Page:The Count of Monte-Cristo (1887 Volume 2).djvu/319

301 "'Tush, tush!' cried the men, 'keep your innocent stories to tell to the judge at Nîmes. Meanwhile, come along with us, and the best advice we can give you is to do so unresistingly.'

"Alas! resistance was far from my thoughts. I was utterly over powered by surprise and terror; and without a word I suffered myself to be handcuffed and tied to a horse's tail, in which disgraceful plight I arrived at Nîmes.

"It seems I had been tracked by a douanier, who had lost sight of me near the auberge; feeling assured that I intended to pass the night there, he had returned to summon his comrades, who just arrived in time to hear the report of the pistol, and to take me in the midst of such circumstantial proofs of my guilt as rendered all hopes of proving my innocence utterly at an end. One only chance was left me, that of beseeching the magistrate before whom I was taken to cause every inquiry to be made for an individual named the Abbe Busoni, who had stopped at the auberge of the Pont du Grard on the morning previous to the murder.

"If Caderousse had invented the story relative to the diamond, and there existed no such person as the Abbe Busoni, then, indeed, I was lost past redemption, unless Caderousse himself was apprehended and confessed the truth.

"Two months passed away; while I must do the magistrate justice by declaring he used every means to obtain information of the person I declared could exculpate me if he would. Caderousse had not been captured, and I lost all hope. My trial was to come on at the approaching sessions, when, on the 8th of September,—that is to say, precisely three months and five days after the event,—the Abbé Busoni, whom I never ventured to believe I should see, presented himself at the prison, saying he understood one of the prisoners wished to speak to him; he added that he had learned this at Marseilles, and hastened to comply with my desire.

"You may easily imagine with what eagerness I welcomed him, and how minutely I related the whole of what I had seen and heard. I felt some nervousness as I entered upon the history of the diamond; but, to my astonishment, he confirmed it, and to my equal surprise, he seemed to place entire belief in all I stated.

"And then it was that, won by his mild charity, perceiving him acquainted with all the habits and customs of my own country, and considering also that pardon for the only crime of which I was really guilty might come with a double power from lips so benevolent and kind, I besought him to receive my confession, under the seal of which I recounted the affair of Auteuil, in all its details. That which I had done by the impulse of my best feelings produced the same effect as