcasm of destiny. No, I want
to live; I shall struggle to the very last; I will yet win back the
happiness of which I have been deprived. Before I die I must not forget
that I have my executioners to punish, and perhaps, too, who knows, some
friends to reward. Yet they will forget me here, and I shall die in
my dungeon like Faria." As he said this, he became silent and gazed
straight before him like one overwhelmed with a strange and amazing
thought. Suddenly he arose, lifted his hand to his brow as if his brain
wore giddy, paced twice or thrice round the dungeon, and then paused
abruptly by the bed.
"Just God!" he muttered, "whence comes this thought? Is it from thee?
Since none but the dead pass freely from this dungeon, let me take
the place of the dead!" Without giving himself time to reconsider
his decision, and, indeed, that he might not allow his thoughts to be
distracted from his desperate resolution, he bent over the appalling
shroud, opened it with the knife which Faria had made, drew the corpse
from the sack, and bore it along the tunnel to his own chamber, laid it
on his couch, tied around its head the rag he wore at night around his
own, covered it with his counterpane, once again kissed the ice-cold
brow, and tried vainly to close the resisting eyes, which glared
horribly, turned the head towards the wall, so that the jailer might,
when he brought the evening meal, believe that he was asleep, as was
his frequent custom; entered the tunnel again, drew the bed against the
wall, returned to the other cell, took from the hiding-place the needle
and thread, flung off his rags, that they might feel only naked flesh
beneath the coarse canvas, and getting inside the sack, placed himself
in the posture in which the dead body had been laid, and sewed up the
mouth of the sack from the inside.
He would have been discovered by the beating of his heart, if by any
mischance the jailers had entered at that moment. Dantes might have
waited until the evening visit was over, but he was afraid that the
governor would change his mind, and order the dead body to be removed
earlier. In that case his last hope would have been destroyed. Now his
plans were fully made, and this is what he intended to do. If while he
was being carried out the grave-diggers should discover that they were
bearing a live instead of a dead body, Dantes did not intend to give
them time to recognize him, but with a sudden cut of the knife, he meant
to open the sack from top to bottom, and, profiting by their alarm,
escape; if they tried to catch him, he would use his knife to better
purpose.
If they took him to the cemetery and laid him in a grave, he would
allow himself to be covered with earth, and then, as it was night, the
grave-diggers could scarcely have turned their backs before he would
have worked his way through the yielding soil and escaped. He hoped that
the weight of earth would not be so great that he could not overcome it.
If he was detected in this and the earth proved too heavy, he would be
stifled, and then--so much the better, all would be over. Dantes had not
eaten since the preceding evening, but he had not thought of hunger, nor
did he think of it now. His situation was too precarious to allow him
even time to reflect on any thought but one.
The first risk that Dantes ran was, that the jailer, when he brought
him his supper at seven o'clock, might perceive the change that had been
made; fortunately, twenty times at least, from misanthropy or fatigue,
Dantes had received his jailer in bed, and then the man placed his bread
and soup on the table, and went away without saying a word. This time
the jailer might not be as silent as usual, but speak to Dantes, and
seeing that he received no reply, go to the bed, and thus discover all.
When seven o'clock came, Dantes' agony really began. His hand placed
upon his heart was unable to redress its throbbings, while, with the
other he wiped the perspiration from his temples. From time to time
chills ran through his whole body, and clutched his heart in a grasp
of ice. Then he thought he was going to die. Yet the hours passed on
without any unusual disturbance, and Dantes knew that he had escaped
the first peril. It was a good augury. At length, about the hour the
governor had appointed, footsteps were heard on the stairs. Edmond
felt that the moment had arrived, summoned up all his courage, held
his breath, and would have been happy if at the same time he could
have repressed the throbbing of his veins. The footsteps--they
were double--paused at the door--and Dantes guessed that the two
grave-diggers had come to seek him--this idea was soon converted
into certainty, when he heard the noise they made in putting down the
hand-bier. The door opened, and a dim light reached Dantes' eyes through
the coarse sack that covered him; he saw two shadows approach his bed,
a third remaining at the door with a torch in its hand. The two men,
approaching the ends of the bed, took the sack by its extremities.
"He's heavy though for an old and thin man," said one, as he raised the
head.
"They say every year adds half a pound to the weight of the bones," said
another, lifting the feet.
"Have you tied the knot?" inquired the first speaker.
"What would be the use of carrying so much more weight?" was the reply,
"I can do that when we get there."
"Yes, you're right," replied the companion.
"What's the knot for?" thought Dantes.
They deposited the supposed corpse on the bier. Edmond stiffened himself
in order to play the part of a dead man, and then the party, lighted by
the man with the torch, who went first, ascended the stairs. Suddenly he
felt the fresh and sharp night air, and Dantes knew that the mistral was
blowing. It was a sensation in which pleasure and pain were strangely
mingled. The bearers went on for twenty paces, then stopped, putting
the bier down on the ground. One of them went away, and Dantes heard his
shoes striking on the pavement.
"Where am I?" he asked himself.
"Really, he is by no means a light load!" said the other bearer, sitting
on the edge of the hand-barrow. Dantes' first impulse was to escape, but
fortunately he did not attempt it.
"Give us a light," said the other bearer, "or I shall never find what I
am looking for." The man with the torch complied, although not asked in
the most polite terms.
"What can he be looking for?" thought Edmond. "The spade, perhaps." An
exclamation of satisfaction indicated that the grave-digger had found
the object of his search. "Here it is at last," he said, "not without
some trouble though."
"Yes," was the answer, "but it has lost nothing by waiting."
As he said this, the man came towards Edmond, who heard a heavy metallic
substance laid down beside him, and at the same moment a cord was
fastened round his feet with sudden and painful violence.
"Well, have you tied the knot?" inquired the grave-digger, who was
looking on.
"Yes, and pretty tight too, I can tell you," was the answer.
"Move on, then." And the bier was lifted once more, and they proceeded.
They advanced fifty paces farther, and then stopped to open a door, then
went forward again. The noise of the waves dashing against the rocks on
which the chateau is built, reached Dantes' ear distinctly as they went
forward.
"Bad weather!" observed one of the bearers; "not a pleasant night for a
dip in the sea."
"Why, yes, the abbe runs a chance of being wet," said the other; and
then there was a burst of brutal laughter. Dantes did not comprehend the
jest, but his hair stood erect on his head.
"Well, here we are at last," said one of them. "A little farther--a
little farther," said the other. "You know very well that the last was
stopped on his way, dashed on the rocks, and the governor told us next
day that we were careless fellows."
They ascended five or six more steps, and then Dantes felt that they
took him, one by the head and the other by the heels, and swung him to
and fro. "One!" said the grave-diggers, "two! three!" And at the same
instant Dantes felt himself flung into the air like a wounded bird,
falling, falling, with a rapidity that made his blood curdle. Although
drawn downwards by the heavy weight which hastened his rapid descent, it
seemed to him as if the fall lasted for a century.
At last, with a horrible splash, he darted like an arrow into the
ice-cold water, and as he did so he uttered a shrill cry, stifled in a
moment by his immersion beneath the waves.
Dantes had been flung into the sea, and was dragged into its depths by
a thirty-six pound shot tied to his feet. The sea is the cemetery of the
Chateau d'If.
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