Page:The Count of Monte-Cristo (1887 Volume 5).djvu/210

190 "I have to weep over the grave of my father," replied Morrel, in a broken voice.

"Well, then, go, wait for me there, and I will soon join you."

"You leave me, then?"

"Yes; I also have a pious visit to pay."

Morrel allowed his hand to fall into that which the count extended to him; then with an inexpressibly melancholy inclination of the head he quitted the count, and bent his steps to the east of the city. Monte-Cristo remained on the same spot until Maximilian was out of sight; he then walked slowly toward the Allées de Meillan to seek out the small house with which our readers must have been familiar at the commencement of this story.

It yet stood under the shade of the fine avenue of lime-trees, which forms one of the most frequent walks of the idlers of Marseilles; covered by an immense vine, which spreads its aged and blackened branches over the stone front, burned yellow by the ardent sun of the south. Two stone steps, worn away by the friction of the feet, led to the door, made of three planks, which, owing to their never having made acquaintance with paint or varnish, parted annually to reunite again when the damp season arrived. This house, with all its crumbling antiquity and apparent misery, was yet cheerful and picturesque, and was the same that old Dantès formerly inhabited—the only difference being that the old man occupied merely the garret, while the whole house was now placed at the command of Mercédès by the count.

The woman whom the count had seen leave the ship with so much regret entered this house; she had scarcely closed the door after her when Monte-Cristo appeared at the corner of a street, so that he found and lost her again almost at the same instant. The worn-out steps were old acquaintances of his; he knew better than any one else how to open that weather-beaten door with a large-headed nail, which served to raise the latch within. He entered without knocking, or giving any other intimation of his presence, as if he had been the friend or the master of the place. At the end of a passage, paved with bricks, was seen a little garden, bathed in sunshine, and rich in warmth and light—it was in this garden that Mercédès found in the place indicated by the count, the sum of money which he, through a sense of delicacy, intimated had been placed there four-and-twenty years previously. The trees of the garden were easily seen from the steps of the street-door.

Monte-Cristo, on stepping into the house, heard a sigh, almost resembling a deep sob; he looked in the direction whence it came, and there, under an arbor of Virginian jasmine, with its thick foliage and beautiful long purple flowers, he perceived Mercédès seated with her head bowed, and weeping bitterly. She had raised her veil, and with