The Count of Monte Cristo

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so preparing himself for his future destiny. At intervals he listened
to learn if the noise had not begun again, and grew impatient at the
prudence of the prisoner, who did not guess he had been disturbed by a
captive as anxious for liberty as himself.

Three days passed--seventy-two long tedious hours which he counted off
by minutes!

At length one evening, as the jailer was visiting him for the last time
that night, Dantes, with his ear for the hundredth time at the wall,
fancied he heard an almost imperceptible movement among the stones. He
moved away, walked up and down his cell to collect his thoughts, and
then went back and listened.

The matter was no longer doubtful. Something was at work on the other
side of the wall; the prisoner had discovered the danger, and had
substituted a lever for a chisel.