On the morrow, at nightfall, Jean Valjean tapped at the gateway of the
Gillenormand mansion, and it was Basque who received him. Basque was
in the yard at the appointed time, as if he had had his orders. It
sometimes happens that people say to a servant, "You will watch for Mr.
So-and-so's arrival." Basque, without waiting for Jean Valjean to come
up to him, said,--

"Monsieur le Baron has instructed me to ask you, sir, whether you wish
to go upstairs or stay down here?"

"Stay down here," Jean Valjean replied.

Basque, who, however, was perfectly respectful in his manner, opened
the door of the ground-floor room, and said, "I will go and inform
her ladyship." The room which Jean Valjean entered was a damp,
arched, basement room, employed as a cellar at times, looking out on
the street, with a flooring of red tiles, and badly lighted by an
iron-barred window. This room was not one of those which are harassed
by the broom and mop, and the dust was quiet there. No persecution of
the spiders had been organized; and a fine web, extensively drawn out,
quite black, and adorned with dead flies, formed a wheel on one of the
window-panes. The room, which was small and low-ceiled, was furnished
with a pile of empty bottles collected in a corner. The wall, covered
with a yellow-ochre wash, crumbled off in large patches; at the end was
a mantel-piece of panelled black wood, with a narrow shelf, and a fire
was lighted in it, which indicated that Jean Valjean's reply, "Stay
down here," had been calculated on. Two chairs were placed, one in each
chimney-corner, and between the chairs was spread, in guise of carpet,
an old bed-room rug, which displayed more cord than wool. The room was
illumined by the flickering of the fire, and the twilight through the
window. Jean Valjean was fatigued; for several days he had not eaten or
slept, and he fell into one of the arm-chairs. Basque returned, placed
a lighted candle on the mantelpiece, and withdrew. Jean Valjean, who
was sitting with hanging head, did not notice either Basque or the
candle, till all at once he started up, for Cosette was behind him: he
had not seen her come in, but he felt that she was doing so. He turned
round and contemplated her; she was adorably lovely. But what he gazed
at with this profound glance was not the beauty, but the soul.

"Well, father," Cosette exclaimed, "I knew that you were singular, but
I could never have expected this. What an idea! Marius told me that it
was your wish to see me here."

"Yes, it is."

"I expected that answer, and I warn you that I am going to have a scene
with you. Let us begin with the beginning: kiss me, father."

And she offered her cheek, but Jean Valjean remained motionless.

"You do not stir: I mark the fact! It is the attitude of a culprit. But
I do not care, I forgive you. Christ said, 'Offer the other cheek;'
here it is."

And she offered the other cheek, but Jean Valjean did not stir; it
seemed as if his feet were riveted to the floor.

"Things are growing serious," said Cosette. "What have I done to you? I
am offended, and you must make it up with me; you will dine with us?"

"I have dined."

"That is not true, and I will have you scolded by M. Gillenormand.
Grandfathers are made to lay down the law to fathers. Come, go with me
to the drawing-room. At once."

"Impossible!"

Cosette here lost a little ground; she ceased to order and began
questioning.

"But why? And you choose the ugliest room in the house to see me in. It
is horrible here."

"You know--"

Jean Valjean broke off--

"You know, Madame, that I am peculiar, and have my fancies."

"Madame--_you_ know--more novelties; what does this all mean?"

Jean Valjean gave her that heart-broken smile to which he sometimes had
recourse.

"You wished to be Madame. You are."

"Not for you, father."

"Do not call me father."

"What?"

"Call me Monsieur Jean, or Jean, if you like."

"You are no longer father? I am no longer Cosette? Monsieur Jean? Why,
what does it mean? These are revolutions. What has happened? Look me in
the face, if you can. And you will not live with us! And you will not
accept our bed-room! What have I done to offend you? Oh, what have I
done? There must be something."

"Nothing."

"In that case, then?"

"All is as usual."

"Why do you change your name?"

"You have changed yours."

He smiled the same smile again, and added,--

"Since you are Madame Pontmercy, I may fairly be Monsieur Jean."

"I do not understand anything, and all this is idiotic. I will ask my
husband's leave for you to be Monsieur Jean, and I hope that he will
not consent. You cause me great sorrow; and though you may have whims,
you have no right to make your little Cosette grieve. That is wrong,
and you have no right to be naughty, fear you are so good."

As he made no reply, she seized both his hands eagerly, and with an
irresistible movement raising them to her face she pressed them against
her neck under her chin, which is a profound sign of affection.

"Oh," she said, "be kind to me!" And she continued: "This is what I
call being kind,--to behave yourself, come and live here, for there are
birds here as in the Rue Plumet; to live with us, leave that hole in
the Rue de l'Homme Armé, give us no more riddles to guess; to be like
everybody else, dine With us, breakfast with us, and be my father."

He removed her hands,--

"You no longer want a father, as you have a husband."

Cosette broke out,--

"I no longer want a father! Things like that have no common sense, and
I really do not know what to say."

"If Toussaint were here," Jean Valjean continued, like a man seeking
authorities and who clings to every branch, "she would be the first to
allow that I have always had strange ways of my own. There is nothing
new in it, for I always loved my dark corner."

"But it is cold here, and we cannot see distinctly; and it is
abominable to wish to be Monsieur Jean; and I shall not allow you to
call me Madame."

"As I was coming along just now," Jean Valjean replied, "I saw a very
pretty piece of furniture at a cabinet-maker's in the Rue St. Louis. If
I were a pretty woman, I should treat myself to it It is a very nice
toilette table in the present fashion, made of rosewood, I think you
call it, and inlaid. There is a rather large glass with drawers, and
it is very nice."

"Hou! the ugly bear!" Cosette replied. And clenching her teeth, and
parting her lips in the most graceful way possible, she blew at Jean
Valjean; it was a grace imitating a cat.

"I am furious," she went on, "and since yesterday you have all put
me in a passion. I do not understand it at all; you do not defend me
against Marius, Marius does not take my part against you, and I am all
alone. I have a nice room prepared, and if I could have put my dear
father in it, I would have done so; but my room is left on my hands
and my lodger fails me. I order Nicolette to prepare a nice little
dinner, and--they will not touch your dinner, Madame. And my father
Fauchelevent wishes me to call him Monsieur Jean, and that I should
receive him in a frightful old, ugly, mildewed cellar, in which the
walls wear a beard, and empty bottles represent the looking-glasses,
and spiders' webs the curtains. I allow that you are a singular man,
it is your way; but a truce is accorded to newly-married folk, and you
ought not to have begun to be singular again so soon. You are going
to be very satisfied, then, in your Rue de l'Homme Armé; well, I was
very wretched there. What have I done to offend you? You cause me great
sorrow. Fie!"

And suddenly growing serious, she looked intently at Jean Valjean and
added,--

"You are angry with me for being happy; is that it?"

Simplicity sometimes penetrates unconsciously very deep, and this
question, simple for Cosette, was profound for Jean Valjean. Cosette
wished to scratch, but she tore. Jean Valjean turned pale, he remained
for a moment without answering, and then murmured with an indescribable
accent, and speaking to himself,--

"Her happiness was the object of my life, and at present God may order
my departure. Cosette, thou art happy, and my course is run."

"Ah! you said _thou_ to me," Cosette exclaimed, and leaped on his neck.

Jean Valjean wildly strained her to his heart, for he felt as if he
were almost taking her back again.

"Thank you, father," Cosette said to him.

The excitement was getting too painful for Jean Valjean; he gently
withdrew himself from Cosette's arms, and took up his hat.

"Well?" said Cosette.

Jean Valjean replied,--

"I am going to leave you, Madame, as you will be missed."

And on the threshold he added,--

"I said _thou_ to you; tell your husband that it shall not happen
again. Forgive me."

Jean Valjean left Cosette stupefied by this enigmatical leave-taking.

CHAPTER II.

OTHER BACKWARD STEPS.

The next day Jean Valjean came at the same hour, and Cosette asked him
no questions, was no longer astonished, no longer exclaimed that it was
cold, no longer alluded to the drawing-room; she avoided saying either
father or Monsieur Jean. She allowed herself to be called Madame; there
was only a diminution of her delight perceptible, and she would have
been sad, had sorrow been possible. It is probable that she had held
with Marius one of those conversations in which the beloved man says
what he wishes, explains nothing, and satisfies the beloved woman; for
the curiosity of lovers does not extend far beyond their love. The
basement room had been furbished up a little; Basque had suppressed
the bottles, and Nicolette the spiders. Every following day brought
Jean Valjean back at the same hour; he came daily, as he had not the
strength to take Marius's permission otherwise than literally. Marius
arranged so as to be absent at the hour when Jean Valjean came, and
the house grew accustomed to M. Fauchelevent's new mode of behaving.
Toussaint helped in it; "My master was always so," she repeated. The
grandfather issued this decree, "He is an original," and everything
was said. Moreover, at the age of ninety no connection is possible;
everything is juxtaposition, and a new-comer is in the way; there is no
place for him, for habits are unalterably formed. M. Fauchelevent, M.
Tranchelevent,--Father Gillenormand desired nothing better than to get
rid of "that gentleman," and added, "Nothing is more common than such
originals. They do all sorts of strange things without any motive. The
Marquis de Canoples did worse, for he bought a palace in order to live
in the garret."

No one caught a glimpse of the sinister reality, and in feet who could
have divined such a thing? There are marshes like this in India: the
water seems extraordinary, inexplicable, rippling when there is no
breeze, and agitated when it ought to be calm. People look at the
surface of this ebullition which has no cause, and do not suspect the
hydra dragging itself along at the bottom. Many men have in this way a
secret monster, an evil which they nourish, a dragon that gnaws them, a
despair that dwells in their night. Such a man resembles others, comes
and goes, and no one knows that he has within him a frightful parasitic
pain with a thousand teeth, which dwells in the wretch and kills him.
They do not know that this man is a gulf; he is stagnant but deep. From
time to time a trouble which no one understands is produced on his
surface; a mysterious ripple forms, then fades away, then reappears; a
bubble rises and bursts. It is a slight thing, but it is terrible, for
it is the respiration of the unknown boast. Certain strange habits,
such as arriving at the hour when others go away, hiding one's self
when others show themselves, wearing on all occasions what may be
called the wall-colored cloak, seeking the solitary walk, preferring
the deserted street, not mixing in conversation, avoiding crowds and
festivities, appearing to be comfortably off and living poorly, having,
rich though one is, one's key in one's pocket and one's candle in
the porter's lodge, entering by the small door and going up the back
stairs,--all these insignificant singularities, ripples, air-bubbles,
and fugitive marks on the surface, frequently come from a formidable
depth.

Several weeks passed thus; a new life gradually seized on Cosette,--the
relations which marriage creates, visits, the management of the
household, and pleasures, that great business. The pleasures of Cosette
were not costly; they consisted in only one, being with Marius. To go
out with him, remain at home with him, was the great occupation of
her life. It was for them an ever novel joy to go out arm in arm, in
the sunshine, in the open streets, without hiding themselves, in the
face of everybody, both alone. Cosette had one vexation: Toussaint
could not agree with Nicolette (for the welding of the two old maids
was impossible), and left. The grandfather was quite well; Marius
had a few briefs now and then; Aunt Gillenormand peacefully lived
with the married pair that lateral life which sufficed her, and Jean
Valjean came daily. The Madame and the Monsieur Jean, however, made
him different to Cosette, and the care he had himself taken to detach
himself from her succeeded. She was more and more gay, and less and
less affectionate; and yet she loved him dearly still, and he felt
it One day she suddenly said to him, "You were my father, you are no
longer my father; you were my uncle, you are no longer my uncle; you
were Monsieur Fauchelevent, and are now Jean. Who are you, then? I do
not like all this. If I did not know you to be so good, I should be
afraid of you." He still lived in the Rue de l'Homme Armé, as he could
not resolve to remove from the quarter in which Cosette lived. At first
he stayed only a few minutes with Cosette, and then went away; but by
degrees he grew into the habit of making his visits longer. It might be
said that he took advantage of the lengthening days; he arrived sooner
and went away later. One day the word "father" slipped over Cosette's
lips, and a gleam of joy lit up Jean Valjean's old solemn face, but he
chided her: "Say Jean."

"Ah, that is true," she replied, with a burst of laughter, "Monsieur
Jean."

"That is right," he said; and he turned away that she might not see the
tears in his eyes.

CHAPTER III.

THEY REMEMBER THE GARDEN IN THE RUE PLUMET.

This was the last occasion, and after this last flare total extinction
took place. There was no more familiarity, no more good-day with a
kiss, and never again that so deeply tender word "father:" he had
been, at his own request and with his own complicity, expelled from
all those joys in succession, and he underwent this misery,--that,
after losing Cosette entirely on one day, he was then obliged to lose
her again bit by bit. The eye eventually grows accustomed to cellar
light, and he found it enough to have an apparition of Cosette daily.
His whole life was concentrated in that hour; he sat down by her side,
looked at her in silence, or else talked to her about former years,
her childhood, the convent, and her little friends of those days. One
afternoon--it was an early day in April, already warm but still fresh,
the moment of the sun's great gayety; the gardens that surrounded
Marius's and Cosette's windows were rousing from their slumber, the
hawthorn was about to bourgeon, a jewelry of wall-flowers was displayed
on the old wall, there was on the grass a fairy carpet of daisies and
buttercups, the white butterflies were springing forth, and the wind,
that minstrel of the eternal wedding, was trying in the trees the first
notes of that great auroral symphony which the old poets called the
renewal--Marius said to Cosette, "We said that we would go and see our
garden in the Rue Plumet again. Come, we must not be ungrateful." And
they flew off like two swallows toward the spring. This garden in the
Rue Plumet produced on them the effect of a dawn, for they already had
behind them in life something that resembled the springtime of their
love. The house in the Rue Plumet, being taken on lease, still belonged
to Cosette; they went to this garden and house, found themselves
again, and forgot themselves there. In the evening Jean Valjean went
to the Rue des Filles du Calvaire at the usual hour. "My lady went out
with the Baron," said Basque, "and has not returned yet." He sat down
silently and waited an hour, but Cosette did not come in; he hung his
head and went away. Cosette was so intoxicated by the walk in "their
garden," and so pleased at having "lived a whole day in her past," that
she spoke of nothing else the next day. She did not remark that she had
not seen Jean Valjean.

"How did you go there?" Jean Valjean asked her.

"On foot."

"And how did you return?"

"On foot too."

For some time Jean Valjean had noticed the close life which the young
couple led, and was annoyed at it. Marius's economy was severe,
and that word had its fall meaning for Jean Valjean; he hazarded a
question.

"Why do you not keep a carriage? A little coupé would not coat you more
than five hundred francs a month, and you are rich."

"I do not know," Cosette answered.

"It is the same with Toussaint," Jean Valjean continued; "she has left,
and you have engaged no one in her place. Why not?"

"Nicolette is sufficient."

"But you must want a lady's maid?"

"Have I not Marius?"

"You ought to have a house of your own, servants of your own, a
carriage, and a box at the opera. Nothing is too good for you. Then
why not take advantage of the fact of your being rich? Wealth adds to
happiness."

Cosette made no reply. Jean Valjean's visits did not grow shorter, but
the contrary; for when it is the heart that is slipping, a man does not
stop on the incline. When Jean Valjean wished to prolong his visit and
make the hour be forgotten, he sung the praises of Marius; he found him
handsome, noble, brave, witty, eloquent, and good. Cosette added to the
praise, and Jean Valjean began again. It was an inexhaustible subject,
and there were volumes in the six letters composing Marius's name.
In this k way Jean Valjean managed to stop for a long time, for it
was so sweet to see Cosette and forget by her side. It was a dressing
for his wound. It frequently happened that Basque would come and say
twice, "M. Gillenormand has sent me to remind Madame la Baronne that
dinner is waiting." On those days Jean Valjean would return home very
thoughtful. Was there any truth in that comparison of the chrysalis
which had occurred to Marius's mind? Was Jean Valjean really an
obstinate chrysalis, constantly paying visits to his butterfly? One day
he remained longer than usual, and the next noticed there was no fire
in the grate. "Stay," he though, "no fire?" And he gave himself this
explanation: "It is very simple; we are in April, and the cold weather
has passed."

"Good gracious! How cold it is here!" Cosette exclaimed as she came in.

"Oh no," said Jean Valjean.

"Then it was you who told Basque not to light a fire?"

"Yes; we shall have May here directly."

"But fires keep on till June; in this cellar there ought to be one all
the year round."

"I thought it was unnecessary."

"That is just like one of your ideas," Cosette remarked.

The next day there was a fire, but the two chairs were placed at the
other end of the room, near the door. "What is the meaning of that?"
Jean Valjean thought; he fetched the chairs and placed them in their
usual place near the chimney. This rekindled fire, however, encouraged
him, and he made the conversation last even longer than usual. As he
rose to leave, Cosette remarked to him,--

"My husband said a funny thing to me yesterday."

"What was it?"

"He said to me,'Cosette, we have thirty thousand francs a
year,--twenty-seven of yours, and three that my grandfather allows
me.' I replied, 'That makes thirty;' and he continued, 'Would you
have the courage to live on the three thousand?' I answered, 'Yes, on
nothing, provided that it be with you;' and then I asked him, 'Why did
you say that to me?' He replied, 'I merely wished to know.'"

Jean Valjean had not a word to say. Cosette probably expected some
explanation from him, but he listened to her in a sullen silence. He
went back to the Rue de l'Homme Armé, and was so profoundly abstracted
that, instead of entering his own house, he went into the next one.
It was not till he had gone up nearly two flights of stairs that he
noticed his mistake, and came down again. His mind was crammed with
conjectures: it was evident that Marius entertained doubts as to the
origin of the six hundred thousand francs, that he feared some impure
source; he might even--who knew?--have discovered that this money came
from him, Jean Valjean; that he hesitated to touch this suspicious
fortune, and was repugnant to use it as his own, preferring that
Cosette and he should remain poor rather than be rich with dubious
wealth. Moreover, Jean Valjean was beginning to feel himself shown to
the door. On the following day he had a species of shock on entering
the basement room; the fauteuils had disappeared, and there was not
even a seat of any sort.

"Dear me, no chairs!" Cosette exclaimed on entering; "where are they?"

"They are no longer here," Jean Valjean replied.

"That is rather too much."

Jean Valjean stammered,--

"I told Basque to remove them."

"For what reason?"

"I shall only remain a few minutes to-day."

"Few or many, that is no reason for standing."

"I believe that Basque required the chairs for the drawing-room."

"Why?"

"You have probably company this evening."

"Not a soul."

Jean Valjean had not another word to say, and Cosette shrugged her
shoulders.

"Have the chairs removed! The other day you ordered the fire to be left
off! How singular you are!"

"Good-by," Jean Valjean murmured.

He did not say "Good-by, Cosette," and he had not the strength to say
"Good-by, Madame."

He went away crushed, for this time he had comprehended. The next day
he did not come, and Cosette did not remark this till the evening.

"Dear me," she said, "Monsieur Jean did not come to-day."

She felt a slight pang at the heart, but she scarce noticed it, as she
was at once distracted by a kiss from Marius. The next day he did not
come either. Cosette paid no attention to this, spent the evening, and
slept at night as usual, and only thought of it when she woke; she
was so happy! She very soon sent Nicolette to Monsieur Jean's to see
whether he were ill, and why he had not come to see her on the previous
day, and Nicolette brought back Monsieur Jean's answer. "He was not
ill, but was busy, and would come soon,--as soon as he could. But he
was going to make a little journey, and Madame would remember that he
was accustomed to do so every now and then. She need not feel at all
alarmed or trouble herself about him." Nicolette, on entering Monsieur
Jean's room, had repeated to him her mistress's exact words,--"That
Madame sent to know 'why Monsieur Jean had not called on the previous
day?'"

"I have not called for two days," Jean Valjean said quietly; but the
observation escaped Nicolette's notice, and she did not repeat it to
Cosette.

CHAPTER IV.

ATTRACTION AND EXTINCTION.

During the last months of spring and the early months of summer,
1833, the scanty passers-by in the Marais, the shop-keepers, and the
idlers in the door-ways, noticed an old gentleman, decently dressed in
black, who every day, at nearly the same hour in the evening, left the
Rue de l'Homme Armé, in the direction of the Rue Sainte Croix de la
Bretonnerie, passed in front of the Blancs Manteaux, reached the Rue
Culture Sainte Catharine, and on coming to the Rue de l'Écharpe, turned
to his left and entered the Rue St. Louis. There he walked slowly, with
head stretched forward, seeing nothing, hearing nothing, with his eye
incessantly fixed on a spot which always seemed his magnet, and which
was nought else than the corner of the Rue des Filles du Calvaire.
The nearer he came to this corner the more brightly his eye flashed;
a sort of joy illumined his eyeballs, like an internal dawn; he had a
fascinated and affectionate air, his lips made obscure movements as
if speaking to some one whom he could not see, he smiled vaguely, and
he advanced as slowly as he could. It seemed as if, while wishing to
arrive, he was afraid of the moment when he came quite close. When he
had only a few houses between himself and the street which appeared to
attract him, his step became so slow that at moments he seemed not to
be moving at all. The vacillation of his head and the fixedness of his
eye suggested the needle seeking the pole. However he might delay his
arrival, he must arrive in the end; when he reached the corner of the
Rue des Filles du Calvaire, he trembled, thrust his head with a species
of gloomy timidity beyond the corner of the last house, and looked into
this street, and there was in this glance something that resembled the
bedazzlement of the impossible and the reflection of a closed paradise.
Then a tear, which had been gradually collecting in the corner of his
eyelashes, having grown large enough to fall, glided down his cheeks,
and sometimes stopped at his mouth. The old man tasted its bitter
flavor. He stood thus for some minutes as if he were of stone; then
returned by the same road, at the same pace, and the farther he got
away the more lustreless his eye became.

By degrees this old man ceased going as far as the corner of the Rue
des Filles du Calvaire; he stopped half-way in the Rue St. Louis:
at times a little farther off, at times a little nearer. One day he
stopped at the corner of the Rue Culture Sainte Catharine and gazed
at the Rue des Filles du Calvaire from a distance; then he silently
shook his head from right to left, as if refusing himself something,
and turned back. Ere long he did not reach even the Rue St Louis; he
arrived at the Rue Pavie, shook his head, and turned back; then he did
not go beyond the Rue des Trois Pavilions; and then he did not pass
the Blancs Manteaux. He seemed like a clock which was not wound up, and
whose oscillations grow shorter and shorter till they stop. Every day
he left his house at the same hour, undertook the same walk but did not
finish it, and incessantly shortened it, though probably unconscious of
the fact. His whole countenance expressed this sole idea, Of what good
is it? His eyes were lustreless, and there was no radiance in them. The
tears were also dried up; they no longer collected in the corner of his
eyelashes, and this pensive eye was dry. The old man's head was still
thrust forward; the chin moved at times, and the creases in his thin
neck were painful to look on. At times, when the weather was bad, he
had an umbrella under his arm, which he never opened. The good women of
the district said, "He is an innocent," and the children followed him
with shouts of laughter.

BOOK IX.

SUPREME DARKNESS, SUPREME DAWN.

CHAPTER I.

PITY THE UNHAPPY, BUT BE INDULGENT TO THE HAPPY.

It is a terrible thing to be happy! How satisfied people are! How
sufficient they find it! How, when possessed of the false object
of life, happiness, they forget the true one, duty! We are bound
to say, however, that it would be unjust to accuse Marius. Marius,
as we have explained, before his marriage asked no questions of M.
Fauchelevent, and since had been afraid to ask any of Jean Valjean.
He had regretted the promise which he had allowed to be drawn from
him, and had repeatedly said to himself that he had done wrong in
making this concession to despair. He had restricted himself to
gradually turning Jean Valjean out of his house, and effacing him as
far as possible in Cosette's mind. He had to some extent constantly
stationed himself between Cosette and Jean Valjean, feeling certain
that in this way she would not perceive it or think of it. It was more
than an effacement,--it was an eclipse. Marius did what he considered
necessary and just; he believed that he had serious reasons, some of
which we have seen, and some we have yet to see, for getting rid of
Jean Valjean, without harshness, but without weakness. Chance having
made him acquainted, in a trial in which he was retained, with an
ex-clerk of Laffitte's bank, he had obtained, without seeking it,
mysterious information, which, in truth, he had not been able to
examine, through respect for the secret he had promised to keep, and
through regard for Jean Valjean's perilous situation. He believed,
at this very moment, that he had a serious duty to perform,--the
restitution of the six hundred thousand francs to some one whom he was
seeking as discreetly as he could. In the mean while he abstained from
touching that money.

As for Cosette, she was not acquainted with any of these secrets, but
it would be harsh to condemn her either. Between Marius and her was
an omnipotent magnetism, which made her do instinctively and almost
mechanically whatever Marius wished. She felt a wish of Marius in the
matter of Monsieur Jean, and she conformed to it. Her husband had
said nothing to her, but she suffered the vague but clear pressure of
his tacit intentions, and blindly obeyed. Her obedience in this case
consisted in not remembering what Marius forgot; and she had no effort
to make in doing so. Without knowing why herself, and without there
being anything to blame her for, her mind had so thoroughly become
that of her husband, that whatever covered itself with a shadow in
Marius's thoughts was obscured in hers. Let us not go too far, however;
as regards Jean Valjean, this effacement and this forgetfulness were
only superficial, and she was thoughtless rather than forgetful. In
her heart she truly loved the man whom she had so long called father;
but she loved her husband more, and this had slightly falsified the
balance of this heart, which weighed down on one side only. It happened
at times that Cosette would speak of Jean Valjean and express her
surprise, and then Marius would calm her. "He is away, I believe; did
he not say that he was going on a journey?" "That is true," Cosette
thought, "he used to disappear like that, but not for so long a time."
Twice or thrice she sent Nicolette to inquire in the Rue de l'Homme
Armé whether Monsieur Jean had returned from his tour, and Jean Valjean
sent answer in the negative. Cosette asked no more, as she had on
earth but one want,--Marius. Let us also say that Marius and Cosette
had been absent too. They went to Vernon, and Marius took Cosette to
his father's tomb. Marius had gradually abstracted Cosette from Jean
Valjean, and Cosette had allowed it. However, what is called much too
harshly in certain cases the ingratitude of children is not always so
reprehensible a thing as may be believed. It is the ingratitude of
nature; for nature, as we have said elsewhere, "looks before her," and
divides living beings into arrivals and departures. The departures
are turned to the darkness, and the arrivals toward light. Hence a
divergence, which on the part of the old is fatal, on the part of
the young is involuntary; and this divergence, at first insensible,
increases slowly, like every separation of branches, and the twigs
separate without detaching themselves from the parent stem. It is not
their fault, for youth goes where there is joy, to festivals, to bright
light, and to love, while old age proceeds toward the end. They do not
lose each other out of sight, but there is no longer a connecting link:
the young people feel the chill of life, and the old that of the tomb.
Let us not accuse these poor children.

CHAPTER II.

THE LAST FLUTTERINGS OF THE LAMP WITHOUT OIL.

One day Jean Valjean went down his staircase, took three steps in the
street, sat down upon a post, the same one on which Gavroche had found
him sitting in thought on the night of June 5; he stayed there a few
minutes, and then went up again. This was the last oscillation of the
pendulum; the next day he did not leave his room; the next to that he
did not leave his bed. The porter's wife, who prepared his poor meals
for him, some cabbage or a few potatoes and a little bacon, looked at
the brown earthenware plate and exclaimed,--

"Why, poor dear man, you ate nothing yesterday!"

"Yes, I did," Jean Valjean answered.

"The plate is quite full."

"Look at the water-jug: it is empty."

"That proves you have drunk, but does not prove that you have eaten."

"Well," said Jean Valjean, "suppose that I only felt hungry for water?"

"That is called thirst, and if a man does not eat at the same time it
is called fever."

"I will eat to-morrow."

"Or on Trinity Sunday. Why not to-day? Who-ever ever thought of
saying, I will eat to-morrow? To leave my plate without touching it; my
rashers were so good."

Jean Valjean took the old woman's hand.

"I promise you to eat them," he said, in his gentle voice.

"I am not pleased with you," the woman replied.

Jean Valjean never saw any other human creature but this good woman:
there are in Paris streets through which people never pass, and houses
which people never enter, and he lived in one of those streets and
one of those houses. During the time when he still went out he had
bought at a brazier's for a few sous a small copper crucifix, which he
suspended from a nail opposite his bed; that gibbet is ever good to
look on. A week passed thus, and Jean Valjean still remained in bed.
The porter's wife said to her husband, "The old gentleman upstairs
does not get up; he does not eat, and he will not last long. He has a
sorrow, and no one will get it out of my head but that his daughter has
made a bad match."

The porter replied, with the accent of marital sovereignty,--

"If he is rich, he can have a doctor; if he is not rich, he can't. If
he has no doctor, he will die."

"And if he has one?"

"He will die," said the porter.

The porter's wife began digging up with an old knife the grass between
what she called her pavement, and while doing so grumbled,--

"It's a pity--an old man who is so tidy. He is as white as a pullet."

She saw a doctor belonging to the quarter passing along the bottom of
the street, and took upon herself to ask him to go up.

"It's on the second floor," she said; "you will only have to go in,
for, as the old gentleman no longer leaves his bed, the key is always
in the door."

The physician saw Jean Valjean and spoke to him: when he came down
again the porter's wife was waiting for him.

"Well, doctor?"

"He is very ill."

"What is the matter with him?"

"Everything and nothing. He is a man who, from all appearances, has
lost a beloved person. People die of that."

"What did he say to you?"

"He told me that he was quite well."

"Will you call again, doctor?"

"Yes," the physician replied, "but some one beside me ought to come
too."

CHAPTER III.

A PEN IS TOO HEAVY FOR THE MAN WHO LIFTED FAUCHELEVENT'S CART.

One evening Jean Valjean had a difficulty in rising on his elbow; he
took hold of his wrist and could not find his pulse; his breathing was
short, and stopped every now and then, and he perceived that he was
weaker than he had ever yet been. Then, doubtless, under the pressure
of some supreme preoccupation, he made an effort, sat up, and dressed
himself. He put on his old workman's clothes; for, as he no longer went
out, he had returned to them and preferred them. He was compelled to
pause several times while dressing himself; and the perspiration poured
off his forehead, merely through the effort of putting on his jacket.
Ever since he had been alone he had placed his bed in the anteroom,
so as to occupy as little as possible of the deserted apartments. He
opened the valise and took out Cosette's clothing, which he spread
on his bed. The Bishop's candlesticks were at their place on the
mantel-piece; he took two wax candles out of a drawer and put them
up, and then, though it was broad summer daylight, he lit them. We
sometimes see candles lighted thus in open day in rooms where dead men
are lying. Each step he took in going from one article of furniture
to another exhausted him, and he was obliged to sit down. It was not
ordinary fatigue, which expends the strength in order to renew it; it
was the remnant of possible motion; it was exhausted life falling drop
by drop in crushing efforts which will not be made again.

One of the chairs on which he sank was placed near the mirror, so fatal
for him, so providential for Marius, in which he had read Cosette's
reversed writing on the blotting-book. He saw himself in this mirror,
and could not recognize himself. He was eighty years of age; before
Marius's marriage he had looked scarce fifty, but the last year had
reckoned as thirty. What he had on his forehead was no longer the
wrinkle of age, but the mysterious mark of death, and the laceration
of the pitiless nail could be traced on it. His cheeks were flaccid;
the skin of his face had that color which makes one think that the
earth is already over it; the two corners of his mouth drooped as in
that mask which the ancients sculptured on the tomb. He looked at
space reproachfully, and he resembled one of those tragic beings who
have cause to complain of some one. He had reached that stage, the
last phase of dejection, in which grief no longer flows; it is, so to
speak, coagulated, and there is on the soul something like a clot of
despair. Night had set in, and he with difficulty dragged a table and
the old easy-chair to the chimney, and laid on the table, pen, ink,
and paper. This done he feinted away, and when he regained his senses
he was thirsty. As he could not lift the water-jar, he bent down with
an effort and drank a mouthful. Then he turned to the bed, and, still
seated, for he was unable to stand, he gazed at the little black dress
and all those dear objects. Such contemplations last hours which appear
minutes. All at once he shuddered, and felt that the cold had struck
him. He leaned his elbows on the table which the Bishop's candlesticks
illumined, and took up the pen. As neither the pen nor the ink had been
used for a long time, the nibs of the pen were bent, the ink was dried
up, and he was therefore obliged to put a few drops of water in the
ink, which he could not do without stopping and sitting down twice or
thrice, and was forced to write with the back of the pen. He wiped his
forehead from time to time, and his hand trembled as he wrote the few
following lines:--

"COSETTE,---I bless you. I am about to explain to you. Your husband
did right in making me understand that I ought to go away; still, he
was slightly in error as to what he believed, but he acted rightly. He
is a worthy man, and love him dearly when I am gone from you. Monsieur
Pontmercy, always love my beloved child. Cosette, this paper will be
found: this is what I wish to say to you; you shall see the figures if
I have the strength to remember them; but listen to me, the money is
really yours. This is the whole affair. White jet comes from Norway,
black jet comes from England, and black beads come from Germany. Jet
is lighter, more valuable, and dearer; but imitations can be made in
France as well as in Germany. You must have a small anvil two inches
square, and a spirit lamp to soften the wax. The wax used to be made
with resin and smoke-black, and costs four francs the pound; but I
hit on the idea of making it of gum-lac and turpentine. It only costs
thirty sous, and is much better. The rings are made of violet glass,
fastened by means of the wax on a small black iron wire. The glass must
be violet for iron ornaments, and black for gilt ornaments. Spain buys
large quantities; it is the country of jet---"

Here he stopped, the pen slipped from his fingers, he burst into one of
those despairing sobs which rose at times from the depths of his being.
The poor man took his head between his hands and thought.

"Oh!" he exclaimed internally (lamentable cries heard by God alone),
"it is all over. I shall never see her again; it is a smile which
flashed across me, and I am going to enter night without even seeing
her. Oh! for one moment, for one instant to hear her voice, to touch
her, to look at her,--her, the angel, and then die! Death is nothing,
but the frightful thing is to die without seeing her! She would smile
on me, say a word to me, and would that do any one harm? No, it is all
over forever. I am now all alone. My God! my God! I shall see her no
more."

At this moment there was a knock at his door.

CHAPTER IV.

A BOTTLE OF INK WHICH ONLY WHITENS.

That same day, or, to speak more correctly, that same evening, as
Marius was leaving the dinner-table to withdraw to his study, as he
had a brief to get up, Basque handed him a letter, saying, "The person
who wrote the letter is in the anteroom." Cosette had seized her
grandfather's arm, and was taking a turn round the garden. A letter may
have an ugly appearance, like a man, and the mere sight of coarse paper
and clumsy folding is displeasing. The letter which Basque brought was
of that description. Marius took it, and it smelt of tobacco. Nothing
arouses a recollection so much as a smell, and Marius recognized the
tobacco. He looked at the address, "To Monsieur le Baron Pommerci, At
his house." The recognized tobacco made him recognize the handwriting.
It might be said that astonishment has its flashes of lightning, and
Marius was, as it were, illumined by one of these flashes. The odor,
that mysterious aid to memory, had recalled to him a world: it was
really the paper, the mode of folding, the pale ink; it was really
the well-known handwriting; and, above all, it was the tobacco. The
Jondrette garret rose again before him. Hence--strange blow of
accident!--one of the two trails which he had so long sought, the
one for which he had latterly made so many efforts and believed lost
forever, came to offer itself voluntarily to him. He eagerly opened the
letter and read:--

"MONSIEUR LE BARON,--If the Supreme Being had endowed me with talents,
I might have been Baron Thénard, member of the Institute (academy of
ciences), but I am not so. I merely bear the same name with him, and
shall be happy if this reminisence recommends me to the excellense
of your kindness. The benefits with which you may honor me will
be reciprocal, for I am in possession of a secret conserning an
individual. This individual conserns you. I hold the secret at your
disposal, as I desire to have the honor of being uceful to you. I will
give you the simple means for expeling from your honorable family
this individual who has no right in it, Madam la Barronne being of
high birth. The sanctuary of virtue could no longer coabit with crime
without abdicating.

"I await in the anteroom the order of Monsieur le Baron.

"Respectfully."

The letter was signed "THÉNARD." This signature was not false, but only
slightly abridged. However, the bombast and the orthography completed
the revelation, the certificate of origin was perfect, and no doubt
was possible. Marius's emotion was profound; and after the movement
of surprise he had a movement of happiness. Let him now find the
other man he sought, the man who had saved him, Marius, and he would
have nothing more to desire. He opened a drawer in his bureau, took
out several bank-notes, which he put in his pocket, closed the drawer
again, and rang. Basque opened the door partly.

"Show the man in," said Marius.

Basque announced,--

"M. Thénard."

A man came in, and it was a fresh surprise for Marius, as the man he
now saw was a perfect stranger to him. This man, who was old, by the
way, had a large nose, his chin in his cravat, green spectacles, with
a double shade of green silk over his eyes, and his hair smoothed
down and flattened on his forehead over his eyebrows, like the wig of
English coachmen of high life. His hair was gray. He was dressed in
black from head to foot,--a very seedy but clean black,--and a bunch
of seals, emerging from his fob, led to the supposition that he had a
watch. He held an old hat in his hand, and walked bent, and the curve
in his back augmented the depth of his bow. The thing which struck most
at the first glance was that this person's coat, too large, though
carefully buttoned, had not been made for him. A short digression is
necessary here.

There was at that period in Paris, in an old house situated in the Rue
Beautreillis near the arsenal, an old Jew whose trade it was to convert
a rogue into an honest man, though not for too long a period, as it
might have been troublesome to the rogue. The change was effected at
sight, for one day or two, at the rate of thirty sous a day, by means
of a costume resembling as closely as possible every-day honesty. This
letter-out of suits was called the "exchange-broker." Parisian thieves
had given him that name, and knew him by no other. He had a very
complete wardrobe, and the clothes in which he invested people suited
almost every condition. He had specialties and categories: from each
nail of his store hung a social station, worn and threadbare; here the
magistrate's coat, there the curé's coat, and the banker's coat; in
one corner the coat of an officer on half pay, elsewhere the coat of a
man of letters, and further on the statesman's coat. This creature was
the costumer of the immense drama which roguery plays in Paris, and
his den was the side-scene from which robbery went out or swindling
re-entered. A ragged rogue arrived at this wardrobe, deposited thirty
sous, and selected, according to the part which he wished to play on
that day, the clothes which suited him; and, on going down the stairs
again, the rogue was somebody. The next day the clothes were faithfully
brought back, and the "exchange-broker," who entirely trusted to the
thieves, was never robbed. These garments had one inconvenience,--they
did not fit; not being made for the man who wore them, they were
tight on one, loose on another, and fitted nobody. Any swindler who
exceeded the average mean in height or shortness was uncomfortable in
the "exchange-broker's" suits. A man must be neither too stout nor too
thin, for the broker had only provided for ordinary mortals, and had
taken the measure of the species in the person of the first thief who
turned up, and is neither stout nor thin, nor tall nor short. Hence
arose at times difficult adaptations, which the broker's customers
got over as best they could. All the worse for the exceptions! The
statesman's garments, for instance, black from head to foot, would have
been too loose for Pitt and too tight for Castelcicala. The statesman's
suit was thus described in the broker's catalogue, from which we copied
it: "A black cloth coat, black moleskin trousers, a silk waistcoat,
boots, and white shirt." There was on the margin "Ex-Ambassador," and a
note which we also transcribe: "In a separate box a carefully-dressed
peruke, green spectacles, bunch of seals, and two little quills an
inch in length, wrapped in cotton." All this belonged to the statesman
or ex-ambassador. The whole of this costume was, if we may say so,
extenuated. The seams were white, and a small button-hole gaped at
one of the elbows; moreover, a button was missing off the front, but
that is only a detail, for as the hand of the statesman must always be
thrust into the coat, and upon the heart, it had the duty of hiding the
absence of the button.

Had Marius been familiar with the occult institutions of Paris, he
would at once have recognized in the back of the visitor whom Basque
had just shown in, the coat of the statesman borrowed from the
Unhook-me-that of the "exchange-broker." Marius's disappointment on
seeing a different man from the one whom he expected to enter, turned
into disgust with the new-comer. He examined him from head to foot,
while the personage was giving him an exaggerated bow, and asked him
curtly, "What do you want?"

The man replied with an amiable _rictus_, of which the caressing smile
of a crocodile would supply some idea:--

"It appears to me impossible that I have not already had the honor of
seeing Monsieur le Baron in society. I have a peculiar impression of
having met him a few years back at the Princess Bagration's, and in the
salons of his Excellency Vicomte Dambray, Peer of France."

It is always good tactics in swindling to pretend to recognize a person
whom the swindler does not know. Marius paid attention to the man's
words, he watched the action and movement, but his disappointment
increased; it was a nasal pronunciation, absolutely different from the
sharp dry voice he expected. He was utterly routed.

"I do not know," he said, "either Madame Bagration or Monsieur Dambray.
I never set foot in the house of either of them."

The answer was rough, but the personage continued with undiminished
affability,--

"Then it must have been at Chateaubriand's that I saw Monsieur! I know
Chateaubriand intimately, and he is a most affable man. He says to me
sometimes, Thénard, my good friend, will you not drink a glass with me?"

Marius's brow became sterner and sterner. "I never had the honor of
being received at M. de Chateaubriand's house. Come to the point; what
do you want with me?"

The man bowed lower still before this harsh voice.

"Monsieur le Baron, deign to listen to me. There is in America, in a
country near Panama, a village called La Joya, and this village is
composed of a single house. A large square house three stories high,
built of bricks dried in the sun, each side of the square being five
hundred feet long, and each story retiring from the one under it for
a distance of twelve feet, so as to leave in front of it a terrace
which runs all round the house. In the centre is an inner court, in
which provisions and ammunition are stored; there are no windows, only
loop-holes, no door, only ladders,--ladders to mount from the ground
to the first terrace, and from the first to the second, and from the
second to the third; ladders to descend into the inner court; no
doors to the rooms, only traps; no staircases to the apartments, only
ladders. At night the trap-doors are closed, the ladders are drawn up,
and blunderbusses and carbines are placed in the loop-holes; there is
no way of entering; it is a house by day, a citadel by night. Eight
hundred inhabitants,--such is this village. Why such precautions?
Because the country is dangerous, and full of man-eaters. Then, why do
people go there? Because it is a marvellous country, and gold is found
there."

"What are you driving at?" Marius, who had passed from disappointment
to impatience, interrupted.

"To this, M. le Baron. I am a worn-out ex-diplomatist. I am sick of our
old civilization, and wish to try the savages."

"What next?"

"Monsieur le Baron, egotism is the law of the world. The proletarian
peasant-wench who works by the day turns round when the diligence
passes, but the peasant-woman who is laboring on her own field does not
turn. The poor man's dog barks after the rich, the rich man's dog barks
after the poor; each for himself, and self-interest is the object of
mankind. Gold is the magnet."

"What next? Conclude."

"I should like to go and settle at La Joya. There are three of us. I
have my wife and my daughter, a very lovely girl. The voyage is long
and expensive, and I am short of funds."

"How does that concern me?" Marius asked.

The stranger thrust his neck out of his cravat, with a gesture peculiar
to the vulture, and said, with a more affable smile than before,--

"Monsieur le Baron cannot have read my letter?"

That was almost true, and the fact is that the contents of the epistle
had escaped Marius; he had seen the writing rather than read the
letter, and he scarce remembered it. A new hint had just been given
him, and he noticed the detail, "My wife and daughter." He fixed a
penetrating glance on the stranger,--a magistrate could not have done
it better,--but he confined himself to saying,--

"Be more precise."

The stranger thrust his hands in his trousers' pockets, raised his head
without straightening his backbone, but on his side scrutinizing Marius
through his green spectacles.

"Very good, M. le Baron, I will be precise. I have a secret to sell
you."

"Does it concern me?"

"Slightly."

"What is it?"

Marius more and more examined the man while listening.

"I will begin gratis," the stranger said; "you will soon see that it is
interesting."

"Speak."

"Monsieur le Baron, you have in your house a robber and an assassin."

Marius gave a start.

"In my house? No," he said.

The stranger imperturbably brushed his hat with his arm, and went on.

"An assassin and a robber. Remark, M. le Baron, that I am not speaking
here of old-forgotten facts, which might be effaced by prescription
before the law--by repentance before God. I am speaking of recent
facts, present facts, of facts still unknown to justice. I continue.
This man has crept into your confidence, and almost into your family,
under a false name. I am going to tell you his real name, and tell it
you for nothing."

"I am listening."

"His name is Jean Valjean."

"I know it."

"I will tell, equally for nothing, who he is." "Speak."

"He is an ex-convict."

"I know it."

"You have known it since I had the honor of telling you."

"No, I was aware of it before."

Marius's cold tone, this double reply, "I know it," and his stubborn
shortness in the conversation aroused some latent anger in the
stranger, and he gave Marius a furious side-glance, which was
immediately extinguished. Rapid though it was, the glance was one of
those which are recognized if they have once been seen, and it did not
escape Marius. Certain flashes can only come from certain souls; the
eyeball, that cellar-door of the soul, is lit up by them, and green
spectacles conceal nothing; you might as well put up a glass window to
hell. The stranger continued, smiling,--

"I will not venture to contradict M. le Baron, but in any case you will
see that I am well informed. Now, what I have to tell you is known to
myself alone, and it affects the fortune of Madame la Baronne. It is
an extraordinary secret, and is for sale. I offer it you first. Cheap!
twenty thousand francs."

"I know that secret as I know the other," said Marius.

The personage felt the necessity of lowering his price a little.

"Monsieur le Baron, let us say ten thousand francs, and I will speak."

"I repeat to you that you have nothing to tell me. I know what you want
to say to me."

There was a fresh flash in the man's eye, as he continued,--

"Still, I must dine to-day. It is an extraordinary secret, I tell you.
Monsieur, I am going to speak. I am speaking. Give me twenty francs."

Marius looked at him fixedly.

"I know your extraordinary secret, just as I knew Jean Valjean's name,
and as I know yours."

"My name?"

"Yes."

"That is not difficult, M. le Baron, for I had the honor of writing it
and mentioning it to you. Thénard--"

"--dier."

"What?"

"Thénardier."

"What does this mean?"

In danger the porcupine bristles, the beetle feigns death, the old
guard forms a square. This man began laughing. Then he flipped a grain
of dust off his coat-sleeve. Marius continued,--

"You are also the workman Jondrette, the actor Fabantou, the poet
Genflot, the Spanish Don Alvares, and Madame Balizard."

"Madame who?"

"And you once kept a pot-house at Montfermeil."

"A pot-house! Never."

"And I tell you that you are Thénardier."

"I deny it."

"And that you are a scoundrel. Take that."

And Marius, taking a bank-note from his pocket, threw it in his face.

"Five hundred francs! Monsieur le Baron!"

And the man, overwhelmed and bowing, clutched the note and examined it.

"Five hundred francs!" he continued, quite dazzled. And he stammered
half aloud, "No counterfeit;" then suddenly exclaimed, "Well, be it so.
Let us be at our ease."

And with monkey-like dexterity, throwing back his hair, tearing off his
spectacles, and removing the two quills to which we alluded just now,
and which we have seen before in another part of this book, he took
off his face as you or I take off our hat. His eye grew bright, the
forehead--uneven, gullied, scarred, hideously wrinkled at top--became
clear, the nose sharp as a beak, and the ferocious and shrewd profile
of the man of prey reappeared.

"Monsieur le Baron is infallible," he said in a sharp voice, from which
the nasal twang had entirely disappeared; "I am Thénardier."

And he straightened his curved back.

Thénardier--for it was really he--was strangely surprised, and would
have been troubled could he have been so. He had come to bring
astonishment, and it was himself who was astonished. This humiliation
was paid for with five hundred francs, and he accepted it; but he was
not the less stunned. He saw for the first time this Baron Pontmercy,
and in spite of his disguise this Baron Pontmercy recognized him, and
recognized him thoroughly; and not alone was this Baron acquainted
with Thénardier, but he also seemed acquainted with Jean Valjean. Who
wad this almost beardless young man, so cold and so generous; who knew
people's names, knew all their names, and opened his purse to them; who
bullied rogues like a judge, and paid them like a dupe? Thénardier,
it will be remembered, though he had been Marius's neighbor, had never
seen him, which is frequently the case in Paris. He had formerly
vaguely heard his daughter speak of a very poor young man of the name
of Marius, who lived in the house, and he had written him, without
knowing him, the letter we formerly read. No approximation between this
Marius and M. le Baron Pontmercy was possible in his mind. With regard
to the name of Pontmercy, we must recollect that on the battle-field
of Waterloo he had heard only the last two syllables, for which he had
always had the justifiable disdain which one is likely to have for what
is merely thanks.

However, he had managed through his daughter Azelma, whom he put on the
track of the married couple on February 16, and by his own researches,
to learn a good many things, and in his dark den had succeeded in
seizing more than one mysterious thread. He had by sheer industry
discovered, or at least by the inductive process had divined, who the
man was whom he had met on a certain day in the Great Sewer. From the
man he had easily arrived at the name, and he knew that Madame la
Baronne Pontmercy was Cosette. But on that point he intended to be
discreet. Who Cosette was he did not know exactly himself. He certainly
got a glimpse of some bastardism, and Fantine's story had always
appeared to him doubtful. But what was the good of speaking,--to have
his silence paid? He had, or fancied he had, something better to sell
than that; and according to all expectation, to go and make to Baron
Pontmercy, without further proof, the revelation, "Your wife is only a
bastard," would only have succeeded in attracting the husbands boot to
the broadest part of his person.

In Thénardier's thoughts the conversation with Marius had not yet
begun; he had been obliged to fall back, modify his strategy, leave a
position, and make a change of front; but nothing essential was as yet
compromised, and he had five hundred francs in his pocket. Moreover, he
had something decisive to tell, and he felt himself strong even against
this Baron Pontmercy, who was so well-informed and so well-armed. For
men of Thénardier's nature every dialogue is a combat, and what was his
situation in the one which was about to begin? He did not know to whom
he was speaking, but he knew of what he was speaking. He rapidly made
this mental review of his forces, and after saying, "I am Thénardier,"
waited. Marius was in deep thought; he at length held Thénardier, and
the man whom he had so eagerly desired to find again was before him.
He would be able at last to honor Colonel Pontmercy's recommendation.
It humiliated him that this hero owed anything to this bandit, and
that the bill of exchange drawn by his father from the tomb upon him,
Marius, had remained up to this day protested. It seemed to him, too,
in the complex state of his mind as regarded Thénardier, that he was
bound to avenge the Colonel for the misfortune of having been saved
by such a villain. But, however this might be, he was satisfied; he
was at length going to free the Colonel's shadow from this unworthy
creditor, and felt as if he were releasing his fathers memory from a
debtor's prison. By the side of this duty he had another, clearing up
if possible the source of Cosette's fortune. The opportunity appeared
to present itself, for Thénardier probably knew something, and it might
be useful to see to the bottom of this man; so he began with that.
Thénardier put away the "no counterfeit" carefully in his pocket, and
looked at Marius with almost tender gentleness. Marius was the first to
break the silence.

"Thénardier, I have told you your name, and now do you wish me to
tell you the secret which you have come to impart to me? I have my
information also, and you shall see that I know more than you do. Jean
Valjean, as you said, is an assassin and a robber. A robber, because he
plundered a rich manufacturer, M. Madeleine, whose ruin he caused: an
assassin, because he murdered Inspector Javert."

"I do not understand you, M. le Baron," said Thénardier.

"I will make you understand; listen. There was in the Pas de Calais
district, about the year 1822, a man who had been in some trouble
with the authorities, and who had rehabilitated and restored himself
under the name of Monsieur Madeleine. This man had become, in the
fullest extent of the term, a just man, and he made the fortune of an
entire town by a trade, the manufacture of black beads. As for his
private fortune, he had made that too, but secondarily, and to some
extent as occasion offered. He was the foster-father of the poor, he
founded hospitals, opened schools, visited the sick, dowered girls,
supported widows, adopted orphans, and was, as it were, guardian of the
town. He had refused the cross, and was appointed mayor. A liberated
convict knew the secret of a penalty formerly incurred by this man;
he denounced and had him arrested, and took advantage of the arrest
to come to Paris and draw out of Laffitte's--I have the facts from
the cashier himself--by means of a false signature, a sum of half
a million and more, which belonged to M. Madeleine. The convict who
robbed M. Madeleine was Jean Valjean; as for the other fact, you can
tell me no more than I know either. Jean Valjean killed Inspector
Javert with a pistol-shot, and I, who am speaking to you, was present."

Thénardier gave Marius the sovereign glance of a beaten man who sets
his hand again on the victory, and has regained in a minute all the
ground he had lost. But the smile at once returned, for the inferior,
when in presence of his superior, must keep his triumph to himself, and
Thénardier confined himself to saying to Marius,--

"Monsieur le Baron, we are on the wrong track."

And he underlined this sentence by giving his bunch of seals an
expressive twirl.

"What!" Marius replied, "do you dispute it? They are facts."

"They are chimeras. The confidence with which Monsieur le Baron honors
me makes it my duty to tell him so. Before all, truth and justice, and
I do not like to see people accused wrongfully. Monsieur le Baron,
Jean Valjean did not rob M. Madeleine, and Jean Valjean did not kill
Javert."

"That is rather strong. Why not?"

"For two reasons."

"What are they? Speak."

"The first is this: he did not rob M. Madeleine, because Jean Valjean
himself is M. Madeleine."

"What nonsense are you talking?"

"And this is the second: he did not assassinate Javert, because the man
who killed Javert was Javert."

"What do you mean?"

"That Javert committed suicide."

"Prove it, prove it!" Marius cried wildly.

Thénardier repeated slowly, scanning his sentence after the fashion of
an ancient Alexandrian,--

"Police-Agent-Javert-was-found-drowned-un-der-a boat-at-Pont-au-Change."

"But prove it, then."

Thénardier drew from his side-pocket a large gray paper parcel which
seemed to contain folded papers of various sizes.

"I have my proofs," he said calmly, and he added: "Monsieur le Baron,
I wished to know Jean Valjean thoroughly on your behalf. I say that
Jean Valjean and Madeleine are the same, and I say that Javert had no
other assassin but Javert; and when I say this, I have the proofs,
not manuscript proofs, for writing is suspicious and complaisant, but
printed proofs."

While speaking, Thénardier extracted from the parcel two newspapers,
yellow, faded, and tremendously saturated with tobacco. One of these
two papers, broken in all the folds, and falling in square rags,
seemed much older than the other.

"Two facts, two proofs," said Thénardier, as he handed Marius the two
open newspapers.

These two papers the reader knows; one, the older, a number of the
_Drapeau Blanc_, for July 25, 1823, of which the exact text was given
in the second volume of this work, established the identity of M.
Madeleine and Jean Valjean. The other, a _Moniteur_, of June 15,
1832, announced the suicide of Javert, adding that it was found, from
a verbal report made by Javert to the Préfet, that he had been made
prisoner at the barricade of the Rue de la Chanvrerie, and owed his
life to the magnanimity of an insurgent, who, when holding him under
his pistol, instead of blowing out his brains, fired in the air. Marius
read; there was evidence, a certain date, irrefragable proof, for these
two papers had not been printed expressly to support Thénardier's
statement, and the note published in the _Moniteur_ was officially
communicated by the Préfecture of Police. Marius could no longer doubt;
the cashier's information was false, and he was himself mistaken. Jean
Valjean, suddenly growing great, issued from the cloud, and Marius
could not restrain a cry of joy.

"What, then, this poor fellow is an admirable man! All this fortune is
really his! He is Madeleine, the providence of an entire town! He is
Jean Valjean, the savior of Javert! He is a hero! He is a saint!"

"He is not a saint, and he is not a hero," said Thénadier; "he is
an assassin and a robber." And he added with the accent of a man
beginning to feel himself possessed of some authority, "Let us calm
ourselves."

Robber, assassin,--those words which Marius believed had disappeared,
and which had returned, fell upon him like a cold shower-bath.
"Still--" he said.

"Still," said Thénardier, "Jean Valjean did not rob M. Madeleine, but
he is a robber; he did not assassinate Javert, but he is an assassin."

"Are you alluding," Marius continued, "to that wretched theft committed
forty years back, and expiated, as is proved from those very papers, by
a whole life of repentance, self-denial, and virtue?"

"I say assassination and robbery, M. le Baron, and repeat that I am
alluding to recent facts. What I have to reveal to you is perfectly
unknown and unpublished, and you may perhaps find in it the source of
the fortune cleverly offered by Jean Valjean to Madame la Baronne. I
say cleverly, for it would not be a stupid act, by a donation of that
nature, to step into an honorable house, whose comforts he would share,
and at the same time hide the crime, enjoy his robbery, bury his name,
and create a family."

"I could interrupt you here," Marius observed, "but go on."

"Monsieur le Baron, I will tell you all, leaving the reward to your
generosity, for the secret is worth its weight in gold. You will say to
me, 'Why not apply to Jean Valjean?' For a very simple reason. I know
that he has given up all his property in your favor, and I consider
the combination ingenious; but he has not a halfpenny left; he would
show me his empty hands, and as I want money for my voyage to La Joya,
I prefer you, who have everything, to him, who has nothing. As I am
rather fatigued, permit me to take a chair."

Marius sat down, and made him a sign to do the same. Thénardier
installed himself in an easy-chair, took up the newspapers, put them
back in the parcel, and muttered as he dug his nail into the _Drapeau
Blanc_, "It cost me a deal of trouble to procure this." This done, he
crossed his legs, threw himself in the chair in the attitude of men
who are certain of what they are stating, and then began his narrative
gravely, and laying a stress on his words:--

"Monsieur le Baron, on June 6, 1832, about a year ago, and on the day
of the riots, a man was in the Great Sewer of Paris, at the point where
the sewer falls into the Seine between the Pont des Invalides and the
Pont de Jéna."

Marius hurriedly drew his chair closer to Thénardier's. Thénardier
noticed this movement, and continued with the slowness of an orator who
holds his hearer, and feels his adversary quivering under his words:--

"This man, forced to hide himself, for reasons, however, unconnected
with politics, had selected the sewer as his domicile, and had the key
of it. It was, I repeat, June 6, and about eight in the evening the man
heard a noise in the sewer; feeling greatly surprised, he concealed
himself and watched. It was a sound of footsteps; some one was walking
in the darkness, and coming in his direction; strange to say, there was
another man beside himself in the sewer. As the outlet of the sewer
was no great distance off, a little light which passed through enabled
him to see the new-comer, and that he was carrying something on his
back. He walked in a stooping posture; he was an ex-convict, and what
he had on his shoulders was a corpse. A flagrant case of assassination,
if there ever was one; as for the robbery, that is a matter of course,
for no one kills a man gratis. This convict was going to throw the body
into the river, and a fact worth notice is, that, before reaching the
outlet, the convict, who had come a long way through the sewer, was
obliged to pass a frightful hole, in which it seems as if he might have
left the corpse; but the sewer-men who came to effect the repairs next
day would have found the murdered man there, and that did not suit the
assassin. Hence he preferred carrying the corpse across the slough,
and his efforts must have been frightful; it was impossible to risk
one's life more perfectly, and I do not understand how he got out of it
alive."

Marius's chair came nearer, and Thénardier took advantage of it to draw
a long breath; then he continued:---

"Monsieur le Baron, a sewer is not the Champ de Mars; everything is
wanting there, even space, and when two men are in it together they
must meet. This happened, and the domiciled man and the passer-by were
compelled to bid each other good-evening, to their mutual regret. The
passer-by said to the domiciled man, 'You see what I have on my back.
I must go out; you have the key, so give it to me.' This convict was
a man of terrible strength, and there was no chance of refusing him;
still, the man who held the key parleyed, solely to gain time. He
examined the dead man, but could see nothing, except that he was young,
well dressed, had a rich look, and was quite disfigured with blood.
While talking, he managed to tear off, without the murderer perceiving
it, a piece of the skirt of the victim's coat, as a convincing proof,
you understand, a means of getting on the track of the affair, and
bringing the crime home to the criminal. He placed the piece of cloth
in his pocket; after which he opened the grating, allowed the man with
the load on his back to go out, locked the grating again, and ran
away, not feeling at all desirous to be mixed up any further in the
adventure, or to be present when the assassin threw the corpse into
the river. You now understand: the man who carried the corpse was Jean
Valjean; the one who had the key is speaking to you at this moment, and
the piece of coat-skirt--"

Thénardier completed the sentence by drawing from his pocket and
holding level with his eyes a ragged piece of black cloth all covered
with dark spots. Marius had risen, pale, scarce breathing, with his
eye fixed on the black patch, and, without uttering a syllable, or
without taking his eyes off the rag, he fell back, and, with his right
hand extended behind him, felt for the key of a wall-cupboard near
the mantel-piece. He found this key, opened the cupboard, and thrust
in his hand without looking or once taking his eyes off the rag which
Thénardier displayed. In the mean while Thénardier continued,--

"Monsieur le Baron, I have the strongest grounds for believing that
the assassinated young man was a wealthy foreigner, drawn by Jean
Valjean into a trap, and carrying an enormous sum about him."

"I was the young man, and here is the coat!" cried Marius, as he threw
on the floor an old black coat all covered with blood. Then, taking the
patch from Thénardier's hands, he bent over the coat and put it in its
place in the skirt; the rent fitted exactly, and the fragment completed
the coat Thénardier was petrified, and thought, "I'm sold." Marius drew
himself up, shuddering, desperate, and radiant; he felt in his pocket,
and walking furiously towards Thénardier, thrusting almost into his
face his hand full of five hundred and thousand franc notes,--

"You are an infamous wretch! You are a liar, a calumniator, and a
villain! You came to accuse that man, and you have justified him; you
came to ruin him, and have only succeeded in glorifying him. And it
is you who are the robber! It is you who are an assassin! I saw you,
Thénardier--Jondrette, at that den on the Boulevard de l'Hôpital. I
know enough about you to send you to the galleys, and even farther if I
liked. There are a thousand francs, ruffian that you are!"

And he threw a thousand-franc note at Thénardier.

"Ah! Jondrette--Thénardier, vile scoundrel, let this serve you as a
lesson, you hawker of secrets, you dealer in mysteries, you searcher in
the darkness, you villain, take these five hundred francs, and be off.
Waterloo protects you."

"Waterloo!" Thénardier growled, as he pocketed the five hundred francs.

"Yes, assassin! You saved there the life of a colonel."

"A general!" Thénardier said, raising his head.

"A colonel!" Marius repeated furiously. "I would not give a farthing
for a general. And you come here to commit an infamy! I tell you that
you have committed every crime! Begone! Disappear! Be happy, that is
all I desire. Ah, monster! Here are three thousand francs more: take
them. You will start to-morrow for America with your daughter, for your
wife is dead, you abominable liar! I will watch over your departure,
bandit, and at the moment when you set sail, pay you twenty thousand
francs. Go and get hanged elsewhere."

"Monsieur le Baron," Thénardier answered, bowing to the ground, "accept
my eternal gratitude."

And Thénardier left the room, understanding nothing of all this, but
stupefied and ravished by this sweet crushing under bags of gold, and
this lightning flashing over his head in the shape of bank-notes. Let
us finish at once with this man: two days after the events we have just
recorded he started for America, under a false name, with his daughter
Azelma, and provided with an order on a New York banker for twenty
thousand francs. The moral destitution of Thénardier, the spoiled
bourgeois, was irremediable, and he was in America what he had been in
Europe. The contact with a wicked man is sometimes sufficient to rot
a good action, and to make something bad issue from it: with Marius's
money Thénardier turned slave dealer.

So soon as Thénardier had departed, Marius ran into the garden where
Cosette was still walking.

"Cosette, Cosette!" he cried, "come, come quickly, let us be off!
Basque, a hackney coach! Cosette, come! Oh, heavens! It was he who
saved my life! Let us not lose a minute! Put on your shawl."

Cosette thought him mad, and obeyed. He could not breathe, and laid
his hand on his heart to check its beating. He walked up and down with
long strides, and embraced Cosette. "Oh, Cosette!" he said, "I am a
wretch." Marius was amazed, for he was beginning to catch a glimpse
of some strange, lofty, and sombre figure in this Jean Valjean. An
extraordinary virtue appeared to him, supreme and gentle, and humble in
its immensity, and the convict was transfigured into Christ. Marius was
dazzled by this prodigy, and though he knew not exactly what he saw,
it was grand. In an instant the hackney coach was at the gate. Marius
helped Cosette in, and followed her.

"Driver," he cried, "No. 7, Rue de l'Homme Armé."

"Oh, how glad I am!" said Cosette. "Rue de l'Homme Armé; I did not dare
speak to you about Monsieur Jean, but we are going to see him."

"Your father, Cosette! your father more than ever. Cosette, I see it
all. You told me that you never received the letter I sent you by
Gavroche. It must have fallen into his hands, Cosette, and he came to
the barricade to save me. As it is his sole duty to be an angel, in
passing he saved others: he saved Javert. He drew me out of that gulf
to give me to you; he carried me on his back through that frightful
sewer. Ah! I am a monstrous ingrate! Cosette, after having been your
providence, he was mine. Just imagine that there was a horrible pit, in
which a man could be drowned a hundred times, drowned in mud, Cosette;
and he carried me through it. I had feinted; I saw nothing, I heard
nothing, I could not know anything about my own adventures. We are
going to bring him back with us, and whether he is willing or not he
shall never leave us again. I only hope he is at home! I only hope we
shall find him! I will spend the rest of my life in revering him. Yes,
it must have been so, Cosette, and Gavroche must have given him my
letter. That explains everything. You understand."

Cosette did not understand a word.

"You are right," she said to him.

In the mean while the hackney coach rolled along.

CHAPTER V.

A NIGHT BEHIND WHICH IS DAY.

At the knock he heard at his door Jean Valjean turned round.

"Come in," he said feebly.

The door opened, and Cosette and Marius appeared. Cosette rushed
into the room. Marius remained on the threshold, leaning against the
doorpost.

"Cosette!" said Jean Valjean, and he sat up in his chair, with his arms
outstretched and opened, haggard, livid, and sinister, but with an
immense joy in his eyes. Cosette, suffocated with emotion, fell on Jean
Valjean's breast.

"Father!" she said.

Jean Valjean, utterly overcome, stammered, "Cosette! She--you--Madame!
It is thou! Oh, my God!"

And clasped in Cosette's arms, he exclaimed,--

"It is you! You are here; you forgive me, then!"

Marius, drooping his eyelids to keep his tears from flowing, advanced a
step, and muttered between his lips, which were convulsively clenched
to stop his sobs,--

"Father!"

"And you too, you forgive me!" said Jean Valjean.

Marius could not find a word to say, and Jean Valjean added, "Thank
you." Cosette took off her shawl, and threw her bonnet on the bed.

"It is in my way," she said.

And sitting down on the old man's knees, she parted his gray hair with
an adorable movement, and kissed his forehead. Jean Valjean, who was
wandering, let her do so. Cosette, who only comprehended very vaguely,
redoubled her caresses, as if she wished to pay Marius's debt, and Jean
Valjean stammered,--

"How foolish a man can be! I fancied that I should not see her again.
Just imagine, Monsieur Pontmercy, that at the very moment when you came
in I was saying, 'It is all over.' There is her little dress. 'I am a
wretched man, I shall not see Cosette again,' I was saying at the very
moment when you were coming up the stairs. What an idiot I was! A man
can be as idiotic as that! But people count without the good God, who
says, 'You imagine that you are going to be abandoned; no, things will
not happen like that. Down below there is a poor old fellow who has
need of an angel.' And the angel comes, and he sees Cosette again, and
he sees his little Cosette again. Oh, I was very unhappy!"

For a moment he was unable to speak; then he went on,--

"I really wanted to see Cosette for a little while every now and then,
for a heart requires a bone to gnaw. Still, I knew well that I was
in the way. I said to myself, 'They do not want you, so stop in your
corner; a man has no right to pay everlasting visits,' Ah, blessed be
God! I see her again. Do you know, Cosette, that your husband is very
handsome? What a pretty embroidered collar you are wearing; I like that
pattern. Your husband chose it, did he not? And then, you will need
cashmere shawls. Monsieur Pontmercy, let me call her Cosette, it will
not be for long."

And Cosette replied,--

"How unkind to have left us like that! Where have you been to? Why
were you away so long? Formerly your absences did not last over three
or four days. I sent Nicolette, and the answer always was, 'He has not
returned.' When did you get back? Why did you not let us know? Are you
aware that you are greatly changed? Oh, naughty papa, he has been ill,
and we did not know it. Here, Marius, feel how cold his hand is!"

"So you are here! So you forgive me, Monsieur Pontmercy?" Jean Valjean
repeated.

At this remark, all that was swelling in Marius's heart found a vent,
and he burst forth,--

"Do you hear, Cosette? He asks my pardon. And do you know what he did
for me, Cosette? He saved my life; he did more, he gave you to me, and,
after saving me, and after giving you to me, Cosette, what did he do
for himself? He sacrificed himself. That is the man. And to me, who
am so ungrateful, so pitiless, so forgetful, and so guilty, he says,
'Thank you!' Cosette, my whole life spent at this man's feet would be
too little. That barricade, that sewer, that furnace, that pit,--he
went through them all for me and for you, Cosette! He carried me
through every form of death, which he held at bay from me and accepted
for himself. This man possesses every courage, every virtue, every
heroism, and every holiness, and he is an angel, Cosette!"

"Stop, stop!" Jean Valjean said in a whisper; "why talk in that way?"

"But why did you not tell me of it?" exclaimed Marius, with a passion
in which was veneration; "it is your fault also. You save people's
lives, and conceal the fact from them! You do more; under the pretext
of unmasking yourself, you calumniate yourself. It is frightful!"

"I told the truth," Jean Valjean replied.

"No!" Marius retorted, "the truth is the whole truth, and you did not
tell that. You were Monsieur Madeleine; why not tell me so? You saved
Javert; why not tell me so? I owed you my life; why not tell me so?"

"Because I thought like you, and found that you were right. It was
necessary that I should leave you. Had you known of the sewer, you
would have compelled me to remain with you, and hence I held my tongue.
Had I spoken, I should have been in the way."

"Been in the way of whom,--of what?" Marius broke out. "Do you fancy
that you are going to remain here? We mean to take you back with us.
Oh, good heaven! when I think that I only learned all this by accident!
We shall take you away with us, for you form a part of ourselves.
You are her father and mine. You shall not spend another day in this
frightful house, so do not fancy you will be here to-morrow."

"To-morrow," said Jean Valjean, "I shall be no longer here; but I shall
not be at your house."

"What do you mean?" Marius asked. "Oh, no! we shall not let you travel
any more. You shall not leave us again, for you belong to us, and we
will not let you go."

"This time it is for good," Cosette added. "We have a carriage below,
and I mean to carry you off; if necessary, I shall employ force."

And laughing, she feigned to raise the old man in her arms.

"Your room is still all ready in our house," she went on. "If you
only knew how pretty the garden is just at present! The azaleas are
getting on splendidly; the walks are covered with river sand, and there
are little violet shells. You shall eat my strawberries, for it is I
who water them. And no more Madame and no more Monsieur Jean, for we
live in a republic, do we not, Marius? The programme is changed. If
you only knew, father, what a sorrow I had; a redbreast had made its
nest in a hole in the wall, and a horrible cat killed it for me. My
poor, pretty little redbreast, that used to thrust its head out of its
window and look at me! I cried at it, and could have killed the cat!
But now, nobody weeps, everybody laughs, everybody is happy. You will
come with us; how pleased grandfather will be! You will have your bed
in the garden, you will cultivate it, and we will see whether your
strawberries are as fine as mine. And then, I will do all you wish, and
you will obey me."

Jean Valjean listened without hearing; he heard the music of her voice
rather than the meaning of her words, and one of those heavy tears,
which are the black pearls of the soul, slowly collected in his eye. He
murmured,--

"The proof that God is good is that she is here."

"My father!" said Cosette.

Jean Valjean continued,--

"It is true it would be charming to live together. They have their
trees full of birds, and I should walk about with Cosette. It is sweet
to be with persons who live, who say to each other good-morning, and
call each other in the garden. We should each cultivate a little bed;
she would give me her strawberries to eat, and I would let her pick my
roses. It would be delicious, but--"

He broke off, and said gently, "It is a pity!"

The tear did not fall, it was recalled, and Jean Valjean substituted a
smile for it. Cosette took both the old man's hands in hers.

"Good Heaven!" she said, "your hands have grown colder. Can you be ill?
Are you suffering?"

"I--no," Jean Valjean replied, "I am quite well. It is only--" He
stopped.

"Only what?"

"I am going to die directly."

Marius and Cosette shuddered.

"Die!" Marius exclaimed.

"Yes; but that is nothing," said Jean Valjean.

He breathed, smiled, and added,--

"Cosette, you were talking to me; go on, speak again. Your redbreast is
dead, then? Speak, that I may hear your voice."

Marius, who was petrified, looked at the old man, and Cosette uttered a
piercing shriek.

"Father, father, you will live! You are going to live. I insist on your
living, do you hear?"

Jean Valjean raised his head to her with adoration.

"Oh, yes, forbid me dying. Who knows? Perhaps I shall obey. I was on
the road to death when you arrived, but that stopped me. I fancied I
was coming to life again."

"You are full of strength and life," Marius exclaimed; "can you suppose
that a man dies like that? You have known grief, but you shall know no
more. It is I who ask pardon of you, and on my knees! You are going to
live, and live with us, and live a long time. We will take you with us,
and shall have henceforth but one thought, your happiness!"

"You hear," said Cosette, who was all in tears. "Marius says that you
will not die."

Jean Valjean continued to smile.

"Even if you were to take me home with you, Monsieur Pontmercy, would
that prevent me being what I am? No. God has thought the same as you
and I, and he does not alter his opinion. It is better for me to be
gone. Death is an excellent arrangement, and God knows better than we
do what we want. I am certain that it is right, that you should be
happy, that Monsieur Pontmercy should have Cosette, that youth should
espouse the dawn, that there should be around you, my children, lilacs
and nightingales, that your life should be a lawn bathed in sunlight,
that all the enchantments of Heaven should fill your souls, and that I
who am good for nothing should now die. Come, be reasonable; nothing
is possible now, and I fully feel that all is over. An hour ago I had
a fainting-fit, and last night I drank the whole of that jug of water.
How kind your husband is, Cosette! You are much better with him than
with me!"

There was a noise at the door; it was the physician come to pay his
visit.

"Good-day, and good-by, doctor," said Jean Valjean; "here are my poor
children."

Marius went up to the physician, and addressed but one word to him,
"Sir?"--but in the manner of pronouncing it there was a whole question.
The physician answered the question by an expressive glance.

"Because things are unpleasant," said Jean Valjean, "that is no reason
to be unjust to God."

There was a silence, and every breast was oppressed. Jean Valjean
turned to Cosette, and began contemplating her, as if he wished to take
the glance with him into eternity. In the deep shadow into which he had
already sunk ecstasy was still possible for him in gazing at Cosette.
The reflection of her sweet countenance illumined his pale face, for
the sepulchre may have its brilliancy. The physician felt his pulse.

"Ah, it was you that he wanted," he said, looking at Marius and
Cosette.

And bending down to Marius's ear, he whispered, "Too late!"

Jean Valjean, almost without ceasing to regard Cosette, looked at
Marius and the physician with serenity, and the scarcely articulated
words could be heard passing his lips.

"It is nothing to die, but it is frightful not to live."

All at once he rose; such return of strength is at times a sequel of
the death-agony. He walked with a firm step to the wall, thrust aside
Marius and the doctor, who wished to help him, detached from the wall
the small copper crucifix hanging on it, returned to his seat with all
the vigor of full health, and said, as he laid the crucifix on the
table,--

"There is the great Martyr."

Then his chest sank in, his head vacillated, as if the intoxication of
the tomb were seizing on him, and his hands, lying on his knees, began
pulling at the cloth of his trousers. Cosette supported his shoulders,
and sobbed, and tried to speak to him, but was unable to do so. Through
the words mingled with that lugubrious saliva which accompanies tears,
such sentences as this could be distinguished: "Father, do not leave
us. Is it possible that we have only found you again to lose you?" It
might be said that the death-agony moves like a serpent; it comes,
goes, advances toward the grave, and then turns back toward life; there
is groping in the action of death. Jean Valjean, after this partial
syncope, rallied, shook his forehead as if to make the darkness fall
off it, and became again almost lucid. He caught hold of Cosette's
sleeve and kissed it.

"He is recovering, doctor, he is recovering," Marius cried.

"You are both good," said Jean Valjean, "and I am going to tell you
what causes me sorrow. It causes me sorrow, Monsieur Pontmercy, that
you have refused to touch that money; but it is really your wife's. I
will explain to you, my children, and that is why I am so glad to see
you. Black jet comes from England, and white jet from Norway; it is all
in that paper there, which you will read. I invented the substitution
of rolled-up snaps for welded snaps in bracelets; they are prettier,
better, and not so dear. You can understand what money can be earned by
it; so Cosette's fortune is really hers. I give you these details that
your mind may be at rest!"

The porter's wife had come up, and was peeping through the open door;
the physician sent her off, but could not prevent the zealous old woman
shouting to the dying man before she went,--

"Will you have a priest?"

"I have one," Jean Valjean answered.

And he seemed to point with his finger to a spot over his head, where
it seemed as if he saw some one; it is probable, in truth, that the
Bishop was present at this death-scene. Cosette gently placed a pillow
behind Jean Valjean's loins, and he continued,--

"Monsieur Pontmercy, have no fears, I conjure you. The six hundred
thousand francs are really Cosette's! I should have thrown away my
life if you did not enjoy them! We had succeeded in making those beads
famously, and we competed with what is called Berlin jewelry. For
instance, the black beads of Germany cannot be equalled; for a gross,
which contains twelve hundred well-cut beads, only costs three francs."

When a being who is dear to us is about to die, we regard him with a
gaze which grapples him, and would like to retain him. Cosette and
Marius stood before him hand in hand, dumb through agony, not knowing
what to say to death, despairing and trembling. With each moment
Jean Valjean declined and approached nearer to the dark horizon. His
breathing had become intermittent, and a slight rattle impeded it.
He had a difficulty in moving his fore-arm, his feet had lost all
movement, and at the same time, as the helplessness of the limbs and
the exhaustion of the body increased, all the majesty of the soul
ascended and was displayed on his forehead. The light of the unknown
world was already visible in his eyeballs. His face grew livid and
at the same time smiling; life was no longer there, but there was
something else. His breath stopped, but his glance expanded; he was a
corpse on whom wings could be seen. He made Cosette a sign to approach,
and then Marius; it was evidently the last minute of the last hour, and
he began speaking to them in so faint a voice that it seemed to come
from a distance, and it was as if there were a wall between them and
him.

"Come hither, both of you; I love you dearly. Oh, how pleasant it is
to die like this! You too love me, my Cosette; I felt certain that you
had always a fondness for the poor old man. How kind it was of you
to place that pillow under my loins! You will weep for me a little,
will you not? But not too much, for I do not wish you to feel real
sorrow. You must amuse yourselves a great deal, my children. I forgot
to tell you that more profit was made on the buckles without tongues
than on all the rest; the gross cost two francs to produce, and sold
for sixty. It was really a good trade, so you must not feel surprised
at the six hundred thousand francs, Monsieur Pontmercy. It is honest
money. You can be rich without any fear. You must have a carriage, now
and then a box at the opera, handsome ball-dresses, my Cosette, and
give good dinners to your friends, and be very happy. I was writing
just now to Cosette. She will find my letter. To her I leave the two
candlesticks on the mantel-piece. They are silver, but to me they are
made of gold, of diamonds; they change the candles placed in them into
consecrated tapers. I know not whether the man who gave them to me is
satisfied with me above, but I have done what I could. My children,
you will not forget that I am a poor man, you will have me buried in
some corner with a stone to mark the spot. That is my wish. No name
on the stone. If Cosette comes to see it now and then, it will cause
me pleasure. And you, too, Monsieur Pontmercy. I must confess to you
that I did not always like you, and I ask your forgiveness. Now, she
and you are only one for me. I am very grateful to you, for I feel
that you render Cosette happy. If you only knew, Monsieur Pontmercy;
her pretty pink cheeks were my joy, and when I saw her at all pale, I
was miserable. There is in the chest of drawers a five-hundred-franc
note. I have not touched it; it is for the poor, Cosette. Do you see
your little dress there on the bed? Do you recognize it? And yet it was
only ten years ago! How time passes! We have been very happy, and it
is all over. Do not weep, my children; I am not going very far, and I
shall see you from there. You will only have to look when it is dark,
and you will see me smile. Cosette, do you remember Montfermeil? You
were in the wood and very frightened: do you remember when I took the
bucket-handle? It was the first time I touched your pretty little hand.
It was so cold. Ah, you had red hands in those days, Miss, but now they
are very white. And the large doll? Do you remember? You christened
it Catherine, and were sorry that you did not take it with you to the
convent. How many times you have made me laugh, my sweet angel! When it
had rained, you used to set straws floating in the gutter, and watched
them go. One day I gave you a wicker battledore and a shuttlecock with
yellow, blue, and green feathers. You have forgotten it. You were so
merry when a little girl. You used to play. You would put cherries
in your ears. All these are things of the past. The forests through
which one has passed with one's child, the trees under which we have
walked, the convent in which we hid, the sports, the hearty laughter of
childhood, are shadows. I imagined that all this belonged to me, and
that was my stupidity. Those Thénardiers were very wicked, but we must
forgive them. Cosette, the moment has arrived to tell you your mother's
name. It was Fantine. Remember this name,--Fantine. Fall on your knees
every time that you pronounce it. She suffered terribly. She loved you
dearly. She knew as much misery as you have known happiness. Such are
the distributions of God. He is above. He sees us all, and he knows all
that he does, amid his great stars. I am going away, my children. Love
each other dearly and always. There is no other thing in the world but
that: love one another. You will sometimes think of the poor old man
who died here. Ah, my Cosette, it is not my fault that I did not see
you every day, for it broke my heart. I went as far as the corner of
the street, and must have produced a funny effect on the people who saw
me pass, for I was like a madman, and even went out without my hat. My
children, I can no longer see very clearly. I had several things to say
to you, but no matter. Think of me a little. You are blessed beings. I
know not what is the matter with me, but I see light. Come hither. I
die happy. Let me lay my hands on your beloved heads."

Cosette and Marius fell on their knees, heartbroken and choked with
sobs, each under one of Jean Valjean's hands. These august hands did
not move again. He had fallen back, and the light from the two candles
illumined him: his white face looked up to heaven, and he let Cosette
and Marius cover his hands with kisses.

He was dead.

The night was starless and intensely dark; doubtless some immense angel
was standing in the gloom, with outstretched wings, waiting for the
soul.

CHAPTER VI.

THE GRASS HIDES, AND THE RAIN EFFACES.

There is at the cemetery of Père-Lachaise, in the vicinity of the poor
side, far from the elegant quarter of this city of sepulchres, far
from those fantastic tombs which display in the presence of eternity
the hideous fashions of death, in a deserted corner near an old wall,
under a yew up which bind-weed climbs, and amid couch-grass and moss,
a tombstone. This stone is no more exempt than the others from the
results of time, from mildew, lichen, and the deposits of birds.
Water turns it green and the atmosphere blackens it. It is not in the
vicinity of any path, and people do not care to visit that part because
the grass is tall and they get their feet wet. When there is a little
sunshine the lizards disport on it; there is all around a rustling of
wild oats, and in spring linnets sing on the trees. This tombstone is
quite bare. In cutting it, only the necessities of the tomb were taken
into consideration; no further care was taken than to make the stone
long enough and narrow enough to cover a man.

No name can be read on it.

Many, many years ago, however, a hand wrote on it in pencil these
lines, which became almost illegible through rain and dust, and which
are probably effaced at the present day:--

    "Il dort. Quoique le sort fût pour lui bien étrange,
    Il vivait. Il mourut quand il n'eut pas son ange;
    La chose simplement d'elle-même arriva,
    Comme la nuit se fait lorsque le jour s'en va."

THE END.