Les Misérables
“Patron-Minette,” said he, “I did hear that word pronounced, in fact.”
And he repeated to the inspector the dialogue between the long-haired
man and the bearded man in the snow behind the wall of the Rue du
Petit-Banquier.
The inspector muttered:—
“The long-haired man must be Brujon, and the bearded one Demi-Liard,
alias Deux-Milliards.”
He had dropped his eyelids again, and became absorbed in thought.
“As for Father What’s-his-name, I think I recognize him. Here, I’ve
burned my coat. They always have too much fire in these cursed stoves.
Number 50-52. Former property of Gorbeau.”
Then he glanced at Marius.
“You saw only that bearded and that long-haired man?”
“And Panchaud.”
“You didn’t see a little imp of a dandy prowling about the premises?”
“No.”
“Nor a big lump of matter, resembling an elephant in the Jardin des
Plantes?”
“No.”
“Nor a scamp with the air of an old red tail?”
“No.”
“As for the fourth, no one sees him, not even his adjutants, clerks,
and employees. It is not surprising that you did not see him.”
“No. Who are all those persons?” asked Marius.
The inspector answered:—
“Besides, this is not the time for them.”
He relapsed into silence, then resumed:—
“50-52. I know that barrack. Impossible to conceal ourselves inside it
without the artists seeing us, and then they will get off simply by
countermanding the vaudeville. They are so modest! An audience
embarrasses them. None of that, none of that. I want to hear them sing
and make them dance.”
This monologue concluded, he turned to Marius, and demanded, gazing at
him intently the while:—
“Are you afraid?”
“Of what?” said Marius.
“Of these men?”
“No more than yourself!” retorted Marius rudely, who had begun to
notice that this police agent had not yet said “monsieur” to him.
The inspector stared still more intently at Marius, and continued with
sententious solemnity:—
“There, you speak like a brave man, and like an honest man. Courage
does not fear crime, and honesty does not fear authority.”
Marius interrupted him:—
“That is well, but what do you intend to do?”
The inspector contented himself with the remark:—
“The lodgers have pass-keys with which to get in at night. You must
have one.”
“Yes,” said Marius.
“Have you it about you?”
“Yes.”
“Give it to me,” said the inspector.
Marius took his key from his waistcoat pocket, handed it to the
inspector and added:—
“If you will take my advice, you will come in force.”
The inspector cast on Marius such a glance as Voltaire might have
bestowed on a provincial academician who had suggested a rhyme to him;
with one movement he plunged his hands, which were enormous, into the
two immense pockets of his top-coat, and pulled out two small steel
pistols, of the sort called “knock-me-downs.” Then he presented them to
Marius, saying rapidly, in a curt tone:—
“Take these. Go home. Hide in your chamber, so that you may be supposed
to have gone out. They are loaded. Each one carries two balls. You will
keep watch; there is a hole in the wall, as you have informed me. These
men will come. Leave them to their own devices for a time. When you
think matters have reached a crisis, and that it is time to put a stop
to them, fire a shot. Not too soon. The rest concerns me. A shot into
the ceiling, the air, no matter where. Above all things, not too soon.
Wait until they begin to put their project into execution; you are a
lawyer; you know the proper point.” Marius took the pistols and put
them in the side pocket of his coat.
“That makes a lump that can be seen,” said the inspector. “Put them in
your trousers pocket.”
Marius hid the pistols in his trousers pockets.
“Now,” pursued the inspector, “there is not a minute more to be lost by
any one. What time is it? Half-past two. Seven o’clock is the hour?”
“Six o’clock,” answered Marius.
“I have plenty of time,” said the inspector, “but no more than enough.
Don’t forget anything that I have said to you. Bang. A pistol shot.”
“Rest easy,” said Marius.
And as Marius laid his hand on the handle of the door on his way out,
the inspector called to him:—
“By the way, if you have occasion for my services between now and then,
come or send here. You will ask for Inspector Javert.”
CHAPTER XV—JONDRETTE MAKES HIS PURCHASES
A few moments later, about three o’clock, Courfeyrac chanced to be
passing along the Rue Mouffetard in company with Bossuet. The snow had
redoubled in violence, and filled the air. Bossuet was just saying to
Courfeyrac:—
“One would say, to see all these snow-flakes fall, that there was a
plague of white butterflies in heaven.” All at once, Bossuet caught
sight of Marius coming up the street towards the barrier with a
peculiar air.
“Hold!” said Bossuet. “There’s Marius.”
“I saw him,” said Courfeyrac. “Don’t let’s speak to him.”
“Why?”
“He is busy.”
“With what?”
“Don’t you see his air?”
“What air?”
“He has the air of a man who is following some one.”
“That’s true,” said Bossuet.
“Just see the eyes he is making!” said Courfeyrac.
“But who the deuce is he following?”
“Some fine, flowery bonneted wench! He’s in love.”
“But,” observed Bossuet, “I don’t see any wench nor any flowery bonnet
in the street. There’s not a woman round.”
Courfeyrac took a survey, and exclaimed:—
“He’s following a man!”
A man, in fact, wearing a gray cap, and whose gray beard could be
distinguished, although they only saw his back, was walking along about
twenty paces in advance of Marius.
This man was dressed in a great-coat which was perfectly new and too
large for him, and in a frightful pair of trousers all hanging in rags
and black with mud.
Bossuet burst out laughing.
“Who is that man?”
“He?” retorted Courfeyrac, “he’s a poet. Poets are very fond of wearing
the trousers of dealers in rabbit skins and the overcoats of peers of
France.”
“Let’s see where Marius will go,” said Bossuet; “let’s see where the
man is going, let’s follow them, hey?”
“Bossuet!” exclaimed Courfeyrac, “eagle of Meaux! You are a prodigious
brute. Follow a man who is following another man, indeed!”
They retraced their steps.
Marius had, in fact, seen Jondrette passing along the Rue Mouffetard,
and was spying on his proceedings.
Jondrette walked straight ahead, without a suspicion that he was
already held by a glance.
He quitted the Rue Mouffetard, and Marius saw him enter one of the most
terrible hovels in the Rue Gracieuse; he remained there about a quarter
of an hour, then returned to the Rue Mouffetard. He halted at an
ironmonger’s shop, which then stood at the corner of the Rue
Pierre-Lombard, and a few minutes later Marius saw him emerge from the
shop, holding in his hand a huge cold chisel with a white wood handle,
which he concealed beneath his great-coat. At the top of the Rue
Petit-Gentilly he turned to the left and proceeded rapidly to the Rue
du Petit-Banquier. The day was declining; the snow, which had ceased
for a moment, had just begun again. Marius posted himself on the watch
at the very corner of the Rue du Petit-Banquier, which was deserted, as
usual, and did not follow Jondrette into it. It was lucky that he did
so, for, on arriving in the vicinity of the wall where Marius had heard
the long-haired man and the bearded man conversing, Jondrette turned
round, made sure that no one was following him, did not see him, then
sprang across the wall and disappeared.
The waste land bordered by this wall communicated with the back yard of
an ex-livery stable-keeper of bad repute, who had failed and who still
kept a few old single-seated berlins under his sheds.
Marius thought that it would be wise to profit by Jondrette’s absence
to return home; moreover, it was growing late; every evening, Ma’am
Bougon when she set out for her dish-washing in town, had a habit of
locking the door, which was always closed at dusk. Marius had given his
key to the inspector of police; it was important, therefore, that he
should make haste.
Evening had arrived, night had almost closed in; on the horizon and in
the immensity of space, there remained but one spot illuminated by the
sun, and that was the moon.
It was rising in a ruddy glow behind the low dome of Salpêtrière.
Marius returned to No. 50-52 with great strides. The door was still
open when he arrived. He mounted the stairs on tip-toe and glided along
the wall of the corridor to his chamber. This corridor, as the reader
will remember, was bordered on both sides by attics, all of which were,
for the moment, empty and to let. Ma’am Bougon was in the habit of
leaving all the doors open. As he passed one of these attics, Marius
thought he perceived in the uninhabited cell the motionless heads of
four men, vaguely lighted up by a remnant of daylight, falling through
a dormer window.
Marius made no attempt to see, not wishing to be seen himself. He
succeeded in reaching his chamber without being seen and without making
any noise. It was high time. A moment later he heard Ma’am Bougon take
her departure, locking the door of the house behind her.
CHAPTER XVI—IN WHICH WILL BE FOUND THE WORDS TO AN ENGLISH AIR WHICH
WAS IN FASHION IN 1832
Marius seated himself on his bed. It might have been half-past five
o’clock. Only half an hour separated him from what was about to happen.
He heard the beating of his arteries as one hears the ticking of a
watch in the dark. He thought of the double march which was going on at
that moment in the dark,—crime advancing on one side, justice coming up
on the other. He was not afraid, but he could not think without a
shudder of what was about to take place. As is the case with all those
who are suddenly assailed by an unforeseen adventure, the entire day
produced upon him the effect of a dream, and in order to persuade
himself that he was not the prey of a nightmare, he had to feel the
cold barrels of the steel pistols in his trousers pockets.
It was no longer snowing; the moon disengaged itself more and more
clearly from the mist, and its light, mingled with the white reflection
of the snow which had fallen, communicated to the chamber a sort of
twilight aspect.
There was a light in the Jondrette den. Marius saw the hole in the wall
shining with a reddish glow which seemed bloody to him.
It was true that the light could not be produced by a candle. However,
there was not a sound in the Jondrette quarters, not a soul was moving
there, not a soul speaking, not a breath; the silence was glacial and
profound, and had it not been for that light, he might have thought
himself next door to a sepulchre.
Marius softly removed his boots and pushed them under his bed.
Several minutes elapsed. Marius heard the lower door turn on its
hinges; a heavy step mounted the staircase, and hastened along the
corridor; the latch of the hovel was noisily lifted; it was Jondrette
returning.
Instantly, several voices arose. The whole family was in the garret.
Only, it had been silent in the master’s absence, like wolf whelps in
the absence of the wolf.
“It’s I,” said he.
“Good evening, daddy,” yelped the girls.
“Well?” said the mother.
“All’s going first-rate,” responded Jondrette, “but my feet are beastly
cold. Good! You have dressed up. You have done well! You must inspire
confidence.”
“All ready to go out.”
“Don’t forget what I told you. You will do everything sure?”
“Rest easy.”
“Because—” said Jondrette. And he left the phrase unfinished.
Marius heard him lay something heavy on the table, probably the chisel
which he had purchased.
“By the way,” said Jondrette, “have you been eating here?”