Thus, you see, though born in Paris, I was brought up in Corsica."
There was a moment's silence, during which one could have fancied
the hall empty, so profound was the stillness. "Proceed," said the
president.
"Certainly, I might have lived happily amongst those good people, who
adored me, but my perverse disposition prevailed over the virtues which
my adopted mother endeavored to instil into my heart. I increased in
wickedness till I committed crime. One day when I cursed Providence for
making me so wicked, and ordaining me to such a fate, my adopted father
said to me, 'Do not blaspheme, unhappy child, the crime is that of your
father, not yours,--of your father, who consigned you to hell if you
died, and to misery if a miracle preserved you alive.' After that I
ceased to blaspheme, but I cursed my father. That is why I have uttered
the words for which you blame me; that is why I have filled this whole
assembly with horror. If I have committed an additional crime, punish
me, but if you will allow that ever since the day of my birth my fate
has been sad, bitter, and lamentable, then pity me."
"But your mother?" asked the president.
"My mother thought me dead; she is not guilty. I did not even wish to
know her name, nor do I know it." Just then a piercing cry, ending in a
sob, burst from the centre of the crowd, who encircled the lady who had
before fainted, and who now fell into a violent fit of hysterics. She
was carried out of the hall, the thick veil which concealed her face
dropped off, and Madame Danglars was recognized. Notwithstanding his
shattered nerves, the ringing sensation in his ears, and the madness
which turned his brain, Villefort rose as he perceived her. "The proofs,
the proofs!" said the president; "remember this tissue of horrors must
be supported by the clearest proofs."
"The proofs?" said Benedetto, laughing; "do you want proofs?"
"Yes."
"Well, then, look at M. de Villefort, and then ask me for proofs."
Every one turned towards the procureur, who, unable to bear the
universal gaze now riveted on him alone, advanced staggering into the
midst of the tribunal, with his hair dishevelled and his face indented
with the mark of his nails. The whole assembly uttered a long murmur of
astonishment. "Father," said Benedetto, "I am asked for proofs, do you
wish me to give them?"
"No, no, it is useless," stammered M. de Villefort in a hoarse voice;
"no, it is useless!"
"How useless?" cried the president, "what do you mean?"
"I mean that I feel it impossible to struggle against this deadly weight
which crushes me. Gentlemen, I know I am in the hands of an avenging
God! We need no proofs; everything relating to this young man is true."
A dull, gloomy silence, like that which precedes some awful phenomenon
of nature, pervaded the assembly, who shuddered in dismay. "What, M.
de Villefort," cried the president, "do you yield to an hallucination?
What, are you no longer in possession of your senses? This strange,
unexpected, terrible accusation has disordered your reason. Come,
recover."
The procureur dropped his head; his teeth chattered like those of a man
under a violent attack of fever, and yet he was deadly pale.
"I am in possession of all my senses, sir," he said; "my body alone
suffers, as you may suppose. I acknowledge myself guilty of all the
young man has brought against me, and from this hour hold myself under
the authority of the procureur who will succeed me."
And as he spoke these words with a hoarse, choking voice, he staggered
towards the door, which was mechanically opened by a door-keeper.
The whole assembly were dumb with astonishment at the revelation and
confession which had produced a catastrophe so different from that which
had been expected during the last fortnight by the Parisian world.
"Well," said Beauchamp, "let them now say that drama is unnatural!"
"Ma foi!" said Chateau-Renaud, "I would rather end my career like M.
de Morcerf; a pistol-shot seems quite delightful compared with this
catastrophe."
"And moreover, it kills," said Beauchamp.
"And to think that I had an idea of marrying his daughter," said Debray.
"She did well to die, poor girl!"
"The sitting is adjourned, gentlemen," said the president; "fresh
inquiries will be made, and the case will be tried next session by
another magistrate." As for Andrea, who was calm and more interesting
than ever, he left the hall, escorted by gendarmes, who involuntarily
paid him some attention. "Well, what do you think of this, my fine
fellow?" asked Debray of the sergeant-at-arms, slipping a louis into his
hand. "There will be extenuating circumstances," he replied.
Chapter 111. Expiation.
Notwithstanding the density of the crowd, M. de Villefort saw it open
before him. There is something so awe-inspiring in great afflictions
that even in the worst times the first emotion of a crowd has generally
been to sympathize with the sufferer in a great catastrophe. Many people
have been assassinated in a tumult, but even criminals have rarely
been insulted during trial. Thus Villefort passed through the mass
of spectators and officers of the Palais, and withdrew. Though he had
acknowledged his guilt, he was protected by his grief. There are
some situations which men understand by instinct, but which reason is
powerless to explain; in such cases the greatest poet is he who gives
utterance to the most natural and vehement outburst of sorrow. Those
who hear the bitter cry are as much impressed as if they listened to
an entire poem, and when the sufferer is sincere they are right in
regarding his outburst as sublime.
It would be difficult to describe the state of stupor in which Villefort
left the Palais. Every pulse beat with feverish excitement, every nerve
was strained, every vein swollen, and every part of his body seemed
to suffer distinctly from the rest, thus multiplying his agony a
thousand-fold. He made his way along the corridors through force of
habit; he threw aside his magisterial robe, not out of deference to
etiquette, but because it was an unbearable burden, a veritable garb
of Nessus, insatiate in torture. Having staggered as far as the Rue
Dauphine, he perceived his carriage, awoke his sleeping coachman by
opening the door himself, threw himself on the cushions, and pointed
towards the Faubourg Saint-Honore; the carriage drove on. The weight of
his fallen fortunes seemed suddenly to crush him; he could not
foresee the consequences; he could not contemplate the future with the
indifference of the hardened criminal who merely faces a contingency
already familiar. God was still in his heart. "God," he murmured, not
knowing what he said,--"God--God!" Behind the event that had overwhelmed
him he saw the hand of God. The carriage rolled rapidly onward.
Villefort, while turning restlessly on the cushions, felt something
press against him. He put out his hand to remove the object; it was
a fan which Madame de Villefort had left in the carriage; this fan
awakened a recollection which darted through his mind like lightning. He
thought of his wife.
"Oh!" he exclaimed, as though a redhot iron were piercing his heart.
During the last hour his own crime had alone been presented to his mind;
now another object, not less terrible, suddenly presented itself. His
wife! He had just acted the inexorable judge with her, he had condemned
her to death, and she, crushed by remorse, struck with terror,
covered with the shame inspired by the eloquence of his irreproachable
virtue,--she, a poor, weak woman, without help or the power of defending
herself against his absolute and supreme will,--she might at that very
moment, perhaps, be preparing to die! An hour had elapsed since her
condemnation; at that moment, doubtless, she was recalling all her
crimes to her memory; she was asking pardon for her sins; perhaps
she was even writing a letter imploring forgiveness from her virtuous
husband--a forgiveness she was purchasing with her death! Villefort
again groaned with anguish and despair. "Ah," he exclaimed, "that woman
became criminal only from associating with me! I carried the infection
of crime with me, and she has caught it as she would the typhus fever,
the cholera, the plague! And yet I have punished her--I have dared to
tell her--I have--'Repent and die!' But no, she must not die; she shall
live, and with me. We will flee from Paris and go as far as the earth
reaches. I told her of the scaffold; oh, heavens, I forgot that it
awaits me also! How could I pronounce that word? Yes, we will fly;
I will confess all to her,--I will tell her daily that I also have
committed a crime!--Oh, what an alliance--the tiger and the serpent;
worthy wife of such as I am! She must live that my infamy may diminish
hers." And Villefort dashed open the window in front of the carriage.
"Faster, faster!" he cried, in a tone which electrified the coachman.
The horses, impelled by fear, flew towards the house.
"Yes, yes," repeated Villefort, as he approached his home--"yes, that
woman must live; she must repent, and educate my son, the sole survivor,
with the exception of the indestructible old man, of the wreck of
my house. She loves him; it was for his sake she has committed these
crimes. We ought never to despair of softening the heart of a mother who
loves her child. She will repent, and no one will know that she has been
guilty. The events which have taken place in my house, though they now
occupy the public mind, will be forgotten in time, or if, indeed, a few
enemies should persist in remembering them, why then I will add them to
my list of crimes. What will it signify if one, two, or three more are
added? My wife and child shall escape from this gulf, carrying treasures
with them; she will live and may yet be happy, since her child, in whom
all her love is centred, will be with her. I shall have performed a good
action, and my heart will be lighter." And the procureur breathed more
freely than he had done for some time.
The carriage stopped at the door of the house. Villefort leaped out
of the carriage, and saw that his servants were surprised at his early
return; he could read no other expression on their features. Neither of
them spoke to him; they merely stood aside to let him pass by, as usual,
nothing more. As he passed by M. Noirtier's room, he perceived two
figures through the half-open door; but he experienced no curiosity to
know who was visiting his father: anxiety carried him on further.
"Come," he said, as he ascended the stairs leading to his wife's room,
"nothing is changed here." He then closed the door of the landing.
"No one must disturb us," he said; "I must speak freely to her, accuse
myself, and say"--he approached the door, touched the crystal handle,
which yielded to his hand. "Not locked," he cried; "that is well." And
he entered the little room in which Edward slept; for though the child
went to school during the day, his mother could not allow him to be
separated from her at night. With a single glance Villefort's eye
ran through the room. "Not here," he said; "doubtless she is in her
bedroom." He rushed towards the door, found it bolted, and stopped,
shuddering. "Heloise!" he cried. He fancied he heard the sound of a
piece of furniture being removed. "Heloise!" he repeated.
"Who is there?" answered the voice of her he sought. He thought that
voice more feeble than usual.
"Open the door!" cried Villefort. "Open; it is I." But notwithstanding
this request, notwithstanding the tone of anguish in which it was
uttered, the door remained closed. Villefort burst it open with a
violent blow. At the entrance of the room which led to her boudoir,
Madame de Villefort was standing erect, pale, her features contracted,
and her eyes glaring horribly. "Heloise, Heloise!" he said, "what is the
matter? Speak!" The young woman extended her stiff white hands towards
him. "It is done, monsieur," she said with a rattling noise which seemed
to tear her throat. "What more do you want?" and she fell full length on
the floor. Villefort ran to her and seized her hand, which convulsively
clasped a crystal bottle with a golden stopper. Madame de Villefort was
dead. Villefort, maddened with horror, stepped back to the threshhold
of the door, fixing his eyes on the corpse: "My son!" he exclaimed
suddenly, "where is my son?--Edward, Edward!" and he rushed out of the
room, still crying, "Edward, Edward!" The name was pronounced in such a
tone of anguish that the servants ran up.
"Where is my son?" asked Villefort; "let him be removed from the house,
that he may not see"--
"Master Edward is not down-stairs, sir," replied the valet.
"Then he must be playing in the garden; go and see."
"No, sir; Madame de Villefort sent for him half an hour ago; he went
into her room, and has not been down-stairs since." A cold perspiration
burst out on Villefort's brow; his legs trembled, and his thoughts flew
about madly in his brain like the wheels of a disordered watch. "In
Madame de Villefort's room?" he murmured and slowly returned, with one
hand wiping his forehead, and with the other supporting himself
against the wall. To enter the room he must again see the body of his
unfortunate wife. To call Edward he must reawaken the echo of that room
which now appeared like a sepulchre; to speak seemed like violating the
silence of the tomb. His tongue was paralyzed in his mouth.
"Edward!" he stammered--"Edward!" The child did not answer. Where, then,
