Chapter 80

CHAPTER 80
The Accusation.

M. D'Avrigny soon restored the magistrate to consciousness,
who had looked like a second corpse in that chamber of
death. "Oh, death is in my house!" cried Villefort.

"Say, rather, crime!" replied the doctor.

"M. d'Avrigny," cried Villefort, "I cannot tell you all I
feel at this moment, -- terror, grief, madness."

"Yes," said M. d'Avrigny, with an imposing calmness, "but I
think it is now time to act. I think it is time to stop this
torrent of mortality. I can no longer bear to be in
possession of these secrets without the hope of seeing the
victims and society generally revenged." Villefort cast a
gloomy look around him. "In my house," murmured he, "in my
house!"

"Come, magistrate," said M. d'Avrigny, "show yourself a man;
as an interpreter of the law, do honor to your profession by
sacrificing your selfish interests to it."

"You make me shudder, doctor. Do you talk of a sacrifice?"

"I do."

"Do you then suspect any one?"

"I suspect no one; death raps at your door -- it enters --
it goes, not blindfolded, but circumspectly, from room to
room. Well, I follow its course, I track its passage; I
adopt the wisdom of the ancients, and feel my way, for my
friendship for your family and my respect for you are as a
twofold bandage over my eyes; well" --

"Oh, speak, speak, doctor; I shall have courage."

"Well, sir, you have in your establishment, or in your
family, perhaps, one of the frightful monstrosities of which
each century produces only one. Locusta and Agrippina,
living at the same time, were an exception, and proved the
determination of providence to effect the entire ruin of the
Roman empire, sullied by so many crimes. Brunehilde and
Fredegonde were the results of the painful struggle of
civilization in its infancy, when man was learning to
control mind, were it even by an emissary from the realms of
darkness. All these women had been, or were, beautiful. The
same flower of innocence had flourished, or was still
flourishing, on their brow, that is seen on the brow of the
culprit in your house." Villefort shrieked, clasped his
hands, and looked at the doctor with a supplicating air. But
the latter went on without pity: --

"'Seek whom the crime will profit,' says an axiom of
jurisprudence."

"Doctor," cried Villefort, "alas, doctor, how often has
man's justice been deceived by those fatal words. I know not
why, but I feel that this crime" --

"You acknowledge, then, the existence of the crime?"

"Yes, I see too plainly that it does exist. But it seems
that it is intended to affect me personally. I fear an
attack myself, after all these disasters."