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Updated: June 21, 2025
By degrees the recollection of Lyons seemed to fall from the mind of Jane. Never was there the most distant allusion ever made to her mother, and the girl never spoke of her. This silence astonished Sanselme, and troubled him as well. He had studied Jane so closely that he thoroughly understood her character, her goodness, unselfishness and passionate gratitude.
Sanselme listened with beads of sweat on his brow. He determined to drink the cup to the dregs. "Yes," he said, "go on. It was at Selzheim." "Selzheim! yes. Oh! how sweet it was there. There was a mountain, and a lovely brook where I bathed my feet when I was a little thing." "And a Square and a fountain," whispered Sanselme. "Yes, how gay it was there, when we all played together.
It is nonsense, of course, for she will go the same way as her mother in the end." "Will you show me the papers?" asked Sanselme, "and I will do all I can for this woman." "Help me to get rid of her! That is all I ask." "Rely on me." Sanselme presently had the papers in his hands. The sick woman's name was Jane Zeld. She came from a little village in Switzerland, near Zurich.
The unhappy Zelda had fallen into a state of prostration, that rendered her unconscious of all that was going on about her. Her daughter went to her side. "Do not disturb her," said Sanselme, "she is asleep." For the first time the girl looked him full in the face. "You are very kind," she said. "You knew my mother then?"
He could dimly see his form on the shore, and then the man's shadow was lost in the shadow of the woods. Sanselme uttered a groan. This man had killed Jane, and would now go unpunished. Up to this moment the former convict had been sustained by unnatural strength, but now this strength was gone. He could do no more and believed himself to be dying.
And suddenly, in spite of the lapse of years, she recognized him. She shrank away with a frenzied shrink. "Yes, it is I! pardon me!" and Sanselme sank on his knees; "and tell me, I implore you, where the child is?" She did not speak, she could not. She stretched out her hand, and pointed to the room where her daughter was. "And she is my child?" cried Sanselme. "Yes," answered the dying woman.
The cold was sharp and there was no moon. Suddenly he heard an angry discussion across the street. Coarse voices and then a woman's tone of appeal. Sanselme did not linger, he had made it a rule never to interfere in quarrels. He feared any complication which should compromise him. But as he hurried on, he heard a wild cry for help. "Oh! leave my child!" the woman cried. "Help! Help!"
Our readers will remember how he was finally thrown up by the sea on the island of Monte-Cristo. Sanselme remained alone with the corpse. The sun rose, and finally a ray crept over the face of the dead woman. Sanselme started. Perhaps she is not dead after all. He stooped and lifted her from the floor. Should he call for assistance? To do so was to deliver himself up as an escaped convict.
It will be remembered that the former convict had been present at the conversation in which Fanfar and his companions resolved to rescue Esperance. The sick man, unable to move, still down with fever, saw them go. The mad woman also remained in the room, saying over and over again: "Benedetto is my son, my son, and he killed me!" While Sanselme repeated Jane's name without cessation.
He assassinated his mother, and by what miracle she escaped, I know not. He this Benedetto is to-day in Paris. He has come to avenge himself on Monte-Cristo." Fanfar questioned Sanselme, who avowed everything except that Jane was his daughter. He would not have admitted this had he been threatened with the guillotine. Fanfar listened attentively.
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