The Count's French valet de chambre, drilled in absolute discretion and rewarded for loyal, silent service.
Baptistin is the French valet de chambre of the Count of Monte Cristo (Edmond Dantès), a year in his service and, by the count's summons of two strokes on the gong, one of his three chief attendants beside Ali and Bertuccio. The count coolly lectures him on his good fortune—handsome wages, servants of his own, forbidden profits—and lays down the iron rule that any gossip about his master, favorable or not, means instant dismissal; loyal servants share a fund accumulated to the count's death. Baptistin, awed, vows to take the mute Ali as his model, only to be told Ali is no paid servant but a slave the count would 'kill' rather than dismiss.
Discreet, well-paid, and kept firmly in his place, Baptistin embodies the count's meticulous, faintly menacing command of his household.
A well-kept French manservant, correct and deferential in showy livery.
The Count's discreet French valet, an instrument of his exacting household discipline.