your
oath."

"Then you believe me guilty in spite of all! This is the worst blow
yet!"

"It is in your power to completely justify yourself; at least, so you
give me to understand, and yet your refusal will forever separate you
from the woman you love!"

"You fill me with despair!" said Massetti, in a smothered voice, sinking
upon a sofa. "I fain would reveal everything to you, but an awful oath
of silence stands between me and the revelation."

"Then I must wait for Vampa's answer, and shape my course by that!" said
M. Dantes, firmly.

"That answer will destroy both Esperance and myself!" replied the
Viscount, in a hoarse whisper.

"We shall see," returned the Deputy, rising and resuming his cloak; as
he stood at the door of the salon with his hat in his hand, he added: "I
thought you all a man should be, Viscount, and that you would make
Zuleika happy, but my convictions have been sadly shaken. I came here
thinking that love for woman was all powerful in the heart of man, that
it would induce you to speak, even in the face of an oath, perhaps
violently and iniquitously administered; I was wrong; farewell!"

M. Dantes turned slowly and took his departure, leaving Giovanni
Massetti on the sofa plunged in grief and dismay.

CHAPTER XXXI.

VAMPA'S ANSWER.

As the time for the arrival of Luigi Vampa's answer to M. Dantes' letter
approached, Esperance grew more and more uneasy and serious; he spent
the greater portion of every day from home, apparently for the purpose
of avoiding his father and sister; when he returned he was moody,
depressed and silent, and far into the night he could be heard pacing
his chamber as if unable to sleep from excitement and anxiety.

Zuleika endeavored to comfort him, but all her efforts were fruitless.
She, poor girl, was herself overwhelmed with her own distress, though
she strove to bear up against it. Massetti had neither written to nor
attempted to see her since their separation, a circumstance she could
not reconcile with his protestations of ardent love for her, and this
served vastly to augment her sadness and anguish, though she still
believed in her soul that the Viscount was entirely innocent of the
crime laid to his charge.

M. Dantes, who had plunged into politics deeper than ever since the
success of the Revolution, was frequently in consultation with the
Republican leaders, and many of them visited him at his residence and
were closeted with him for hour