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Rain of Blood

35:22 recording · EN · 2 speakers

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Brief overview

Bertuccio recounts the inn murder that nearly hanged him, and Monte Cristo names his real crime.

  1. Sudden hospitality was the trapLa Carconte, ordinarily querulous and indifferent, gave the jeweller her own bed and waited on him the evening she and Caderousse planned the murder.
  2. Circumstantial proof nearly convicted an innocent manA customs officer's comrades arrived in time to hear the pistol and found Bertuccio in the house, so he was arrested and held two months while the magistrate searched for the Abbe Busoni.
  3. Monte Cristo locates the one real guiltHe absolves Bertuccio of the killing at the inn but says the crime was failing to restore the infant rescued from its grave to its mother.
Executive Summary AI
  • A jeweller who has just bought a diamond returns to Caderousse's tavern for the night, while Caderousse handles the gold and bank-notes and La Carconte, normally querulous, turns into a smiling hostess offering him the bed overhead.
  • Bertuccio, hidden below, is woken by a pistol shot and a cry, then by groans and a struggle overhead, and feels drops of a wet, clammy moisture falling on his forehead.
  • Caderousse comes down pale with a bloody shirt, checks the diamond in its shagreen case, rolls it into his red handkerchief, pockets the notes and gold and runs off into the night.
  • Bertuccio finds La Carconte shot dead across the stairs and the jeweller dying, then runs downstairs into five or six custom-house officers and two or three gendarmes, who take him for the assassin and carry him handcuffed to Nîmes.
  • Caderousse is finally caught abroad and confesses, is sentenced to the galleys for life and Bertuccio is freed, after which Monte Cristo hears the whole story, including Assunta's burning at Roliano, and tells Bertuccio his true crime was never returning the rescued infant to its mother.
Key Quote
“so much the worse for those who are abroad.”
— the jeweller
Key Quote
“He was pale, and his shirt was all bloody.”
— Bertuccio
Key Quote
“I did not do it!”
— Bertuccio

Transcript

0:00 CHAPTER XLV.
0:20 THE RAIN OF BLOOD The Reign of Blood As the jeweller returned to the apartment, he cast round him a scrutinising glance, but
0:29 there was nothing to excite suspicion if it did not exist, or to confirm it if it were
0:34 already awakened.
0:36 Caderousse's hands still grasped the gold and bank-notes, and La Carconte called up
0:41 her sweetest smiles while welcoming the reappearance of their guest.
0:46 "'Well, well,' said the jeweller,
0:48 "'you seem, my good friends, to have had some fears respecting the accuracy of your money,
0:53 by counting it over so carefully directly I was gone.'
0:56 "'Oh, no,' answered Cadarousse,
0:59 "'that was not my reason, I can assure you.
1:02 But the circumstances by which we have become possessed
1:05 of this wealth are so unexpected as to make us scarcely credit our good fortune, and it is only
1:10 by placing the actual proof of our riches before our eyes that we can persuade ourselves that the
1:16 whole affair is not a dream.' The jeweller smiled.
1:20 "'Have you any other guests in your house?' inquired he.
1:24 "'Nobody but ourselves,' replied Caderousse.
1:27 "'The fact is, we do not lodge travellers.
1:30 Indeed, our tavern is so near the town that nobody would think of stopping here.'
1:34 "'Then, I am afraid, I shall very much inconvenience you.'
1:38 "'Inconvenience us? Not at all, my dear sir,' said la Carcante, in her most gracious manner.
1:46 "'Not at all, I assure you.
1:48 "'But where will you manage to stow me?'
1:50 "'In the chamber overhead.
1:53 "'Surely that is where you yourselves sleep.
1:57 "'Never mind that.
1:58 "'We have a second bed in the adjoining room.'
2:01 Caderousse stared at his wife with much astonishment.
2:05 The jeweller, meanwhile, was humming a song as he stood warming his back at the fire la carconte had kindled to dry the wet garments of her guest
2:14 and this done she next occupied herself in arranging his supper by spreading a napkin at the end of the table and placing on it the slender remains of their dinner to which she added three or four fresh-laid eggs.
2:27 Caderousse had once more parted with his treasure. The bank-notes were replaced in the pocket-book,
2:32 the gold put back into the bag, and the whole carefully locked in the cupboard.
2:37 He then began pacing the room with a pensive and gloomy air, glancing from time to time at
2:43 the jeweller who stood reeking with the steam from
2:46 his wet clothes, and merely changing his place on the warm hearth to enable the whole of his
2:51 garments to be dried. "'There,' said Lacar-Comte, as she placed a bottle of wine on the table,
2:57 "'supper is ready whenever you are.' "'And you?' asked Johannes. "'I don't want any supper,' said Cadarousse.
3:07 "'We dined so very late,' hastily interposed Lacarcante.
3:12 "'Then it seems I am to eat alone,' remarked the jeweller.
3:16 "'Oh, we shall have the pleasure of waiting upon you,' answered Lacarcante.

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