1) I brought up doubling—the twinning of characters—a few posts ago; here, we should be in Paris happily with Dantès fulfilling his duty to deliver the captain’s letter, but instead we’re there miserably with Villefort shirking his duty to act justly. Could we interpret Dantès and Villefort as two warring halves of the same soul?

2) Does Louis XVIII give the impression of being intelligent (via his interest in Latin) or unintelligent (via his dismissal of Blacas’ warnings)?

3) We keep seeing characters trust each other blindly; here, the king trusts Villefort even as he points out that Villefort is overly ambitious. Is this a reflection of a society that values people’s word too much?

Final sentence of chapter:

“Villefort Made to retire from the room, but M. de Blacas clasped his hand to restrain him.”

previous chapter discussion