Page:The Count of Monte-Cristo (1887 Volume 5).djvu/244

224 is not justice which is pursuing me! Gracious heavens! another idea presents itself; what if they should be"

His hair stood on end. He remembered those interesting stories, so little believed in Paris, respecting Roman bandits; he remembered the adventures that Albert de Morcerf had related when it was intended he should many Mademoiselle Eugénie. "They are robbers, perhaps!" he muttered.

Just then the carriage rolled on something harder than the graveled road. Danglars hazarded a look on both sides of the road, and perceived monuments of a singular form; and his mind now recalled all the details Morcerf had related, and comparing them with his own situation, he felt sure he must be on the Appian Way. On the left, in a sort of valley, he perceived a circular excavation. It was the Circus of Caracalla. On a word from the man who rode at the side of the carnage, it stopped. At the same time the door was opened. "Scendi!" exclaimed a commanding voice.

Danglars instantly descended; though he did not yet speak Italian, he understood it very well. More dead than alive, he looked around him. Four men surrounded him, besides the postilion.

"Di quà?" said one of the men, descending a little path leading out of the Appian Way, in the midst of the numerous inequalities of the surface of the Campagna. Danglars followed his guide without opposition, and had no occasion to turn round to see whether the three others were following him. Still it appeared as though they stopped at equal distances from one another, like sentinels. After walking for about ten minutes, during which Danglars did not exchange a single word with his guide, he found himself between a hillock and a clump of high weeds; three men, standing silent, formed a triangle, of which he was the center. He wished to speak, but his tongue refused to move.

"Avanti!" said the same sharp and imperative voice.

This time Danglars had double reason to understand; for if the word and gesture had not explained the speaker's meaning, it was clearly expressed by the man walking behind him, who pushed him so rudely that he struck against the guide. This guide was our friend Peppino, who dashed into the thicket of high weeds, through a path which none but lizards or weasels could have imagined to be an open road.

Peppino stopped before a rock overhung by thick hedges; the rock, with its half-hidden opening, afforded a passage to the young man, who disappeared like the evil spirits of fairy dramas into their traps. The voice and gesture of the man who followed Danglars ordered him to do the same. There was no longer any doubt, the bankrupt was in the hands of Roman banditti. Danglars acquitted himself like a man