news.' If you had let me sleep on, I should have finished my galop, and have been grateful to you all my life. So, then, they have paid my
ransom?"
"No, your excellency!"
"Well, then, how am I free?"
"A person to whom I can refuse nothing has come to demand you."
"Come hither?"
"Yes, hither."
"Really! then that person is a most amiable person."
Albert looked round, and perceived Franz. "What!" said he, "is it you, my dear Franz, whose devotion and friendship are thus displayed!"
"No, not I," replied Franz, "but our neighbor, the Count of Monte-Cristo."
"Ah! ah! M. le Comte," said Albert gayly, and arranging his cravat and wristbands, "you are really most kind, and I hope you will consider me as your eternally obliged, in the first place for the carriage, and in the next for this!" And he put out his hand to the count, who shuddered as he gave his own, but who nevertheless did give it.
The bandit gazed on this scene with amazement; he was evidently accustomed to see his prisoners tremble before him, and yet here was one whose gay temperament was not for a moment altered; as for Franz, he was enchanted at the way in which Albert had sustained the national honor in the presence of the bandit.
"My dear Albert," he said, "if you will make haste, we shall yet have time to finish the night at Torlonia's. You may conclude your interrupted galop, so that you will owe no ill-will to Signor Luigi, who has, indeed, throughout this whole affair acted like a gentleman."
"You are decidedly right, and we may reach the Palazzo by two o'clock. Signor Luigi," continued Albert, "is there any formality to fulfill before I take leave of your excellency?"
"None, sir," replied the bandit; "you are as free as air."
"Well, then, a happy and merry life to you. Come, gentlemen, come."
And Albert, followed by Franz and the count, descended the stair case, crossed the square chamber, where stood all the bandits, hat in hand.
"Peppino," said the brigand chief, "give me the torch."
"What are you going to do then!" inquired the count.
"I will show you the way back myself," said the captain; "that is the least honor I can testify to your excellency."
And taking the lighted torch from the hands of the herdsman, he preceded his guests not as a servant who performs an act of civility, but like a king who precedes ambassadors. On reaching the door, he bowed.
