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Updated: June 3, 2025
Dantes recollected that his hair and beard had not been cut all the time he was at the Chateau d'If. "Yes," said he, "I made a vow, to our Lady of the Grotto not to cut my hair or beard for ten years if I were saved in a moment of danger; but to-day the vow expires." "Now what are we to do with you?" said the captain. "Alas, anything you please.
"There are special reports on every prisoner." "Well, sir, I was educated at home by a poor devil of an abbe, who disappeared suddenly. I have since learned that he was confined in the Chateau d'If, and I should like to learn some particulars of his death." "What was his name?" "The Abbe Faria." "Oh, I recollect him perfectly," cried M. de Boville; "he was crazy." "So they said."
I had been told that you had endeavored to escape; that you had taken the place of another prisoner; that you had slipped into the winding sheet of a dead body; that you had been thrown alive from the top of the Chateau d'If, and that the cry you uttered as you dashed upon the rocks first revealed to your jailers that they were your murderers.
Here it was that he wrote his first work of which we have any exact knowledge, its title being: "Essai sur le Despotisme." In the following year he was transferred from the Château d'If to the Castle of Joux, where he was less strictly confined. He had the freedom of the place and frequent opportunities for visiting the near-by town of Pontarlier.
There had been no prisoners confined in the Chateau d'If since the revolution of July; it was only inhabited by a guard, kept there for the prevention of smuggling. A concierge waited at the door to exhibit to visitors this monument of curiosity, once a scene of terror.
"The marriage-feast the marriage-feast!" But instantly the expression of the voice and the countenance altered. The light of joy was shrouded in clouds. "Arrest arrest me?" was the exclamation "me! at my marriage-feast! A dungeon for me! Mercédès! Mercédès! My love my wife! Oh! God! it is the Château d'If! Despair despair!"
Clear sky, swift-flitting boats, and brilliant sunshine disappeared; the heavens were hung with black, and the gigantic structure of the Chateau d'If seemed like the phantom of a mortal enemy. As they reached the shore, the count instinctively shrunk to the extreme end of the boat, and the owner was obliged to call out, in his sweetest tone of voice, "Sir, we are at the landing."
"I am the spectre of a wretch you buried in the dungeons of the Chateau d'If. God gave that spectre the form of the Count of Monte Cristo when he at length issued from his tomb, enriched him with gold and diamonds, and led him to you!" "Ah, I recognize you I recognize you!" exclaimed the king's attorney; "you are" "I am Edmond Dantes!"
It was a long time before he had finished his tale. Haydee felt with him the horrors of his prison, she sobbed as he described the death of Faria, whom he called his spiritual father, and cried out in terror as she heard that the cemetery of Chateau d'If was the wide sea! Then he had dug out Faria's treasure.
"I am not going there to be imprisoned," said Dantes; "it is only used for political prisoners. I have committed no crime. Are there any magistrates or judges at the Chateau d'If?" "There are only," said the gendarme, "a governor, a garrison, turnkeys, and good thick walls. Come, come, do not look so astonished, or you will make me think you are laughing at me in return for my good nature."
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