nce
you are the ship's supercargo?"

"Why, as for that, I could only know what I was told respecting the
merchandise with which the vessel was laden. I know she was loaded with
cotton, and that she took in her freight at Alexandria from Pastret's
warehouse, and at Smyrna from Pascal's; that is all I was obliged to
know, and I beg I may not be asked for any further particulars."

"Now I recollect," said the afflicted old father; "my poor boy told me
yesterday he had got a small case of coffee, and another of tobacco for
me!"

"There, you see," exclaimed Danglars. "Now the mischief is out; depend
upon it the custom-house people went rummaging about the ship in our
absence, and discovered poor Dantes' hidden treasures."

Mercedes, however, paid no heed to this explanation of her lover's
arrest. Her grief, which she had hitherto tried to restrain, now burst
out in a violent fit of hysterical sobbing.

"Come, come," said the old man, "be comforted, my poor child; there is
still hope!"

"Hope!" repeated Danglars.

"Hope!" faintly murmured Fernand, but the word seemed to die away on his
pale agitated lips, and a convulsive spasm passed over his countenance.

"Good news! good news!" shouted forth one of the party stationed in the
balcony on the lookout. "Here comes M. Morrel back. No doubt, now, we
shall hear that our friend is released!"

Mercedes and the old man rushed to meet the shipowner and greeted him at
the door. He was very pale.

"What news?" exclaimed a general burst of voices.

"Alas, my friends," replied M. Morrel, with a mournful shake of his
head, "the thing has assumed a more serious aspect than I expected."

"Oh, indeed--indeed, sir, he is innocent!" sobbed forth Mercedes.

"That I believe!" answered M. Morrel; "but still he is charged"--

"With what?" inquired the elder Dantes.

"With being an agent of the Bonapartist faction!" Many of our readers
may be able to recollect how formidable such an accusation became in the
period at which our story is dated.

A despairing cry escaped the pale lips of Mercedes; the old man sank
into a chair.

"Ah, Danglars!" whispered Caderousse, "you have deceived me--the trick
you spoke of last night has been played; but I cannot suffer a poor
old man or an innocent girl to die of grief through your fault. I am
determined to tell them all about it."

"Be silent, you simpleton!" cried Danglars, grasping him by the arm, "or
I will not answer even for your own