Tell me, I entreat." "But my orders." "Your orders do not forbid your telling me what I must know in ten minutes, in half an hour, or an hour.

You see I cannot escape, even if I intended." "Unless you are blind, or have never been outside the harbor, you must know." "I do not." "Look round you then." Dantes rose and looked forward, when he saw rise within a hundred yards of him the black and frowning rock on which stands the Chateau d'If.

This gloomy fortress, which has for more than three hundred years furnished food for so many wild legends, seemed to Dantes like a scaffold to a malefactor.
"The Chateau d'If ?" cried he, "what are we going there for ?" The gendarme smiled.
"I am not going there to be imprisoned," said Dantes; "it is only used for political prisoners.

I have committed no crime.

Are there any magistrates or judges at the Chateau d'If ?" "There are only," said the gendarme, "a governor, a garrison, turnkeys, and good thick walls.