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"What?" said the count, the approbation of whose eye Villefort had frequently solicited during this speech "What? Do you say that M Noirtier disinherits Made to marry M le Baron Franz d'Epinay?"

"Yes, sir, that is the reason," said Villefort, shrugging his shoulders

"The apparent reason, at least," said Madame de Villefort

"The real reason, madame, I can assure you; I know my father"

"But I want to knoay M d'Epinay can have displeased your father more than any other person?"

"I believe I know M Franz d'Epinay," said the count; "is he not the son of General de Quesnel, as created Baron d'Epinay by Charles X?"

"The sato my ideas"

"He is, which makes me believe that it is only an excuse of M Noirtier to prevent his granddaughter ; old men are always so selfish in their affection," said Madame de Villefort

"But," said Monte Cristo "do you not know any cause for this hatred?"

"Ah, ma foi, who is to know?"

"Perhaps it is some political difference?"

"My father and the Baron d'Epinay lived in the stor," said Villefort

"Was not your father a Bonapartist?" asked Monte Cristo; "I think I re of that kind"

"My father has been a Jacobinelse," said Villefort, carried by his emotion beyond the bounds of prudence; "and the senator's robe, which Napoleon cast on his shoulders, only served to disguise the oldhim When ainst the Bourbons; for M Noirtier possessed this peculiarity, he never projected any Utopian schemes which could never be realized, but strove for possibilities, and he applied to the realization of these possibilities the terrible theories of The Mountain,--theories that never shrank fro about the desired result"

"Well," said Monte Cristo, "it is just as I thought; it was politics which brought Noirtier and M d'Epinay into personal contact Although General d'Epinay served under Napoleon, did he not still retain royalist sentiments? And was he not the person as assassinated one evening on leaving a Bonapartistto which he had been invited on the supposition that he favored the cause of the emperor?" Villefort looked at the count almost with terror "Am I mistaken, then?" said Monte Cristo

"No, sir, the facts were precisely what you have stated," said Madame de Villefort; "and it was to prevent the renewal of old feuds that M de Villefort for in the bonds of affection the two children of these inveterate enemies"