Page:The Count of Monte-Cristo (1887 Volume 2).djvu/254

236 honor to introduce me; but I cannot accept the offer of any one of these gentlemen, since my habitation is already prepared."

"What!" cried Morcerf; "you are, then, going to a hotel that will be very dull for you."

"Was I so badly lodged at Rome!" said Monte-Cristo, smiling.

"Parbleu! at Rome you spent fifty thousand piastres in furnishing your apartments, but I presume that you are not disposed to spend a similar sum eveiy day."

"It is not that which deterred me," replied Monte-Cristo; "but as I determined to have a house to myself, I sent on my valet-de-chambre, and he ought by this time to have bought the house and furnished it."

"But you have, then, a valet-de-chambre who knows Paris!" said Beauchamp.

"It is the first time he has ever been in Paris. He is black, and cannot speak," returned Monte-Cristo.

"It is Ali!" cried Albert, in the midst of the general surprise.

"Yes, AH himself, my Nubian mute, whom you saw, I think, at Rome."

"Certainly," said Morcerf; "I recollect him perfectly. But how could you charge a Nubian to purchase a house, and a mute to furnish it? he will do everything wrong."

"Undeceive yourself, monsieur," replied Monte-Cristo; "I am quite sure, that, on the contrary, he will choose everything as I wish. He knows my tastes, my caprices, my wants; he has been here a week, with the instinct of a hound, hunting by himself; he will organize eveiy thing for me. He knew I should arrive to-day at ten o'clock; since nine he awaited me at the Barriere de Fontainebleau. He gave me this paper; it contains the number of my new abode. Read it yourself." And Monte-Cristo passed a paper to Albert.

"Ah, that is really original," said Beauchamp.

"And very princely," added Chateau-Renaud.

"What! do you not know your house!" asked Debray.

"No," said Monte-Cristo; "I told you I did not wish to be behind my time; I dressed myself in the carriage, and descended at the vicomte's door."

The young men looked at each other; they did not know if it was a comedy Monte-Cristo was playing; but every word he uttered had such an air of simplicity, that it was impossible to suppose what he said was false. Besides, why should he tell a falsehood I

"We must content ourselves, then," said Beauchamp, "with rendering M. le Comte all the little services in our power. I, in my quality of journalist, open all the theaters to him."