Monte-Cristo's Daughter
"For what are you going to ring?" asked Monte-Cristo, who had hurried to
his daughter's side.
"For brandy," answered M. Morrel, his hand still on the cord. "It will
revive her."
"Never mind the brandy," returned the Count, as he took a small vial
containing a red-looking fluid from his pocket and, opening Zuleika's
mouth, poured eight drops of the liquid down her throat. "This is the
Abbe Faria's elixir, a potent remedy that never yet failed of effect! It
will work like a charm! See! It is already doing its office!"
As he uttered these words Zuleika moved slightly in the fauteuil, then
opened her eyes and gazed about her in bewilderment. Almost immediately,
however, she realized that she had swooned and a full sense of her
father's terrible though considerately made revelation returned to her.
She buried her face in her hands, quivered from head to foot, and then
the glistening drops trickling through her fingers told that the tears
had at last come to calm her. Valentine bent over her, gently stroking
her raven hair and endeavoring in a womanly way to soothe her, while
the Count and Maximilian looked on with anxious countenances, waiting
for Mme. Morrel's touch and influence to do their work.
Suddenly Zuleika removed her hands from her tear-bathed visage,
straightened herself up in the fauteuil and, fixing her glance on
Monte-Cristo, said, in a low, faint and gasping tone that betrayed the
depth, the intensity, of her emotion:
"Father, you spoke of finding Giovanni! Has he disappeared?"
The Count compressed his lips, hesitating to reply. He wished to keep
back as much of the dread truth as possible. He feared the effect upon
his daughter of the startling announcement that young Massetti was
wandering about amid the ruins of the Colosseum like a second King Lear
on the blasted heath. But Maximilian came quickly to his aid.
"There is no need to find the Viscount," he said. "He has already been
found and is at present under treatment in a suitable institution, where
he is both comfortable and contented."
Zuleika cast a grateful look at M. and Mme. Morrel. Monte-Cristo seized
Maximilian's hand and pressed it warmly.
"You have done this, my friend," said he, his countenance brightening,
"and I thank you for it!"
"Do not thank me," replied the husband, gazing fondly and admiringly at
his wife; "thank Valentine, for she it was who formed the plan and
successfully carried it into execution!"
Mme. Morrel cast down her eyes and a heightened color overspread her
charming face.
"You are an angel, Valentine!" exclaimed Monte-Cristo, enthusiastically.
"Maximilian said awhile ago that no success of any moment had as yet
crowned your united efforts, but his statement was too modest. Your
success has been conspicuous; you have taken the first step that I
designed making and simplified my task to a marked degree. I am deeply
indebted to you both."
M. and Mme. Morrel lifted their hands and shook their heads in protest.
"The debt is all on our side," said Maximilian, deprecatingly, "and no
matter what we may do we can never discharge it. We owe you the
happiness of our lives!"
Monte-Cristo turned the conversation; he took but little credit to
himself for the benefits he had conferred upon his fellow-creatures,
considering that every good action on his part went towards atoning for
the terrible catastrophes he had caused in the prosecution of his
relentless vengeance against his old-time enemies.
"Tell me," said he, addressing M. Morrel, "what is the Viscount's
present condition. Is he recovering?"
Maximilian looked hastily in the direction of Zuleika; the poor girl was
intently watching him, eagerly waiting for his answer. His voice was
somewhat unsteady as he replied:
"Ever since he was placed in the institution of which I told you he has
received the closest and most skilful care, but his progress is very
slow, almost imperceptible, though the physician who is ministering to
him has never ceased to assure us that he will ultimately regain the
full possession of his health and senses."
"Oh! take me to him, take me to him at once!" cried Zuleika, starting to
her feet. "My place is by his side! I will nurse him, I will cure him!"
Monte-Cristo glanced at Maximilian, who shook his head negatively and
whispered in the Count's ear:
"It will never do to take her to him now; the shock of seeing him would
be too great! He would not even recognize her--he recognizes no one!"
Zuleika divined enough of what was passing to realize that Maximilian
opposed her wishes, was striving to prevent her from going to her lover,
from ministering to his wants. She sprang to her father, clasped her
arms about his neck, and, looking pitifully and pleadingly into his
face, exclaimed:
"Oh! take me to Giovanni, take me to him! Do not deny your loving,
dutiful daughter's most earnest prayer! Do not deny it, oh! my beloved
father, do not deny it!"
Monte-Cristo was touched to the very depths of his soul; M. and Mme.
Morrel were equally affected. The Count, however, instantly decided what
was to be done. Tenderly, compassionately, embracing his daughter, he
said to her, in a soothing voice:
"My child, for the present it is best that you do not go to Giovanni. I
will see him for you and without delay put a plan in operation that I do
not doubt will result in his speedy cure. I know a wondrous physician
whose skill is so great that he can almost restore the dead to life. He
belongs to the despised race of Jews, but is a good as well as a
marvellous man. His name is Dr. Israel Absalom and he resides here in
Rome, within the walls of the shunned and execrated Ghetto, near the
Capitoline Mount. I will go to him at once and take him to young
Massetti. My daughter, rest assumed that this learned Hebrew will work
another miracle and give your lover back to you and in all the glory of
his mind and manhood! Be content, therefore, to remain where you are for
a brief period, with our devoted friend Valentine as your companion and
comforter."
"Yes, Zuleika," said Mme. Morrel, persuasively, "be content to remain
with me. I will not quit you even for an instant. We will talk of
Giovanni, of the happiness and joy the future has in store for both of
you, and, believe me, the hours will pass on rapid wings!"
As Valentine spoke she gently disengaged the girl from her father's neck
and passed her arm lovingly around her slender waist. Zuleika's head
sank upon her friend's shoulder.
"I yield to my father's solicitations and to your own, Valentine," she
said, submissively. "You are older and wiser than I am and what you say
is without doubt for the best. I will remain and trust to the wondrous
physician."
"I have heard a great deal of this Dr. Absalom since I have been in
Rome," said M. Morrel, addressing Monte-Cristo. "The common people
regard him as a magician and the higher classes as a cunning charlatan,
but, if his legitimate scientific skill is generally denied, his
brilliant and marvellous success, even in cases that the best Roman
physicians have abandoned as hopeless, is universally admitted."
"Dr. Absalom is neither a magician nor a charlatan," answered
Monte-Cristo, warmly, "but a physician of the utmost experience and of
the highest possible attainments. He is bent beneath the weight of years
and arduous study, yet his eye is as keen and his perception as acute as
if he were a youth of twenty. No man knows either his age or his
history. I met him long ago in Athens, where I had the good fortune to
rescue him from the clutches of a howling mob of ruffians who had seized
upon him and were about to slay him as a sorcerer because he had taken
into his hut and cured of the plague a wretched Greek who had been cast
into the streets to die! For my sake he will save Giovanni!"
"But," said Maximilian, as a sudden thought occurred to him and filled
him with dismay, "Dr. Absalom can practise outside of the Ghetto only by
stealth and at the risk of being thrown into prison! He will not be
allowed to visit the Viscount Massetti!"
The Count of Monte-Cristo drew himself up proudly and his peculiar smile
passed over his countenance.
"I will take care of that!" he said, impressively.
Zuleika was left with Mme. Morrel, and, accompanied by Maximilian,
Monte-Cristo at once started for the Ghetto.
CHAPTER XXII.
THE WONDROUS PHYSICIAN.
A brisk walk of half an hour brought the Count and his companion to one
of the two gates in the wall of the Ghetto or Jews' quarter of Rome.
Monte-Cristo knocked at a wicket and a policeman immediately appeared.
He was a young man and wore a military dress. His coat was buttoned to
the throat, a yellow cord and tassel gracefully looped over the breast.
His hands were encased in white cotton gloves, a helmet adorned with
brass was upon his head and at his side hung a sword, while on the
collar of his coat the number of his regiment shone in gilt figures. The
man's bearing was soldierly and he had evidently seen service in the
field. The Count addressed him in Italian, informing him that he and M.
Morrel desired to visit the Ghetto, at the same time exhibiting their
passports. After examining the papers and seeing that they were in
proper form the policeman opened the gate and the visitors entered the
crowded and filthy precincts of the Jews' quarter.
"Mon Dieu! what vile odors!" exclaimed M. Morrel, placing his
handkerchief saturated with cologne to his nose, as they hurried through
the narrow, garbage-encumbered lanes.
"The atmosphere is not like that of a perfumer's shop!" replied the
Count, laughing. "But it seems to suit the children of Israel, for they
thrive and multiply in it as the sparrows in the pure air and green
fields of England!"
"I pity them!" said Maximilian.
"Tastes differ," returned Monte-Cristo, philosophically. "I will wager
that in this whole quarter we could not find a single Jew who would eat
a partridge in that state of partial decay in which a Frenchman deems it
most palatable!"
"What a strange, uncouth place this is," said M. Morrel, after a brief
silence. "It seems like some city of the far orient. No one, suddenly
transported here, would ever imagine that he was in the heart of Rome."
"It closely resembles the Judengasse at Frankfort-on-the-Main," replied
the Count, "and is quite as ancient though much larger. But the Germans
are more progressive and liberal than the Romans, for the gates that
closed the Judengasse were removed in 1806, while those of the Ghetto
still remain and are, as you have seen, in charge of the police, who
subject every person entering or quitting the place to the closest
scrutiny. Even as far back as the 17th century the gates of the
Judengasse were shut and locked only at nightfall, after which no Jew
could venture into any other part of Frankfort without incurring a heavy
penalty if caught, whereas here at the present time, in this age of
enlightenment and religious toleration, the gates of the Ghetto are kept
closed day and night, and the poor Israelites, victims of bigotry and
unreasoning prejudice, are treated worse than the pariahs in Hindoostan!
Rome is the Eternal City and verily its faults are as eternal as
itself!"
Monte-Cristo had evidently visited the Ghetto before, as he seemed
thoroughly familiar with its crooked lanes and obscure byways, pursuing
his course without hesitation or pause for inquiry. It apparently
contained no new sights or surprises for him. To M. Morrel, on the
contrary, who now was within its walls for the first time, it presented
an unending series of wonders. The buildings particularly impressed him.
They looked as if erected away back in remote antiquity, and were
curiously quaint combinations of wood and stone, exceedingly picturesque