Page:The Count of Monte-Cristo (1887 Volume 2).djvu/150

132 places at his windows in the Palace Rospoli." The friends looked at each other with surprise.

"But do you think," asked Albert, "that we ought to accept such offers from a perfect stranger?"

"What sort of person is this Count of Monte-Cristo?" asked Franz of his host.

"A very great nobleman, but whether Maltese or Sicilian, I cannot exactly say; but this I know, that he is as noble as a Borghese and rich as a gold-mine."

"It seems to me," said Franz, speaking in an undertone to Albert, "that if he merited the high panegyrics of our landlord, he would have conveyed his invitation through another channel. He would have written—or"

At this instant some one knocked at the door.

"Come in!" said Franz.

A servant, wearing a handsome livery, appeared at the threshold, and placing two cards in the landlord's hands, who forthwith presented them to the two young men, said:

"Please to deliver these, from M. le Comte de Monte-Cristo, to M. le Vicomte Albert de Morcerf and M. Franz Epinay. M. le Comte de Monte-Cristo," continued the servant, "begs these gentlemen's permission to wait upon them as their neighbor, and he will be honored by an intimation of what time they will please to receive him."

"Faith, Franz," whispered Albert, "there is not much to find fault with here."

"Tell the count," replied Franz, "that we will do ourselves the pleasure of calling on him."

The servant bowed and retired.

"That is what I call an elegant mode of attack," said Albert. "You were quite correct in what you stated, Pastrini. The Count of Monte-Cristo is unquestionably a man of the world."

"Then you accept his offer?" said the host.

"Of course we do," said Albert. "Still I must own I am sorry to be obliged to give up the cart and the group of reapers. And were it not for the windows at the Palace Rospoli, by way of recompense for the loss of our beautiful scheme, I don't know but what I should have held on by my original plan. What say you, Franz?"

"Oh, I agree with you; the windows in the Palace Rospoli alone decided me."

The truth was, that the mention of two places in the Palace Rospoli had recalled to Franz's mind the conversation he had overheard the preceding evening in the ruins of the Colosseum between the mysterious