Monte Cristo, Part III, or The Count of Morcerf
Drama in Five Acts
by Alexandre Dumas père, 1851
Translated and adapted by Frank J. Morlock
Translation is Copyright © 2001 by Frank J. Morlock. Reproduction in any form is prohibited without explicit consent of Frank J. Morlock. Please contact frankmorlock@msn.com for licensing information.
For more information on this play, click here.
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Table of Contents
Characters
A young man's room in the Morcerf residence, arms, pipes, canes. A portrait of Mercedes in her Catalan costume. A portrait of the Count dressed as a Palikar.
(Albert de Morcerf in a turkish robe lying on a sofa. A little groom lights his long turkish pipe, Germain enters, carrying letters and newspapers on a plate of porcelain.)
ALBERT
What's this, Germain?
GERMAIN
The letters and the newspapers, Monsieur le Vicomte.
ALBERT
Have a look.
(taking two letters)
How were these two letters delivered?
GERMAIN
One by the post, the other by Madame Danglars' valet de chambre.
ALBERT
Tell Madame Danglars that I accept the place that she's so kind as to offer me in her box -- then you can go to Rosa's yourself. You will dine with her after leaving the Opera -- and that I'll probably bring a friend with me. You will take her six assorted bottles of wine: Cypress, Sherry, Malaga, and a barrel of oysters from Ostend. Get the oysters from Phillipe and say they're for me.
GERMAIN
Monsieur le Vicomte has ordered lunch for this morning?
ALBERT
Yes.
GERMAIN
For what time?
ALBERT
For 10:30.
GERMAIN
How many places?
ALBERT
Six or seven -- put on two more rather than two less. By the way, go to Madame, the Countess, and tell her that it is likely that this morning I will have the honor of presenting the Count of Monte Cristo to her. But it seems to me, someone's there. Go see.
DEBRAY
Can I come in?
ALBERT
What! You Debray, you that I never expect till the last? Do you know you frighten me with your punctuality? Why do I say punctuality? You arrive at 9:55 when the meeting was for 10:30. It's miraculous! The ministry was overthrown, perhaps?
DEBRAY
My very dear friend, relax. We always totter but we never fall. I spent the night expediting some letters, twenty-five diplomatic dispatches. I went home this morning. I wanted to sleep, but a headache took me when I was relieving myself by riding horseback for an hour. At Boulogne, boredom and hunger swept over me, then I remembered there was a party at your place this morning and here I am. I am hungry -- feed me; I am bored; amuse me.
ALBERT
It's my duty as Amphitryon, dear friend. Germain -- a glass of sherry and a bun! While waiting, my dear friend, here are some contraband cigars I invite you to taste them and to challenge your minister to sell us the like.
DEBRAY
This does not concern my minister. Address your complaint to the Revenue Office. Rue de Rivoli, section of indirect imposts. Consider A # 26.
ALBERT
Truly, my dear Lucien, you astonish me by the extent of your acquaintances, but have a cigar.
(The groom presents to Lucien a red candle burning in a little vermillion candle-holder.)
DEBRAY
(lighting a cigar and stretching on the divan)
Ah, dear Vicomte, may you be happy in having nothing to do. In truth, you don't know your luck.
ALBERT
Eh, what will you be doing then my dear fellow, if you are not doing anything? How's that? Private secretary to the ministry, thrown into the great European cable and into the petty intrigues of Paris, having kings and better still queens to protect, partners to reunite, elections to control, doing more from your office and with your pen and your telegraph, than Napoleon did with his battlefield, with his sword and his victims -- possessing 25,000 pounds of income, outside your official salary, a horse that Chateaubrun has offered you four hundred crowns for, and which you didn't want to give him, a tailor that never fails you; having the Opera, the Versailles and the Jockey Club -- you find nothing in all that to distract you? Then I will try to.
DEBRAY
How's that?
ALBERT
(rising)
In making you meet a new acquaintance.
DEBRAY
A man or a woman?
ALBERT
A man.
DEBRAY
The devil. I know enough of them already.
ALBERT
But you don't know the one of whom I am speaking.
DEBRAY
Where's he come from then? The ends of the world?
ALBERT
Further than that, perhaps.
DEBRAY
I hope he isn't bringing our lunch?
ALBERT
Rest easy -- our lunch is preparing in the maternal kitchen. Decidedly, you must be hungry?
DEBRAY
Yes, I dined yesterday at Mr. de Villefort's. Have you noticed something, dear friend -- one dines very badly at the homes of all the legal people.
ALBERT
Oh, by God! Disparage the dinners of others -- this way one may dine well with your ministers.
BEAUCHAMP
(in the antechamber)
He's waiting for us, right?
ALBERT
Eh! Hold on, I heard the voice of Beauchamp in the antechamber, you can dispute and that will make patient.
GERMAIN
(announcing)
Mr. Beauchamp!
ALBERT
Come in, come in -- ferocious writer! Wait, here's Mr. Debray who detests you without reading you -- at least that's what he says.
BEAUCHAMP
I'm the same. I criticize him without knowing what he does. Goodday, my dear Albert! An explanation! I see Debray who drinks sherry and eats biscuits. Are we lunching or having dinner? I have to go to the Chamber. As you see, all is not rosy in our job.
ALBERT
We are lunching. We are waiting only for two more people.
BEAUCHAMP
What type of people?
ALBERT
A gentleman and a traveler.
BEAUCHAMP
Fine! Two hours for the gentleman and one hour for the traveler. I will return for dessert. Keep me some fresh coffee and cigars. I will eat a cutlet at the Senate.
ALBERT
Don't do anything of the kind, my dear fellow, whether the guests arrive or not, at 10:30 we go to table.
BEAUCHAMP
(looking at his watch)
Ten o'clock! Well, all right, we will test it. Anyway, I am horribly sulky this morning.
ALBERT
Fine, you are like Debray. Now it seems to me if the ministry is sad, the opposition should be gay.
BEAUCHAMP
Ah, that's because you don't know what threatens me. I heard Mr. Danglars speak in the Chamber this morning and tonight, at his wife's, a tragedy of a peer of France.
ALBERT
My dear fellow, this morning you are revoltingly bitter. Recall that the Parisian gossip speaks of a marriage between myself and Miss Eugenie Danglars. I cannot, in good conscience let you speak ill of the eloquence of a man who one day must say to me, "You know, Monsieur le Vicomte, that I am giving two millions to my daughter."
BEAUCHAMP
Come now, Albert, this marriage will never take place. The King is able to make Danglars a baron -- can even make him a peer -- but he can never make him a gentleman and the Count de Morcerf is too aristocratic a swordsman to consent to a misalliance for two poor millions.
ALBERT
Two millions, that's pretty now.
BEAUCHAMP
It's the social capital for a Boulevard theater or a railway from the Jardin de Plantes to La Rapee.
DEBRAY
Let him say it, Morcerf, and get married. You are marrying the etiquette of a moneybags, right? Well, what does the rest matter to you? A blason less and a zero more is worth more on this type of etiquette. You have seven martlets your arms and you will give three to your wife -- that leaves you with four. It's one more than the Duke of Guise who failed to be king of and whose Cousin-German was Emperor of Germany.
BEAUCHAMP
Oh, you, Debray, everyone knows your weakness for the whole family.
GERMAIN
(announcing)
The Marquis de Chateaubrun.
(Chateaubrun enters.)
BEAUCHAMP
Good! Here's the gentleman; we are waiting only for the traveler.
DEBRAY
What! Chateaubrun? But I thought he was in Africa.
CHATEAUBRUN
I got back yesterday, my dear Mr. Debray.
ALBERT
And I offer you something today, one can't be served any hotter, I hope!
CHATEAUBRUN
Goodday, Albert. Goodday, Mr. de Beauchamp. I have to thank you.
BEAUCHAMP
Me?
CHATEAUBRUN
Yes. You have consecrated half a column to me and when that doesn't displease us very much, it flatters us greatly -- we men of the world.
BEAUCHAMP
I think so, indeed! Monsieur le Marquis plays in amateur theaters -- to look arms crossed like the taking of Constantine; they don't take Constantine. They fight retreating, the gentleman uncrosses his arms and performs prodigies.
CHATEAUBRUN
Yes, but there is a man who makes greater prodigies than I do, since he saved me -- and that one you haven't spoken of.
BEAUCHAMP
Ah, yes, Mr. Maximilian Morrel, a captain of the Spokes, who arrived like two Arabs. Note the gentleman has already killed four. Who arrived like two Arabs getting ready to wrangle you about the neck, why the devil do I mention it? He is a soldier and he's only doing his job.
CHATEAUBRUN
It's all the same, my dear fellow, on this occasion I recommend him to you and to you, also, my dear Debray.
DEBRAY
To me? But I am in the Interior and this concerns War.
BEAUCHAMP
Bah -- between ministries.
DEBRAY
With the result that you are here, right? Good! We are only waiting for the traveler.
BEAUCHAMP
It's 10:15.
ALBERT
I demand a respite until 10:30. Tell us, Chateaubrun, you should have brought us your savior. I ought to put him face-to-fact with mine!
CHATEAUBRUN
Your savior, Albert? You have been saved, too? You?
DEBRAY
What can we do to reward these two benefactors of humanity? Who have only the Montyou prize!
CHATEAUBRUN
And from what part of the world does this savior come to us?
ALBERT
Truly, I would be very embarrassed to say it. When I invited him, it was nearly two years ago; it was in Rome, and who can say what road he's been taking since then?
CHATEAUBRUN
Ah, so -- then he's the wondering Jew?
ALBERT
Perhaps so, indeed.
DEBRAY
Do you think he's capable of being punctual at least?
ALBERT
I think he's capable of everything.
BEAUCHAMP
Observe that with the five minutes respite demanded we have only ten minutes.
ALBERT
Well, I've profited by speaking to you of my guest.
BEAUCHAMP
Is there a story from a news sheet that you are going to tell me?
ALBERT
Yes and some more curious beside.
BEAUCHAMP
Speak, then -- for I see clearly I will miss the Chamber -- and I must get back.
ALBERT
I was in Rome -- it was two years ago during Carnival.
BEAUCHAMP
We know that.
ALBERT
Yes, but what you don't know is that I was carried off by bandits.
DEBRAY
There were bandits.
ALBERT
And very hideous, in other words -- wonderful. I found them wonderful to inspire fear. These gentleman had kidnapped me and taken me to a very sad place, that they called the catacombs of Saint Sebastian. I was a prisoner against ransom, a miserly four thousand roman shillings or 26,000 francs. Unfortunately, I had only fifteen hundred; I was at the end of my travels. My credit was exhausted. I wrote to Frantz d'Epinay, who had travelled with me -- and knew everything. The question was grave. If he hadn't arrived at 6:00 in the morning with the four thousand shillings, at precisely 6:10, I was going to have to rejoin the blessed saints and glorious martyrs with whose relics, I had the honor of then finding myself.
CHATEAUBRUN
Well, Frantz arrived with the four thousand shillings?
ALBERT
No, he came purely and simply accompanied by the guest I announced to you, and who, I hope; I shall have the honor of presenting to you.
DEBRAY
Ah, that's it. Why here's a Hercules killing Cacus, like this gentleman, a Perseus delivering Andromeda?
ALBERT
No, he's a man of my build, a little less.
BEAUCHAMP
He was armed to the teeth?
ALBERT
He didn't even have knitting needles.
CHATEAUBRUN
He paid your ransom then?
ALBERT
He said two words in the ear of the chief bandit and I was free.
BEAUCHAMP
(laughing)
Then he made some excuses for stopping you, right?
ALBERT
Exactly.
DEBRAY
Why then this was Ariosto?
ALBERT
No -- it was the Count of Monte Cristo.
DEBRAY
Come on! No one's called the Count of Monte Cristo.
BEAUCHAMP
Wait, wait! I think I can get you out of this embarrassment, Monte Cristo is a little island near which I passed on my way to Palerno.
ALBERT
Precisely. It's grains of black sand of this atom, the man I speak of is King of this grain of sand, of this atom. He must have bought his title of Count somewhere in Tuscany.
BEAUCHAMP
He is rich, your Count?
ALBERT
I should think so. He has a cave full of gold.
BEAUCHAMP
And you have seen this cave?
ALBERT
No, but I've heard it spoken of.
CHATEAUBRUN
Eh, but so have I. One night, in the tent while we were waiting for our supper which did not come.
DEBRAY
Like our lunch today.
ALBERT
Don't interrupt, Debray. What the devil! We are not in the Senate.
CHATEAUBRUN
Well, Morrel, my savior, had always told me that he was going to hunt in this island of Monte-Cristo, and that there he had been invited to supper by a stranger, but on the condition that he let himself be blindfolded and escorted so he didn't know where he was.
ALBERT
Well?
CHATEAUBRUN
Well -- he went down to a cave. There he found a kind of magician who was served by mutes and by women compared to whom Aspasia and Cleopatra were only sluts.
ALBERT
Well, you are throwing ball of twine in my labyrinth, my dear Chateaubrun, the Count of your Captain de Spokes is mine.
DEBRAY
Truly, my friend, you tell of unlikely things.
ALBERT
That doesn't prevent my Count from existing.
DEBRAY
Everybody exists, quite a miracle!
ALBERT
Yes, but nobody exists in similar conditions. Not everybody has black slaves, princely galleries, weapons like Casuaba, horses of six million francs a piece, greek mistresses.
BEAUCHAMP
He has a greek mistress? Have you seen her?
ALBERT
Seen, with both my eyes, once at the Valtee theater and once when I lunched with the Count. Two times in all.
DEBRAY
So he actually eats, your extraordinary man?
ALBERT
My word, if he eats, it is so little that it is hardly worth speaking of.
CHATEAUBRUN
You see -- he's a vampire.
ALBERT
Well, gentleman, you are going to mock me, but I won't say no.
BEAUCHAMP
Ah, bravo.
CHATEAUBRUN
Your Count of Monte Cristo is a gallant man in his lost moments, right?
DEBRAY
Yes, except in his little arrangements with Italian bandits.
BEAUCHAMP
Bah! There are no Italian bandits.
DEBRAY
No vampires!
BEAUCHAMP
No Count de Monte Cristo! And the proof, my dear friend, is that the clock's striking 10:30.
CHATEAUBRUN
Admit you are having a nightmare, and let's go to lunch.
GERMAIN
(opening the door)
His Excellence -- the Count of Monte Cristo.
MONTE CRISTO
(entering)
Punctuality is the politeness of Kings, I believe one of your sovereigns pretended, but whatever may be their wish, it isn't always that of travelers. Now, my dear Vicomte I hope you will excuse, in favor of my good intentions the two or three seconds delay I have taken in arriving at the meeting. Five hundred leagues are not without some inconveniences, in France especially where it is forbidden, it seems to beat the coachmen.
ALBERT
Count, I was just occupied in announcing your visit to some of my friends that I had brought here on the occasion of the promise you had kindly given me in Rome of coming to visit me in Paris, on June 25 at 10:30 in the morning. I have the honor of presenting them to you -- they are the Marquis de Chateaubrun whose noble ancestors include a dozen peers of the realm and whose ancestors had their place at King Arthur's roundtable. Mr. Lucien Debray, private secretary to the ministry. Mr. Beauchamp, a terrible journalist -- terror of the government and delight of his friends.
MONTE CRISTO
Gentlemen, permit me, I beg you, an admission which will be my excuse for all the inconveniences I may ever cause. I am a stranger, but a stranger to such a degree that this is the first time I have ever been to Paris. French life is completely unknown to me, and until the present moment, I've practiced an oriental life, the most antipathetic to all Parisian traditions -- I beg you to excuse me if you find me too Turkish, to Neapolitan, too Arabic.
ALBERT
And, I, Count, I am fearful that the cuisine of the Rue Helder won't be to your liking I should have asked you your taste and prepared a plate to your fancy.
MONTE CRISTO
If you knew me better, sir, you wouldn't bother yourself with such an almost humiliating case for a traveler like me, who has successively lived on macaroni in Naples, polenta in Milan, olla-podrida in Valencia, Pilaf in Constantinople, Karic in Calcutta and birds nests in Canton. There is no cuisine for a Cosmopolitan like me. I eat everything everywhere. Only I eat little and today you will excuse me if I don't eat at all.
ALBERT
What? If you don't eat at all?
MONTE CRISTO
I was obliged to go out of my way to get some information in the environs of Nimes with the result that I was a little delayed and I didn't want to stop to eat.
ALBERT
So you ate in your carriage then?
MONTE CRISTO
No, I slept -- which is what happens to me when I am bored and lack the courage to distract myself and when I'm hungry without the desire to eat.
BEAUCHAMP
You order yourself to sleep then?
MONTE CRISTO
Exactly.
DEBRAY
The Count has a recipe for this!
MONTE CRISTO
Infallible, sir.
ALBERT
And can one learn what this recipe is?
MONTE CRISTO
Oh, my God, yes, Vicomte -- it's a mixture of excellent opium that I went to look for in China to be certain it was pure and some of the finest hashish which is grown in the Orient. One mixes these two ingredients in equal portions and makes a sort of pill that's swallowed in a moment when needed -- ten minutes later, the effect is produced.
BEAUCHAMP
And you carry this on you?
MONTE CRISTO
Always!
BEAUCHAMP
Would it be indiscreet, sir, to ask to see these precious pills?
MONTE CRISTO
No, sir.
(He takes a little box made of a single emerald from his pocket.)
DEBRAY
And this is your cook who fixes you up so regally?
MONTE CRISTO
Oh, no sir, I don't entrust my purest pleasures to unworthy hands. I am a good enough chemist to prepare my pills myself.
CHATEAUBRUN
That's an admirable emerald, the most beautiful I have ever seen, although my mother has family jewels remarkable enough.
MONTE CRISTO
I had three such, sir. I gave one to the Great Turk, who had it mounted on his saber -- the other to the Holy Father which he had encrusted on his tiara, next to an emerald a little like it, but less beautiful that had been given to his predecessor Pius VII by the Emperor Napoleon, I kept the third for myself -- only I had it cut which cut its value in half but which made it more useful for the purpose I wanted it for.
DEBRAY
And what did these two sovereigns give you to deserve such magnificent gifts?
MONTE CRISTO
The Grand Turk freed a woman, our Holy Father spared the life of a man, with the result that twice in my existence, I have been more powerful than if God had let me be born on the steps of a throne.
(Germain enters and speaks low to Albert)
DEBRAY
What's wrong? Is it the lunch?
ALBERT
Yes, sir. Morcerf, before leaving for the Senate knowing that you were here -- wanted to thank you.
MONTE CRISTO
Well, sir, nothing simpler. I would be a bad guest, leave me here. I will have, if Mr. Albert permits, the honor of receiving Mr. Morcerf here.
ALBERT
Marvelously -- but don't go disappear without my knowing.
MONTE CRISTO
Why, sir? I belong to you and promise not to retake my liberty until you have given it to me.
BEAUCHAMP
How he says all this! He is decidedly a great Lord!
DEBRAY
A foreign lord.
CHATEAUBRUN
A great lord in all countries.
ALBERT
You will excuse us, Count, but these gentlemen are dying of hunger and my father is coming down.
MONTE CRISTO
Go, sir, go.
(The men go into the dining room.)
MONTE CRISTO
I am going to see him -- and her, perhaps, silence, my heart -- it's old hatred! Silence my soul! For it's old love!
(Morcerf enters.)
ALBERT
Father, I have the honor to present to you the Count of Monte Cristo, this generous friend, whom I had the happiness to meet in the difficult circumstances you know of.
MORCERF
The gentleman is welcome among us -- and he has given our house a unique service which solicits our eternal recognition in conserving its only heir.
(He points Monte Cristo to a seat.)
ALBERT
Can I go?
MORCERF
Go join your friends.
ALBERT
(to Monte Cristo)
You'll excuse me -- ?
MONTE CRISTO
Certainly.
(Albert leaves.)
MORCERF
Madame the Countess was dressing sir, when my son informed her we had the joy of receiving your visit. She will be down and will be here in ten minutes.
MONTE CRISTO
It's a great honor for me, Count, to be from the day of my arrival put in touch with a man whose merit equals his reputation and to whom fortune, justly for once, has made no error, but hasn't it yet, in the plains of Mitidja and in the mounts of Atlas a Marshall's baton to offer you?
MORCERF
Oh, I left the service, sir. Named Peer of France under the Restoration, I was in the first Algerian Campaign. I could still pretend to a superior office if the elder branch were still on the throne, but the events which occurred forced me to give my resignation. When one has earned one's epaulets on the battlefield one doesn't know how to maneuver in the slippery terrain of the salons; I gave up the sword; I am thrown into politics I am devoted to industry. I study the useful arts. During the twenty years I was in the service, I had that intention but I never had the time.
MONTE CRISTO
It's ideas like these, Count, which show the superiority of your nation over other countries. Gentlemen drawn from an illustrious house, possessing a great fortune, you at first consented to earn your first promotions as an obscure soldier -- this is very rare! Then, after becoming a general, a peer of France you agree to begin a second apprenticeship without any ambition other than to be useful one day to your fellow creatures. Ah, sir -- that is truly fine; I will say more -- it is sublime!
MORCERF
(bowing)
Sir!
MONTE CRISTO
Alas, we don't do it that way in Italy. We are born according to our race and type; and we even cling to foliage and feudal vineyards, and often remain useless all our lives.
MORCERF
But, sir, for a man of your merit, Italy is not a fatherland and France extends her arms to you -- answer her call. France treats its own children badly, but it welcomes foreigners grandly.
MONTE CRISTO
Oh, sir, it's clear you don't know me. My aspirations are not worldly. I desire no honors and take only those which can be placed on a passport.
MORCERF
You have been master of your future and you have chosen a way strewn with flowers.
MONTE CRISTO
Exactly, sir.
(The Countess enters. She has heard these last words. She shivers and leans on the casing of the door.)
MORCERF
(without seeing her)
If I weren't afraid of tiring you, sir, I would have taken you to the Senate. There is a curious sitting today for anyone who doesn't know our modern Senators.
MONTE CRISTO
I would be very grateful, sir, if you would review this offer another time, today, they flattered me with the hope of being presented to the Countess, and I will wait --
(seeing the Countess)
But pardon -- isn't this she, herself?
MORCERF
(to Monte Cristo)
Yes.
(rising, to Mercedes)
What's the matter? You are horribly pale? Are you sick?
(Monte Cristo remains motionless - hand on his heart.)
MERCEDES
No, sir, but I experienced a strong emotion I admit in seeing for the first time the one but for whose intervention we should have been in tears and in mourning.
(advancing towards Monte Cristo)
Sir, I owe you the life of my son, and for this good deed, I bless you. Now, I thank you for this pleasure you do me in giving me the occasion to thank you as I have blessed you -- meaning from the bottom of my heart.
MONTE CRISTO
(bowing)
Madame, you reward me very generously for a quite simple action, to save a man, to spare a father from torment, to spare the sensibility of a woman, is not to do a good deed, merely to accomplish an act of humanity.
MERCEDES
It is happy for my son, sir, to have you for a friend and I thank God who has arranged things so.
MORCERF
Madame, I have already made my excuses to the Count for being obliged to leave him, and you will repeat them, I beg you. But we have an extraordinary sitting -- it opens at 10:00 and at 11:00 I must speak.
MERCEDES
Go, sir, I will try to make our guest forget your absence.
MORCERF
(bowing)
Count.
MONTE CRISTO
Sir!
(Morcerf leaves.)
MERCEDES
(in an emotional tone)
Will the Count of Monte Cristo, do us the honor of spending the rest of the day with us?
MONTE CRISTO
Thanks, Madame, and you see in me, believe me, one who cannot appreciate your offer more. But I left my traveling carriage at your door. How did I settle in Paris? I am unaware. Where am I staying? I hardly know. It's a slight uncertainty, I know, but nonetheless appreciable.
MERCEDES
We will have this pleasure another time, at least, you will promise me.
(ringing)
Tell my son that the Count is going to leave.
(to a servant)
MONTE CRISTO
(regarding the Count's portrait)
This is a portrait of the Count de Morcerf, Madame?
MERCEDES
Yes, sir.
MONTE CRISTO
He's wearing a Greek uniform?
MERCEDES
My husband was, for three years in the service of Ali Pasha of Janina -- he was one of his last followers to remain faithful to him and he proudly admits that our small fortune came to us through the liberality of that great man who remembered him at the moment of his death.
MONTE CRISTO
(bowing to Mercedes side)
As for this one, Madame?
MERCEDES
You are looking at mine -- mine when I was young, alas.
MONTE CRISTO
It's a fantasy costume you were wearing there, if I am not deceived -- that of the Catalan Colony in the environs of Marseille.
MERCEDES
Yes -- the Count once saw me in this costume, and since our marriage, he wanted this pictures as a souvenir.
MONTE CRISTO
I understand -- whoever has seen you in this costume must never forget you.
ALBERT
(entering)
Here I am, mother.
MERCEDES
(falling into an armchair)
It was just in time, I was suffocating.
ALBERT
What! You are leaving us already, my dear Count?
MONTE CRISTO
I gave my reasons for my prompt departure to the Countess -- the reasons for which she kindly appreciated.
ALBERT
Go on then, I won't keep you longer. I don't want our gratitude to become an indication of an importunity. But I beg you, let me try to render you in Paris the same hospitality I received from you in Rome. Let me put my coach and my horses at your disposal until you have time to obtain your own equipage.
MONTE CRISTO
A thousand thanks for your kindness Vicomte, but I think that if Mr. Bertuccio my attendant has been agreeably employed during the five days he preceded me here, I shall find at the door a carriage fully harnessed. Only tell me, am I far from the Rue Mont Blanc?
ALBERT
A hundred paces. Are you going to the Rue Mont Blanc after leaving here?
MONTE CRISTO
Yes, to the home of Mr. Danglars, a banker.
MERCEDES
(excitedly)
You know Mr. Danglars?
MONTE CRISTO
No, Madame, not at all. I know no one. I have letters of credit drawn on him -- is he good?
ALBERT
Excellent.
(half voice)
He is my future father-in-law.
MONTE CRISTO
Oh! As that's the case! My money relations and my relations of friendship won't leave the family.
ALBERT
Thanks.
MONTE CRISTO
(bowing)
Madame.
ALBERT
(wanting to accompany him)
Allow me, dear Count --
MONTE CRISTO
(stopping him)
Oh -- for goodness sake.
(Monte Cristo leaves)
ALBERT
(turning to Mercedes)
Ah! My God -- what's wrong? Do you feel ill?
MERCEDES
In fact, I am a little indisposed. These roses, these tuberoses, these orange flowers, release, during the first hot spell to which they are unaccustomed such violent perfumes to which I'm not accustomed.
ALBERT
Germain! Germain! Remove these flowers right away.
MERCEDES
What's this name of Monte Cristo that the Count bears. Is it a family name, or place name or simply a title?
ALBERT
It's a title, I think, mother, that's all.
MERCEDES
His manners are excellent, at least so far as I can judge from the short time he spent here.
ALBERT
Perfect, mother.
MERCEDES
You saw, my dear Albert -- pardon -- it's a mother's question I am asking you -- you saw Monte Cristo in his home?
ALBERT
Yes.
MERCEDES
You are worldly, full of tact, extraordinary at your age. Tell me, do you think the Count is what he appears?
ALBERT
And what does he appear to be mother?
MERCEDES
You said it yourself, just now -- a great lord.
ALBERT
I will admit to you I don't have a fixed opinion about him. I think he's Maltese.
MERCEDES
I don't ask you about his origins -- I am asking you about his person.
ALBERT
But you ought to be able to see. Thirty-five or thirty-six, mother.
MERCEDES
(to herself)
Thirty-five or thirty-six -- it's impossible. Did you notice how pale he is?
ALBERT
Yes, and I asked him the cause of this pallor -- he told me that having been taken by the Barberry pirates, he was a prisoner for a long time in a dungeon.
MERCEDES
Prisoner! And this man is friendly to you, Albert?
ALBERT
I believe so, mother.
MERCEDES
And you like him, too?
ALBERT
Yes, although this friendship, I admit it, is mixed with a kind of terror.
MERCEDES
Albert, I've always put on guard against new acquaintances -- now you are a man and can give me advice yourself. Still, I will repeat to you: be careful.
ALBERT
Still, for the advice to be profitable to me there must be something for me to be on guard against. The Count doesn't gamble. The Count only drinks water. The Count is declared to be so rich that if he sneezes he would only cover me with money. What should I fear from the Count?
MERCEDES
You are right and my fears are crazy, especially as they are for a man who has saved your life when he could have let you perish. But you know, my dear Albert, a mother's heart is full of vague fears. Has the Count ever taken your hand?
ALBERT
Never, and I've noticed it.
MERCEDES
Has he ever called you his friend?
ALBERT
Never.
MERCEDES
Yet has he ever eaten at the same table with you, when you were his guest -- when he was yours?
ALBERT
Never and even today as you saw --
MERCEDES
Yes, yes, I saw -- listen, I am giving a ball in three days, bring the Count, it's important.
ALBERT
I will bring him, mother -- I don't think he will refuse to come.
MERCEDES
If he comes, the rest is my concern and I will know what to do about it. Goodbye, Albert. Try to get the Count to be your friend.
(curtain)
A salon in Monte Cristo's apartment. In the rear is a Moroccan boudoir with large doors.
MONTE CRISTO
Mr. Bertuccio, I've seen your poor marbles in this antechamber I've just been in. I hope they will take all that away.
BERTUCCIO
Excellency, I haven't had time --
MONTE CRISTO
Mr. Bertuccio, that's a word I cannot permit from a man I sent to Paris five days before me with 500,000 pounds. Time is money, Mr. Bertuccio.
BERTUCCIO
But, Milord, I haven't spent everything. I still have 200,000 pounds.
MONTE CRISTO
Eh! Sir, you must spend your 200,000 pounds to the last sou, and not compromise me with such marbles -- you still have a stingy Corsican streak in you, my dear Mr. Bertuccio, which makes me jump through the roof.
BERTUCCIO
Is Milord satisfied with the salon, at least?
MONTE CRISTO
Now, I have some orders to give you.
BERTUCCIO
Speak, Excellency.
MONTE CRISTO
Call Baptistin.
BERTUCCIO
(to Baptistin)
Come!
MONTE CRISTO
Mr. Baptistin, you've been in my service for a year -- it's a test I ordinarily employ on my servants: You are agreeable to me.
(Baptistin bows)
What remains to be known is if I am agreeable to you.
BAPTISTIN
Oh! Excellency!
MONTE CRISTO
Listen to the finish. You earn two thousand pounds a year -- the wages of a good and brave officer who everyday risks his life. You have a table that many of the wretched servants of the state -- infinitely more occupied than you desire. A servant, you have yourself servants who take care of your linen and your effects. In addition to the two thousand pounds of wages, you steal from me, on the purchases you make, close to another thousand francs a year.
BAPTISTIN
Oh, Excellency.
MONTE CRISTO
I'm not complaining, Mr. Baptistin except, I want it to stop at this point. You couldn't find a better place than your good fortune has given you. I never beat my servants, I never swear, I never get enraged, I always pardon a mistake, even negligence or forgetfulness -- my orders ordinarily are short, but clear and precise. I prefer to repeat them twice or even three times than to have them badly interpreted. I am wise enough to know all that I wish to know and I am very curious, I warn you -- if I learn that you ever speak of me -- whether good or bad, remark upon my actions, observe my conduct, you will leave my service instantly. I never warn my servants more than once. You have been warned. Go.
(Baptistin bows and is ready to leave.)
MONTE CRISTO
By the way, I forgot to tell you that, each year I put a certain sum to the account of my servants -- those I send away necessarily lose this money which profits those who remain. So it's been a year you have been with me -- your fortune has begun -- continue it.
(Ali enters.)
BAPTISTIN
I will try to conform in every point to your desires, Excellency, besides I will model myself on Ali.
MONTE CRISTO
Oh, not at all. Ali has many fault mixed with his virtues. Don't take him as an example for Ali is an exception. Ali gets no wages, Ali is not a servant, he's my slave, he's my dog. If Ali fails in his duty, I won't send him away, I'll kill him. You doubt it? Is it not true, Ali?
(Ali approaches, goes on his knees and respectfully kisses his master's hand.)
MONTE CRISTO
Now go.
(Ali and Baptistin leave.)
MONTE CRISTO
And now you say you have lodged Haidee in this ship's sail?
BERTUCCIO
These curtains shut her boudoir.
MONTE CRISTO
Did you find something presentable for this poor child?
BERTUCCIO
A marvel! A moroccan mosque executed by two Tunisian sculptors -- that an artist brought with him to Paris. It was this that caused me to buy the house for you, Count.
MONTE CRISTO
Really? Ask her if she can receive me.
HAIDEE
(calling)
Milord! Milord!
(Bertuccio draws open the curtains and leaves.)
HAIDEE
Why do you ask permission to come in? Aren't you my master? Am I not your slave?
MONTE CRISTO
(coming forward)
You know, Haidee that we are in France?
HAIDEE
Why don't you speak to me like you used to? Have I done something wrong? In this case punish me and talk to me.
MONTE CRISTO
Haidee, you know you are in France and consequently you are free.
HAIDEE
Free to what?
MONTE CRISTO
Free to leave me.
HAIDEE
And why would I want to leave you?
MONTE CRISTO
What do I know? We are going to see the world.
HAIDEE
I don't wish to see anyone.
MONTE CRISTO
And among the handsome young men you are going to meet, there's likely to be one who will please you, and I won't be so unjust --
HAIDEE
I've never seen a man more handsome than you and I've never loved anyone except my father and you.
MONTE CRISTO
Poor child! That's because you've never spoken to anyone but your father and me.
HAIDEE
Do I need to speak to others? My father called me his joy -- you call me your love, and you both call me your child.
MONTE CRISTO
You remember your father much, Haidee?
HAIDEE
He is here!
MONTE CRISTO
And I? Where am I?
HAIDEE
You -- you are everywhere.
(Monte Cristo wishes to kiss her hand. She presents her face.)
MONTE CRISTO
Now, Haidee, you know that you are free, that you are mistress, that you are queen. You can keep your costume or change it at your fantasy. You will stay when you want to stay. You will go out when you want to go out. There will always be a carriage harnessed for you. Ali and Myrtho will accompany you everywhere and be at your orders. Only, there's one thing I beg of you.
HAIDEE
Speak.
MONTE CRISTO
Keep the secret of your birth. Tell no one a word of your past. Don't say a word to anyone about your illustrious father, nor that of your poor mother.
HAIDEE
I already told you, Milord, I won't see anyone.
MONTE CRISTO
Listen, my girl, this reclusiveness which is quite oriental is perhaps impossible in Paris. Continue to learn the life of our northern countries as you did in Florence, Rome, Milan and Madrid. This will always serve you whether you continue to live here or return to the orient.
HAIDEE
You mean to say when we return to the orient, right, Milord?
MONTE CRISTO
Oh! You know quite well that it will never be me that leaves you. The tree never leaves, it is left, it's the leaf that leaves the tree.
HAIDEE
I will never leave you, for I could never live without you. I am sure of it.
MONTE CRISTO
Poor child! You say what you think now, but in ten years, I will be old, while you, you in ten years you will still be quite young.
HAIDEE
My father, Ali Tibelin, had a long white beard and that didn't prevent me from loving him. At sixty, he appeared to me more handsome than all the young men I saw.
MONTE CRISTO
Do you think you will get accustomed to it here?
HAIDEE
Will I see you?
MONTE CRISTO
Everyday.
HAIDEE
Well, why do you ask me then, Milord?
MONTE CRISTO
I'm afraid you'll be bored.
HAIDEE
No, for mornings, I will think you are coming. Evening I will remember that you have come. Besides, when I am alone, I have rich memories, I saw immense pictures of great horizons of Pindres and Olympus in the distance there, I have at heart three sentiments with which one is never bored -- sadness, love and gratitude.
MONTE CRISTO
You are a worthy daughter of Epirus, Haidee, gracious and poetic and it's plain you descend from this family of Goddesses born in your country. Rest assured, I will act so you will never lose your youth, for if you love me as you loved your father, I will love you as my child.
HAIDEE
You are mistaken, for I never loved my father as I love you. My father is dead and I am not dead. While you, if you were to die, I would die.
MONTE CRISTO
You told me that you recall your father, Haidee?
HAIDEE
Oh! Yes, I see him still at the moment when he was killed. How handsome he was, how grand the Vizier Ali Tibelin, in the midst of the cannon fire, scimitar in his hand, face blackened by powder as his enemies fled before him.
MONTE CRISTO
And then he succumbed.
HAIDEE
No, he was betrayed, betrayed by the man he had covered with diamonds, by the hand to which he had confided his scabbard -- he was betrayed -- sold by the very one who ought to have defended him.
MONTE CRISTO
Take care, dear child, in thinking there is a God who punishes treason.
HAIDEE
And who rewards the good, right, Milord? God will reward you for all you have done for me.
BERTUCCIO
(entering)
Excellency --
MONTE CRISTO
Well?
BERTUCCIO
Pardon, Excellency, but you told me that to the Vicomte de Morcerf.
MONTE CRISTO
That I would always be in, right? It's true.
HAIDEE
You are going, sir?
MONTE CRISTO
For a moment, unless you want to loan me your room?
HAIDEE
Everything is yours, Milord, and everything where I am and around me.
MONTE CRISTO
Well, then, leave us alone. Perhaps, I will call you back.
HAIDEE
Call and I will come.
MONTE CRISTO
Let the Vicomte come in.
HAIDEE
Au revoir.
MONTE CRISTO
If I call you, Haidee, and I tell you 'Speak' you can speak of your father, of your mother, of everything, even of the traitor, but, on your soul, Haidee, don't pronounce the name of the traitor.
HAIDEE
That's fine, I will hide it, though it were to break my heart.
BERTUCCIO
(announcing)
The Vicomte de Morcerf.
MONTE CRISTO
Go.
(Haidee leaves.)
ALBERT
(entering)
Truly, Count, I proceed through marvel after marvel! I have just crossed a room worthy in every respect of Aladdin's palace, and now you bring me to the boudoir of a fairy.
MONTE CRISTO
Will you have a cup of tea, Vicomte?
ALBERT
My word, willingly.
MONTE CRISTO
(striking on a bell)
And where are you coming from like this?
ALBERT
By the way, I forgot, from Mr. Danglars and I still found him stunned by your limitless credit.
MONTE CRISTO
Poor man!
(to Baptistin who enters with the tea)
Put it there -- fine.
ALBERT
Truly, what I admire in you, my dear Count, not your riches, perhaps there are men richer than you; it is not your wit: Beaumarchais didn't have more, but perhaps he had as much; no, it's your way of being served instantly, momentarily, without having need of giving an order. It's as if they could tell from the manner of your ring or the way you rapped, what you wish and as if what you wanted was already ready.
MONTE CRISTO
What you say is almost true; they know my customs. Do you want to do something while having your tea?
ALBERT
By God! I want to smoke.
(Monte Cristo goes to the bell and strikes twice)
And who are you calling?
MONTE CRISTO
I am calling Ali.
ALBERT
And here he is.
(Ali appears with two well-filled chibouks.)
ALBERT
Marvelous.
MONTE CRISTO
No, it's very simple. Ali knows that when taking tea or coffee, I generally smoke and he knows I asked for tea; he knows I am staying with you; he hears me call him and he is from a country where hospitality is expressed especially with a pipe instead of a chibouk, he brings two, that's all.
ALBERT
Certainly, it's an explanation for it, but it's at least true, it's only you who -- oh! But what is that I hear?
MONTE CRISTO
What you heard before in Rome. Haidee playing the guzla.
ALBERT
Haidee. What an admirable name. Are there really women named Haidee outside the poems of Lord Byron?
MONTE CRISTO
Certainly! Haidee is a name very rare in France, but common enough in Albania and Epirus. It is, as you said, chastity, modesty, innocence. It's a type of Baptismal name as you Parisians call it.
ALBERT
Oh! How charming it is. And how I would like to see our French ladies named Miss Goodness, Miss Silence, Miss Charity. I suppose, for example, that Miss Danglars, my future wife instead of being named Claire-Marie-Eugene were named Chastity-Modesty-Innocence Danglars? Plague! What an effect that would make when publishing the Banns.
MONTE CRISTO
Madman! Don't speak so loud -- Haidee can hear you.
ALBERT
And it will make her angry?
MONTE CRISTO
Not at all!
ALBERT
Is she good natured?
MONTE CRISTO
A slave does not get angry with her master.
ALBERT
Come on! Don't joke. Are there still slaves?
MONTE CRISTO
Doubtless -- since Haidee is mine.
ALBERT
In fact, you do nothing like anyone else. Slave of the Count of Monte Cristo is a position in France, and from the way you spend money it must be a position worth a hundred thousand a year.
MONTE CRISTO
A hundred thousand! What's that to Haidee? She came into the world sleeping on treasures compared to which those of the Thousand and One Nights are little things.
ALBERT
Then she's a princess?
MONTE CRISTO
You have said it. And even one of the greatest princesses of her country.
ALBERT
But how did a great princess become a slave?
MONTE CRISTO
As Dionysus became Tyrant of Syracuse. The chance of war, my dear Vicomte, the Caprice of Fortune.
ALBERT
And her name is a secret?
MONTE CRISTO
To all the world, yes; but to you who are one of my friends, no. On the condition, just the same, that you swear to keep it secret.
ALBERT
Oh, word of honor.
MONTE CRISTO
Do you know the story of the Pasha of Janina.
ALBERT
Of Ali Tibelin? Since it was in his service that my father made his fortune. Well, what is Haidee to Ali Tibelin?
MONTE CRISTO
Quite simply, his daughter.
ALBERT
What, the daughter of Ali Pasha?
MONTE CRISTO
And of the beautiful Vasiliki?
ALBERT
She is your slave?
MONTE CRISTO
Oh, my God, yes --
ALBERT
How did she become so?
MONTE CRISTO
In the simplest way. One day on my way to Constantinople, I bought her.
ALBERT
This is splendid, my dear Count! Well, I beg you, present me to your Princess.
MONTE CRISTO
Willingly, but on two conditions.
ALBERT
I accept them in advance.
MONTE CRISTO
The first is that you never confide to any person this presentation.
ALBERT
Very good -- I swear it.
MONTE CRISTO
The second is that you never tell her that your father served hers.
ALBERT
I swear that, too.
MONTE CRISTO
Very good. I know you to be a man of honor. You will recall these two oaths.
(he plucks the gong)
Inform Haidee that I want her to take a cup of tea with us, and let her understand I intend to present one of my friends to her.
(Ali leaves.)
ALBERT
But how is he going to make her understand your wishes since he is mute?
MONTE CRISTO
Wait, here's my answer.
HAIDEE
(to Monte Cristo who has come in front of her)
Who are you bringing me to? A brother, a friend of mere acquaintance or an enemy?
MONTE CRISTO
A friend.
HAIDEE
Be welcome, friend who comes with my lord and master. Sit in my house.
(Albert gives his pipe to Ali.)
MONTE CRISTO
Oh! Look Haidee is almost as civilized as a Parisian. A Havana is disagreeable to her because she detests bad odors -- but Oriental tobacco is a perfume and Haidee loves perfumes.
ALBERT
My dear host, and you, Madame, excuse my stupefaction. I am completely overwhelmed and it's very natural. Here I find the Orient, the true Orient, not unfortunately the one I have seen, but the one I dreamed of. Just now I heard a bus roll by and the tinkling bells of lemonade sellers, and here I am suddenly transported five hundred leagues, a thousand leagues from Paris -- to Cairo, Baghdad, and Samarkand. Oh, tell me, Count, of what can I speak to her?
MONTE CRISTO
But of anything you wish, of her country, of her youth, of her memories, then, if you prefer of theaters, of balls, of jewels?
ALBERT
Oh, it wouldn't be worthwhile, having a Greek before one, to speak to her of what you could speak to a Parisian. Let me speak to her of the Orient, Count.
MONTE CRISTO
Do so, it's the conversation most agreeable to her.
ALBERT
How old was Madame when she left Greece?
HAIDEE
Five years old.
ALBERT
And you remember your country?
HAIDEE
When I close my eyes, I can see again everything I once saw. There are two ways of looking, looking with the body and looking with the soul. The looking with the body can be forgotten, that of the soul always remembers.
ALBERT
And what is the earliest time you can remember?
HAIDEE
I was hardly walking. My mother, who was called Vasiliki --
(proudly)
Vasiliki means royal -- my mother took me by the hand, and together, covered by a veil after having first taken from the purse all the gold we possessed, we went to demand alms for the prisoners, saying, "He who gives to the poor, loans to God." Then when our purse was full, we returned to the palace, and -- without saying anything to my father, we sent all this money given to us by those who took us as poor women to the head of the convent who divided it among the prisoners.
ALBERT
And at that time, how old were you?
HAIDEE
Three!
ALBERT
So your first memory is your pilgrimage to the prisoners -- what is your second?
HAIDEE
The second? I see myself under the shadows of sycamores, near a lake which I can still picture through the leaves, the mirror trembling. Against the oldest and bushiest trees, my father was seated on his cushions, and I, weak child, with my mother asleep at his feet, I played with his white beard, which fell to his chest, and with the hilt of a diamond dagger passed through his belt. Then, from time to time, came an Albanian, who said to him some word -- to which I did not pay attention and to which my father replied with the same tone of voice, "kill" or "spare".
ALBERT
It's strange, in truth, to hear such things from the mouth of a young girl while thinking, "This is no fiction." And do you have any other memory?
HAIDEE
A third. A last. A terrible memory. Spare me telling it.
MONTE CRISTO
No -- speak.
HAIDEE
I recall a night -- obscure as if it were underground. My father had hidden us there -- all his wives, all his children. They came looking for us, my mother and me, we went up towards the daylight, then they escorted us to a kiosk in the middle of a lake. When we arrived the voice of my father thundered. My mother stood still shaking behind a door pressing her eye on the cracks of that door -- an opening was before mine -- I watched. My father was lying on his lion skin. About thirty Palikars still faithful hung at his sides. All around the kiosk were boats filled with soldiers. "What do you want?" shouted my father to some men who held a paper with some handwriting on it. "This is what we want," said one of them, "It is the will of His Highness to you -- do you see this firman?" "Well -- what's he want?" "He wants your head." My father let out a shout of laughter, more frightening than if it had been a threat, and it hadn't ceased when two pistol shots from his hands had killed two men.
The Palikars who surrounded my father fired, and the room was filled with smoke and flames. At the same time, firing began on all sides and the balls came to make a hole in the boards around us. Oh! How grand he was, the vizier Ali Tibelin, my father! How his enemies fled! When all of a sudden a heavy explosion was heard and the splinters from the floor flew all around my father. A traitor had introduced enemies into the lower hall and they were killing through the flooring. My father roared and thrusting his finger into the holes created by the bullets, tore a plank out entirely. But at the same time, twenty shots ran out through this opening, and the flame, leaping as from a crater, reached the tapestry which it devoured. In the midst of all this frightful tumult, in the midst of all these terrible screams, two shots, more distinct than the others, two screams more wrenching than all the other shouts, from me, from terror. Those two explosions had mortally struck my father; it was he who uttered these two screams, and still he remained standing, but staggering.
Suddenly, the whole floor cracked. My father fell on his knees. Twenty arms reached toward him, arms with sabers, with pistols, with daggers, twenty blows struck a single man at one time and my father disappeared in a whirlpool of fire as if hell had opened under his feet. I felt myself rolling on the floor, it was my mother who sank, fainting. Oh! My God!
MONTE CRISTO
Repose yourself, dear child, and take courage in thinking there is a God who punishes traitors.
ALBERT
Oh! There's a terrifying story, Count, and I reproach myself now for having been so cruelly indiscreet.
MONTE CRISTO
It is nothing. Haidee is a courageous woman and she has often found relief in speaking of her miseries.
HAIDEE
Because my miseries recall to me your kindness, Milord.
ALBERT
One day, Count, you will tell me, won't you how this little daughter of Vasiliki became your slave.
MONTE CRISTO
She is going to tell you herself.
HAIDEE
You wish it?
MONTE CRISTO
I beg you to.
HAIDEE
They led us, my mother and me, before the chief troops of the sultan. "Kill me," said my mother, "but spare the honor of the widow of the Sultan Ali." "It is not to me that you must address yourself," replied the Janisary. "Then to whom," asked my mother, "To your new master." "Who is he?" "Here he is." And the Janisary pointed to the traitor who had sold my father to take the sultan, the one who had veritably killed my father.
ALBERT
So then, you became the property of this infamous creature?
HAIDEE
No, he dared not keep us. He sold us to slave merchants who were going to Constantinople. We crossed Greece and arrived almost dying before the Imperial gate surrounded by curiosity seekers whose ranks opened to let us pass. When my mother raised her eyes, she screamed and fell, pointing to a head above the doorway. Under the head were written these words: "This is the head of Ali Tibelin, Pasha of Janina." Crying, I tried to raise my mother. She was dead. I was taken to the Bazaar. A rich Armenian bought me, had me instructed, gave me some training and when I was thirteen years old, sold me to Sultan Mahmoud.
MONTE CRISTO
From whom I bought her; I told you -- for an emerald like to that in which I put my hashish pills.
HAIDEE
Ah! You are good! You are great, Milord, and I am very happy to belong to you.
MONTE CRISTO
Finish your cup of tea, Albert; the story is over.
ALBERT
Oh -- this is odious! And this man, this infamous one, this traitor, this wretch who sold you -- has he been punished at least?
MONTE CRISTO
No -- but he will be.
BERTUCCIO
(entering)
Excellency!
MONTE CRISTO
What is it?
BERTUCCIO
The Count de Morcerf asks if your Excellency is visible?
MONTE CRISTO
Your father, Albert?
ALBERT
Oh, he's coming to invite you, I think, to a soiree that my mother is giving day after tomorrow.
MONTE CRISTO
Go greet him in the salon, Albert, I will follow you.
ALBERT
But, Haidee?
MONTE CRISTO
Be easy.
ALBERT
Oh, poor and noble creature!
(Going out.)
MONTE CRISTO
Where is the Count?
BERTUCCIO
At the door -- in his carriage.
MONTE CRISTO
Have him cross the court on foot. Go.
(Bertuccio goes out.)
MONTE CRISTO
Haidee!
HAIDEE
I am here.
MONTE CRISTO
You are wondering why I forced you to recall these terrible memories -- right, my child?
HAIDEE
Yes -- for you are good, Lord, and you know that every time I think of my father, my misery is great.
MONTE CRISTO
Then you would like to avenge him?
HAIDEE
You know I am a daughter from Epirus, and for every daughter from Epirus, vengeance is a duty. But where to find him, this infamous Fernand.
MONTE CRISTO
Come!
HAIDEE
What do you mean?
MONTE CRISTO
Come!
(pulling her to the window)
HAIDEE
Here I am, Milord.
MONTE CRISTO
Look!
HAIDEE
What?
MONTE CRISTO
The man who's crossing the courtyard with Bertuccio. Do you recognize him?
HAIDEE
My God! My God! Is it a dream, an apparition? It's him! It's him!
MONTE CRISTO
Him -- who?
HAIDEE
Him, the traitor! Him, the wretch! The one who betrayed my father! Fernand!
MONTE CRISTO
You are mistaken, Haidee -- this man is the Count de Morcerf, peer of France.
HAIDEE
And I, I tell you, it is the Spaniard Fernand, the traitor, the infamous Fernand.
MONTE CRISTO
Be easy, my child, we will know quite soon if the Count de Morcerf, who married the Catalan Mercedes is indeed the same as Colonel Fernand who betrayed his benefactor, Ali Pasha of Janina.
HAIDEE
And then?
MONTE CRISTO
Then be easy, you will be avenged.
HAIDEE
Oh, my father, my father! You hear him, the one who never, ever, lies.
(curtain)
A magnificently lit conservatory at Madame de Morcerf's. Many people.
MERCEDES
(to Albert)
I am afraid he may not come.
ALBERT
Oh -- he will come, I'll answer for it. I have his word.
MERCEDES
Wait -- here's Madame Danglars. Go before she gets here.
ALBERT
I am going now, Mother.
MADAME DANGLARS
Ah, my dear, but you've invited all Paris? You have a queue like "Robert the Devil".
MERCEDES
What a charming outfit you have. Only you can get yourself up with such taste.
MADAME DANGLARS
(to Albert, who is looking into the distance)
You are looking for my daughter, right?
ALBERT
I admit it. Could you have had the cruelty not to have brought her?
MADAME DANGLARS
Reassured yourself. She met Miss de Villefort and is taking her arm. Wait, here they both are in white robes, one with a bouquet of camellias, the other with myosotis. You will be able to go greet them in a minute. It seems to me I indeed have the right to keep you a little longer.
ALBERT
What! At your orders. But who are you looking all around for?
MADAME DANGLARS
Don't you have the Count of Monte Cristo here?
ALBERT
Right. The seventeenth!
MADAME DANGLARS
What do you mean?
ALBERT
I mean to tell you, you are the seventeenth person who has asked me that question. The Count is getting on fine, I want to pay him my compliment.
MADAME DANGLARS
And do you answer every one the way you just did me?
ALBERT
Ah, it's true; I haven't answered you. Rest assured Madame, we are privileged.
MADAME DANGLARS
Were you at the Opera yesterday?
ALBERT
No.
MADAME DANGLARS
He was there.
ALBERT
Ah, truly -- and did the eccentric man display some new act of originality?
MADAME DANGLARS
Oh! Good God! Can he appear without doing so? Elssler was dancing in the Devil on Sticks. The Greek princess was in raptures. After the Spanish dance, he set the stems of a magnificent bouquet of flowers from the Indies in a superb ring and tossed it to the charming dancer, who, in the third act, reappeared to do him honor with his ring on her finger. And the Greek princess, will you have her?
ALBERT
No, you'll have to pass on her. Princess though she may be, her position in the Count's household is not sufficiently regular.
MADAME DANGLARS
Wait, let me go and go and greet Madame de Valgeneuse. I can see she's dying to talk to you.
(Madame de Valgeneuse enters.)
ALBERT
(to Madame de Valgeneuse)
I bet I know what you are going to say to me.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Oh -- for heaven's sake.
ALBERT
If I get it right, will you admit it?
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Yes.
ALBERT
On honor?
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Word of honor.
ALBERT
You were going to ask me if the Count de Monte Cristo had come or was going to come.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Oh, my God, I wanted to ask you if it was true that Mr. Danglars had lost a half million on the Spanish bonds.
ALBERT
It's possible, but in any case, I am sure they've been removed from the exchange. He truly has an insolent good luck. Everyone said he was playing on a sure thing and that he knew the news in advance.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Let's see, and now the Count?
ALBERT
The Count will come -- be easy.
MONTE CRISTO
You know that he has another name besides Monte Cristo?
ALBERT
No, I don't know it.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Monte Cristo is the name of an island. He has a family name.
ALBERT
That's probable, but I've never heard him mention it.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Well, I'm ahead of you: his name's Zaccone.
ALBERT
It's possible.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
He's Maltese.
ALBERT
It's possible.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Son of a ship owner.
ALBERT
That, too, is possible.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
He served in India; he exploits a gold mine in Thessally -- and he's coming to Paris to create a hot bath establishment at Auteuil.
ALBERT
Well, fine! Here's news. You must repeat it loudly -- you will make a great success. Do you allow me to spread it?
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Yes, but without saying it comes from me.
ALBERT
Why's that?
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Because it is a secret discovered.
ALBERT
From whom?
MADAME VALGENEUSE
From the police.
ALBERT
Then this news is second-hand?
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Yesterday evening at the police headquarters in Paris, you understand, sight of this unheard of luxury caused some commotion and the chief of police got some information.
ALBERT
Good! Poor Count! He only needs to be arrested like a vagabond, under the pretext he is too rich.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Don't laugh -- it really might have happened if the information hadn't been favorable.
ALBERT
Does he know the danger he was in?
MADAME VALGENEUSE
I don't think so.
ALBERT
There it is simple charity to warn him of it on his arrival. I won't fail to do so. Ah, there's Debray. Debray! Debray! Over here.
DEBRAY
Ah! It's you -- my dear.
ALBERT
Do you know what Madame was telling me about the Count?
DEBRAY
It seems he's a Polish refugee who trimmed the troops of the Egyptian Pasha and had pearl fisheries in Ceylon. The Pasha gave him I don't know how many purses, and in the same year fortune sent him three million pearls.
ALBERT
Hush. Here he is.
ALBERT
(going to him)
You have seen my mother?
MONTE CRISTO
I have just had the honor of greeting her, but I haven't seen the Count de Morcerf.
ALBERT
Wait, he's talking politics down there in that little group of celebrities.
(A quadrille line is forming in the distance.)
MONTE CRISTO
In truth! Those gentleman that I saw down there are great celebrities. I would never have thought so.
ALBERT
There are celebrities of every kind, as you know. I am going to tell you about them. There's a scholar, the large dry looking fellow. In the Roman Campagne, he discovered a species of lizard with an extra vertebrae, and because of this discovery, he became part of the Institute. The thing was contested for a long while, but finally strength rested on the side of the great dry man.
MONTE CRISTO
And that other fellow who had the singular idea of dressing up in a blue coat brocaded in green. What can he be?
ALBERT
Oh, my God, the poor man! It wasn't his idea to get rigged up in that outfit. It is the Republic, which as you know was not very artistic, and who had David design a costume for academicians.
MONTE CRISTO
Ah! Really! This is an academician! Let me see, if you please. And what is his specialty?
ALBERT
His specialty? I believe he thrusts needles into the head of rabbits and that he replaces with whole bones the spinal marrow of dogs.
MONTE CRISTO
Is he in the Academy of Sciences for that?
ALBERT
Not at all. The Academy Francaise.
MONTE CRISTO
But what has the Academy Francaise to do with that?
ALBERT
I am going to tell you. It appears --
MONTE CRISTO
That his experiences have made a great step for science, right?
ALBERT
No, but he writes in a very beautiful style.
MONTE CRISTO
Ah! Ah! That must flatter the rabbits immensely as they had needles stuck in their heads and the dogs that he replaces the spinal marrow in. And this other one?
ALBERT
The man in the blue-green outfit?
MONTE CRISTO
Yes.
ALBERT
He's a colleague of my father, a peer of France. He was the one who just opposed most hotly, that the peerage should have a uniform. He had a great success from the podium on that subject. He was embroiled with the liberal papers but his noble opposition to the wishes of the court, ingratiated him with the liberals. They talk of naming him ambassador.
MONTE CRISTO
And what are his qualifications to the peerage?
ALBERT
Why he's written three or four comic operas, brought five or six lawsuits against the Century and voted seven or eight times for the ministry.
MONTE CRISTO
Bravo, Vicomte, you are a charming guide. Now, you will do me a service, right?
ALBERT
What is it?
MONTE CRISTO
You won't present me to these gentleman and if they ask to be presented to me you will warn me of it.
DANGLARS
(entering) (to Monte Cristo)
Eh! Good evening, Count.
MONTE CRISTO
(coldly)
Ah, it's you Baron.
DANGLARS
(a little stunned)
Why do you call me baron? You know very well that I don't go by my title?
(to Albert)
It's you who go by yours, right, Vicomte?
ALBERT
Certainly! Because if I were not Vicomte, I would be almost nothing, while you, you can give up your title of baron and you will always remain a millionaire.
DANGLARS
Yes, which appears to me more beautiful than the most handsome title.
ALBERT
Fine! With what an air you tell me this, Baron.
MONTE CRISTO
Unfortunately, one does not have to be a millionaire to live like a Baron, peer of France or Academician. Witness the millionaires and Frank and Poulmon from Frankfurt, who have just gone bankrupt.
DANGLARS
Truly?
MONTE CRISTO
My word, I received the news this evening by a courier. I had placed something like a million with them. But warned in time I demanded reimbursement -- a month ago or a little less.
DANGLARS
Eh -- sir, they drew 200,000 francs on me about a week ago.
MONTE CRISTO
Well -- then you are warned. Their signature is worth five on the dollar.
DANGLARS
Yes, but I am warned too late. Unfortunately, I honored their signatures.
MONTE CRISTO
Good! There are two hundred thousand francs well ventured.
DANGLARS
Hush! Don't speak of it.
ALBERT
(pointing to a plate of ices)
Would Madame de Valgeneuse care for an ice?
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Willingly.
ALBERT
(to Mercedes who is coming)
Are you here, Mother?
(The valet presents the ices to Monte Cristo who refuses.)
MONTE CRISTO
Thanks.
MERCEDES
(at the back, to Albert)
You see!
ALBERT
(coming forward)
What -- you refuse, Count?
MONTE CRISTO
Thanks.
ALBERT
Let's see -- it's suffocatingly hot.
MONTE CRISTO
Thanks.
MERCEDES
Oh, this is a foregone conclusion.
(to Mme de Valgeneuse)
Would you give your arm to Mr. Danglars, my dear? I want to speak with Albert.
(to Albert)
Well, did I tell you?
ALBERT
But, how can you be concerned that the Count refuses to have an ice?
MERCEDES
You know, Albert, women, and especially mothers, have singular concerns. I would have watched the Count have something in my home with great pleasure, if nothing more than a drop of wine. Perhaps, in the end, he can't accommodate himself to French customs, perhaps he has preferences for something?
ALBERT
My God, no. In Italy, I saw him take everything. Without doubt he's ill disposed this evening.
MERCEDES
Then perhaps used to hot climates, he is less susceptible than others to the heat.
ALBERT
I don't think that's his reason, he complained just now of suffocating.
MERCEDES
Oh, decidedly. I must find out if it is chance. Leave me, Albert --
(to Monte Cristo)
It's very hot here, isn't it, Count?
MONTE CRISTO
Then you know, Madame, in the evening flowers release a certain amount of carbon.
MERCEDES
(to valets)
Open the skylights for me.
MONTE CRISTO
Take care, Madame! With that light gown and no other protection for your neck except this gauze scarf, perhaps you will catch cold. I think it prudent for you to go back into the salon.
MERCEDES
No, I will stay here. Would you keep me company for a little bit, Count?
MONTE CRISTO
Happily, Madame.
MERCEDES
(taking a bunch of grapes)
Our French grapes are not comparable, I know to your grapes of Sicily and Cypress but you will be indulgent won't you to our poor Occidental sun?
(the Count bows and takes a step back)
Why! You refuse?
MONTE CRISTO
I beg you to excuse me, Madame.
MERCEDES
(letting the grapes fall)
Oh! Again, again, Count! In truth, I am unfortunate.
(moment of silence)
Sir, there is a touching Arab custom which makes eternal friends of those who partake of bread and salt under the same roof.
MONTE CRISTO
I know it, Madame, but we are in France and not in Arabia -- and in France there are no more eternal friendships from the partaking of bread and salt.
MERCEDES
But still, Count, still -- we are friends, aren't we?
MONTE CRISTO
Certainly we are friends, Madame. Why wouldn't we be?
MERCEDES
Thanks, sir. Is it true that you have seen so much, travelled so much, suffered so much?
MONTE CRISTO
I have suffered much, yes, Madame.
MERCEDES
But you are happy now?
MONTE CRISTO
Without doubt, and the proof is that no one hears me complain.
MERCEDES
And your present happiness softens your soul?
MONTE CRISTO
My present happiness equals my past misery.
MERCEDES
You are not married?
MONTE CRISTO
Married? Me, Madame? Who told you that?
MERCEDES
No one told me that, but several times you have been seen escorting a young and beautiful woman to the Opera.
MONTE CRISTO
She is a slave that I bought in Constantinople, Madame, the daughter of a prince, whom I have made my daughter -- having no more affection for the word.
MERCEDES
Then you live alone?
MONTE CRISTO
I live alone.
MERCEDES
You have no sister, brother, father?
MONTE CRISTO
I have nobody.
MERCEDES
And how can you live so, sir, with nothing to attach you to life?
MONTE CRISTO
It is not my fault, Madame. In Malta, I loved a young girl, and I was going to marry her when the war swept me far away from her like a hurricane. I had believed that she loved me enough to wait for me and to live faithfully at my tomb. When I returned, she was married. This is the story of all men who have passed the age of twenty. Perhaps, I had a heart weaker than others. I suffered more than they would have in my place -- that's all.
MERCEDES
Yes, and this love remained in your heart? Alas, one loves well only once. And have you seen this woman again?
MONTE CRISTO
Yes.
MERCEDES
And have you pardoned her for what she made you suffer?
MONTE CRISTO
Yes, I pardon her.
MERCEDES
But only her then -- and you hate all those who separated you from her?
MONTE CRISTO
Me? Not at all. Why should I hate them?
MERCEDES
(presenting the peach to him)
For the love of her.
MONTE CRISTO
Impossible.
ALBERT
Mother! Mother! Do you know what's wrong with Mr. Danglars. He has just forced his wife and Eugenie to leave the ball.
MERCEDES
What concern is that of mine! Come here, Albert.
(taking his hand and trying to join it to that of Monte Cristo)
We are friends, right?
MONTE CRISTO
(disengaging his hand)
Oh, your friend, Madame, I have no such pretension, but in any case, I am your very humble servant.
MERCEDES
Oh! My God! My God!
(She leaves.)
ALBERT
Ah, Count, are you in disagreement with my mother?
MONTE CRISTO
On the contrary, since she just said in your presence that we are friends.
MADAME VALGENEUSE
Well, Mr. de Morcerf -- have you forgotten that I am waiting for you for the next dance?
ALBERT
It's true.
(looking at Monte Cristo who goes off)
Oh! Could Mother be right?
(to Mme de Valgeneuse)
Come Madame.
(He leads her to the Quadrilles which are forming in the distance.)
(curtain)
The Lopage shooting range.
ALBERT
(entering)
And you say the Count is on the range?
BOY
For the last half hour, yes, Mr. Vicomte.
(the sound of pistol shots)
Do you hear? You know this Lord?
ALBERT
I am come to find him. He's my friend.
BOY
I will go to inform him.
(He leaves.)
ALBERT
I hope he won't refuse me this service.
(Monte Cristo enters)
Ah, it's you, my friend! Come!
MONTE CRISTO
By what chance or rather by what happy accident?
ALBERT
Pardon for following you here, my dear Count, but when I went to your residence, I was told that you were on the rifle range and here I am, am I indiscreet?
MONTE CRISTO
What you've just told me, gives me the hope I can do you some service.
ALBERT
Yes, and even a great service.
MONTE CRISTO
Speak.
ALBERT
I am fighting today or tomorrow.
MONTE CRISTO
You! And to do what?
ALBERT
To fight, by God.
MONTE CRISTO
Yes, I understand that, but the cause of the fight? That's what I mean.
ALBERT
A matter of honor.
MONTE CRISTO
Oh -- then this is serious.
(He goes to the vestibule and washes his hands.)
BOY
Mr. Vicomte.
ALBERT
What?
BOY
Look at that -- there's a funny marksman.
ALBERT
Ah! Ah! Were you planning to play spades, Count?
MONTE CRISTO
Now, I was on the way to play cards.
ALBERT
How's that?
MONTE CRISTO
They are aces and some 2's, as you see, only my shots make 3's, 5's, 7's, 9's and 10's.
BOY
(pointing to a swallow)
And then look there.
ALBERT
What's that?
BOY
An unfortunate swallow, which had the imprudence to pass by.
ALBERT
(to the Count)
The devil. You shoot well.
MONTE CRISTO
What do you want, Vicomte! I have to occupy my usual time. But look, I am waiting on you.
ALBERT
Useless. Let me tell you this. We will get arms right way, and then I am not irritated to do as you; if you agree to do the little favor I ask of you, I will wait for you here and you can find me here.
MONTE CRISTO
Then let's talk but calmly. With whom do you wish to fight?
ALBERT
With Beauchamp.
MONTE CRISTO
What! With Beauchamp -- one of your friends?
ALBERT
It's always with one's friends that one fights.
MONTE CRISTO
But at least there must be a reason!
ALBERT
I have one.
MONTE CRISTO
What did he do to you?
ALBERT
In a newspaper -- yesterday evening there was -- but here --
(giving a newspaper)
Read for yourself.
(Monte Cristo unfolds the paper.)
ALBERT
Here see.
MONTE CRISTO
"They write us from Janina. A fact central this very day hidden or at least unpublished has come to our attention. The castles which defended the city of Janina were delivered to the Turks by a French officer in whom the Vizier Ali Tibelin had put all his confidences, named Fernand. They assure us that this same officer, returned to France, is occupying a very high position."
(to Albert)
Well, what do you see in this which shocks you?
ALBERT
What do you mean? What do I see in it?
MONTE CRISTO
Doubtless! What does it matter to you that the castles of Janina were betrayed by an officer named Fernand?
ALBERT
Here's what it means to me, it's the name of my father, the Count de Morcerf, who's known by his baptismal name as Fernand.
MONTE CRISTO
And your father served Ali Pasha?
ALBERT
Didn't you know it?
MONTE CRISTO
In fact, I did, but as it didn't interest me particularly, I forgot it.
ALBERT
And you can understand quite clearly that I must demand satisfaction from this wretched --
MONTE CRISTO
Ah, Vicomte -- let's talk reasonably.
ALBERT
I don't ask anything better.
MONTE CRISTO
Look, tell me -- who the devil knows in France that the officer Fernand is the same man as the Count de Morcerf -- and who is bothered at this time about Janina which fell in 1822 or 1823?
ALBERT
Eh! Well, that's precisely what's so infamous about it. They let the time pass over it, then today, they return to forgotten events, to create a scandal which ruins a high position. Well, I, as sole heir of my father, I do not wish a shadow of a doubt to float over his name. I am going to send my seconds to Beauchamp, whose journal has published this note, and he will either retract it or we will fight.
MONTE CRISTO
And you are going to send him your seconds?
ALBERT
This very instant.
MONTE CRISTO
You are wrong.
ALBERT
And why do you think I should not fight?
MONTE CRISTO
Listen to me carefully. I don't say that you ought not to fight, I tell you a duel is a serious matter which must be carefully considered.
ALBERT
Did he reflect when insulting my father?
MONTE CRISTO
Look, I suppose -- I suppose -- do you understand -- ? Do not get angry with what I am saying. I suppose that the information is true as reported.
ALBERT
Sir, a son cannot admit such a supposition on the honor of his father.
MONTE CRISTO
Eh! My God, we are in a period where one admits so many things. Let's see, are you unwilling to listen to good advice?
ALBERT
Not while coming from a friend.
MONTE CRISTO
Do you believe me to be yours?
ALBERT
Yes.
MONTE CRISTO
Well, instead of sending your seconds to Beauchamp, inform yourself.
ALBERT
From whom?
MONTE CRISTO
From whom? Oh, by God! From Haidee, if you wish.
ALBERT
(hesitating)
Put a woman in the midst of all this? And what can she do about it?
MONTE CRISTO
You refuse this way?
ALBERT
I refuse it.
MONTE CRISTO
Absolutely?
ALBERT
Absolutely.
MONTE CRISTO
Then a last bit of advice, don't send seconds to Beauchamp. No strangers. Use prudent methods with Beauchamp. If he wants to retract it, then let him do so. If he refuses, well, then you have nothing to reproach yourself with.
ALBERT
I must go find Beauchamp myself.
MONTE CRISTO
Yes -- go.
ALBERT
But if despite all my precautions, if despite all my cautious procedures, I have this duel, would you serve me as a second?
MONTE CRISTO
My dear Vicomte, I have regrets but the service that you ask of me is of the sort I cannot render.
ALBERT
That's fine. I will take Frantz and Chateaubrun.
MONTE CRISTO
Take them -- this will do wonderfully well.
ALBERT
At least, if I fight, you will give me a little lesson with sword or pistol?
MONTE CRISTO
No, that's an impossibility.
ALBERT
Singular man that you are, go! Decidedly you don't wish to be involved in any way.
MONTE CRISTO
In absolutely nothing.
ALBERT
Then, let's not speak any more about it. Goodbye, Count.
MONTE CRISTO
Goodbye.
(As Albert goes to leave, he meets Beauchamp at the door.)
ALBERT
In truth, this falls out wonderfully.
BEAUCHAMP
Why, it's you, Albert? Delighted to meet you!
ALBERT
I as well. I was going to pay you a visit.
MONTE CRISTO
I will leave you and go home, Vicomte. It's there you will find me, if I can do you good in some way.
ALBERT
Yes, that's fine, go.
MONTE CRISTO
Mr. de Beauchamp -- to the pleasure of seeing you again.
BEAUCHAMP
To the honor, Count.
MONTE CRISTO
(to Albert)
Be patient.
ALBERT
Be easy, I will control myself.
(Monte Cristo leaves.)
BEAUCHAMP
You were going to see me?
ALBERT
Yes.
BEAUCHAMP
And what did you want? Speak.
ALBERT
I wanted a correction.
BEAUCHAMP
A correction, you? Concerning what, Albert?
ALBERT
On a fact put forth in your paper which places a taint on the honor of my family.
BEAUCHAMP
Come on! In my paper? It can't be. On what fact?
ALBERT
About what you wrote about Janina.
BEAUCHAMP
About Janina?
ALBERT
Yes, about Janina. In truth, you seem to be unaware of the news you publish in your paper.
BEAUCHAMP
Ah, but what makes you think I read my paper? I publish it, that's true enough.
(to Boy)
Phillippe, can you bring me yesterday's Impartial?
ALBERT
No need, I have it.
BEAUCHAMP
That's even better then.
(Albert gives him the paper. He reads it stammering)
"They write us of Janina."
ALBERT
You understand?
BEAUCHAMP
This officer, this Fernand, is your relation then?
ALBERT
Yes, he's my relation.
BEAUCHAMP
Well, my friend, what can I do for you? Tell me.
ALBERT
I want you, my dear Beauchamp, to make a retraction.
BEAUCHAMP
Look -- this is going to lead us into a long discussion.
ALBERT
Why?
BEAUCHAMP
Because a retraction is a serious matter. I am going to reread this article.
(he rereads it but aloud this time -- slowly)
"They write us from Janina. A fact which until today was unknown or at least unpublished has come to our attention. The castles which defended the city of Janina were betrayed to the Turks by a French officer in whom the Vizier Ali Tibelin had placed all his confidence -- and whose name was Fernand. We are assured that this same officer returned to France and occupies a high position."
ALBERT
Well, you see, in the face of such a slander, I must have a retraction.
BEAUCHAMP
You must have? My dear Vicomte, permit me to say you are not a parliamentarian.
ALBERT
I don't wish to be. I am after a retraction and I will have it. You are enough my friend, and as such you know me well enough to understand my tenacity in such circumstances.
BEAUCHAMP
If I am your friend, Morcerf, you will end by making me forget it, with words like these. But let's see, let's not get angry or at least not yet. You are upset, irritated, angry. Calm down, Albert. Look who is this relative of yours who is named Fernand?
ALBERT
Quite simply, sir, he is my father, General Fernand Mondego, Count de Morcerf, an old soldier who has seen twenty years on the battlefield, and on whose scars they wish to cover with impure mud collected from the river.
BEAUCHAMP
He's your father, my friend? That's another matter, then, yes, I understand your indignation.
(he reads to himself)
But where does this say he's your father.
ALBERT
It doesn't, I am quite aware. But others will see it, which is why I insist the fact be retracted.
BEAUCHAMP
You insist? Again, Albert, I thought we had agreed that such expressions weren't helping us.
ALBERT
(with growing rage)
You will retract this lie, right, Beauchamp?
BEAUCHAMP
Yes.
ALBERT
About time. Good.
BEAUCHAMP
But when I am sure it is false.
ALBERT
You mean -- ?
BEAUCHAMP
I mean, that the thing needs to be looked into and I will look into it.
ALBERT
But how are you going to clarify all this, sir? If you do not believe that it is my father say so right away. If you think it is my father give me your reason for that opinion.
BEAUCHAMP
"Sir", since you use "sir", if it was to demand satisfaction from me that you were going to my home, it should have been done at first, and not by coming to me to speak of friendship and other idle things with which I've had the patience of listening for the last half hour. Is this the ground we're marching on? Look here!
ALBERT
Yes, if you don't retract this infamous slander.
BEAUCHAMP
One moment. No more threats, Mr. Albert Mondego, Vicomte de Morcerf. I won't put up with them from my enemies, so more reason not from my friends. Then you insist that I withdraw the article on Colonel Fernand, about whom, on my honor, I have taken no part.
ALBERT
Yes, I insist on it.
BEAUCHAMP
Otherwise we fight?
ALBERT
Otherwise we fight.
BEAUCHAMP
You insist on this retraction to the point of killing me if I don't do it? Though I have told you, though I have repeated to you, though I affirm to you, on my honor, that I do not know the truth of the matter and even though I declare to you again that for anyone else it is impossible to tell whether the Count de Morcerf or Napoleon Bonaparte is intended by "Fernand"?
ALBERT
I absolutely insist upon it.
BEAUCHAMP
Well, my dear sir, I agree to play cut throat with you. In three weeks, you will meet me again to tell you, "Yes, the story is false and I will withdraw it" or as the case may be, "Yes, the story is true" and I will leave the choice of swords or pistols to you.
ALBERT
Three weeks! But three weeks are three centuries during which I am dishonored.
BEAUCHAMP
If you had remained what we were yesterday, I would have said 'patience, friend!' You've become my enemy, so I say to you, "What does that matter to me, sir?"
ALBERT
Well, in three weeks, so be it, although I don't know what you want to do in three weeks. But, now for sure, in three weeks, there can be no further delay nor subterfuge which can excuse you.
BEAUCHAMP
Mr. Albert de Morcerf, I don't have to kill you for three weeks, and you have no right to run me through until then. We are on the 29th of August today -- so we shall meet on the 21st of September. Until then, believe me let's spare ourselves such insults which resemble the barking of dogs chained apart. If you have anything for Janina, I am leaving tonight.
(He bows and leaves.)
ALBERT
For Janina! He's going to Janina! Pistols, Phillippe and a lot of bullets.
(He goes into the shooting range.)
(curtain)
The corridors of the Opera.
MORCERF
(entering with a letter in his hand -- very agitated)
Box 23, I believe. Yes, that is indeed it.
(to a doorlady)
Madame, beg Baron Danglars if he is in his box, to come out for a minute.
(the doorlady goes into the box)
Two seconds of explanation will suffice.
DANGLARS
(coming out of the box)
Eh! Good evening, my dear Count! Good evening, Baron, I got this letter today. Is it from you?
(Danglars makes a motion)
Wait, let me read it before replying.
(reading)
"My dear Count, it is impossible to give you at present a reply that you asked me for last night. There's no hurry -- my daughter's seventeen, your son twenty-three. During our delay events will march on. Things which appear obscure at dusk are often cleared up the next day. Sometimes, also, in a day, the cruelest slanders collapse -- "
Slanders -- cruel slanders -- you understand, Baron, that a man like me, when he is slandered, has only one desire, only one will, only one demand: To be put face to face with the slanderers.
DEBRAY
(entering)
Well, gentlemen -- what is it?
DANGLARS
My dear, Debray, it's that the Count won't hear even half a word from me, and forces me to refer him to the "Impartial." That's what I am doing, my dear Count. The Impartial doesn't cost very much and it's sold everywhere. Buy today's copy and tomorrow, I think that you will have become reasonable enough not to speak to me about this business.
(He goes back in, Debray wants to follow him, but Morcerf restrains him.)
MORCERF
Pardon, sir, but I am totally confused. What's it mean -- this reference to a newspaper? You read the papers, sir -- has the Impartial published something this morning, that is insulting or slanderous about me?
DEBRAY
My word, no -- I don't know, sir -- unless --
MORCERF
Unless?
DEBRAY
Unless it was you who were meant by the name Fernand, were you ever known as Colonel Fernand?
MORCERF
Yes, in Greece, sir. I served Ali Pasha under that name.
DEBRAY
Ah. The devil.
MORCERF
Huh? Speak, sir, what's wrong?
DEBRAY
My word, I can do only what Mr. Danglars has done and refer you to the Impartial.
(He goes into Danglars' box.)
MORCERF
Oh, my God! What could they have said? What could they know? Colonel Fernand! Ali Pasha -- Courage, Morcerf!
(to Doorlady)
Madame, Madame, could you get me a copy of the newspaper -- the Impartial.
(Albert enters.)
ALBERT
To do what, father?
MORCERF
Ah, it's you, Albert.
ALBERT
Yes, it's me -- and I heard you say --
MORCERF
Do you know what it's all about?
ALBERT
A slander, father, an infamous slander.
MORCERF
Against --
ALBERT
Again you! Meaning against the noblest, most loyal man. Can you imagine they have been infamous enough to write -- but no, it's useless to tell you.
MORCERF
On the contrary, I have to know.
ALBERT
Well, yes, you are right. You need to know how far the hate of the envious can go. Well, father, they are saying that you, the defender of Ali Pasha, that you whom Ali Tibelin in his last hour recognized for your loyal services, by enriching you -- they are saying -- pardon me for repeating such slanders -- they are saying that you were a traitor and that you betrayed the Castles of Janina.
MORCERF
Oh!
ALBERT
It's unworthy, isn't it? Also, I saw Mr. Beauchamp.
MORCERF
And --
ALBERT
And I was right to do so. More than I could have expected for he was leaving for Janina.
MORCERF
For Janina! He's left for Janina?
ALBERT
No. He stayed -- for I found two cards from him at the house since I didn't return until morning and the second one gave me a meeting here in the foyer of the Opera at 9:00 p.m. It will be 9:00 in five minutes. Do you want to stay or leave, father?
MORCERF
I will stay.
ALBERT
Fine! You're right. You are accustomed to vanquish the enemy by meeting him face to face, and this time, as always, you will knock him down like a soldier and gentleman. But who told you about this?
MORCERF
Danglars, in telling me that everything was finished between us, and the projected marriage was broken, then to explain, he referred me to the newspaper of Mr. Beauchamp, that's what I was asking him about at the moment you arrived.
ALBERT
Fine, father, fine! Ah -- right in time, Mr. Beauchamp.
(Beauchamp enters.)
ALBERT
Come, sir, come.
BEAUCHAMP
Why with your father, Vicomte?
ALBERT
It's chance that brought my father here and strong in his innocence, my father wanted to stay.
BEAUCHAMP
But it's an affair between you and me, Albert, let's let it finish between you and me. Count, believe that tomorrow you will be satisfied with the manner in which I will behave. Meanwhile, rest assured, I understand your discontent, we will do what is possible to ease it.
MORCERF
Mr. Beauchamp.
BEAUCHAMP
Tell your father to leave me alone, Albert.
MORCERF
But now --
BEAUCHAMP
In the name of our friendship, Vicomte!
ALBERT
(aside)
Oh! It overwhelms me.
(to Count)
Father, you hear, you hear. Beauchamp wants to speak to me alone -- go home. Be at ease, in your absence your name will be worthily upheld. Go! Go!
MORCERF
I'll see you, Albert?
ALBERT
I shall have the honor to pay my respects this evening.
(Morcerf leaves.)
ALBERT
Now, sir, I hope you'll have the goodness to explain.
BEAUCHAMP
I promised you to look into it, Albert, and here I am.
ALBERT
Well?
BEAUCHAMP
Well, the information, purely and simply had been thrown into the paper's mail box by an anonymous hand.
ALBERT
Ah, you see quite well, then it was clearly a deliberate slander.
BEAUCHAMP
But annexed to the note were affidavits.
ALBERT
What affidavits?
BEAUCHAMP
Read them, my friend. They relieved me of the unfortunate necessity of going to Epirus.
ALBERT
Affidavits from four notable inhabitants of Janina stating that -- oh, my God, give me the strength -- that Colonel Fernand Mondego, instructor general in the service of Ali Pasha, sold out the castles for two thousand pounds -- ah, sir -- you are indeed in great haste!
BEAUCHAMP
Yes, my friend, I am in haste to speak to you; Albert, the faults of our fathers in these times of action and reaction cannot smirch their children. Albert, few can traverse the revolutions in whose midst we are living without some mud or blood being splashed on their face. Albert, no one in the world. Now I have all the proof, now that I am master of your secret, no one can force me into a duel which your conscience would reproach you for as a crime. But though you have no right to demand it from me, my friend. I come to offer it to you now. The proofs that I alone possess, do you want them to disappear? This frightful secret, do you want it kept just between us? Confided to my word of honor, it will never leave my mouth. Speak, do you wish it, Albert, my friend?
ALBERT
(embracing him)
Oh! Noble heart.
BEAUCHAMP
(presenting the papers to Albert)
Here.
(Albert, taking the papers crumpling them, ready to tear them up.)
BEAUCHAMP
Give them here.
(burning the papers with a candelabra)
Let it all be forgotten like a bad dream, let it all be effaced like the last sparks which run on this paper. Let all this evaporate, the last smoke which escapes from these mute cinders.
ALBERT
Yes, yes, let it remain only in the eternal friendship that I vow to my savior, friendship that my children will bear to yours, which will always recollect that I owe to you the blood in my being, the life of my body and the honor of my name; for if such a thing had been proved, I declare to you, Beauchamp, I would have blown my brains out.
BEAUCHAMP
Dear Albert.
(silence for a moment)
Well, still something is wrong, my friend.
ALBERT
Beauchamp, something is broken in my heart. Oh, one isn't separated so, in a moment from the respect, from the confidence, from the pride which the spotless name of his father inspires in a son. Oh, Beauchamp, Beauchamp, how can I stand mine, now? Will I look away when his lips approach me, pull my hand away if he comes too close? Still, Beauchamp, I am the unhappiest of men. Oh my mother, my poor mother! If you had read this, how much you would have suffered!
BEAUCHAMP
Look, courage, my friend!
ALBERT
But where did this note come from that was printed in the paper? Behind all this is the hand of an unknown person, an invisible enemy, an anonymous denouncer, who entrusted the shame of my family to the bronze mouth of your newspaper.
BEAUCHAMP
Oh, as to him, my friend, look for him, find him, strangle him, I will assist with all my ability and if I can, I will help you with all my strength. Meanwhile, courage, Albert! no show of emotion on your face -- wear this sorrow within like, like the cloud that brings ruin and death, a fatal secret that no one can fathom until the tempest breaks. Go, friend, go, conserve your strength.
ALBERT
Oh -- you think we've come that far?
BEAUCHAMP
I don't know, but after what has just happened, anything is possible. By the way!
ALBERT
What?
BEAUCHAMP
Are you still marrying Miss Danglars? The rumor of the break off of your engagement, is it true?
ALBERT
Broken, but wait, now you make me think of it, Mr. Danglars is here right now -- ah! there he is coming from his box with Debray.
DANGLARS
(to a servant)
Go find the Star -- you'll find a newspaper stand at the end of the hall.
ALBERT
What's he doing? Not sending for a newspaper?
BEAUCHAMP
Yes.
DANGLARS
Will you have an ice, Debray?
DEBRAY
(exiting the box)
Willingly.
DANGLARS
Oh, it's you Vicomte.
ALBERT
Yes, sir, it's me; I am leaving my father.
DANGLARS
Ah, the General?
ALBERT
Yes, the General -- he told me something strange.
DANGLARS
Bah! What did the dear Count tell you?
ALBERT
He told me that without giving any reason, without giving him any motive --
DANGLARS
Good! There we are.
ALBERT
Well, so be it, there we are. Listen, I didn't want this alliance, sir. I begged my father not to force the repugnance that I had to enter your family -- but the Count de Morcerf insisted and I obeyed.
DANGLARS
Yes, I understand -- you were done violence.
ALBERT
Yes, I was done violence -- that's the word.
DANGLARS
After having seen the sum of the dowry or before?
ALBERT
Sir, I have from my father 50,000 francs or a little less. That's my reply -- my father began as a simple soldier and --
DANGLARS
Pardon, my fine friend, but everyone has not had the opportunities to make his fortune that your father has had.
ALBERT
What do you mean, sir?
DANGLARS
I mean to say that no one has had, and no one ever will have, an Ali Tibelin.
ALBERT
You hear him, Beauchamp? He admits he's denouncing --
DANGLARS
I admit what? What do I denounce?
ALBERT
Sir, you will give us the reason for the outrage that you have just perpetrated on us.
DANGLARS
I will give you reason why I do not wish to give my daughter to the son of Colonel Fernand Mondego -- instructor of the troops of Ali Pasha.
ALBERT
Sir, this is not a question of marriage, it is a question of --
DANGLARS
The article in the morning paper, right?
ALBERT
Well, yes.
DANGLARS
In truth! And you come to take that up with me? Are you mad? What do I know of this Greek scandal? Do you know Ali Tibelin? Have I ever travelled in that part of the world. Did I advise your father to betray the castles whose protection was under his care -- to commit treason?
ALBERT
Silence, sir, silence!
BEAUCHAMP
Albert! Albert.
(Meanwhile the servant has returned with the papers to Debray)
DANGLARS
(to Debray)
Well -- is it there?
DEBRAY
Yes.
DANGLARS
Fine!
ALBERT
I was saying, then, sir, that I regard as an insult from you, not only the refusal made to my father, but in what you just said to me. I was telling you then that I demand a double satisfaction for the double insult and that I will have this satisfaction or indeed --
DEBRAY
Vicomte!
ALBERT
Are you giving proxy to Mr. Debray, Baron, and do you want me to have an affair with him?
DANGLARS
Sir, if you have come here to seek a quarrel with me, to prepare an ambush for me, take care! For I warn you I will place this affair in the hands of the King's attorney.
ALBERT
You deceive yourself, sir, I addressed myself to Mr. Debray only because he appeared to me to want to intervene in our discussion but since you reclaim priority --
DANGLARS
Sir, I warn you that when I find a mad dog in my way, I kill it. Or, if you've gone mad and try to kill me, I will kill you without pity. After all, is it my fault if your father is dishonored?
DEBRAY
Baron!
ALBERT
Dishonored!
DANGLARS
Is it my fault, if the papers name the Count de Morcerf in so many words?
ALBERT
You lie, they do not name him.
DANGLARS
The morning papers don't, but the evening papers -- yes.
ALBERT
The evening.
DANGLARS
Eh! Read, by God.
(He puts the paper under their eyes.)
ALBERT
My God! Beauchamp, he's telling the truth and I'm not at the end of it?
(reading)
"The French officer mentioned in this morning's "Impartial" and who not only betrayed the castles of Janina, but even betrayed his benefactor, was named at this time Fernand, as our honorable colleague said, but afterwards he added a name to his baptismal name, a title of nobility. Today he's known as the Count de Morcerf and is a member of the House of Lords.
DANGLARS
Well -- it is clear.
ALBERT
It's also clear, sir, that it comes from you.
DANGLARS
Well, on that score, if that comes from me, it seems that, in marrying one's daughter to a young man, one can get some information about the young man's family -- it's not only a right, but a duty.
ALBERT
Fine! Continue, sir, then it's you who wrote to Janina.
DANGLARS
When would I have written?
ALBERT
It was to you the affidavit were addressed?
DANGLARS
Eh! Sir -- ?
ALBERT
Oh -- he must reply to me.
DANGLARS
Well, if I wrote, sir, it's because I was advised to write.
ALBERT
Oh -- someone gave you such advice.
DANGLARS
Eh! Certainly! I spoke in passing of your father -- I said that the origins of his fortune had always remained obscure, then the person to whom I was talking asked where your father had made his fortune. I replied, "In Greece." "In what part of Greece?" "In Epirus." "Eh, well, write to Janina" - this person replied and I wrote.
ALBERT
The person who gave you this advice, I may know him?
DANGLARS
By God -- he's your friend.
DANGLARS
Will you name this individual?
DANGLARS
You want to know?
ALBERT
Will you name him?
DANGLARS
Well, I name the Count of Monte Cristo.
ALBERT
So it was the Count of Monte Cristo who gave you advice to write to Janina?
DANGLARS
You disbelieve it?
ALBERT
Oh -- yes, I admit that.
DANGLARS
Well, ask him yourself. He's in his box.
ALBERT
Here? Here?
DANGLARS
Yes.
ALBERT
That's fine, sir, you are free.
DANGLARS
Young man!
ALBERT
Sir!
DANGLARS
Very well, very well. You have found your man -- take it up with him.
(Danglars leaves.)
ALBERT
Oh! When I think that he's here! When I think that only this door stands between him and me.
DEBRAY and BEAUCHAMP
Albert!
ALBERT
Oh, let me alone.
(He strikes on Monte Cristo's box door. Monte Cristo comes out with Chateaubrun.)
MONTE CRISTO
Ah, it's you, Mr. Morcerf. Will do you me the pleasure of coming into my box?
ALBERT
Count, I haven't come to exchange hypocritical politeness or false pretensions of friendship. I came here to ask you for an explanation.
MONTE CRISTO
An explanation at the Opera, sir. So unfamiliar am I with Parisian customs, I had no idea that explanations were demanded at the Opera.
ALBERT
Sir, when people can from one moment to the other, disappear, when one doesn't know where they come from nor where they are going, one must seize the moment that presents itself and take them where one finds them.
MONTE CRISTO
I didn't think I was so hard find, sir, since you were with me this very morning.
ALBERT
Yes, just this morning, I was with you, because this morning I didn't know who you were.
MONTE CRISTO
But where are you coming from, sir? In truth, you do not appear to me to be playing with a full deck.
ALBERT
So long as I understand your lies and that I make you understand I intend to be avenged, I will be reasonable enough in my own view.
MONTE CRISTO
I don't understand you, sir, and if I do understand you, you are speaking much too loud. I rent this box, the box is mine, I am, as it were, at home, and I alone have the right to raise my voice above others. Leave, sir.
ALBERT
Oh, I will make you leave, too.
MONTE CRISTO
Ah, you are looking for a quarrel with me, Vicomte, I see that -- but some advice, and listen carefully -- it is a bad custom to make a lot of noise in a provocation -- the noise doesn't become everybody, Mr. Morcerf.
ALBERT
Oh!
(Albert tries to throw his glove in Monte Cristo's face, but Beauchamp holds his arm. The glove falls at Monte Cristo's feet.)
MONTE CRISTO
Sir, I take your glove as having been thrown. And tomorrow morning, I shall send it back to you with a bullet attached.
ALBERT
That's all that I wish. Beauchamp, I leave the rest to you.
(He leaves like a madman.)
CHATEAUBRUN
What have you done to him?
MONTE CRISTO
Me? Nothing -- personally at least.
BEAUCHAMP
Count.
MONTE CRISTO
(leaving his box)
Come on -- it is written that I shall not hear the third act. Fortunately, it's the least good. What do you want of me, Mr. Beauchamp?
BEAUCHAMP
Sir, I was accompanying Mr. Morcerf, as you have seen.
MONTE CRISTO
Which means you probably have just had supper together. I compliment you, sir, on being more sober than your friend.
BEAUCHAMP
Sir, Albert was wrong to lose control of himself, and on my own account, but for myself alone, I make you an apology. Now, you are too gallant a man to refuse to give him some explanation apropos of this Janina business.
MONTE CRISTO
So, all my hopes are dashed. You rush to give me an eccentric reputation. I am, according to you a Lara, a Manfred, a Ruthwen. Then you waste your type print -- you try to make a banal man of me, a man like all other men. You even ask explanations from me. Come on, Mr. Beauchamp, you want to laugh.
BEAUCHAMP
Except, sir, it is one of those occasions where honor commands.
MONTE CRISTO
Mr. Beauchamp, the one who commands the Count of Monte Cristo is the Count of Monte Cristo. So, not a word about that if you please. I do what I choose Mr. Beauchamp and believe me it is always well done.
BEAUCHAMP
Sir, permit me to tell you that one does not pay honest men in that coin. There must be guarantees to honor.
MONTE CRISTO
Sir, I am living guaranty. Both Mr. Morcerf and I have blood in our veins we are burning to shed. There's our mutual guaranty. Report this reply to the Vicomte and tell him that, tomorrow before 10:00 in the morning I will have seen the color of his.
BEAUCHAMP
It only remains for me, then Count, to settle the conditions of the combat.
MONTE CRISTO
That's perfectly indifferent to me. It is useless for me to be disturbed for a long while over such a thing. In France one fights with the sword or with pistols, in the colonies with rifles, in Arabia with daggers, in South America with knives. Tell your client, that to be eccentric to the end I will let him have the choice of weapons and I accept everything without discussion and without argument. All -- do you understand clearly? All, even duel by the voice of fate which is always stupid. But for me, it's another matter -- I am sure of winning.
BEAUCHAMP
Sure of winning?
MONTE CRISTO
Eh! Certainly! Were I not, I wouldn't fight with Mr. Morcerf. I will kill him, it's necessary, that's all.
BEAUCHAMP
Ah! Count! His father loves him so much.
MONTE CRISTO
Don't tell me of such things, Mr. Beauchamp! I will make him suffer!
BEAUCHAMP
Count! Count!
MONTE CRISTO
Only, Mr. Beauchamp, by a word let me know this evening the weapon and the place. I don't like to be kept waiting.
BEAUCHAMP
Pistols -- at eight o'clock in the morning -- in the Bois de Vincennes.
MONTE CRISTO
It's fine, sir. Now that all is settled, let me hear the performance, I beg you and tell your friend, Albert, not to return this evening -- it would be wrong to add bad taste to all his other brutalities. Let him go home and sleep. Adieu.
(The Count goes into his box.)
(curtain)
The home of the Count of Monte Cristo. Monte Cristo is with his servants.
MONTE CRISTO
Ah! My little ebony pistols! Baptistin, my swords. Before you go, hang the gold sheet and place in the middle of it an ace of spades.
(to Ali who brings him his box of pistols)
Thanks, Ali -- are they loaded?
(Ali nods)
Are you ready, Baptistin!
BERTUCCIO
(entering)
Count.
MONTE CRISTO
Well, what's wrong?
BERTUCCIO
A veiled lady who won't give her name and who will speak only to you.
MONTE CRISTO
A veiled lady?
BERTUCCIO
Yes.
MONTE CRISTO
Let her come in.
(He gestures. Ali and Baptistin disappear through side doors. Bertuccio leaves after admitting Mercedes.)
MONTE CRISTO
Who are you and what do you want of me?
MERCEDES
(raising her veil)
Edmond, you will not kill my son!
MONTE CRISTO
(letting his pistol fall)
Oh! What name have you used, Madame de Morcerf.
MERCEDES
Yours, yours, who perhaps I alone in all the world have not forgotten. Edmond, it is not Madame de Morcerf, who comes to you, it is Mercedes.
MONTE CRISTO
Mercedes is dead, Madame, I know no one of that name.
MERCEDES
Mercedes lives, sir, and Mercedes remembers -- for she alone recognized you when she saw you and even without seeing you by the sole accent of your voice, since the moment she saw you, she has followed you step-by-step -- she watches you -- she fears you, she has had no need to look for the hand which struck the blow at the Count de Morcerf.
MONTE CRISTO
Fernand, you mean, Madame? Since we're remembering our names, remember all of them.
MERCEDES
You see clearly, Edmond, that I am not deceived and that I am right in saying to you: Edmond, spare my son!
MONTE CRISTO
And who told you, Madame, that I have it in for your son?
MERCEDES
No one, my God! But does a mother have need of such things? I divined it all. I followed him tonight to the Opera and hidden in a pit box, I saw everything.
MONTE CRISTO
Then, if you saw everything, Madame, you saw that your son insulted me publicly?
MERCEDES
Oh -- have pity!
MONTE CRISTO
You saw that he would have thrown his glove in my face if Mr. de Chateaubrun had not stopped him?
MERCEDES
Listen to me, my son has figured it out, too and he attributed to you the misfortunes that are striking his father.
MONTE CRISTO
Madame, you are confused. These are not misfortunes -- they are punishments. It is not I who strike Mr. Morcerf. It is Providence which pursues him.
MERCEDES
And you substitute yourself for Providence? Why do you remember what it has forgotten? What does Janina and it's Vizier mean to you, Edmond? What wrong did Fernand Mondego do to you in betraying Ali Tibelin?
MONTE CRISTO
As to that, Madame, all that is an affair between the French captain and the daughter of Ali Pasha, who is still alive, I think and if I have sworn to avenge myself it is not on the French Captain, not on the Count de Morcerf, but in the fisherman Fernand, husband of Mercedes the Catalan.
MERCEDES
Oh, sir, what a terrible vengeance for a fault which fate made me commit, for I am the guilty one, and if you must avenge yourself on someone it should be on me. I'm the one who lacked the strength during your absence and my isolation.
MONTE CRISTO
But why was I absent? Why were you isolated?
MERCEDES
Because you were arrested, Edmond, because you were a prisoner.
MONTE CRISTO
But why was I arrested? Why was I a prisoner?
MERCEDES
I don't know.
MONTE CRISTO
Yes, you don't know. At least I hope not. Well, I am going to tell you. I was arrested, I was imprisoned because, at the Reserve, the very day I was to marry you, a man named Danglars wrote a letter which the fisherman, Fernand, obligingly put in the mail. This letter.
(He goes to a desk and removes a letter.)
MERCEDES
A letter! What letter?
MONTE CRISTO
Read! This letter cost me 100,000 francs. But it was not too expensive since it allows me to justify myself in your eyes.
MERCEDES
(reading)
"The King's attorney is warned by a friend of the throne and religion that the one called Edmond Dantes, first mate on the boat, Pharoah, returned this morning from Smyrna after having stopped at Naples and Porto Ferraio, has been charged by Murat with a letter for the usurper and by the usurper with a letter to the Bonapartist committee in Paris -- one can find proof of the crime when he is arrested for he will have this letter on him -- " Oh! Oh! My God! My God!
MONTE CRISTO
You've read it?
MERCEDES
Yes! And the result of this letter?
MONTE CRISTO
You know, Madame; it was my arrest but what you don't know is how long this imprisonment lasted. Fourteen years! What you don't know is that each day of these fourteen years, I renewed the vow of vengeance that I took the first day, and yet, in the depths of my prison. I was unaware that you had married; that Fernand was my accuser; I was unaware that my father had died and died of starvation.
MERCEDES
Just God!
MONTE CRISTO
But what I knew leaving the prison fourteen years after I entered was what had been done to Mercedes who was living and my father, who was dead -- I swore to be avenged on Fernand and I am going to do it! But I knew on leaving prison that I would be avenged on whoever did this to my father and Mercedes.
MERCEDES
Are you sure that the wretched Fernand was the cause of all this?
MONTE CRISTO
On my soul! He did what you read. Besides, isn't it more odious that being French by adoption, he went over to the English. Spanish by birth, fight against Spain, the employee of Ali, to betray and assassinate Ali. In face of such things, My God! What is the letter you have just read -- ? A gallant mystification one ought to pardon, I admit it and I understand the woman who married this man -- but I cannot pardon the lover who should have married this woman. Well, the French haven't avenged themselves on the traitor, the Spaniards didn't shoot the traitor, Ali lying in his tomb has not strangled the traitor! As for me, betrayed, murdered, also thrown in my tomb, I escaped this tomb by the grace of God. I owe it to God to avenge myself, he sent me here for that -- and here I am.
MERCEDES
Oh, yes, you are right. Yes, you are in your rights, yes! God has given you the job to punish! But pardon Edmond, pardon for me, for me begging you on my knees.
MONTE CRISTO
How can I pardon? How can I not wipe out the cursed race? How could I disobey God who saved me for his punishment? Impossible, Madame, impossible!
MERCEDES
Edmond, my God! When I still call you Edmond why don't you ever call me Mercedes?
MONTE CRISTO
Mercedes! Well, yes, you're right, Mercedes that name is still sweet to pronounce and this is the first time in a long while it has passed my lips. Oh! Mercedes your name -- I've pronounced it so many times with sighs of melancholy, with tremblings of sadness, the gasp of despair, I have pronounced it frozen by the cold and squatting on the straw in my cell; I pronounced it devoured by the heat, rolling on the flagstones of my prison! Mercedes! Fourteen years I suffered, fourteen years I was cursed. Now, I tell you, Mercedes, it is time that I be avenged.
MERCEDES
Take revenge, Edmond -- but take it on the guilty. Take it on him; take it on me -- but don't take it on my son!
MONTE CRISTO
It is written "The faults of the fathers fall on the children until the 14th generation". Since God elicited his own words through his Prophet why should I be better than God.
MERCEDES
Because God has time and eternity. Two things men do not have.
MONTE CRISTO
Oh!
MERCEDES
Edmond, since I first knew you, I've adored your name. Edmond, since I lost you, I've adored your memory. Edmond, don't force me to tarnish this pure and noble image reflected without cease in the mirror of my heart! Edmond, if you knew all the prayers I addressed to God, so long as I hoped you were living and later when I believed you dead. What could I do for you, Edmond, but pray and weep? Hear me, for ten years I dreamed of you each night. They told me you had tried to escape, that you had taken the place of a prisoner, that you had slid into the shroud of a dead man, that when they threw the cadaver from the walls of the Chateau that the scream you uttered when you landed on the rocks disclosed the substitution to your enslavers, now become your executioners. Well, Edmond, I swear to you on the head of the son I am imploring you to spare, that for ten years, I saw every night men balancing something shapeless and unknown at the height of a rock -- and every night for ten years, I heard a terrible scream which awakened me cold and shivering! Oh, I too, Edmond, believe me, criminal that I am, I too have suffered!
MONTE CRISTO
Did you feel your father dying of starvation in your absence? Did you see the woman you loved give her hand to your rival, while you gave your death rattle in the depths of a pit?
MERCEDES
No, but I have seen the man that I have always loved become the murderer of my son!
MONTE CRISTO
My God! My God! This is all I can take; this is more than I can take! What do you ask of me? That your son live! Very well, he shall live! The lion is tamed! The avenger is vanquished.
MERCEDES
(taking Edmond's hands to her lips)
Oh, thanks, Edmond! You remain fine as I have always dreamed, as I have always loved you, oh, yes, always loved -- now I can tell you.
MONTE CRISTO
But poor Edmond will not have a long while to be loved by you. The dead man will return to his tomb. The ghost will fade into the night.
MERCEDES
What are you saying?
MONTE CRISTO
I am saying that, since you order it, Mercedes, I must die.
MERCEDES
Who said that? Who spoke of dying? Where are you getting these ideas of death from?
MONTE CRISTO
You don't imagine that outraged publicly in the presence of the entire hallway, in the presence of your friends and those of your son, provoked by a child, who would glorify himself with my pardon, as if with a victory -- you don't suppose that leaves me even a momentary desire to live?
MERCEDES
But this duel won't take place, Edmond since you pardon --
MONTE CRISTO
It must take place, Madame, only in place of blood of your son, which the earth ought to devour, mine will be shed.
MERCEDES
Edmond, since you live, there must be a God above us -- and I have seen you again. And I trust him from the depths of my heart. While awaiting his help, I rely on your word; you've said he will live -- he lives, right?
MONTE CRISTO
He will live, Madame, what is said is said.
MERCEDES
Oh, Edmond, how handsome this is, how good, how sublime to pardon as you have just done!
MONTE CRISTO
You say that, Mercedes and what would you say if you understood the extent of the sacrifice I am making for you?
MERCEDES
I have only one more word to say to you, you see that even if my face is pale, my eyes are bright, that if my beauty is lost, that if Mercedes no longer looks like the person she once was, Mercedes still has the same heart. Goodbye, Edmond! I have nothing more to ask of heaven. I have seen you again and seen you as grand and noble as before. Goodbye, Edmond! Goodbye and thanks!
MONTE CRISTO
(alone)
Why, there's a work so artfully prepared, raised with such trouble and labor, demolished by a single blow, with only one word, with a breath, alas! And all this, my God, because my heart, which I thought dead was only numb, because it was beaten, because once I gave in to the sorrow of the palpitations raised in the depths of my breast by the voice of a woman. Fool! Fool! To act from generosity which has in effect made me a helpless target for this man's pistol. Never will he believe that my death is a suicide, and yet, it matters for the honor of my memory that the world know I consented myself -- by my will -- by my free will, to hold my hand, which was already raised, and that this arm so powerfully armed against others is striking me myself.
(pulling a paper from a drawer he writes some words)
And first of all to add this codicil to my will. "I bequeath to Maximilian Morrel, Captain of Spahis, and son of my former patron, Pierre Morrel, shipowner of Marseille, the sum of twenty million. These twenty millions are stored in my grotto at Monte Cristo of which Bertuccio knows the secret."
(Haidee enters and approaches the count and reads over his shoulder)
"If his heart is free and he wishes to marry Haidee, daughter of Ali Pasha of Janina, whom I have raised with a father's love and who has for me the love and tenderness of a daughter, he will fulfill, I don't say my last wish, but my last desire. The present will already make Haidee, the residual heir of the remainder of my fortune."
HAIDEE
Oh! My God!
MONTE CRISTO
Haidee, you read it?
HAIDEE
Oh, Milord, why do you write such things and at such an hour? Why do you leave me all your fortune? Milord is leaving me then?
MONTE CRISTO
I am going on a long trip, my girl, and if something unfortunate happens to me --
HAIDEE
Well -- ?
MONTE CRISTO
Well, if some misfortune befalls me, I want my daughter to be happy.
HAIDEE
Milord, you are thinking of dying.
MONTE CRISTO
It's a healthy thought, my child, a philosopher said.
HAIDEE
Well, if you are dying, leave your fortune to others, for if you die, Milord, Haidee won't have need of anything.
(She takes the will, tears it, then falls into a faint.)
MONTE CRISTO
Mercedes remembered she had a son -- I -- I have forgotten I have a daughter.
(curtain)
The Wood of Vincennes
CHATEAUBRUN
Good -- we have arrived, and I think that we have arrived first.
DEBRAY
You will excuse me, my dear chap, I think I see a carriage under those trees down there.
CHATEAUBRUN
It's true, and two young people appear to be waiting, I recognize Frantz and Beauchamp.
(to the wings)
Here are our men, Count, and you can step down.
MONTE CRISTO
Thanks, gentleman!
DEBRAY
Count, would you care to permit me to go to these gentleman and ask them the cause that keeps them so far from us?
MONTE CRISTO
I was going to beg you to do it.
(Debray leaves.)
MONTE CRISTO
Let me, Mr. de Chateaubrun, renew all my thanks.
CHATEAUBRUN
For what, sir?
MONTE CRISTO
You agreed to be my second without knowing me, without knowing if I was right or wrong, if my cause was just or unjust.
CHATEAUBRUN
Listen, Count. I watched you yesterday during the entire scene of provocation; I thought of your assurance all night and I told myself justice ought to be for you, or men's faces cannot be relied on.
MONTE CRISTO
What did you do after leaving me?
CHATEAUBRUN
I went to Tortoni's where, as I expected, I found Beauchamp and Frantz that Morcerf had taken for his seconds; I admit that I was looking for them.
MONTE CRISTO
To do what, since all was agreed?
CHATEAUBRUN
I hoped to change the weapons; to substitute the sword for the pistols, the pistol is blind.
MONTE CRISTO
(quickly)
Were you able to succeed, by chance?
CHATEAUBRUN
No, it appears that your expertise with the sword is known.
MONTE CRISTO
Fine -- thus we will be fighting with pistols?
CHATEAUBRUN
Yes.
MONTE CRISTO
At how many paces?
CHATEAUBRUN
At twenty.
MONTE CRISTO
And we will fire together?
CHATEAUBRUN
No, you will fire first.
MONTE CRISTO
I fire first?
CHATEAUBRUN
Oh! That I obtained or rather demanded; we made enough concessions for them to make us that one.
MONTE CRISTO
You've never seen me fire a pistol, Mr. de Chateaubrun?
CHATEAUBRUN
No, never.
MONTE CRISTO
(taking a pistol from a box)
You see that little tree?
CHATEAUBRUN
Which?
MONTE CRISTO
Near to the oak? It's twenty paces or nearly so, right?
CHATEAUBRUN
Yes.
MONTE CRISTO
Watch.
(He fires and breaks the tree.)
CHATEAUBRUN
Oh! My God!
MONTE CRISTO
Mr. Chateaubrun, never forget what you have just seen.
CHATEAUBRUN
It's frightening. In the name of heaven, Count, do not kill Albert! The wretch has a mother.
MONTE CRISTO
That's very true, and I do not have one.
CHATEAUBRUN
Oh! Count, be generous. Sure of your shot as you are, I can say something to you that would be ridiculous if said to someone else.
MONTE CRISTO
Which is?
CHATEAUBRUN
Wound him, but don't kill him.
MONTE CRISTO
Baron, I have no need to be encouraged to care for Mr. de Morcerf. Mr. Morcerf will be cared for and I announce to you before hand that he will return with his two friends, while I --
CHATEAUBRUN
While you -- ?
MONTE CRISTO
As for me, it's another matter. You will bring me home.
CHATEAUBRUN
Come now!
MONTE CRISTO
I have the honor to tell you, Baron, Albert will kill me.
CHATEAUBRUN
What's come over you since last night, Count?
MONTE CRISTO
What came over Brutus before the Battle of Phillippi; I've seen a ghost!
CHATEAUBRUN
And this ghost --
MONTE CRISTO
Told me I had lived too long. But here are the gentlemen. Come, come, I am ready for you.
(Debray, Beauchamp and Frantz enter.)
BEAUCHAMP
It's three minutes to 8:00, gentleman; there's no time to lose.
MONTE CRISTO
Oh, that wasn't what I meant.
FRANTZ
Besides, I hear hoofbeats.
CHATEAUBRUN
Gentlemen, you are provided with pistols, the Count of Monte Cristo declares he renounces the right to have you use his.
BEAUCHAMP
We foresaw this delicacy of the Count, Mr. Chateaubrun, and I brought weapons which I purchased a week or ten days ago, believing I would need one for such an affair. They are perfectly new, and have never been used by anyone. Do you want to inspect them?
CHATEAUBRUN
Oh, Mr. de Beauchamp, when you assure me that Mr. Morcerf is not familiar with these weapons, be sure that your word suffices for me.
DEBRAY
Sir, here's Albert; he's on horseback.
BEAUCHAMP
(looking at his watch)
Eight o'clock.
FRANTZ
What a mistake to come on horseback to duel with pistols! And I taught him that lesson so well!
BEAUCHAMP
And then look, with a knot on his tie, with an open coat, with a white waistcoat. At least, he didn't put a bulls eye on his breast, that had been rather too much.
(A servant in the background holds two hands.)
ALBERT
(entering)
Thanks, gentleman for coming at my invitation. And you too Mr. Chateaubrun, thanks. Approach then -- you are not too many.
CHATEAUBRUN
You are unaware, perhaps, Mr. de Morcerf that I am the witness for Mr de Monte Cristo?
ALBERT
I wasn't sure, but I suspected. So much the better gentlemen, for the more men of honor there are here, the more satisfied I am.
FRANTZ
Mr. Debray you can tell the Count of Monte Cristo that we are here at his disposition.
(At the same time opens a pistol box.)
ALBERT
Wait, gentlemen. I have two words to say to the Count of Monte Cristo.
CHATEAUBRUN
In particular?
ALBERT
No, sir, before the whole world.
CHATEAUBRUN
(to Monte Cristo)
You hear?
MONTE CRISTO
What does he want?
CHATEAUBRUN
I don't know, but he asks to speak to you.
MONTE CRISTO
Oh -- don't let him tempt God by some new outrage!
CHATEAUBRUN
I don't think that is his intention.
ALBERT
Gentlemen, come closer, I beg you. I desire that not a word of what I am going to have the honor to say to the Count of Monte Cristo shall be lost, for what I am about to have the honor to say to him, will be repeated by you to whoever wants to hear it, however strange or incomprehensible my speech may appear to you!
MONTE CRISTO
I am waiting, sir.
ALBERT
Sir, yesterday, I reproached you for having divulged the conduct of Mr. de Morcerf in Epirus, for however guilty the Count de Morcerf may have been, I did not think that you had the right to punish him, but today, sir, I do know the right you acquired. It is not the treason of Fernand Mondego towards Ali Pasha which makes me so prompt to excuse you, it's the treason of Fisherman Fernand toward you -- there were unheard of misfortunes that stemmed from that treason, also I tell you, indeed I proclaim it aloud, yes, sir, you had the right to avenge yourself on my father, and I, his son, the son of Mercedes, I think you for taking your vengeance only on him.
MONTE CRISTO
(raising his eyes to heaven with an expression of infinite joy)
Ah, I recognize your wish, Mercedes!
ALBERT
And now, sir, if you find these excuses which I have just made you are sufficient, I beg your hand. After the merit of such a rare infallibility which seems to be yours, the next most outstanding merit in my opinion, is to admit one's wrongs -- but this admission is one I make for myself for it concerns me alone. Only an angel can save one of us from death, and the angel has come down from heaven to make the two of us -- if not friends -- alas, fate makes such a thing impossible, at least two men who can esteem each other.
MONTE CRISTO
Here's my hand, sir -- but for you, you understand, for you alone.
(low)
And for your mother.
ALBERT
Thanks, Count! Gentlemen, you see that the Count of Monte Cristo has indeed accepted my excuses. I behaved rashly towards him: rage is a bad counsellor. I have indeed behaved badly. Now, my fault is mended. I hope indeed the world will not take me for a coward, because I have acted as my conscience dictated. But in any case, if they are deceived about me, I will try to change their opinions.
FRANTZ
What happened that night, Mr. de Beauchamp? It seems to me we are playing a sad role here.
BEAUCHAMP
In fact, what Albert has just done is either wretched or very noble.
MONTE CRISTO
(aside)
Always, Providence! Oh -- today for the first time, I am indeed certain of having been sent by God.
(curtain)
A room in the Hall of Peers.
The President of the Chamber, six members of a commission of inquiry and Morcerf.
MORCERF
Milord, I have been requested to appear before you and you see I am here at your orders.
PRESIDENT
You know what accusation weighs on you -- , Count?
MORCERF
I know that two anonymous slanderers directed by the hand of an enemy -- have tried to smirch the life of a man whose inspires a jealousy much greater because it has been covered with honors.
PRESIDENT
You know this double accusation, Count?
MORCERF
Yes, I know it.
PRESIDENT
It is then unnecessary to send it to you.
MORCERF
Unnecessary. Only I wish to observe to Milords that this charge because of its unofficial character cannot carry a precise designation.
PRESIDENT
That's true. Also, we would not have given this charge any attention, but for that fact that the one which appeared the same evening in the Star in making the accusation gave the name of the accused. Here's the second newspaper article, "This French officer in the service of Ali Pasha of Janina, who was mentioned this morning in the "Impartial" and who not only betrayed the castles of Janina, but even delivered his benefactor to the Turks, was named, at that time Fernand, as our honorable colleague said -- but since then, he has added a title of nobility to this baptismal name. Today, he's known as the Count de Morcerf and a member of the Senate." How do you respond to this, Count?
MORCERF
I reply, gentlemen, that neither of these two articles is signed, that few of the bravest most honest can boast of having lived through our times without having had to blot out such stains. I have to reply that no proof is offered to support the infamous accusation while I, gentlemen, I have on the contrary thousands of proofs that Ali Pasha held me in his friendship, in this confidence, right up to the last moment. Here's my commission signed by him. Here's his signet ring with which he usually sealed his letters, and which he gave me when he sent me to Constantinople to negotiate in his name with the Great Sultan -- and with that I could, after my return, go to him at any time of the day and night, even into the Harem. Unfortunately, as you know, gentlemen, the negotiations failed and when I returned my benefactor was already dead, but in his last moments, his confidence in me was still so great, so complete, that it was to me that he left his favorite, Vasiliki, and his cherished daughter, Haidee.
PRESIDENT
Thus, it was to you, Count, that the Pasha confided as he died, both his daughter and his mistress?
MORCERF
Yes, sir, but in this as in all the rest, bad luck pursued me at my return, Vasiliki and her daughter had disappeared.
PRESIDENT
You knew them, Count?
MORCERF
My intimacy with the Pasha and the extreme confidence, which he had in my fidelity allowed me to see them more than twenty times.
PRESIDENT
Do you have some idea what became of them, Count?
MORCERF
Yes, sir, I heard it said that they had succumbed to their shames and perhaps their misery. As I was known as a faithful servant of the Pasha, my life was in great danger, and to my great regret, I could not search after them.
PRESIDENT
Milords, you have heard and followed the Count in his explanations. These anonymous attacks so frankly, so loyally repulsed by our honorable colleague -- does it seem to you they deserve further amplifications?
(The peers make negative signs.)
PRESIDENT
Would you retire, Count? We are going to deliberate.
USHER
(entering)
A letter.
PRESIDENT
Give it here.
MORCERF
Will you remember, gentlemen, that I have given you the most convincing proofs I can against an anonymous attack -- meaning the absence of all witnesses against my word as an honest man -- and the purity of my entire military life.
PRESIDENT
I regret you have spoken too soon, Count.
MORCERF
What do you mean, sir?
PRESIDENT
Or rather, I have no doubt the witness who presents himself and who has just announced his presence is called to prove the perfect innocence of our colleague. Here's the letter I have just received. "Mr. President, I assisted at the last moments of Ali Pasha, I can furnish the committee of inquiry, charged with examining the conduct of General Count de Morcerf, in Epirus and Macedonia with the most positive information. I know what became of Haidee and Vasiliki, I place myself at the disposition of the committee and even demand the honor of being heard. I will be in the outer chamber at the moment you receive this letter -- "
MORCERF
Oh! And who is this witness or rather this enemy?
PRESIDENT
We are going to find out, sir. The Committee is disposed to listen.
PEERS
Yes, yes, let him be heard -- right now, during this sitting.
PRESIDENT
(to usher)
Is there someone waiting in the vestibule?
USHER
Yes, Mr. President.
PRESIDENT
Who is it?
USHER
A woman.
PRESIDENT
(making a sign to the usher)
Fine.
MORCERF
(aside)
Oh, my God! Who can it be?
(Haidee enters covered with a veil which she lifts as she enters.)
PRESIDENT
Madame, are you the person who wrote the commission offering to give information on the Janina affair?
HAIDEE
Yes, sir.
PRESIDENT
And you have set forth, in this letter, that you have been an eyewitness to these events?
HAIDEE
That is the truth.
PRESIDENT
Permit me to say you must have been very young then, Madame?
HAIDEE
I was four. But as the events were matters of supreme importance for me, none of them has left my memory.
PRESIDENT
But what importance could these events have had for you?
HAIDEE
It was a question of the life or death of my father.
PRESIDENT
Of your father! Who are you then?
HAIDEE
I am Haidee, daughter of Ali Tibelin, Pasha of Janina, and of Vasiliki, his best loved wife.
MORCERF
(aside)
Haidee! Haidee!
PRESIDENT
Madame, permit me a single question -- which is not a doubt -- can you prove the truth of what you say?
HAIDEE
I can, sir, for here is my birth certificate drawn up by my father and signed by his principal officers with the proof of my baptism, my father having consented that I be brought up in the Christian religion, signed by the Primate of Macedonia and Epirus, under his seal. Here's an act of sale, of the sale of myself and my mother to the Armenian El Khebbir by the French officer who in his infamous pacts with the Sultan, reserved as his part of the loot, the wife and daughter of his benefactor, that he sold for a thousand pounds, in other words, almost 400,000 francs.
PRESIDENT
Here's the sales contract, "I, El Khebbir, slave merchant and purveyor to the Harem of his Highness, recognize by this receipt on behalf of the sublime Emperor, from the Count of Monte Cristo an emerald valued at two thousand pounds, as the price of a young Christian slave, aged eleven, named Haidee, recognized daughter of the defunct lord, Ali Tibelin, Pasha of Janina and of Vasiliki -- his favorite."
HAIDEE
Continue.
PRESIDENT
"The latter being sold to me seven years previously with her mother -- who died on her arrival at Constantinople, by a French colonel in the service of said Vizier Ali -- by name Fernand Mondego. Given and delivered with the authorization of His Highness in the 1547 after the Hegira. Signed El Khebbir.
The present sale shall be given all faith and authenticity -- witness the imperial seal which the vendor is obliged to affix."
Count de Morcerf, after the incontestable authenticity of these documents, do you recognize this lady as the daughter of Ali Tibelin, Pasha of Janina?
MORCERF
No, it's without doubt some plot concocted by my enemies.
HAIDEE
You don't recognize me? You don't recognize me, for the daughter of Ali? But, happily I recognize you. You are Fernand Mondego, the French officer who trained the soldiers of my noble father -- it was you who betrayed the castles of Janina, it was you, who sent to Constantinople to negotiate directly with the Emperor for the life and death of your benefactor, brought back a false decree, which granted pardon, while the true decree demanded his head; again it was you who sold us, my mother and me to the Merchant El Khebbir. Murderer! Murderer! Murderer! You still have the blood of your master on your face. Look everyone!
(Morcerf puts his hand to his face.)
PRESIDENT
You positively recognize Mr. de Morcerf to be the same officer, Fernand Mondego?
HAIDEE
Yes, I recognize him. Oh, my mother, you said to me "Haidee, you were free, you had a father you loved, you were destined to be almost a queen, look at this man carefully -- this man who tossed your father's head in his cape -- it is he who betrayed, it is he who gave us up -- look carefully at his right hand, the one with a scar, if you forget the face, you will recognize the hand, in which one by one, the gold pieces of the Merchant El Khebbir fell." Yes, I remember him! Oh! Let him say himself now whether I recognize him!
(The Count collapses in a chair, his head in his hands.)
PRESIDENT
Count, don't give up without a reply. The Justice of the Court is supreme and equal for all like that of God. It will not let you be wiped out by your enemies without giving you means to reply. Reply -- what do you decide?
MORCERF
Nothing.
PRESIDENT
Then the daughter of Ali Tibelin has really spoken the truth? She, then, is really the terrible witness at whose arrival the guilty never dare to reply? You have really done all the terrible things of which you are accused?
MORCERF
(rising, shaking, opens his shirt violently so he can breathe and rushes out of the chamber shouting)
Oh, I will know who -- !
PRESIDENT
Milords, is the Count de Morcerf guilty of felony, treachery, of unworthiness?
(the Lords make affirmative signs)
From this hour, Mr. de Morcerf shall no longer participate in the deliberations of this High Chamber.
HAIDEE
(lowering the veil over her eyes)
This was Justice.
(She leaves slowly.)
(curtain)
The Count de Morcerf's home.
ALBERT
(writing at a table)
Here's the exact inventory of all I possess or rather what I once possessed. Let the last blow fall. I am ready.
GERMAIN
(announcing)
Mr. de Beauchamp.
ALBERT
Let him come in.
(Beauchamp enters.)
ALBERT
Well, my friend?
BEAUCHAMP
Well, the judgment has been announced.
ALBERT
Condemned?
BEAUCHAMP
Struck from the list of Peers.
ALBERT
I expected it, my friend. Come, come, you must do me one great last service.
BEAUCHAMP
Speak, dear friend, I will do all that I can to be agreeable.
ALBERT
I judge the future by the past, Beauchamp, and you have already done more for me than one ordinarily does for a friend.
ALBERT
Well, speak -- what do you wish?
ALBERT
Beauchamp, I am leaving Paris, France, Europe. Here's an inventory of all that I possess, of my pictures, of my porcelains, of my weapons, of my silverplate, my two horses, and my carriage are listed. Beauchamp, to this inventory is added a power of attorney -- when I have gone, you will sell all this.
BEAUCHAMP
Fine, my friend, and I will send you the money.
ALBERT
No, my friend, the money will be used otherwise. You will dispose of it to aid prisoners.
BEAUCHAMP
To aid prisoners?
ALBERT
Yes. Don't ask me questions, Beauchamp, it's a penance -- this gold and these notes belong to them, it seems.
BEAUCHAMP
But you are stripping yourself of everything, my dear friend.
ALBERT
No, I still have five hundred francs.
BEAUCHAMP
Five hundred francs!
ALBERT
Yes -- that you are going to lend me.
BEAUCHAMP
(pulling out his wallet)
Oh, for goodness sakes. With the greatest pleasure.
ALBERT
I must warn you of one thing, Beauchamp, it's that I don't know when I'll be able to pay you back. I only know that I will do it, that's all.
BEAUCHAMP
Oh, my friend!
ALBERT
Now, Beauchamp, whatever part I take, you know that under the clothes I wear, there's a grateful heart, ready to pour out the last drop of its blood for you.
BEAUCHAMP
Ah! Dear Albert, you must be concealing some great act!
ALBERT
You make me out better than I am, Beauchamp.
(to Germain, who enters)
What do you want?
GERMAIN
The Count has returned from the Senate.
ALBERT
And so?
GERMAIN
The Count is asking for me.
ALBERT
Well?
GERMAIN
I do not wish to go to the Count without your orders.
ALBERT
Why's that?
GERMAIN
Because the Count knows that you went to fight this morning and that I went with you.
ALBERT
Hurry up and get to the point.
GERMAIN
And if the Count is asking for me, doubtless it is to find out from me what happened. What shall I say?
ALBERT
The truth.
GERMAIN
Then, I will say that nothing took place at the meeting.
ALBERT
You will say I made excuses to the Count of Monte Cristo and that the Count willingly accepted them.
(Germain leaves.)
ALBERT
Now, Beauchamp, my friend, the hour has come for us to leave -- embrace me.
BEAUCHAMP
Dear Albert!
ALBERT
And if, when I am gone, they attack me?
BEAUCHAMP
Oh! Rest easy -- I have the two methods of defense that are fashionable: the pen and the sword.
ALBERT
If they attack me, don't defend me. I have the future -- one defends the past. Goodbye, Beauchamp, goodbye.
BEAUCHAMP
Goodbye, my friend!
(Beauchamp leaves.)
ALBERT
Come, this first departure from the world is not the most wretched or the most mournful.
(he starts to leave, Mercedes appears in the Catalan costume)
Mother, I was coming to you.
MERCEDES
And I was coming to you.
ALBERT
What does this costume mean, Mother?
MERCEDES
It's the only thing I have the right to take from this palace. For it's the only thing that wasn't paid for by money from treason.
ALBERT
And your furniture, your jewels, your shawls, Mother?
MERCEDES
I've just made an account of all that, and all of it will be sold.
ALBERT
Sold.
MERCEDES
Yes.
ALBERT
Sold!
MERCEDES
At a profit.
ALBERT
At a profit?
MERCEDES
(with an effort)
For prisoners.
ALBERT
Ah! Ah! Mother. I am better than I knew, since I had the same idea as you!
MERCEDES
Albert, I am leaving.
ALBERT
Me, too, Mother.
MERCEDES
Oh! I had doubts, but I was counting, I admit it, that my son would accompany me.
ALBERT
Mother, I cannot make you partake of the fate that awaits me -- from now on I must live without name, without fortune. To begin the apprenticeship of this rude existence, I had to borrow from a friend the bread I will eat.
MERCEDES
You, my poor child, to suffer misery, to suffer from starvation. Oh, don't say that, you would break all my resolutions.
ALBERT
Be careful of dwelling too much on it, Mother, for my resolutions were taken for myself alone and not for you. In leaving, I thought you would remain here, if not happy, at least rich. And now, I have seen all the grandeur of your soul, all the nobility of your heart. Wait, I have only an address to place on this letter.
(writing)
Would you ring, Mother?
(she rings)
Germain, there's a response.
GERMAIN
Fine, sir. The attendant of the Count of Monte Cristo is here and he wishes to give you a letter himself.
ALBERT
Let him enter.
MERCEDES
A letter from the Count!
BERTUCCIO
(entering)
A letter from the Count, Excellency.
ALBERT
Is there a response?
BERTUCCIO
No, Excellency.
ALBERT
Thanks, my friend. Germain, tell the doorman we are at home to no one. As to Mr. de Morcerf?
GERMAIN
He had ordered not to unhitch his carriage. He's shut himself in this rooms. I believe he is writing.
ALBERT
That's fine, go.
(to Mercedes)
Let's read it, Mother.
(Mercedes comes close, Albert reads aloud)
"Albert, by showing that I have penetrated the plan to which you are surely on the point of abandoning yourself, I believe I am also showing that I appreciate its delicacy. You wish to be free. You will leave the Count's residence, and you are going to retire to the home of your mother, free like yourself. But reflect, Albert, you owe her what you cannot pay her; poor noble heart that you are, keep the struggle for youself, reclaim for yourself the suffering, but spare her this first misery which will necessarily accompany your first efforts, for she doesn't deserve, the reflected misfortune which struck today and Providence doesn't want the innocent to pay for the guilty. I know that you are both going to leave the residence of the Rue Helder without taking anything.
"How I learned, don't try to discover. I know, that's all. Listen, Albert, years ago I returned very happy and proud of my country; I had a fiancee, Albert, a saintly young girl that I adored, and I brought to my fiancee five hundred crowns that I had amassed laboriously by working without rest. This money was for her. I intended it for her, and knowing how treacherous the Sea was, I buried our treasure in the garden of the house that my father lived in in Marsielle in the alleys de Meilhan. Your mother knows this poor dear house very well. Finally, before coming to Paris, I passed through Marseille. I went to see this house of dolorous memories, and at night, spade in hand, I probed the corner where I had stuffed my treasure. The iron box was still in the same place -- nobody had touched it. It's at the corner where a handsome fig tree planted by my father on the day of my birth covered it with its shadow. Well, Albert, this money which previously was to aid the life and happiness of this woman that I adored -- is today, by a strange and unhappy accident, ready for the same use. Thus, this little house that we were once to live in together, she can now live in alone. Oh, understand well, my thought, I who could offer millions to this poor woman -- and who gave her only a scrap of forgotten black bread under our poor roof, since the day I was separated from the one I loved.
"Edmond Dantes"
MERCEDES
Oh! I accept. He had the right to give my dowry to a convent.
ALBERT
Oh, Mother! Mother! I say to you like Hamlet -- what difference?
MERCEDES
(sliding to her knees)
Albert!
ALBERT
(embracing her)
Well, look, Mother, let's calculate all our riches. I need a total to carry out my plans. First, 3,600 francs. With 3,600 francs and the amount I can dispose of from my side I have the pretention of covering all our expenses.
MERCEDES
Poor child!
ALBERT
Oh, I've spent enough money, Mother, to know the cost of things, don't worry. On these 3,600 francs, I have enough to build a future of eternal security.
MERCEDES
Well, look, what have you decided, Albert?
ALBERT
First of all, with two hundred francs we are both going to Marsielle.
MERCEDES
But do you have even these two hundred francs?
ALBERT
I have just borrowed five hundred francs from Beauchamp -- then there's two hundred francs, here they are, then three hundred francs again, then wait --
MERCEDES
What's that?
ALBERT
A thousand francs, Mother.
MERCEDES
But where did you get those thousand francs?
ALBERT
Listen, and don't become too emotional.
(embracing her)
You have no idea how pretty I find you in that costume.
MERCEDES
Dear child!
ALBERT
In fact, you only need to be unhappy to change my love to adoration.
MERCEDES
I am not unhappy so long as I have my son, I will never be unhappy so long as I have him.
ALBERT
Ah! Well, the proof will come out now. Mother do you know what's been agreed?
MERCEDES
We've agreed on something?
ALBERT
Yes, we are agreed that you will stay in Marseille -- and I -- I will leave for Africa.
MERCEDES
Oh!
ALBERT
Since this morning, I have joined the Spahis or rather thinking that my body was my only wealth and that I could sell it, since this morning, I have replaced someone.
MERCEDES
My God!
ALBERT
I've sold myself -- as they said, very dearly, my word, more than I thought I was worth -- two thousand francs!
MERCEDES
And this thousand francs?
ALBERT
It's the advance. Half the sum, for the payment was conditioned -- if you didn't go, if you were staying in Paris, I was acting for myself alone.
MERCEDES
My God! Is this for me? No, no.
ALBERT
The letter that I just sent by Germain makes the enlistment final; the other thousand francs comes in a year.
MERCEDES
Oh! The price of his blood!
ALBERT
Yes, if I am killed. Oh, but I assure you -- good mother, I have on the contrary, the intention of protecting my life. I've never felt such a strong desire to live as at this moment.
MERCEDES
My God! My God!
ALBERT
Besides, what makes you think I will be killed? Have our great great generals of the army in Africa been killed? Has Morrel, whom we know, been killed? You will see that I will look handsome in my dress uniform, I chose it from what remains of my vanity. Well, then you understand, Mother, there are 5,600 francs assured. With this in the little house, which belongs to you, you will spend two happy years.
MERCEDES
I will live on half, on a quarter -- I will live on bread, if necessary, but do not leave me.
ALBERT
Mother, I am leaving! You love me too much to keep me near you, idle and useless -- besides, I've signed up.
MERCEDES
You will act according to your will, my son -- I will act according to God's.
ALBERT
Not according to my will, Mother, but according to reason, according to necessity. We are two desperate creatures, right? What's life for you, today? Nothing. What's life for me today? Oh, a small thing, for I swear to you, my life ceased from the moment my father dishonored our name. Still, I am living; if you will permit me to hope, if you will leave to me the care of making your future happiness -- you will double my strength. Then I am going to find the governor of Algeria. He has a loyal and essentially a soldier's heart, I will tell him my lugubrious story, I will beg him from time to time to turn his eyes to wherever I may be -- and if he keeps his word, he will see me do within six months under a new name, under yours Mother, so much that I will be an officer or dead. If I am an officer, your fate is assured, for I will have money for you and for me, and what's more, a new name, of which we will both be proud. If I am killed, then dear Mother, you will die, if it pleases you to die -- and then our misfortune will have terminated in their excesses.
MERCEDES
That's fine, you are right, my son. Let's prove to those people who watch us and await our actions to judge us, that we are at least worthy of being pitied.
ALBERT
But no funereal ideas, dear Mother. Once in the services, I will be rich, once in the house of Mr. Dantes you will be at peace. Let's try, mother, let's try.
MERCEDES
Yes, let's try for you must live, for you must be happy.
ALBERT
And when are you leaving here?
MERCEDES
Right now.
ALBERT
We'll go to Marseille.
MERCEDES
In an hour, if you wish.
ALBERT
Mother, I am waiting for you.
MERCEDES
I am ready.
ALBERT
Mother!
MERCEDES
My son?
ALBERT
Before leaving Paris, isn't there a man to whom we owe a last goodbye?
MERCEDES
To Edmond Dantes?
ALBERT
No -- the Count of Monte Cristo.
MERCEDES
Come, my child, come.
(curtain)
Monte Cristo's home. The weapons hall.
(Monte Cristo is seated, Haidee lies at his feet.)
MONTE CRISTO
And you appeared like an avenging Nemesis to this man?
HAIDEE
Oh! Yes, noble lord! The soul of my father entered me, giving the accent of conviction to each of my words -- and he fell from the height of his pride like a titan from the heights of Mount Pelion.
MONTE CRISTO
How beautiful you are, my daughter!
HAIDEE
How good you are, my Lord!
MONTE CRISTO
O Lord, my God, don't let me go to far in this hope, that there can exist for the same man two Mercedes in the same world.
(Bertuccio enters.)
BERTUCCIO
Excellency?
MONTE CRISTO
Huh?
BERTUCCIO
I know that His Excellency has said no one was to enter, but --
MONTE CRISTO
But -- ?
BERTUCCIO
But it is the Count de Morcerf.
MONTE CRISTO
The Count or the Victome?
BERTUCCIO
The Count -- and he said that it was an affair or honor. I thought, as I know Your Excellency, that before this word all doors would open --
MONTE CRISTO
You are right, Bertuccio, where is the Count?
BERTUCCIO
At the door, in his carriage.
MONTE CRISTO
Let him in.
(Bertuccio leaves.)
HAIDEE
My God -- isn't it over yet?
MONTE CRISTO
I do not know if it's over my beloved child, but this I know, you have nothing to fear.
HAIDEE
Take care, Milord, take care -- you know he's a wretch to whom all means are good.
MONTE CRISTO
This man can do nothing to me, Haidee, it's when I had an affair with his son that you should have been afraid.
HAIDEE
Alas, what I suffered, I who knew everything, oh! You will never know it, Milord.
MONTE CRISTO
(extending his hand)
On the tomb of my father, I swear to you that nothing bad will happen -- at least not to me.
HAIDEE
I believe you, Milord, as if God were speaking to me.
MONTE CRISTO
This man must not see you, Haidee. Leave us.
HAIDEE
(presenting her face to him)
You have said that I have nothing to fear for the soul of my body?
MONTE CRISTO
No.
HAIDEE
I leave you, Milord.
MONTE CRISTO
My God, will you permit me to love again?
(Haidee leaves.)
MONTE CRISTO
Eh! It's Mr. de Morcerf. I thought I heard wrong, sir, when they announced you to me, just now.
MORCERF
Yes, it's I myself sir.
MONTE CRISTO
I have to know now the cause that brings me the honor of seeing Mr. de Morcerf, an honor which I was not expecting.
MORCERF
Sir, you had a meeting with my son this morning?
MONTE CRISTO
You know that?
MONTE CRISTO
And I also know that my son had good reasons to desire to fight you and to do all that he could to kill you.
MONTE CRISTO
Truly, sir, he had good reasons, but you see that, despite that, not only did he not kill me -- he didn't even fight.
MORCERF
And yet, he thought you were the cause of his father's dishonor, and the cause of the frightful ruin which at this moment overwhelms my house.
MONTE CRISTO
It's true, sir, a secondary cause, and not the principal one.
MORCERF
But, doubtless you made some excuse or gave some explanation.
MONTE CRISTO
I gave him no explanation, he made an excuse to me.
MORCERF
Then to what do you attribute his conduct?
MONTE CRISTO
To the conviction that in all this there was a man more guilty than I was.
MORCERF
And who was this man?
MONTE CRISTO
His father.
MORCERF
So be it -- but you know the guilty don't care to hear the evidence of culpability.
MONTE CRISTO
I know it -- so I waited to see what would happen at this time.
MORCERF
You were expecting that my son would be a coward?
MONTE CRISTO
Mr. Albert de Morcerf is no coward.
MORCERF
A man who has a sword or a pistol in his hand and a mortal enemy at the other end of his weapon -- if such a man does not fight, he is a coward. Would that he were here so I could say this to him.
MONTE CRISTO
I don't suppose you came to disturb me, sir, to tell me your little family affairs. Go tell this to Mr. Albert -- perhaps he will know how to respond to you.
MORCERF
Oh, no, no, you are right; I didn't come for that. I came to tell you, I, too, I regard you as my enemy. I am come to tell you that I hate you instinctively, that it seems to me I have always known you and hated you, and since the young folk of our day no longer fight, it's up to the father to fight for them. Is that your opinion, sir?
MONTE CRISTO
Justly. Also, when I told you that I had foreseen what happened, it was the honor of your visit that I was speaking of.
MORCERF
So much the better; your preparations are made then?
MONTE CRISTO
They are always prepared, sir, look.
(He points to a table with swords and pistols.)
MORCERF
You know that once we meet, we are fighting to the death?
MONTE CRISTO
To the death.
MORCERF
Let's go, then -- we have no need of witnesses.
MONTE CRISTO
It's unnecessary, we know each other so well.
MORCERF
On the contrary, it's because we do not know each other.
MONTE CRISTO
Bah -- let's look a bit. Aren't you the soldier, Fernand, who deserted night before the battle of Waterloo? Aren't you Lieutenant Fernand, who served as a spy and guide for the French army in Spain. Aren't you Colonel Fernand, who betrayed, sold out and murdered his benefactor, Ali? And all these Fernands aren't they reunified in General Count de Morcerf -- ex-peer of France?
MORCERF
Oh! The wretch to whom I propose a duel and who brands me with a red iron. Oh! Wretch who reproaches my shame, at the moment perhaps he is going to kill me. No, I didn't say I was unknown to you. I know well enough, demon, that you have penetrated into the darkness of the past and that you have read -- by the light of what torch I don't know -- each page of my life. But perhaps there is still more honor in me, in my shame than in you under your pompous exterior. My name, I know you know it -- but it's you I do not know, adventurer rolling in gold and flint! You call yourself in Paris the Count of Monte Cristo, in Italy - Sinbad the Sailor -- at Malta, I don't know what, I've forgotten, but it's your real name that I demand of you -- it's your true name that I wish to know, in the midst of your hundred names, so that I can say it as I thrust my sword in your heart.
(Monte Cristo rushes into his office.)
MORCERF
Well, are you trying to escape me, to flee from me? I will follow you.
(He takes a pistol from the table and rushes out. At the moment he starts to follow Monte Cristo reappears having had time to throw off his black velvet robe and don a sailor's vest and cap.)
MONTE CRISTO
Fernand of my hundred names, I would need only to say one to destroy you, but you can guess it, can't you? Or rather remember it, for despite all my shames, all my torture, I can show you today a face which vengeance rejuvenates, a face you ought to have seen very often in your dreams since your marriage with Mercedes, my fiancee. Look! Look!
MORCERF
(overwhelmed)
Edmond Dantes!
(He flees to the side of the room. A gunshot is heard. Monte Cristo rushes in and looks and utters a cry.)
BERTUCCIO
(announcing)
The Vicomte and the Countess de Morcerf.
MONTE CRISTO
(quickly closing the door which hides the body)
Oh!
(to Bertuccio)
Everything is fine.
(Mercedes and Albert enter.)
MERCEDES
Edmond!
MONTE CRISTO
Mercedes!
MERCEDES
I am leaving for Marseille, Edmond! Forgive me! My son is leaving for Africa! Bless him!
MONTE CRISTO
Oh!
(He opens his arms.)
MERCEDES
Albert, in the arms of Dantes. Oh, my God. I thank you, for I have seen what I never hoped to see. Come, Albert. Goodbye, Edmond.
MONTE CRISTO
Goodbye! Goodbye!
(Mercedes and Albert leave. Haidee enters, sliding into Monte Cristo's arms.)
HAIDEE
God has made me younger than she is, Milord, so that I may have the joy of loving you longer.
MONTE CRISTO
Be welcome, angel of hope, coming to find the angel of retribution.
(curtain)