Contents
Chapter 17.
Overview
Dantès explores Abbé Faria’s cell, marvels at his inventions, and recounts his case. Through methodical reasoning, Faria identifies Danglars as the likely author of the denunciation and reveals Noirtier as Villefort’s father, explaining Dantès’s secret, extrajudicial imprisonment. After months of study and tunneling for escape, Faria suffers a stroke, survives with paralysis, and Dantès swears never to abandon him, postponing their plan.
Summary
Edmond Dantès crawls through the tunnel into Abbé Faria’s cell and inspects the ingenious tools, writings, and hidden supplies Faria has crafted. Faria’s precise timekeeping and inventions awe Dantès, strengthening his trust in the abbé’s intellect.
At Faria’s urging, Dantès recounts his life and arrest in detail. Applying a maxim—seek who benefits—Faria traces motives: Danglars resented Dantès’s imminent captaincy and saw the Elba letter. A remembered meeting with Fernand and Caderousse beside pens and paper further implicates them. Most decisively, Faria reveals that Noirtier, addressee of the burned letter, is Villefort’s father, explaining the deputy’s sudden change, destruction of evidence, and enforced secrecy. Shocked, Dantès internalizes the truth and forms a grim resolve.
To redirect Dantès, Faria proposes education. Over many months, Dantès learns languages, mathematics, history, and manners, becoming sharper and disciplined, while they also design an escape: drive a level to beneath the gallery, drop the sentry through a loosened flagstone, bind him, and descend the outer wall with Faria’s rope ladder.
After more than a year of mining, they finish the chamber under the gallery and await darkness. Suddenly Faria is struck by a violent seizure. Following Faria’s instructions, Dantès retrieves a hidden phial, waits for the cataleptic stillness, forces his jaws, and administers the drops, narrowly avoiding discovery by the jailer. Faria revives.
Recovery reveals lasting paralysis of Faria’s arm and leg; he foresees he cannot flee. Dantès refuses to abandon him and swears to remain. To avoid detection, they decide to refill the excavation beneath the gallery, and Faria promises an important communication after the next jailer’s visit.
Who Appears
- Edmond DantèsPrisoner No.34; learns Faria’s methods, reconstructs his betrayal, studies intensely, leads tunneling, saves Faria, vows not to escape without him.
- Abbé FariaPrisoner No.27; brilliant inventor and teacher, deduces culprits and Villefort’s motive, plans escape, suffers a stroke, revives but remains partially paralyzed.
- undefinedMakes routine visits; nearly discovers the crisis during Faria’s seizure; his schedule shapes the prisoners’ movements.
- undefinedSupercargo; identified by Faria’s reasoning as the likely author of the anonymous denunciation against Dantès (absent, discussed).
- undefinedCatalan rival for Mercédès; present in recalled meeting with pens and paper, suggesting complicity with Danglars (absent, discussed).
- undefinedTailor; drunken witness at the arbor where plotting likely occurred (absent, discussed).
- Gérard de VillefortDeputy prosecutor; exposed as Noirtier’s son, explaining the destruction of the letter and Dantès’s secret imprisonment (absent, discussed).