Les Misérables, v. 3

"Listen to me," he said; "you brought an old gentleman and his daughter here."

"Yes."

"Do you know their address?"

"No."

"Find it for me."

The girl's eye, which was dull, had become joyous, but now it became gloomy.

"Is that what you want?" she asked.

"Yes."

"Do you know them?"

"No."

"That is to say," she added quickly, "you don't know her, but you would like to know her."

This "them," which became "her," had something most significant and bitter about it.

"Well, can you do it?" Marius said.

"You shall have the beautiful young lady's address."

In these words there was again a meaning which annoyed Marius, so he went on, —

"Well, no matter! the father and daughter's address, – their address, I say."

She looked at him fixedly.

"What will you give me for it?"

"Whatever you like."

"Whatever I like? You shall have the address."

She hung her head, and then closed the door with a hurried gesture; Marius was alone again. He fell into a chair, with his head and elbows on his bed, sunk in thoughts which he could not grasp, and suffering from a dizziness. All that had happened since the morning, – the apparition of the angel, her disappearance, and what this creature had just said to him, a gleam of hope floating in an immense despair, – this is what confusedly filled his brain. All at once he was violently dragged out of his reverie, for he heard Jondrette's loud, hard voice uttering words full of the strangest interest for him.

"I tell you that I am sure, and that I recognized him."

Of whom was Jondrette talking, and whom had he recognized? M. Leblanc, the father of "his Ursule." What! did Jondrette know him? Was Marius going to obtain, in this sudden and unexpected fashion, all the information without which his life was obscure for himself? Was he at last going to know who she was whom he loved, and who her father was? Was the thick cloud that covered them on the point of clearing off? Would the veil be rent asunder? Oh, heavens! He bounded rather than ascended upon the chest of drawers and resumed his place at the aperture in the partition: once more he saw the interior of Jondrette's den.

CHAPTER XII

THE USE OF M. LEBLANC'S FIVE-FRANC PIECE

There was no change in the appearance of the family, save that mother and daughters had put on stockings and flannel waistcoats taken out of the parcel, and two new blankets were thrown on the beds. The man had evidently just returned, for he was out of breath; his daughters were seated near the chimney-piece on the ground, the elder tying up the younger's hand. The mother was crouching on the bed near the fire-place, with an astonished face, while Jondrette was walking up and down the room with long strides and extraordinary eyes. The woman, who seemed frightened and struck with stupor before him, ventured to say, —

"What, really, are you sure?"

"Sure! it is eight years ago, but I can recognize him! I recognized him at once. What I did it not strike you?"

"No."

"And yet I said to you, 'Pay attention!' Why, it is his figure, his face, very little older, – for there are some people who never age, though I do not know how they manage it, – and the sound of his voice. He is better dressed, that's all! Ah! you mysterious old villain, I hold you!"

He stopped and said to his daughters, —

"Be off, you two! – It is funny that it did not strike you."

They rose to obey, and the mother stammered, —

"With her bad hand?"

"The air will do it good," said Jondrette. "Off with you!"

It was evident that this man was one of those who are not answered. The girls went out, but just as they passed the door the father clutched the elder by the arm, and said, with a peculiar accent, —

"You will be here at five o'clock precisely, both of you, for I shall want you."

Marius redoubled his attention. When left alone with his wife, Jondrette began walking up and down room again, and took two or three turns in silence. Then he spent several minutes thrusting the tail of the chemise which he wore into his trousers. All at once he turned to his wife, folded his arms, and exclaimed, —

"And shall I tell you something? The young lady – "

"Well, what?" the wife retorted.

Marius could not doubt, they were really talking about her. He listened with ardent anxiety, and all his life was in his ears. But Jondrette had stooped down, and was whispering to his wife. Then he rose, and ended aloud, —

"It is she."

"That one?" the wife asked.

"That one!" said the husband.

No expression could render all there was in the mother's that one; it was surprise, rage, hatred, and passion mingled and combined in a monstrous intonation. A few words, doubtless a name which her husband whispered in her ear, were sufficient to arouse this fat, crushed woman, and to make her more than repulsive and frightful.

"It is not possible," she exclaimed; "when I think that my daughters go about barefooted, and have not a gown to put on! What! a satin pelisse, a velvet bonnet, clothes worth more than two hundred francs, so that you might take her for a lady! No, you are mistaken; and then, the other was hideous, while this one is not ugly, indeed, rather good-looking. Oh, it cannot be!"

"And I tell you that it is; you will see."

At this absolute assertion the woman raised her large red and white face and looked at the ceiling with a hideous expression. At this moment she appeared to Marius even more formidable than her husband, for she was a sow with the glance of a tigress.

"What!" she continued, "that horrible young lady who looked at my daughters with an air of pity is that vagabond! Oh! I should like to jump on her stomach with wooden shoes."

She leaped off the bed, and stood for a moment unkempt, with swollen nostrils, parted lips, and clenched fists; then she fell back again on the bed. The husband walked up and down and paid no attention to his wife. After a short silence he went up to her and stood in front of her with folded arms, as he had done a few moments previously.

"And shall I tell you something else?"

"What?" she asked.

He replied in a low, guttural voice, "That my fortune is made."

The wife looked at him in the way which means, "Can the man who is talking to me have suddenly gone mad?" He continued, —

"Thunder! I have been a long time a parishioner of the parish of die-of-hunger-if-you-are-cold, and die-of-cold-if-you-have-bread! I have had enough of that misery! I am not jesting, for I no longer consider this comical. I have had enough jokes, good God! and want no more farces, by the Eternal Father! I wish to eat when I am hungry, and drink when I am thirsty: to gorge, sleep, and do nothing. I want to have my turn now, and mean to be a bit of a millionnaire before I rot!" He walked up and down the room and added, "like the rest!"

"What do you mean?" his wife asked.

He shook his head, winked, and raised his voice like a street quack who is going to furnish a proof.

"What I mean? Listen!"

"Not so loud," said his wife, "if it is business which ought not to be overheard."

"Nonsense! by whom, – by the neighbor? I saw him go out just now. Besides, what does that long-legged ass listen to? And then, I tell you I saw him go out." Still, by a species of instinct Jondrette lowered his voice, though not so low that his remarks escaped Marius. A favorable circumstance was that the fallen snow deadened the sound of the vehicles on the boulevard. This is what Marius heard: —

"Listen carefully. The Crœsus is trapped, or as good as trapped. It is done, arranged, and I have seen the people. He will come at six this evening to bring the sixty francs, the vagabond! Did you notice how I blabbed to him about my sixty francs, my landlord, my February 4th? Why, it is not a quarter-day, the ass. Well, he will come at six o'clock, and at that hour the neighbor has gone to dinner, and Mother Bourgon is washing up dishes in town, so there will be no one in the house. The neighbor never comes in before eleven o'clock. The little ones will be on the watch, you will help us, and he will make a sacrifice."

"And suppose he does not?" the wife asked.

Jondrette made a sinister gesture, and said, "We will do it for him."

And he burst into a laugh: it was the first time that Marius saw him laugh, and this laugh was cold and gentle, and produced a shudder. Jondrette opened a cupboard near the fire-place, and took out an old cap, which he put on his head, after brushing it with his cuff.

"Now," he said, "I am going out, for I have some more people to see, good men. I shall be away as short a time as possible, for it is a famous affair; and do you keep house."

And he stood thoughtfully with his hands in his trousers' pockets and suddenly exclaimed, —

"Do you know that it is very lucky he did not recognize me, for if he had done so he would not have returned, and would have slipped from us. It was my beard that saved us, – my romantic beard, my pretty little beard."

And he laughed again. He went to the window; the snow was still falling, and striping the gray sky.

"What filthy weather!" he said.

Then he buttoned up his great-coat.

"The skin is too big, but no matter," he added. "It was devilish lucky that the old villain left it for me, for had he not I could not have gone out, and the whole affair would have been spoiled. On what slight accidents things depend!"

And pulling his cap over his eyes, he went out, but had only gone a short distance when the door opened again, and his sharp, intelligent face reappeared in the aperture.

"I forgot," he said; "you will get a chafing-dish of charcoal ready."

And he threw into his wife's apron the five-franc piece which the "philanthropist" left him.

"How many bushels of charcoal?" the wife asked.

"Two, at least."

"That will cost thirty sous, and with the rest I will buy some grub."

"Hang it, no!"

"Why?"

"Don't spend the five balls."

"Why not?"

"Because I have something to buy too."

"What?"

"Something."

"How much do you want?"

"Where is the nearest ironmonger's?"

"In the Rue Mouffetard."

"Ah, yes, at the corner of a street. I remember the shop."

"But tell me how much you want for what you have to buy."

"From fifty sous to three francs."

"There won't be much left for dinner."

"Don't bother about eating to-day; there is something better to do."

"That's enough, my jewel."

Jondrette closed the door again, and then Marius heard his steps as he went along the passage and down the stairs. It struck one at this moment from St. Médard's.

CHAPTER XIII

PLOT AND COUNTERPLOT

Marius, dreamer though he was, possessed, as we have said, a firm and energetic nature. His habits of solitary contemplation, by developing compassion and sympathy within him, had perhaps diminished the power of being irritated, but left intact the power of becoming indignant: he had the benevolence of a brahmin and the sternness of a judge, and while he pitied a toad he crushed a viper. At present he had a nest of vipers before him, and he said, "I must set my foot upon these villains." Not one of the enigmas which he hoped to see cleared up was solved; on the contrary, they had become more dense, and he had learned no more about the pretty girl of the Luxembourg and the man whom he called M. Leblanc, save that Jondrette knew them. Through the dark words which had been uttered he only saw one thing distinctly, that a snare was preparing, – an obscure but terrible snare; that they both ran an imminent danger, she probably, and the father certainly; and that he must save them, and foil the hideous combinations of the Jondrettes by destroying their spider's web.

He watched the woman for a moment; she had taken an old sheet-iron furnace from the corner, and was rummaging among the scraps of old iron. He got off the chest of drawers as gently as he could, and careful not to make any noise. In his terror at what was preparing, and the horror with which the Jondrettes filled him, he felt a species of joy at the idea that it might perhaps be in his power to render such a service to her whom he loved. But what was he to do? Should he warn the menaced persons? Where was he to find them? for he did not know their address. They had reappeared to him momentarily, and then plunged again into the immense profundities of Paris. Should he wait for M. Leblanc at the gate at the moment when he arrived that evening and warn him of the snare? But Jondrette and his comrades would see him on the watch. The place was deserted, they would be stronger than he, they would find means to get him out of the way, and the man whom Marius wished to save would be lost. It had just struck one, and as the snare was laid for six o'clock, Marius had five hours before him. There was only one thing to be done; he put on his best coat, tied a handkerchief round his neck, took his hat, and went out, making no more noise than if he were walking barefoot on moss; besides, the woman was still rummaging the old iron.

Once outside the house, he turned into the Rue du Petit Banquier. About the middle of the street he found himself near a very low wall, which it was possible to bestride in some places, and which surrounded unoccupied ground. He was walking slowly, deep in thought as he was, and the snow deadened his footsteps, when all at once he heard voices talking close to him. He turned his head, but the street was deserted; it was open day, and yet he distinctly heard the voices. He thought of looking over the wall, and really saw two men seated in the snow, and conversing in a low voice. They were strangers to him: one was a bearded man in a blouse, and the other a hairy man in rags. The bearded man wore a Greek cap, while the other was bareheaded, and had snow in his hair. By thrusting out his head over them Marius could hear the hairy man say to the other, with a nudge, —

"With Patron Minette it cannot fail."

"Do you think so?" asked the bearded man; and the hairy man added, —

"It will be five hundred balls for each, and the worst that can happen is five years, six years, or ten at the most."

The other replied with some hesitation, and shuddering under his Greek cap, —

"That is a reality; and people must not go to meet things of that sort."

"I tell you that the affair cannot fail," the hairy man continued. "Father What's-his-name's trap will be all ready."

Then they began talking of a melodrama which they had seen on the previous evening at the Gaité.

Marius walked on; but it seemed to him that the obscure remarks of these men, so strangely concealed behind this wall, and crouching in the snow, must have some connection with Jondrette's abominable scheme; that must be the affair. He went toward the Faubourg St. Marceau, and asked at the first shop he came to where he could find a police commissary. He was told at No. 14, Rue de Pontoise, and he proceeded there. As he passed a baker's he bought a two-sous roll and ate it, as he foresaw that he should not dine. On the way he rendered justice to Providence. He thought that if he had not given the five francs in the morning to the girl, he should have followed M. Leblanc's hackney coach and consequently known nothing. There would, in that case, have been no obstacle to Jondrettes ambuscade, and M. Leblanc would have been lost, and doubtless his daughter with him.

CHAPTER XIV

A POLICE-AGENT GIVES A LAWYER TWO "KNOCK-ME-DOWNS."

On reaching No. 14, Rue de Pontoise, he went up to the first floor and asked for the commissary.

"He is not in at present," said a clerk, "but there is an inspector to represent him. Will you speak to him? Is your business pressing?"

"Yes," said Marius.

The clerk led him to the commissary's office. A very tall man was leaning here against the fender of a stove, and holding up with both hands the skirts of a mighty coat with three capes. He had a square face, thin and firm lips, thick grayish whiskers, and a look of turning your pockets inside out. Of this look you might have said, not that it penetrated, but that it searched. This man did not appear much less ferocious or formidable than Jondrette; for sometimes it is just as dangerous to meet the dog as the wolf.

"What do you want?" he asked Marius, without adding, "sir."

"The police commissary."

"He is absent, but I represent him."

"It is a very secret affair."

"Then speak."

"And very urgent."

"In that case speak quick."

This man, who was calm and quick, was at once terrifying and reassuring. He inspired both fear and confidence. Marius told him of his adventure; that a person whom he only knew by sight was to be drawn that very evening into a trap; that he, Marius Pontmercy, lawyer, residing in the next room to the den, had heard the whole plot through the partition; that the scoundrel's name who invented the snare was Jondrette; that he would have accomplices, probably prowlers at the barrières, among others one Panchaud, alias Printanier, alias Bigrenaille; that Jondrette's daughters would be on the watch; that there were no means of warning the threatened man, as not even his name was known; and that, lastly, all this would come off at six in the evening, at the most deserted spot on the Boulevard de l'Hôpital, in the house No. 50-52.

At this number the Inspector raised his head, and said coldly, —

"It must be in the room at the end of the passage."

"Exactly," Marius replied; and added, "do you know the house?"

The Inspector remained silent for a moment, and then answered, while warming his boot-heel at the door of the stove, —

"Apparently so."

He went on between his teeth, talking less to Marius than his cravat.

"Patron Minette must be mixed up in this."

This remark struck Marius.

"Patron Minette!" he said; "yes, I heard that name mentioned."

And he told the Inspector of the dialogue between the hairy man and the bearded man in the snow behind the wall in the Rue du Petit Banquier. The Inspector growled, —

"The hairy man must be Burgon, and the bearded man, Demi-liard, alias Deux Milliards."

He was again looking down and meditating. "As for Father What's-his-name, I guess who he is. There, I have burnt my great-coat; they always make too large a fire in these cursed stoves. No. 50-52, formerly the property of one Gorbeau."

Then he looked at Marius.

"You only saw the hairy man and the bearded man?"

"And Panchaud."

"You did not see a small dandy prowling about there?"

"No."

"Nor a heavy lump of a fellow resembling the elephant in the Jardin-des Plantes?"

"No."

"Nor a scamp who looks like an old red-tail?"

"No."

"As for the fourth, no one sees him, not even his adjutants, assistants, and those he employs. It is not surprising, therefore, that you did not perceive him."

"No. Who are all these men?" Marius asked.

The Inspector continued: "Besides, it is not their hour." He fell into silence, and presently added, – "50-52. I know the shanty. It is impossible for us to hide ourselves in the interior without the actors perceiving us, and then they would escape by putting off the farce. They are so modest, and frightened at an audience. That won't do, for I want to hear them sing and make them dance."

This soliloquy ended, he turned to Marius, and asked, as he looked at him searchingly, —

"Would you be afraid?"

"Of what?" Marius asked.

"Of these men."

"No more than I am of you," Marius answered roughly, for he was beginning to notice that this policeman had not yet said, "sir."

The Inspector looked at Marius more intently still, and continued, with a sort of sententious solemnity, —

"You speak like a brave man and like an honest man. Courage does not fear crime, nor honesty the authorities."

Marius interrupted him, —

"That is all very well, but what do you intend doing?"

The Inspector restricted himself to saying, —

"The lodgers in that house have latch-keys to let themselves in at night. You have one?"

"Yes," said Marius.

"Have you it about you?"

"Yes."

"Give it to me," the Inspector said.

Marius took the key out of his waistcoat pocket, handed it to the Inspector, and added, —

"If you take my advice you will bring a strong force."

The Inspector gave Marius such a glance as Voltaire would have given a Provincial Academician who proposed a rhyme to him; then he thrust both hands into his immense coat-pockets and produced two small steel pistols, of the sort called "knock-me-downs." He handed them to Marius, saying sharply and quickly, —

"Take these. Go home. Conceal yourself in your room, and let them suppose you out. They are loaded, both with two bullets. You will watch, as you tell me there is a hole in the wall. People will arrive; let them go on a little. When you fancy the matter ripe, and you think it time to stop it, you will fire a pistol, but not too soon. The rest concerns me. A shot in the air, in the ceiling, I don't care where, – but, mind, not too soon. Wait till the commencement of the execution. You are a lawyer, and know what that means."

Marius took the pistols and placed them in a side pocket of his coat.

"They bulge that way, and attract attention," said the Inspector; "put them in your trousers' pockets."

Marius did so.

"And now," the Inspector continued, "there is not a moment for any one to lose. What o'clock is it? Half-past two. You said seven?"

"Six o'clock," Marius corrected.

"I have time," the Inspector added; "but only just time. Do not forget anything I have said to you. A pistol-shot."

"All right." Marius replied.

And as he pat his hand on the latch to leave the room the Inspector shouted to him, —

"By the way, if you should want me between this and then, come or send here. Ask for Inspector Javert."

CHAPTER XV

JONDRETTE MAKES HIS PURCHASE

At about three o'clock Courfeyrac happened to pass along the Rue Mouffetard, accompanied by Bossuet. The snow was thicker than ever, and filled the air, and Bossuet had just said to Courfeyrac, —

"To see all these flakes of snow fall, we might, say that the sky is suffering from a plague of white butterflies."

All at once Bossuet noticed Marius coming up the street toward the barrière with a peculiar look.

"Hilloh!" said Bossuet, "there's Marius."

"I saw him," said Courfeyrac; "but we won't speak to him."

"Why not?"

"He is busy."

"At what?"

"Do you not see that he looks as if he were following some one?"

"That is true," said Bossuet.

"Only see what eyes he makes!" Courfeyrac added.

"But whom the deuce is he following?"

"Some Mimi-Goton with flowers in her cap. He is in love."

"But," Bossuet observed, "I do not see any Mimi or any Goton, or any cap trimmed with flowers, in the street. There is not a single woman."

Courfeyrac looked, and exclaimed, "He is following a man."

A man wearing a cap, and whose gray beard could be distinguished, although his back was turned, was walking about twenty yards ahead of Marius. This man was dressed in a perfectly new great-coat, which was too large for him, and a frightful pair of ragged trousers all black with mud. Bossuet burst into a laugh.

"Who can the man be?"

"That?" Courfeyrac replied; "oh, he is a poet. Poets are fond of wearing the trousers of rabbit-skin pedlers and the coats of the Peers of France."

"Let us see where Marius is going," said Bossuet, "and where this man is going. Suppose we follow them, eh?"

"Bossuet!" Courfeyrac exclaimed, "Eagle of Meaux, you are a prodigious brute to think of following a man who is following a man."

They turned back. Marius had really seen Jondrette in the Rue Mouffetard, and was following him. Jondrette was walking along, not at all suspecting that an eye was already fixed upon him. He left the Rue Mouffetard, and Marius saw him enter one of the most hideous lodging-houses in the Rue Gracieuse, where he remained for about a quarter of an hour, and then returned to the Rue Mouffetard. He stopped at an ironmonger's shop, which was at that period at the corner of the Rue Pierre-Lombard; and a few minutes after Marius saw him come out of the shop, holding a large cold-chisel set in a wooden handle, which he hid under his great coat. He then turned to his left and hurried toward the Rue du Petit Banquier. Day was dying; the snow, which had ceased for a moment, had begun again, and Marius concealed himself at the corner of the Rue du Petit Banquier, which was deserted as usual, and did not follow Jondrette. It was lucky that he acted thus, for Jondrette, on reaching the spot where Marius had listened to the conversation of the hairy man and the bearded man, looked round, made sure that he was not followed, clambered over the wall, and disappeared. The unused ground which this wall enclosed communicated with the back yard of a livery-stable-keeper of bad repute, who had been a bankrupt, and still had a few vehicles standing under sheds.