Chapter 69.

Honoring his promise to Madame Danglars, M. de Villefort seeks to learn how the Count of Monte Cristo discovered the past at Auteuil. He consults M. de Boville, who reports Monte Cristo’s ties to the Abbe Busoni and Lord Wilmore. Villefort orders inquiries into both men and then personally, under the pretense of a police envoy, goes to question the Abbe Busoni.

At Busoni’s modest lodgings, the abbe presents Monte Cristo as “Monsieur Zaccone,” a Maltese shipbuilder’s son, charitable and decorated for aiding Eastern Christians. Busoni claims the count has one enemy—Lord Wilmore—and provides moderate estimates of his wealth. Crucially, he states Monte Cristo bought the Auteuil house to found a lunatic asylum, invoking a philanthropic model to imply harmless intentions.

Next, the same “envoy” visits Lord Wilmore. Wilmore, professing enmity, offers a fuller, contradictory biography: youthful Indian campaigns against the English, captivity and escape, Greek service, and a hidden silver mine in Thessaly yielding a vast but precarious fortune. He attributes Monte Cristo’s presence in France to railway speculation and scientific telegraph experiments, and says the Auteuil house is for a speculative bath establishment. He even cites duels to justify personal hatred.

After the envoy leaves, Lord Wilmore sheds his disguise, revealing himself as the Count of Monte Cristo. The narrative then reveals the envoy was Villefort himself. Though he has learned nothing verifiable and has been thoroughly misled by Monte Cristo’s crafted personas, the conflicting yet reassuring explanations allay Villefort’s fears, and he sleeps soundly for the first time since the Auteuil dinner.