You are so good that I want to tell you—
MONTE CRISTO
(seeing Emmanuel enter)
We are no longer alone.
MAXIMILIAN
My brother-in-law, Emmanuel. The Count.
MONTE CRISTO
Come, sir, philosopher, so I can pay you my respect; they present to me a man content with his fortune. I have traveled a lot, Mr. Herbaut, and it’s the first time I’ve met such a prodigy.
EMMANUEL
It’s that we’ve placed our happiness elsewhere, sir.
MONTE CRISTO
Yes, in soft and chaste passions. I know already about that, sir. Also, as just now I was sad and I felt I was on the way to getting worse, I told my coachman, “15 Rue Meslay,” for I knew I’d find calm, innocence and love. The three sacred plants whose balm cures all the complaints of humanity.
MAXIMILIAN
(to Julie as she enters)
Come, take your share of compliments, the Count is treating us. Count, if, since you’ve come to Paris, and don’t yet know what a bourgeois of the Marais is—here’s my sister who will teach you.
MONTE CRISTO
Madame, pardon me an emotion which must astonish you, you who are accustomed to peace and happiness such as I meet here—but for me, the thing is so new, that I cannot stop watching you and your husband.
JULIE
We are indeed happy, in fact, sir, but we have suffered for a long time and few people have paid for their happiness as dearly as we have.
MONTE CRISTO
Ah! Truly! If I were more in your confidence, Maximilian, I would ask you to tell me about that.
MAXIMILIAN
Oh, it’s an entire family history and for you, Count, accustomed to see illustrious misfortunes and splendid joys, it would present little interest. Still, Julie, as you just told him, we suffered many cruel sorrows, until they were shut back up in a little box.
MONTE CRISTO
And God poured consolation on your suffering?
JULIE
Yes, Count, we can say that, for he did for us what he doesn’t do for his elect. He sent us one of his angels.
EMMANUEL
Those who are born in a royal cradle and who have nothing to desire do not know the joy of living, even as those who do not know the price of a pure sky who have never lived their lives at the mercy of four planks, tossed on a sea rolling in fury.
MONTE CRISTO
(rising, emotionally moved)
Yes, you are right, both right.
(He looks at the room.)
MAXIMILIAN
Our magnificence makes you smile, Count—
(Monte Cristo stops before a globe on which is placed the purse Maximilian kissed when he entered.)
MONTE CRISTO
No, I was only considering this purse which on the one side encloses a paper it seems to me and on the other is a beautiful diamond.
MAXIMILIAN
(gravely)
Count, this purse is the most precious of our family treasures.
MONTE CRISTO
In fact, the diamond is very beautiful.
JULIE
Oh, brother, don’t speak of the price of the stone, although it’s been appraised at one hundred thousand francs, Count. He means to tell you that the objects contained in the purse are the relics of an angel of whom we were speaking just now.
MONTE CRISTO
That’s what I was unable to understand, Madame, and now, I don’t dare ask you. Pardon me, I have no wish to be indiscreet.
JULIE
Indiscreet? Oh, on the contrary, how happy you would make us, Count, in giving us occasion to be heard on the subject. If we were hiding as a secret the fine action that this purse reminds us of, we wouldn’t put it there on view. Oh! We wish we could publish throughout the universe to make our unknown benefactor shiver which would reveal his presence to us.
MONTE CRISTO
Oh, truly!
MAXIMILIAN
(taking the purse and putting it to his lips)
Count, this purse, which I kiss with respect and recognition, touched the hand of a man who saved my father from death, us from ruin, and our name from shame—a man thanks to whom we poor children vowed to misery and tears are now able to listen to others go into ecstacies over our good fortune.
(pulling a letter from the purse)
This letter was written by him in a day when my father had formed a desperate resolve—and this diamond was given as a dowry to my sister by this generous stranger.
MONTE CRISTO
(opening the letter and reading)
“Come immediately to the alley of Meilhan, go into house #5, ask the concierge for the key to room number five, go into the room from the corner by the chimney, take a red silk purse and take the purse to your father. You promised to obey me blindly; I remind you of your promise. Sinbad the Sailor.”
MAXIMILIAN
And in the purse, sir, there was a contract released, a contract for 287,500 francs which was the reason my father was going to blow his brains and also a diamond which is still there with two words written on a little scrap of paper—’Julie’s dowry’.
MONTE CRISTO
And the man who did this for you remains unknown?
MAXIMILIAN
Yes, sir—we have never had the joy of shaking his hand; but it’s not because we did not ask God for this favor.
JULIE
Oh, I still haven’t yet lost hope of kissing that hand as I kiss this purse which touched it four years ago. Penelon was at Trieste when he saw on the dock an Englishman who was embarking on a brig. Excuse me, you don’t know about Penelon, he was an old sailor manned the Pharaoh when the Pharaoh
