The Son Of Monte Cristo Part 89 (2/2)

”GOUTRAN”

Carmen uttered a joyous exclamation Goutran loved her! Coucon turned toward her

”Well,” he asked, ”what am I to tell him?”

”Return to Monsieur Goutran and tell him that if it costs me my life I will discover what he wishes to know And remember that you must open the door of the hotel to me at whatever time I may coht Now, go!”

At thisservant entered the room

”Mademoiselle,” he said, ”your father has just been taken ill”

Oirl, and was lost in the crowd No one noticed hireat financier Carmen followed the lacquey with rather too slow a step for the occasion She was intensely irritated at this new comedy, and she was tempted to cry out to the crowd:

”He lies! He has always lied!”

Laisangy was lying back in his chair There was no physician in the roo him

Fortunately for him, Carmen arrived

”I knohat it is,” she said; ”he has had similar attacks before He will be better after a little rest”

And Carave orders that the banker should be carried to his chauests, she followed

Laisangy, as beco, supposed that Carmen would dismiss the servants and remain with him herself; but she had quite other plans She bade the y was ready to swear at her, but, of course, he was too ill to dispute If he suddenly revived and et about of the ridiculous co tried, however Carht hope to discover the contents of a letter which she saw the banker receive and put in his pocket early in the evening She found the letter and retired into the next rooeance is assured Fanfar and Goutran are prisoners in the house of Monte-Cristo As to the girl, she is at the house at Courberrie, where Esperance will arrive too late”

Hardly had Carrasped the sense of these words than she ran to her roo black cloak, left the hotel by the private door

CHAPTER LXIV

THE PLOT

We left Esperance in the house at Courberrie just when the panels had been thrown open He uttered a cry of horror What did he see? Around a table covered with glasses sat a nu these wohost, and this one was Jane!

Ah! poor child! Of what terrible machination was she the victieance, had carried her through the subterranean passage, she all the time entirely unconscious

He laid her on a sofa, and stood with folded ar down upon her

Did he feel the s hiirl was so attractive that Esperance would really feel her loss as , strange, fluttering sigh Benedetto leaned over her anxiously What if she were to die now! He ed He opened her teeth with the blade of a knife, and poured down her throat a few drops of a clear white liquor It was an anesthetic whose terrible properties he well understood Jane would see, Jane would hear, and Jane would suffer, but as she could neither speak nor ht she was carried to the house at Courberrie, what terrible agony she suffered! She knew that she was in the power of an enemy, that she had been torn from him whom she loved better than life, and from whose lips she had just heard oaths of eternal fidelity With a heart swelling with agony she could not utter a sound Her soul was alive, but her body was motionless Suddenly the room in which she lay was brilliantly illu in--and such woine that the girl regarded this scene as a hideous dream