ed, sighed deeply, and then resumed in a tone of
still greater menace:

"Count of Monte-Cristo, look well to your beloved wife, Haydee, look
well to your heroic son, Esperance, look well to your darling daughter,
Zuleika, for this night they are in frightful danger! Look well to your
fabulous riches, for they are threatened; look well to your stately and
magnificent palace, for already the element that shall devour it is
noiselessly and stealthily at work! Count of Monte-Cristo, farewell!"

A heart-rending shriek rang in the sleeper's ears, a mighty flash
dazzled his eyes, and, with a grim smile upon his pallid countenance,
Villefort vanished.

Monte-Cristo awoke with a quick start and passed his hand across his
forehead, as if dazed; then he leaped to his feet and glanced
breathlessly about him. Danglars and Villefort had been only the idle
coinage of his brain, but the heart-rending shriek, the mighty flash,
they were, indeed, stern realities--the shriek was Haydee's, and the
flash was fire!

"My God!" cried Monte-Cristo, standing for an instant rooted to the
spot, "can it be possible that this dream is the truth after all, and
that I am even now to feel the vengeance of those two men?"

He sprang into the spacious hall that was as light as day, and, as he
did so, the figure of a man rushed by him--it was Benedetto, and in his
hand he held a long knife dripping with blood. The Count turned and
pursued him, snatching a dagger from a table as he ran. At the door
leading to the lawn, he grasped him firmly by the shoulder and held him.

"Murderer!" he shouted, "whose blood is that upon your knife?"

"The blood of Haydee, the Greek slave!" hissed Benedetto, with a glare
of ferocious triumph, "the blood of Haydee, your wife! Edmond Dantes, I
am even with you!"

Monte-Cristo struck at the assassin with his dagger, but Benedetto
eluded the blow, and raising his own weapon inflicted a frightful gash
upon the Count's cheek.

A terrible struggle ensued. Monte-Cristo was possessed of wonderful
strength and activity, but in both these respects the two desperate
antagonists seemed fairly matched. Three times did the Count bury his
dagger in Benedetto's body, but, though the assassin's blood gushed
copiously from his wounds, he continued to fight with the utmost
determination. At length the men grappled in a supreme, deadly effort,
but Monte-Cristo, making a false step, slipped on the blood-spattered
marble floor, and Ben