interest my mother takes in you."

"`Woman is fickle.' said Francis I.; `woman is like a wave
of the sea,' said Shakespeare; both the great king and the
great poet ought to have known woman's nature well."

"Woman's, yes; my mother is not woman, but a woman."

"As I am only a humble foreigner, you must pardon me if I do
not understand all the subtle refinements of your language."

"What I mean to say is, that my mother is not quick to give
her confidence, but when she does she never changes."

"Ah, yes, indeed," said Monte Cristo with a sigh; "and do
you think she is in the least interested in me?"

"I repeat it, you must really be a very strange and superior
man, for my mother is so absorbed by the interest you have
excited, that when I am with her she speaks of no one else."

"And does she try to make you dislike me?"

"On the contrary, she often says, `Morcerf, I believe the
count has a noble nature; try to gain his esteem.'"

"Indeed?" said Monte Cristo, sighing.

"You see, then," said Albert, "that instead of opposing, she
will encourage me."

"Adieu, then, until five o'clock; be punctual, and we shall
arrive at twelve or one."

"At Treport?"

"Yes; or in the neighborhood."

"But can we travel forty-eight leagues in eight hours?"

"Easily," said Monte Cristo.

"You are certainly a prodigy; you will soon not only surpass
the railway, which would not be very difficult in France,
but even the telegraph."

"But, viscount, since we cannot perform the journey in less
than seven or eight hours, do not keep me waiting."

"Do not fear, I have little to prepare." Monte Cristo smiled
as he nodded to Albert, then remained a moment absorbed in
deep meditation. But passing his hand across his forehead as
if to dispel his revery, he rang the bell twice and
Bertuccio entered. "Bertuccio," said he, "I intend going
this evening to Normandy, instead of to-morrow or the next
day. You will have sufficient time before five o'clock;
despatch a messenger to apprise the grooms at the first
station. M. de Morcerf will accompany me." Bertuccio obeyed
and despatched a courier to Pontoise to say the
travelling-carriage would arrive at six o'clock. From
Pontoise another express was sent to the next stage, and in
six hours all the horses stationed on the road were ready.
Before his departure, the count went to Haidee's apartments,
told her his intention, and resigned everything to her care.
Albert was punctual. The journey soon became interesting
from its rapidity, of which Morcerf had formed no previous
idea. "Truly," said Monte Cristo, "with your posthorses
going at the rate of two leagues an hour, and that absurd
law that one traveller shall not pass another without
permission, so that an invalid or ill-tempered traveller may
detain those who are well and active, it is impossible to
move; I escape this annoyance by travelling with my own
postilion and horses; do I not, Ali?"

The count put his head out of the window and whistled, and
the horses appeared to fly. The carriage rolled with a
thundering noise over the pavement, and every one turned to
notice the dazzling meteor. Ali, smiling, repeated the
sound, grasped the reins with a firm hand, and spurred his
horses, whose beautiful manes floated in the breeze. This
child of the desert was in his element, and with his black
face and sparkling eyes appeared, in the cloud of dust he
raised, like the genius of the simoom and the god of the
hurricane. "I never knew till now the delight of speed,"
said Morcerf, and the last cloud disappeared from his brow;
"but where the devil do you get such horses? Are they made
to order?"

"Precisely," said the count; "six years since I bought a
horse in Hungary remarkable for its swiftness. The
thirty-two that we shall use to-night are its progeny; they
are all entirely black, with the exception of a star upon
the forehead."

"That is perfectly admirable; but what do you do, count,
with all these horses?"

"You see, I travel with them."

"But you are not always travelling."


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