With these words the Count made his way to a gap in the bulwarks and, grasping Haydée tightly, leaped with her into the midst of the angry sea. Ali followed his master, and soon they were seen far in the distance, struggling and battling with the waves.
CHAPTER II.
THE ISLAND.
It was the month of December, but on the little Island of Salmis in the Grecian Archipelago the temperature was as mild and genial as that of June. The grass was rank and thick, while the blooming almond trees filled the atmosphere with fragrance. On a narrow strip of sandy beach three or four fishermen were preparing their nets and boats for a fishing expedition to the waters beyond. They chatted as they toiled. The eldest of them, a man about sixty, with silvered locks and a long gray beard, said:
"You may talk of storms as much as you please, but I maintain that the most severe tempest ever experienced in this neighborhood was the one I witnessed ten years ago last October, when we had the earthquake and the strange man, who now owns this island, was washed ashore."
"The Count of Monte-Cristo you mean?" remarked one of the party.
"Yes, the Count of Monte-Cristo, who has done so much for us all and whose wife is nothing less than an angel of goodness and charity."