The Count of Monte Cristo (Unabridged Penguin) (8 page)

‘You are right, Mercédès, I shall be a seaman; and, instead of the dress of our forefathers which you despise, I shall have a patent-leather hat, a striped shirt and a blue jacket with anchors on the buttons. That’s how a man needs to dress, isn’t it, if he wants to please you?’

‘What do you mean?’ Mercédès asked, with an imperious look. ‘What do you mean? I don’t understand you.’

‘What I mean, Mercédès, is that you are only so hard-hearted and cruel towards me because you are waiting for someone who is dressed like that. But it may be that the one you await is fickle and, even if he isn’t, the sea will be fickle for him.’

‘Fernand!’ Mercédès exclaimed. ‘I thought you were kind, but I was mistaken. It is wicked of you to call on the wrath of God to satisfy your jealousy. Yes, I will not deny it: I am waiting for the man you describe, I love him and if he does not return, instead of blaming the fickleness that it pleases you to speak of, I shall think that he died loving me.’

The young Catalan made an angry gesture.

‘I understand what that means, Fernand: you want to blame him because I do not love you, and cross his dagger with your Catalan knife! What good would that do you? If you were defeated, you would lose my friendship; if you were the victor, you would see that friendship turn to hatred. Believe me, when a woman loves a man, you do not win her heart by crossing swords with him. No, Fernand, don’t be carried away by evil thoughts. Since you cannot have me as your wife, be content to have me as a friend and a sister. In any case,’ she added, her eyes anxious and filling with tears, ‘stay, Fernand: you said, yourself, a moment ago that the sea is treacherous. It is already four months since he left, and I have counted a lot of storms in the past four months!’

Fernand remained impassive. He made no attempt to wipe the tears that were running down Mercédès cheeks, yet he would have given a glass of his own blood for each of those tears; but they were shed for another. He got up, walked round the hut and returned, stopping before Mercédès with a dark look in his eyes and clenched fists.

‘Come now, Mercédès,’ he said. ‘Answer me once more: have you truly made up your mind?’

‘I love Edmond Dantès,’ the young woman said, coldly, ‘and no one will be my husband except Edmond.’

‘And you will love him for ever?’

‘As long as I live.’

Fernand bent his head like a discouraged man, gave a sigh that was like a groan, then suddenly looked up with clenched teeth and nostrils flared.

‘But suppose he is dead?’

‘If he is dead, I shall die.’

‘And if he forgets you?’

‘Mercédès!’ cried a happy voice outside the house. ‘Mercédès!’

‘Ah!’ the girl exclaimed, reddening with joy and leaping up, filled with love. ‘You see that he has not forgotten me: he is here!’ And
she ran to the door, and opened it, crying: ‘Come to me, Edmond! I am here!’

Pale and trembling, Fernand stepped back as a traveller might do at the sight of a snake; and, stumbling against his chair, fell back into it.

Edmond and Mercédès were in each other’s arms. The hot Marseille sun, shining through the doorway, drenched them in a flood of light. At first, they saw nothing of what was around them. A vast wave of happiness cut them off from the world and they spoke only those half-formed words that are the outpourings of such intense joy that they resemble the expression of pain.

Suddenly, Edmond noticed the sombre figure of Fernand, pale and threatening in the darkness. With a gesture of which he was not even himself aware, the young Catalan had laid his hand on the knife at his belt.

‘Oh, forgive me,’ Dantès said, raising an eyebrow. ‘I did not realize that we were not alone.’

Then, turning to Mercédès, he asked: ‘Who is this gentleman?’

‘He will be your best friend, Dantès, because he is my friend, my cousin and my brother: this is Fernand, which means he is the man whom, after you, I love most in the world. Don’t you recognize him?’

‘Ah! Yes, indeed,’ said Edmond. And, without leaving Mercédès whose hand he held clasped in one of his own, he extended the other with a cordial gesture towards the Catalan. But Fernand, instead of responding to this sign of friendship, remained as silent and motionless as a statue. It was enough to make Edmond look enquiringly from Mercédès, who was trembling with emotion, to Fernand, sombre and threatening.

That one glance told him everything. His brow clouded with rage.

‘I did not realize that I had hurried round to see you, Mercédès, only to find an enemy here.’

‘An enemy!’ Mercédès exclaimed, looking angrily in the direction of her cousin. ‘An enemy, in my house, you say, Edmond! If I thought that, I should take your arm and go with you to Marseille, leaving this house, never to return.’

Fernand’s eyes lit up with rage.

‘And if any misfortune were to befall you, my dear Edmond,’ she continued, with the same cool determination, proving to Fernand
that she had read the sinister depths of his mind, ‘if any misfortune should happen to you, I should climb up the Cap de Morgiou and throw myself headlong on to the rocks.’

The blood drained from Fernand’s face.

‘But you are wrong, Edmond,’ she continued. ‘You have no enemies here. The only person here is Fernand, my brother, who is going to shake your hand like a true friend.’

With these words, the girl turned her imperious face towards the Catalan and he, as if mesmerized by her look, slowly came across to Edmond and held out his hand. His hatred, like an impotent wave, had been broken against the ascendancy that the woman exercised over him. But no sooner had he touched Edmond’s hand than he felt he had done all that it was possible for him to do, and rushed out of the house.

‘Ah!’ he cried, running along like a madman and burying his hands in his hair. ‘Ah! Who will deliver me from this man? Wretch that I am, wretch that I am!’

‘Hey, Catalan! Hey, Fernand! Where are you going?’ a voice called to him.

The young man stopped dead, looked around and saw Caderousse at the table with Danglars under a leafy arbour.

‘What now,’ said Caderousse, ‘why don’t you join us? Are you in such a hurry that you don’t have time to say hello to your friends?’

‘Especially when they still have an almost full bottle in front of them,’ Danglars added.

Fernand stared at the two men with a dazed look, and did not answer.

‘He seems a bit down in the dumps,’ Danglars said, nudging Caderousse with his knee. ‘Could we be wrong? Contrary to what we thought, could it be that Dantès has got the upper hand?’

‘Why! We’ll just have to find out,’ said Caderousse. And, turning back to the young man, he said: ‘Well, Catalan, have you made up your mind?’

Fernand wiped the sweat from his brow and slowly made his way under the vault of leaves: its shade appeared to do something to calm his spirits and its coolness to bring a small measure of well-being back to his exhausted body.

‘Good day,’ he said. ‘I think you called me?’

‘I called you because you were running along like a madman
and I was afraid you would go and throw yourself into the sea,’ Caderousse said with a laugh. ‘Devil take it, when one has friends, it is not only to offer them a glass of wine, but also to stop them drinking three or four pints of water.’

Fernand gave a groan that resembled a sob and let his head fall on to his wrists, which were crossed on the table.

‘Well now, do you want me to tell you what, Fernand?’ Caderousse continued, coming straight to the point with that crude brutality of the common man whose curiosity makes him forget any sense of tact. ‘You look to me like a man who has been crossed in love!’ He accompanied this quip with a roar of laughter.

‘Huh!’ Danglars retorted. ‘A lad built like that is not likely to be unhappy in love. You must be joking, Caderousse.’

‘Not at all,’ the other said. ‘Just listen to him sigh. Come, Fernand, come now, lift your nose off the table and tell us: it is not very mannerly to refuse to answer your friends when they are asking after your health.’

‘My health is fine,’ said Fernand, clenching his fists and without looking up.

‘Ah, Danglars, you see now,’ Caderousse said, winking at his friend. ‘This is how things are: Fernand here, who is a fine, brave Catalan, one of the best fishermen in Marseille, is in love with a beautiful girl called Mercédès; but it appears that, unfortunately, the girl herself is in love with the second mate of the
Pharaon
; and, as the
Pharaon
came into port this very day… You follow me?’

‘No, I don’t,’ said Danglars.

‘Poor Fernand has got his marching orders,’ Caderousse continued.

‘So, what then?’ said Fernand, lifting his head and looking at Caderousse, like a man anxious to find someone on whom to vent his wrath. ‘Mercédès is her own woman, isn’t she? She is free to love whomsoever she wants.’

‘Oh, if that’s how you take it,’ said Caderousse, ‘that’s another matter. I thought you were a Catalan, and I have been told that the Catalans are not men to let themselves be pushed aside by a rival. They even said that Fernand, in particular, was fearsome in his vengeance.’

Fernand smiled pityingly. ‘A lover is never fearsome,’ he said.

‘Poor boy!’ Danglars continued, pretending to grieve for the
young man from the bottom of his heart. ‘What do you expect? He didn’t imagine that Dantès would suddenly return like this; he may have thought him dead, or unfaithful. Who knows? Such things are all the more distressing when they happen to us suddenly.’

‘In any event,’ Caderousse said, drinking as he spoke and starting to show the effects of the heady wine of La Malgue, ‘in any event, Fernand is not the only person to have been put out by Dantès’ fortunate return, is he, Danglars?’

‘No, what you say is true – and I might even add that it will bring him misfortune.’

‘No matter,’ Caderousse went on, pouring out some wine for Fernand and replenishing his own glass for the eighth or tenth time (though Danglars had hardly touched the one in front of him). ‘No matter. In the meantime he will marry Mercédès, the lovely Mercédès. He has come back for that, at least.’

While the other was speaking, Danglars directed a piercing look at the young man, on whose heart Caderousse’s words were falling like molten lead.

‘And when is the wedding?’ he asked.

‘Oh, it’s not settled yet,’ Fernand muttered.

‘No, but it will be,’ said Caderousse, ‘just as surely as Dantès will be captain of the
Pharaon
, don’t you think, Danglars?’

Danglars shuddered at this unexpected stab and turned towards Caderousse, studying his face now to see if the blow had been premeditated; but he saw nothing except covetousness on this face, already almost besotted with drink.

‘Very well,’ he said, filling the glasses. ‘Then let’s drink to Captain Edmond Dantès, husband of the beautiful Catalan!’

Caderousse lifted his glass to his lips with a sluggish hand and drained it in one gulp. Fernand took his and dashed it to the ground.

‘Ha, ha!’ said Caderousse. ‘What can I see over there, on the crest of the hill, coming from the Catalan village? You look, Fernand, your eyesight is better than mine. I think I’m starting to see less clearly and, as you know, wine is a deceptive imp: it looks to me like two lovers walking along, side by side and hand in hand. Heaven forgive me! They don’t realize that we can see them and, look at that, they’re kissing each other!’

Danglars marked every single trait of the anguish that crossed Fernand’s face, as its features changed before his eyes.

‘Do you know who they are, Monsieur Fernand?’ he asked.

‘Yes,’ the other replied dully. ‘It’s Monsieur Edmond and Mademoiselle Mercédès.’

‘There! You see?’ said Caderousse. ‘I didn’t recognize them. Hey, Dantès! Hey, there, pretty girl! Come down for a moment and let us know when the wedding is: Fernand here is so stubborn, he won’t tell us.’

‘Why don’t you be quiet!’ said Danglars, pretending to restrain Caderousse who, with drunken obstinacy, was leaning out of the arbour. ‘Try to stay upright and let the lovers enjoy themselves in peace. Why, look at Monsieur Fernand: he’s being sensible. Why not try and do the same?’

It may be that Fernand, driven to the limit and baited by Danglars like a bull by the banderilleros, would finally have leapt forward, for he had already stood up and appeared to be gathering strength to throw himself at his rival; but Mercédès, upright and laughing, threw back her lovely head and shot a glance from her clear eyes. At that moment, Fernand recalled her threat to die if Edmond should die, and slumped back, discouraged, on his chair.

Danglars looked at the two men, one besotted by drink, the other enslaved by love, and murmured: ‘I shall get nothing out of these idiots: I fear I am sitting between a drunkard and a coward. On the one hand, I have a man eaten up by envy, drowning his sorrows in drink when he should be intoxicated with venom; on the other, a great simpleton whose mistress has just been snatched away from under his very nose, who does nothing except weep like a child and feel sorry for himself. And yet he has the blazing eyes of a Spaniard, a Sicilian or a Calabrian – those people who are such experts when it comes to revenge – and fists that would crush a bull’s head as surely as a butcher’s mallet. Fate is definitely on Edmond’s side: he will marry the beautiful girl, become captain and laugh in our faces. Unless…’ (a pallid smile hovered on Danglars’ lips) ‘… unless I take a hand in it.’