The scene now changes dramatically. We are in Rome, where two new characters appear: Franz d'Epinay (a young baron) and Albert de Morcerf (a good-looking viscount). The young men are fretting because they have come to Rome to find romance and laughter during the carnival season, but strangely, all of Rome's carriages and horses have been rented. The two young men are furious; men of their class do not "run around Rome on foot like lawyers' clerks." Nevertheless, they decide to deliver their "letters of introduction" to all of Rome's first families and make plans, if need be, to costume themselves as
colorful "Neapolitan harvesters" and ride around in a festive and beribboned oxcart. But at the last minute, the two men are saved by a stroke of good fortune: The hotel-keeper tells them that the "very great" Count of Monte Cristo has heard of their plight and has offered them two seats in his carriage, as well as two seats in his window above the square where most of the merriment will take place.
When Franz and Albert meet Monte Cristo, they are in awe of him and of his palatial quarters and his princely generosity. In addition, both men are startled by Monte Cristo's enthusiastic invitation to join him in witnessing a public execution from a window overlooking the execution site. Both Albert and Franz survive the ordeal, but they are both greatly distraught. Immediately before the execution, Monte Cristo talks of little else except the justice of slow and painful revenge; the guillotine, he feels, offers death too quickly and too painlessly. In contrast to instantaneous decapitation, however, Franz and Albert witness a singularly savage execution: A man is bludgeoned with a mace, his throat slit open, and his stomach trampled on until jets of blood spurt from his mouth like fantastic ruby-colored fountains. Curiously, the other prisoner on the block, a bronzed and handsome young man with a wild, proud look in his eyes, is pardoned at the last minute—as Monte Cristo prophecied earlier that he would be.
Hurriedly, the two men and Monte Cristo don their carnival costumes and join the festivities. Albert is soon rewarded with romance; a masked lady in a carriage tosses a bouquet of violets to him, and on the second day of the carnival, she tosses another bouquet to him; then Albert is rewarded with an invitation to a rendezvous with the mysterious lady. He goes to the appointed street, but at the moment when all of the carnival candles are suddenly extinguished in a dramatic finale, he is kidnapped.
Franz receives a note demanding a great deal of money and threatening Albert's life if the sum is not paid. In desperation, Franz asks Monte Cristo for a loan, explaining that a man waits below for the ransom money. Monte Cristo goes to the window and speaks to the fellow. It is Peppino, the handsome, tanned youth who was pardoned earlier, and who, it turns out, "owes his life" to Monte Cristo. He explains that his master, the notorious Luigi Vampa, kidnapped Albert. Monte Cristo immediately tells Peppino to take them to Vampa at once.
Deep in the bowels of Rome's catacombs, Monte Cristo accuses Vampa of breaking his vow never to molest a friend of the Count's. Vampa, more like a gallant gentleman than a bandit, profusely apologizes to Monte Cristo and immediately releases Albert. Later, Albert asks Monte Cristo how he can ever repay him for saving his life, and Monte Cristo answers that he would like to be introduced into Parisian society. Albert, of course, promises to do so, and he sets a date for their next meeting—in Paris, in exactly three months. The two men shake hands on the agreement, and Monte Cristo leaves. Franz turns to Albert and says that Monte Cristo is indeed a strange man; he feels uneasy about the Count's coming to Paris.
