زیرزمین

Chapter 6 - Underground

Time passed. The chief officer of prisons visited the prisoners’

rooms. ‘Is the food good’ he asked the prisoners. ‘Do you want anything?’

‘The food is very bad, and we want to be free,’ they all replied.

The officer laughed and turned to the governor. ‘Why do we come here? We always hear the same thing. “The food is bad. I have done nothing wrong. I want to be free.”Are there any other prisoners?’

‘Yes, there are the crazy prisoners. We keep them underground. They are a danger to other people.’

‘Let’s visit them. I must see them all.’

Two soldiers took the officer down the steps. The air smelled bad. The darkness was full of the smell of death.

‘Oh!’ cried the officer. ‘Who can live here?’

‘Very bad men. We must watch them very carefully.’

This was the officer’s first visit.

‘Prisoner number 34. Let’s visit this one first,’ he said.

Dantes was sitting in the corner of his room. He looked up and saw the stranger with two soldiers.

‘This is an important officer,’ he thought. He jumped up to meet him, but the soldiers pushed him back.

‘The officer thinks that I am crazy,’ Dantes thought. He looked at the officer. He tried to make his voice quiet and calm.

‘I only want to know what is going to happen to me. Why am I here? Give me your permission to see a judge.’

‘Perhaps,’ said the chief officer. Then, turning to the governor, he said, ‘Show me your books. What is this man’s crime?’

‘I know that you can’t free me,’ said Dantes. ‘But tell me, please, that there is hope.’

‘I can’t tell you that. I can only promise to ask about the matter. Who gave orders for you to come to the prison?’

‘Mr Villefort.’

‘Does he have a reason to be y o u r enemy?’

‘No. He was very kind to me,’ Dantes said.

‘Then I can believe what he writes about you in the prison’s book?’

‘Yes.’

The officer left the room and closed the door. But he left something in the room — hope.

The officer kept his promise to Dantes. He looked in the prison book and found:

EDMOND DANTES: A dangerous man. He helped Napoleon return from Elba. Watch him carefully .

‘I can’t help this prisoner,’ the chief officer thought. He wrote in the book:

Do nothing .