{"chapter_no":"34","chapter_title":"The Unpleasantness of Receiving Into One's House A Poor Man Who May be a Rich Man","book_id":"3","book_name":"Springville","subchapter_no":"0","page_no":"538","page_number":"1","verses_count":0,"total_pages":15,"page_content":"

 <\/p>

Chapter 34<\/p>

The Unpleasantness of Receiving Into One's<\/h1><\/p>

House A Poor Man Who May be a Rich Man<\/p>

 <\/p>

The story of the young Cosette from <\/i>Les Miserables continued—Cossete returns with the pail of water and<\/i> <\/i>
the stranger finds lodging in the inn.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

 <\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette could not refrain from casting a sidelong glance at the big doll, which was still
displayed at the toy-merchant's; then she knocked. The door opened. The Thenardier appeared
with a candle in her hand. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Ah! so it's you, you little wretch! good mercy, but you've taken your time! The hussy has
been amusing herself!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Madame,\" said Cosette, trembling all over, \"here's a gentleman who wants a lodging.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The Thenardier speedily replaced her gruff air by her amiable grimace, a change of
aspect common to tavern-keepers, and eagerly sought the new-comer with her eyes. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"This is the gentleman?\" said she. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Yes, Madame,\" replied the man, raising his hand to his hat. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Wealthy travellers are not so polite. This gesture, and an inspection of the stranger's
costume and baggage, which the Thenardier passed in review with one glance, caused the
amiable grimace to vanish, and the gruff mien to reappear. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

She resumed dryly:— \"Enter, my good man.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The \"good man\" entered. The Thenardier cast a second glance at him, paid <\/i>particular
attention<\/i> to his frock-coat, which was absolutely threadbare, and to his hat, which was a little
battered, and, tossing her head, wrinkling her nose, and screwing up her eyes, she consulted her
husband, who was still drinking with the carters. The husband replied by that imperceptible
movement of the forefinger, which, backed up by an inflation of the lips, signifies in such cases:
A regular beggar. Thereupon, the Thenardier exclaimed:— <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Ah! see here, my good man; I am very sorry, but I have no room left.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Put me where you like,\" said the man; \"in the attic, in the stable. I will pay as though I
occupied a room.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

“<\/i>Forty sous.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Forty sous; agreed.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Very well, then!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Forty sous!\" said a carter, in a low tone, to the Thenardier woman; \"why, the charge is
only twenty sous!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"It is forty in his case,\" retorted the Thenardier, in the same tone. \"I don't lodge poor
folks for less.\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"That's true,\" added her husband, gently; \"it ruins a house to have such people in it.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

In the meantime, the man, laying his bundle and his cudgel on a bench, had seated
himself at a table, on which Cosette made haste to place a bottle of wine and a glass. The
merchant who had demanded the bucket of water took it to his horse himself. Cosette resumed
her place under the kitchen table, and her knitting. The man, who had barely moistened his lips
in the wine which he had poured out for himself, observed the child with peculiar attention.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette was ugly. If she had been happy, she might have been pretty. We have already
given a sketch of that sombre little figure. Cosette was thin and pale; she was nearly eight years
old, but she seemed to be hardly six. Her large eyes, sunken in a sort of shadow, were almost put
out with weeping. The corners of her mouth had that curve of habitual anguish which is seen in
condemned persons and desperately sick people. Her hands were, as her mother had divined,
\"ruined with chilblains.\" The fire which illuminated her at that moment brought into relief <\/i>all the<\/i>
angles of her bones, and rendered her thinness frightfully apparent. As she was always <\/i>
s<\/i>hivering, she had acquired the habit of pressing her knees one against the other. Her entire
clothing was but a rag which would have inspired pity in summer, and which inspired horror in
winter. All she had on was hole-ridden linen, not a scrap of woollen. Her skin was visible here
and there and everywhere black and blue spots could be descried, which marked the places
where the Thenardier woman had touched her. Her naked legs were thin and red. The hollows in
her neck were enough to make one weep. This child's whole person, her mien, her attitude, the
sound of her voice, the intervals which she allowed to elapse between one word and the next, her
glance, her silence, her slightest gesture, expressed and betrayed one sole idea,—fear. Fear was
diffused all over her; she was covered with it, so to speak; fear drew her elbows close to her
hips, withdrew her heels under her petticoat, made her occupy as little space as possible,
allowed her only the breath that was absolutely necessary, and had become what might be called
the habit of her body, admitting of no possible variation except an increase. In the depths of her
eyes there was an astonished nook where terror lurked. Her fear was such, that on her arrival, <\/i><\/p>

wet as she was, Cosette did not dare to approach the fire and dry herself, but sat silently down to
her work again. The expression in the glance of that child of eight years was habitually so
gloomy, and at times so tragic, that it seemed at certain moments as though she were on the
verge of becoming an idiot or a demon. As we have stated, she had never known what it is to
pray; she had never set foot in a church.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Have I the time?\" said the Thenardier. The man in the yellow coat never took his eyes
from Cosette. All at once, the Thenardier exclaimed:—<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"By the way, where's that bread?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette, according to her custom whenever the Thenardier uplifted her voice, emerged
with great haste from beneath the table. She had completely forgotten the bread. She had
recourse to the expedient of children who live in a constant state of fear. She lied. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Madame, the baker's shop was shut.\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"You should have knocked.\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"I did knock, Madame.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Well?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"He did not open the door.\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"I'll find out to-morrow whether that is true,\" said the Thenardier; \"and if you are telling
me a lie, I'll lead you a pretty dance. In the meantime, give me back my fifteen-sou piece.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette plunged her hand into the pocket of her apron, and turned green. The fifteen-sou
piece was not there. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Ah, come now,\" said Madame Thenardier, \"did you hear me?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette turned her pocket inside out; there was nothing in it. What could have become of
that money? The unhappy little creature could not find a word to say. She was petrified. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Have you lost that fifteen-sou piece?\" screamed the Thenardier, hoarsely, \"or do you
want to rob me of it?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

At the same time, she stretched out her arm towards the cat-o'-nine-tails which hung on a
nail in the chimney-corner. This formidable gesture restored to Cosette sufficient strength to
shriek:— <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Mercy, Madame, Madame! I will not do so any more!\" <\/i><\/p>

The Thenardier took down the whip. In the meantime, the man in the yellow coat had
been fumbling in the fob of his waistcoat, without any one having noticed his movements.
Besides, the other travellers were drinking or playing cards, and were not paying attention to
anything. Cosette contracted herself into a ball, with anguish, within the angle of the chimney,
endeavoring to gather up and conceal her poor half-nude limbs. The Thenardier raised her arm.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Pardon me, Madame,\" said the man, \"but just now I caught sight of something which <\/i>
had fallen<\/i> from this little one's apron pocket, and rolled aside. Perhaps this is it.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

At the same time he bent down and seemed to be searching on the floor for a moment.
\"Exactly; here it is,\" he went on, straightening himself up. And he held out a silver coin to the
Thenardier. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Yes, that's it,\" said she. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

It was not it, for it was a twenty-sou piece; but the Thenardier found it to her advantage.
She put the coin in her pocket, and confined herself to casting a fierce glance at the child,
accompanied with the remark, <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Don't let this ever happen again!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette returned to what the Thenardier called \"her kennel,\" and her large eyes, which
were riveted on the traveller, began to take on an expression such as they had never worn
before. Thus far it was only an innocent amazement, but a sort of stupefied confidence was
mingled with it. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"By the way, would you like some supper?\" the Thenardier inquired of the traveller.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

He made no reply. He appeared to be absorbed in thought.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"What sort of a man is that?\" she muttered between her teeth. \"He's some frightfully poor
wretch. He hasn't a sou to pay for a supper. Will he even pay me for his lodging? It's very lucky,
all the same, that it did not occur to him to steal the money that was on the floor.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

In the meantime, a door had opened, and Eponine and Azelma entered.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

They were two really pretty little girls, more bourgeois than peasant in looks, and very
charming; the one with shining chestnut tresses, the other with long black braids hanging down
her back, both vivacious, neat, plump, rosy, and healthy, and a delight to the eye. They were
warmly clad, but with so much maternal art that the thickness of the stuffs did not detract from
the coquetry of arrangement. There was a hint of winter, though the springtime was not wholly
effaced. Light emanated from these two little beings. Besides this, they were on the throne. In
their toilettes, in their gayety, in the noise which they made, there was sovereignty. When they
entered, the Thenardier said to them in a grumbling tone which was full of adoration, \"Ah! there
you are, you children!\"<\/i><\/p>

Then drawing them, one after the other to her knees, smoothing their hair, tying their <\/i>
ribbons afresh<\/i>, and then releasing them with that gentle manner of shaking off which is peculiar
to mothers, she exclaimed, \"What frights they are!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

They went and seated themselves in the chimney-corner. They had a doll, which they
turned over and over on their knees with all sorts of joyous chatter. From time to time Cosette
raised her eyes from her knitting, and watched their play with a melancholy air. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Eponine and Azelma did not look at Cosette. She was the same as a dog to them. These
three little girls did not yet reckon up four and twenty years between them, but they already
represented the whole society of man; envy on the one side, disdain on the other. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The doll of the Thenardier sisters was very much faded, very old, and much broken; but it
seemed none the less admirable to Cosette, who had never had a doll in her life, a real doll, to
make use of the expression which all children will understand. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

All at once, the Thenardier, who had been going back and forth in the room, perceived
that Cosette's mind was distracted, and that, instead of working, she was paying attention to the
little ones at their play.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Ah! I've caught you at it!\" she cried. \"So that's the way you work! I'll make you work to
the tune of the whip; that I will.\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The stranger turned to the Thenardier, without quitting his chair. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Bah, Madame,\" he said, with an almost timid air, \"let her play!\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Such a wish expressed by a traveller who had eaten a slice of mutton and had drunk a
couple of bottles of wine with his supper, and who had not the air of being frightfully poor,
would have been equivalent to an order. But that a man with such a hat should permit himself
such a desire, and that a man with such a coat should permit himself to have a will, was
something which Madame Thenardier did not intend to tolerate. She retorted with acrimony:—<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"She must work, since she eats. I don't feed her to do nothing.\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"What is she making?\" went on the stranger, in a gentle voice which contrasted strangely
with his beggarly garments and his porter's shoulders.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The Thenardier deigned to reply:— \"Stockings, if you please. Stockings for my little girls,
who have none, so to speak, and who <\/i>are absolutely<\/i> barefoot just now.\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The man looked at Cosette's poor little red feet, and continued:— <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"When will she have finished this pair of stockings?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"She has at least three or four good days' work on them still, the lazy creature!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"And how much will that pair of stockings be worth when she has finished them?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The Thenardier cast a glance of disdain on him. \"Thirty sous at least.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Will you sell them for five francs?\" went on the man.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Good heavens!\" exclaimed a carter who was listening, with a loud laugh; \"five francs!
the deuce, I should think so! five balls!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Thenardier thought it time to strike in. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Yes, sir; if such is your fancy, you will be allowed to have that pair of stockings for five
francs. We can refuse nothing to travellers.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"You must pay on the spot,\" said the Thenardier, in her curt and pèremptory fashion.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"I will buy that pair of stockings,\" replied the man, \"and,\" he added, drawing a five-franc
piece from his pocket, and laying it on the table, \"I will pay for them.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Then he turned to Cosette.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Now I own your work; play, my child.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The carter was so much touched by the five-franc piece, that he abandoned his glass and
hastened up. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"But it's true!\" he cried, examining it. \"A real hind wheel! and not counterfeit!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Thenardier approached and silently put the coin in his pocket. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The Thenardier had no reply to make. She bit her lips, and her face assumed an
expression <\/i>of<\/i> hatred<\/i>. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

In the meantime, Cosette was trembling. She ventured to ask:— \"Is it true, Madame? May
I play?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Play!\" said the Thenardier, in a terrible voice.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Thanks, Madame,\" said Cosette. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

And while her mouth thanked the Thenardier, her whole little soul thanked the traveller.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Thenardier had resumed his drinking; his wife whispèred in his ear:— <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Who can this yellow man be?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"I have seen millionaires with coats like that,\" replied Thenardier, in a sovereign
manner.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette had dropped her knitting, but had not left her seat. Cosette always moved as little
as possible. She picked up some old rags and her little lead sword from a box behind her. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Eponine and Azelma paid no attention to what was going on. They had just executed a
very important operation; they had just got hold of the cat. They had thrown their doll on the
ground, and Eponine, who was the elder, was swathing the little cat, in spite of its mewing and
its contortions, in a quantity of clothes and red and blue scraps. While performing this serious
and difficult work she was saying to her sister in that sweet and adorable language of children,
whose grace, like the splendor of the butterfly's wing, vanishes when one essays to fix it fast. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"You see, sister, this doll is more amusing than the other. She twists, she cries, she is
warm. See, sister, let us play with her. She shall be my little girl. I will be a lady. I will come to
see you, and you shall look at her. Gradually, you will perceive her whiskers, and that will
surprise you. And then you will see her ears, and then you will see her tail and it will amaze you.
And you will say to me, 'Ah! Mon Dieu!' and I will say to you: 'Yes, Madame, it is my little girl.
Little girls are made like that just at present.'\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Azelma listened admiringly to Eponine.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

In the meantime, the drinkers had begun to sing an obscene song, and to laugh at it until
the ceiling shook. Thenardier accompanied and encouraged them.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

As birds make nests out of everything, so children make a doll out of anything which
comes to hand. While Eponine and Azelma were bundling up the cat, Cosette, on her side, had
dressed up her sword. That done, she laid it in her arms, and sang to it softly, to lull it to sleep. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The doll is one of the most imperious needs and, at the same time, one of the most
charming instincts of feminine childhood. To care for, to clothe, to deck, to dress, to undress, to
redress, to teach, scold a little, to rock, to dandle, to lull to sleep, to imagine that something is
some one,—therein lies the whole woman's future. While dreaming and chattering, making tiny
outfits, and baby clothes, while sewing little gowns, and corsages and bodices, the child grows
into a young girl, the young girl into a big girl, the big girl into a woman. The first child is the
continuation of the last doll. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

A little girl without a doll is almost as unhappy, and quite as impossible, as a woman
without children. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

So Cosette had made herself a doll out of the sword. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Madame Thenardier approached the yellow man; \"My husband is right,\" she thought;
\"perhaps it is M. Laffitte; there are such queer rich men!\"<\/i><\/p>

She came and set her elbows on the table. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Monsieur,\" said she. At this word, Monsieur, the man turned; up to that time, the
Thenardier had addressed him only as brave homme or bonhomme. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"You see, sir,\" she pursued, assuming a sweetish air that was even more repulsive to
behold than her fierce mien, \"I am willing that the child should play; I do not oppose it, but it is
good for once, because you are generous. You see, she has nothing; she must needs work.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Then this child is not yours?\" demanded the man.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Oh! mon Dieu! no, sir! she is a little beggar whom we have taken in through charity; a
sort of imbecile child. She must have water on the brain; she has a large head, as you see. We do
what we can for her, for we are not rich; we have written in vain to her native place, and have
received no reply these six months. It must be that her mother is dead.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Ah!\" said the man, and fell into his revery once more. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Her mother didn't amount to much,\" added the Thenardier; \"she abandoned her child.\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

During the whole of this conversation Cosette, as though warned by some instinct that
she was under discussion, had not taken her eyes from the Thenardier's face; she listened
vaguely; she caught a few words here and there. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Meanwhile, the drinkers, all three-quarters intoxicated, were repeating their unclean
refrain with redoubled gayety; it was a highly spiced and wanton song, in which the Virgin and
the infant Jesus were introduced. The Thenardier went off to take part in the shouts of <\/i>laughter.
Cosette<\/i>, from her post under the table, gazed at the fire, which was reflected from her fixed eyes.
She had begun to rock the sort of baby which she had made, and, as she rocked it, she sang in a
low voice, \"My mother is dead! my mother is dead! my mother is dead!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

On being urged afresh by the hostess, the yellow man, \"the millionaire,\" consented at last
to take supper. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"What does Monsieur wish?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Bread and cheese,\" said the man.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Decidedly, he is a beggar\" thought Madame Thenardier. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The drunken men were still singing their song, and the child under the table was singing
hers.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

All at once, Cosette paused; she had just turned round and caught sight of the little
Thenardiers' doll, which they had abandoned for the cat and had left on the floor a few paces
from the kitchen table. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Then she dropped the swaddled sword, which only half met her needs, and cast her eyes
slowly round the room. Madame Thenardier was whispering to her husband and counting over
some money; Ponine and Zelma were playing with the cat; the travellers were eating or drinking
or singing; not a glance was fixed on her. She had not a moment to lose; she crept out from
under the table on her hands and knees, made sure once more that no one was watching her;
then she slipped quickly up to the doll and seized it. An instant later she was in her place again,
seated motionless, and only turned so as to cast a shadow on the doll which she held in her arms.
The happiness of playing with a doll was so rare for her that it contained all the violence of
voluptuousness.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

No one had seen her, except the traveller, who was slowly devouring his meagre supper.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

This joy lasted about a quarter of an hour. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

But with all the precautions that Cosette had taken she did not perceive that one of the
doll's legs stuck out and that the fire on the hearth lighted it up very vividly. That pink and
shining foot, projecting from the shadow, suddenly struck the eye of Azelma, who said to
Eponine, \"Look! sister.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The two little girls paused in stupefaction; Cosette had dared to take their doll! Eponine
rose, and, without releasing the cat, she ran to her mother, and began to tug at her skirt. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Let me alone!\" said her mother; \"what do you want?\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Mother,\" said the child, \"look there!\" And she pointed to Cosette.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette, absorbed in the ecstasies of possession, no longer saw or heard anything.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Madame Thenardier's countenance assumed that peculiar expression which is composed
of the terrible mingled with the trifles of life, and which has caused this style of woman to be
named megaeras. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

On this occasion, wounded pride exasperated her wrath still further. Cosette had
overstepped all bounds; Cosette had laid violent hands on the doll belonging to \"these young
ladies.\" A czarina who should see a muzhik trying on her imperial son's blue ribbon would wear
no other face.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

She shrieked in a voice rendered hoarse with indignation:—<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Cosette!\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette started as though the earth had trembled beneath her; she turned round. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Cosette!\" repeated the Thenardier.<\/i><\/p>

Cosette took the doll and laid it gently on the floor with a sort of veneration, mingled with
despair; then, without taking her eyes from it, she clasped her hands, and, what is terrible <\/i>to
relate<\/i> of a child of that age, she wrung them; then—not one of the emotions of the day, neither
the trip to the forest, nor the weight of the bucket of water, nor the loss of the money, nor the
sight of the whip, nor even the sad words which she had heard Madame Thenardier utter had
been able to wring this from her—she wept; she burst out sobbing.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Meanwhile, the traveller had risen to his feet. \"What is the matter?\" he said to the
Thenardier. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Don't you see?\" said the Thenardier, pointing to the corpus delicti which lay at Cosette's
feet. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Well, what of it?\" resumed the man. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"That beggar,\" replied the Thenardier, \"has permitted herself to touch the children's
doll!\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"All this noise for that!\" said the man; \"well, what if she did play with that doll?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"She touched it with her dirty hands!\" pursued the Thenardier, \"with her frightful
hands!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Here Cosette redoubled her sobs. \"Will you stop your noise?\" screamed the Thenardier. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The man went straight to the street door, opened it, and stepped out. As soon as he had
gone, the Thenardier profited by his absence to give Cosette a hearty kick under the table, which
made the child utter loud cries. The door opened again, the man re-appeared; he carried in both
hands the fabulous doll which we have mentioned, and which all the village brats had been
staring at ever since the morning, and he set it <\/i>up right<\/i> in front of Cosette, saying:—<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Here; this is for you.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

It must be supposed that in the course of the hour and more which he had spent there he
had taken confused notice through his revery of that toy shop, lighted up by fire-pots and candles
so splendidly that it was visible like an illumination through the window of the drinking-<\/i>shop.
Cosette<\/i> raised her eyes; she gazed at the man approaching her with that doll as she might have
gazed at the sun; she heard the unprecedented words, \"It is for you\"; she stared at <\/i>him; she<\/i>
stared at the doll; then she slowly retreated, and hid herself at the extreme end, under the table
in a corner of the wall. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

She no longer cried; she no longer wept; she had the appearance of no longer daring to
breathe.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The Thenardier, Eponine, and Azelma were like statues also; the very drinkers had
paused; a solemn silence reigned through the whole room. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Madame Thenardier, petrified and mute, recommenced her conjectures: \"Who is that old
fellow? Is he a poor man? Is he a millionaire? Perhaps he is both; that is to say, a thief.\"<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The face of the male Thenardier presented that expressive fold which accentuates the
human countenance whenever the dominant instinct appears there in all its bestial force. The
tavern-keeper stared alternately at the doll and at the traveller; he seemed to be scenting out the
man, as he would have scented out a bag of money. This did not last longer than the space of a
flash of lightning. He stepped up to his wife and said to her in a low voice:— <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"That machine costs at least thirty francs. No nonsense. Down on your belly before that
man!\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Gross natures have this in common with naive natures, that they possess no transition
state. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Well, Cosette,\" said the Thenardier, in a voice that strove to be sweet, and which was
composed of the bitter honey of malicious women, \"aren't you going to take your doll?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette ventured to emerge from her hole. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"The gentleman has given you a doll, my little Cosette,\" said Thenardier, with a
caressing air. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Take it; it is yours.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette gazed at the marvellous doll in a sort of terror. Her face was still flooded with
tears, but her eyes began to fill, like the sky at daybreak, with strange beams of joy. What she felt
at that moment was a little like what she would have felt if she had been abruptly told, \"Little
one, you are the Queen of France.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

It seemed to her that if she touched that doll, lightning would dart from it.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

This was true, up to a certain point, for she said to herself that the Thenardier would
scold and beat her.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Nevertheless, the attraction carried the day. She ended by drawing near and murmuring
timidly as she turned towards Madame Thenardier:— <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"May I, Madame?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

No words can render that air, at once despairing, terrified, and ecstatic. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Pardi!\" cried the Thenardier, \"it is yours. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The gentleman has given it to you.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Truly, sir?\" said Cosette. \"Is it true? Is the 'lady' mine?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The stranger's eyes seemed to be full of tears. He appeared to have reached that point of
emotion where a man does not speak for fear lest he should weep. He nodded to Cosette, and
placed the \"lady's\" hand in her tiny hand. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette hastily withdrew her hand, as though that of the \"lady\" scorched her, and began
to stare at the floor. We are forced to add that at that moment she stuck out her tongue
immoderately. All at once she wheeled round and seized the doll in a transport.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"I shall call her Catherine,\" she said. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

It was an odd moment when Cosette's rags met and clasped the ribbons and fresh pink
muslins of the doll. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Madame,\" she resumed, \"may I put her on a chair?\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Yes, my child,\" replied the Thenardier.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

It was now the turn of Eponine and Azelma to gaze at Cosette with envy. Cosette placed
Catherine on a chair, then seated herself on the floor in front of her, and remained motionless,
without uttering a word, in an attitude of contemplation. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Play, Cosette,\" said the stranger. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Oh! I am playing,\" returned the child.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

This stranger, this unknown individual, who had the air of a visit which Providence was
making on Cosette, was the person whom the Thenardier hated worse than any one in the <\/i>world
at<\/i> that moment. However, it was necessary to control herself. Habituated as she was to
dissimulation through endeavoring to copy her husband in all his actions, these emotions were
more than she could endure. She made haste to send her daughters to bed, then she asked the
man's permission to send Cosette off also; \"for she has worked hard all day,\" she added with a
maternal air.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette went off to bed, carrying Catherine in her arms.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The inn-keeper retired to his room. His wife was in bed, but she was not asleep. When she
heard her husband's step she turned over and said to him:— <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Do you know, I'm going to turn Cosette out of doors to-morrow.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Thenardier replied coldly:— \"How you do go on!\" <\/i><\/p>

They exchanged no further words, and a few moments later their candle was
extinguished. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

As for the traveller, he had deposited his cudgel and his bundle in a corner. The landlord
once gone, he threw himself into an arm-chair and remained for some time buried in thought.
Then he removed his shoes, took one of the two candles, blew out the other, opened the door, and
quitted the room, gazing about him like a person who is in search of something. He traversed a
corridor and came upon a staircase. There he heard a very faint and gentle sound like the
breathing of a child. He followed this sound, and came to a sort of triangular recess built under
the staircase, or rather formed by the staircase itself. This recess was nothing else than the space
under the steps. There, in the midst of all sorts of old papers and potsherds, among dust and
spiders' webs, was a bed—if one can call by the name of bed a straw pallet so full of holes as to
display the straw, and a coverlet so tattered as to show the pallet. No sheets. This was placed on
the floor. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

In this bed Cosette was sleeping.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The man approached and gazed down upon her. Cosette was in a profound sleep; she
was fully dressed. In the winter she did not undress, in order that she might not be so cold. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Against her breast was pressed the doll, whose large eyes, wide open, glittered in the
dark. From time to time she gave vent to a deep sigh as though she were on the point of waking,
and she strained the doll almost convulsively in her arms. Beside her bed there was only one of
her wooden shoes.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

A door which stood open near Cosette's pallet permitted a view of a rather large, dark
room. The stranger stepped into it. At the further extremity, through a glass door, he saw two
small, very white beds. They belonged to Eponine and Azelma. Behind these beds, and half <\/i>
hidden, stood<\/i> an uncurtained wicker cradle, in which the little boy who had cried all the evening
lay asleep. The stranger conjectured that this chamber connected with that of the Thenardier
pair. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

He was on the point of retreating when his eye fell upon the fireplace—one of those vast
tavern chimneys where there is always so little fire when there is any fire at all, and which are so
cold to look at. There was no fire in this one, there was not even ashes; but there was something
which attracted the stranger's gaze, nevertheless. It was two tiny children's shoes, coquettish in
shape and unequal in size. The traveller recalled the graceful and immemorial custom in
accordance with which children place their shoes in the chimney on Christmas eve, there to
await in the darkness some sparkling gift from their good fairy. Eponine and Azelma had taken
care not to omit this, and each of them had set one of her shoes on the hearth. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The traveller bent over them. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The fairy, that is to say, their mother, had already paid her visit, and in each he saw a
brand-new and shining ten-sou piece. The man straightened himself up, and was on the point of
withdrawing, when far in, in the darkest corner of the hearth, he caught sight of another object. <\/i><\/p>

He looked at it, and recognized a wooden shoe, a frightful shoe of the coarsest description, half
dilapidated and all covered with ashes and dried mud. It was Cosette's sabot. Cosette, with that
touching trust of childhood, which can always be deceived yet never discouraged, had placed her
shoe on the hearth-stone also.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Hope in a child who has never known anything but despair is a sweet and touching thing.
There was nothing in this wooden shoe. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

The stranger fumbled in his waistcoat, bent over and placed a louis d'or in Cosette's <\/i>
shoe. Then<\/i> he regained his own chamber with the stealthy tread of a wolf.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

On waking up, Cosette had run to get her shoe. In it she had found the gold piece. It was
not a Napoleon; it was one of those perfectly new twenty-franc pieces of the Restoration, on
whose effigy the little Prussian queue had replaced the laurel wreath. Cosette was dazzled. Her
destiny began to intoxicate her. She did not know what a gold piece was; she had never seen
one; she hid it quickly in her pocket, as though she had stolen it. Still, she felt that it really was
hers; she guessed whence her gift had come, but the joy which she experienced was full of fear.
She was happy; above all she was stupefied. Such magnificent and beautiful things did not
appear real. The doll frightened her, the gold piece frightened her. She trembled vaguely in the
presence of this magnificence. The stranger alone did not frighten her. On the contrary, he
reassured her. Ever since the preceding evening, amid all her amazement, even in her sleep, she
had been thinking in her little childish mind of that man who seemed to be so poor and so sad,
and who was so rich and so kind. Everything had changed for her since she had met that good
man in the forest. Cosette, less happy than the most insignificant swallow of heaven, had never
known what it was to take refuge under a mother's shadow and under a wing. For the last five
years, that is to say, as far back as her memory ran, the poor child had shivered and trembled.
She had always been exposed completely naked to the sharp wind of adversity; now it seemed to
her she was clothed. Formerly her soul had seemed cold, now it was warm. Cosette was no
longer afraid of the Thenardier. She was no longer alone; there was some one there.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

She hastily set about her regular morning duties. That louis, which she had about her, in <\/i>
the very<\/i> apron pocket whence the fifteen-sou piece had fallen on the night before, distracted her
thoughts. She dared not touch it, but she spent five minutes in gazing at it, with her tongue
hanging out, if the truth must be told. As she swept the staircase, she paused, remained standing
there motionless, forgetful of her broom and of the entire universe, occupied in gazing at that
star which was blazing at the bottom of her pocket.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

It was during one of these periods of contemplation that the Thenardier joined her. She
had gone in search of Cosette at her husband's orders. What was quite unprecedented, she
neither struck her nor said an insulting word to her. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"Cosette,\" she said, almost gently, \"come immediately.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

An instant later Cosette entered the public room.<\/i><\/p>

The stranger took up the bundle which he had brought and untied it. This bundle
contained a little woollen gown, an apron, a fustian bodice, a kerchief, a petticoat, woollen
stockings, shoes—a complete outfit for a girl of seven years. All was black. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

\"My child,\" said the man, \"take these, and go and dress yourself quickly.\" <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Daylight was appearing when those of the inhabitants of Montfermeil who had begun to
open their doors beheld a poorly clad old man leading a little girl dressed in mourning, and
carrying a pink doll in her arms, pass along the road to Paris. They were going in the direction
of Livry.<\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

It was our man and Cosette. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

No one knew the man; as Cosette was no longer in rags, many did not recognize her.
Cosette was going away. With whom? She did not know. Whither? She knew not. All that she
understood was that she was leaving the Thenardier tavern behind her. No one had thought of
bidding her farewell, nor had she thought of taking leave of any one. She was leaving that hated
and hating house. <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Poor, gentle creature, whose heart had been repressed up to that hour! <\/i><\/p>

 <\/p>

Cosette walked along gravely, with her large eyes wide open, and gazing at the sky. She
had put her louis in the pocket of her new apron. From time to time, she bent down and glanced
at it; then she looked at the good man. She felt something as though she were beside the good
God<\/i>.<\/i><\/p>"}