Here's the scene as related by Dumas (warning: this is seriously gross): Meanwhile, the executioner had taken up his position on one side and raised the mace. Derived from the Italian mazza – mace – what it comes down to is being beaten to death with a big club. That last one sounds pretty crude and pretty cruel, yeah? Well, it is but it's also highly ritualized and regulated. This raises a big question: Why doesn't he kill his enemies himself? Over the course of the novel we see death come in a variety of costumes: apoplexy, poison, pistol, sword – and, in perhaps the single most memorable instance – a big club and a large knife. That said, he's perfectly willing to look death right in the eye, to watch heads get chopped off, to let people – and there's really no way to put this delicately – blow their brains out. The one person he comes closest to killing actively is, actually, himself, back when he was a lowly prisoner named Edmond Dantès. He never kills anyone, never stabs, shoots, or strangles any of his enemies – even though you can tell he really, really wants to sometimes. As you've probably noticed, The Count is a strictly hands-off kind of guy.
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