Spero had never heard of this secret passage. Like a man in a dream he strode toward the table, and seizing the note read the following:
"If the son of the Count of Monte-Cristo is not a coward, and wishes to find her whom he has lost, let him go at once to Courberode and hunt up a man named Malvernet, who lives at the so-called Path of Thorns. Here he will find out what he wants to know, and perhaps a little more."
There was no signature to the letter, and Spero cared very little for that. Suddenly his glance happened to fall on a large mirror and he gave a cry of alarm.
Was the pale man with the deep blue rings about his eyes the twenty-one-year-old son of the great count?
"One would think that the few days I have been away from my father had aged me many years," he bitterly muttered. "But no," he added, flaming up; "the enemies of the great count shall not say that his son is not a worthy scion! I will crush them if they touch a hair of Jane's head. My father did not name me Spero for nothing. So long as I breathe I can hope. I will not despair, I will conquer!"
He pulled out his two pistols and examined them, and with a soft, tender "Father, help me," he left the secret chamber.