Alexandre Dumas: The Count of Monte Cristo

Chapter 82: The Burglary. (continued)

"Reverend sir, since you know everything, you know it was not I -- it was La Carconte; that was proved at the trial, since I was only condemned to the galleys."

"Is your time, then, expired, since I find you in a fair way to return there?"

"No, reverend sir; I have been liberated by some one."

"That some one has done society a great kindness."

"Ah," said Caderousse, "I had promised" --

"And you are breaking your promise!" interrupted Monte Cristo.

"Alas, yes!" said Caderousse very uneasily.

"A bad relapse, that will lead you, if I mistake not, to the Place de Greve. So much the worse, so much the worse -- diavolo, as they say in my country."

"Reverend sir, I am impelled" --

"Every criminal says the same thing."

"Poverty" --

"Pshaw!" said Busoni disdainfully; "poverty may make a man beg, steal a loaf of bread at a baker's door, but not cause him to open a secretary in a house supposed to be inhabited. And when the jeweller Johannes had just paid you 40,000 francs for the diamond I had given you, and you killed him to get the diamond and the money both, was that also poverty?"

"Pardon, reverend sir," said Caderousse; "you have saved my life once, save me again!"

"That is but poor encouragement."

"Are you alone, reverend sir, or have you there soldiers ready to seize me?"

"I am alone," said the abbe, "and I will again have pity on you, and will let you escape, at the risk of the fresh miseries my weakness may lead to, if you tell me the truth."