Les Misérables
district-attorney directed the attention of the jury to this stupid
attitude, evidently deliberate, which denoted not imbecility, but
craft, skill, a habit of deceiving justice, and which set forth in all
its nakedness the “profound perversity” of this man. He ended by making
his reserves on the affair of Little Gervais and demanding a severe
sentence.
At that time, as the reader will remember, it was penal servitude for
life.
The counsel for the defence rose, began by complimenting Monsieur
l’Avocat-General on his “admirable speech,” then replied as best he
could; but he weakened; the ground was evidently slipping away from
under his feet.
CHAPTER X—THE SYSTEM OF DENIALS
The moment for closing the debate had arrived. The President had the
accused stand up, and addressed to him the customary question, “Have
you anything to add to your defence?”
The man did not appear to understand, as he stood there, twisting in
his hands a terrible cap which he had.
The President repeated the question.
This time the man heard it. He seemed to understand. He made a motion
like a man who is just waking up, cast his eyes about him, stared at
the audience, the gendarmes, his counsel, the jury, the court, laid his
monstrous fist on the rim of woodwork in front of his bench, took
another look, and all at once, fixing his glance upon the
district-attorney, he began to speak. It was like an eruption. It
seemed, from the manner in which the words escaped from his
mouth,—incoherent, impetuous, pell-mell, tumbling over each other,—as
though they were all pressing forward to issue forth at once. He said:—
“This is what I have to say. That I have been a wheelwright in Paris,
and that it was with Monsieur Baloup. It is a hard trade. In the
wheelwright’s trade one works always in the open air, in courtyards,
under sheds when the masters are good, never in closed workshops,
because space is required, you see. In winter one gets so cold that one
beats one’s arms together to warm one’s self; but the masters don’t
like it; they say it wastes time. Handling iron when there is ice
between the paving-stones is hard work. That wears a man out quickly.
One is old while he is still quite young in that trade. At forty a man
is done for. I was fifty-three. I was in a bad state. And then, workmen
are so mean! When a man is no longer young, they call him nothing but
an old bird, old beast! I was not earning more than thirty sous a day.
They paid me as little as possible. The masters took advantage of my
age—and then I had my daughter, who was a laundress at the river. She
earned a little also. It sufficed for us two. She had trouble, also;
all day long up to her waist in a tub, in rain, in snow. When the wind
cuts your face, when it freezes, it is all the same; you must still
wash. There are people who have not much linen, and wait until late; if
you do not wash, you lose your custom. The planks are badly joined, and
water drops on you from everywhere; you have your petticoats all damp
above and below. That penetrates. She has also worked at the laundry of
the Enfants-Rouges, where the water comes through faucets. You are not
in the tub there; you wash at the faucet in front of you, and rinse in
a basin behind you. As it is enclosed, you are not so cold; but there
is that hot steam, which is terrible, and which ruins your eyes. She
came home at seven o’clock in the evening, and went to bed at once, she
was so tired. Her husband beat her. She is dead. We have not been very
happy. She was a good girl, who did not go to the ball, and who was
very peaceable. I remember one Shrove-Tuesday when she went to bed at
eight o’clock. There, I am telling the truth; you have only to ask. Ah,
yes! how stupid I am! Paris is a gulf. Who knows Father Champmathieu
there? But M. Baloup does, I tell you. Go see at M. Baloup’s; and after
all, I don’t know what is wanted of me.”
The man ceased speaking, and remained standing. He had said these
things in a loud, rapid, hoarse voice, with a sort of irritated and
savage ingenuousness. Once he paused to salute some one in the crowd.
The sort of affirmations which he seemed to fling out before him at
random came like hiccoughs, and to each he added the gesture of a
wood-cutter who is splitting wood. When he had finished, the audience
burst into a laugh. He stared at the public, and, perceiving that they
were laughing, and not understanding why, he began to laugh himself.
It was inauspicious.
The President, an attentive and benevolent man, raised his voice.
He reminded “the gentlemen of the jury” that “the sieur Baloup,
formerly a master-wheelwright, with whom the accused stated that he had
served, had been summoned in vain. He had become bankrupt, and was not
to be found.” Then turning to the accused, he enjoined him to listen to
what he was about to say, and added: “You are in a position where
reflection is necessary. The gravest presumptions rest upon you, and
may induce vital results. Prisoner, in your own interests, I summon you
for the last time to explain yourself clearly on two points. In the
first place, did you or did you not climb the wall of the Pierron
orchard, break the branch, and steal the apples; that is to say, commit
the crime of breaking in and theft? In the second place, are you the
discharged convict, Jean Valjean—yes or no?”
The prisoner shook his head with a capable air, like a man who has
thoroughly understood, and who knows what answer he is going to make.
He opened his mouth, turned towards the President, and said:—
“In the first place—”
Then he stared at his cap, stared at the ceiling, and held his peace.
“Prisoner,” said the district-attorney, in a severe voice; “pay
attention. You are not answering anything that has been asked of you.
Your embarrassment condemns you. It is evident that your name is not
Champmathieu; that you are the convict, Jean Valjean, concealed first
under the name of Jean Mathieu, which was the name of his mother; that
you went to Auvergne; that you were born at Faverolles, where you were
a pruner of trees. It is evident that you have been guilty of entering,
and of the theft of ripe apples from the Pierron orchard. The gentlemen
of the jury will form their own opinion.”
The prisoner had finally resumed his seat; he arose abruptly when the
district-attorney had finished, and exclaimed:—
“You are very wicked; that you are! This what I wanted to say; I could
not find words for it at first. I have stolen nothing. I am a man who
does not have something to eat every day. I was coming from Ailly; I
was walking through the country after a shower, which had made the
whole country yellow: even the ponds were overflowed, and nothing
sprang from the sand any more but the little blades of grass at the
wayside. I found a broken branch with apples on the ground; I picked up
the branch without knowing that it would get me into trouble. I have
been in prison, and they have been dragging me about for the last three
months; more than that I cannot say; people talk against me, they tell
me, ‘Answer!’ The gendarme, who is a good fellow, nudges my elbow, and
says to me in a low voice, ‘Come, answer!’ I don’t know how to explain;
I have no education; I am a poor man; that is where they wrong me,
because they do not see this. I have not stolen; I picked up from the
ground things that were lying there. You say, Jean Valjean, Jean
Mathieu! I don’t know those persons; they are villagers. I worked for
M. Baloup, Boulevard de l’Hôpital; my name is Champmathieu. You are
very clever to tell me where I was born; I don’t know myself: it’s not
everybody who has a house in which to come into the world; that would
be too convenient. I think that my father and mother were people who
strolled along the highways; I know nothing different. When I was a
child, they called me _young fellow_; now they call me _old Fellow_;
those are my baptismal names; take that as you like. I have been in
Auvergne; I have been at Faverolles. Pardi. Well! can’t a man have been
in Auvergne, or at Faverolles, without having been in the galleys? I
tell you that I have not stolen, and that I am Father Champmathieu; I
have been with M. Baloup; I have had a settled residence. You worry me
with your nonsense, there! Why is everybody pursuing me so furiously?”
The district-attorney had remained standing; he addressed the
President:—
“Monsieur le Président, in view of the confused but exceedingly clever
denials of the prisoner, who would like to pass himself off as an
idiot, but who will not succeed in so doing,—we shall attend to
that,—we demand that it shall please you and that it shall please the
court to summon once more into this place the convicts Brevet,
Cochepaille, and Chenildieu, and Police-Inspector Javert, and question
them for the last time as to the identity of the prisoner with the
convict Jean Valjean.”
“I would remind the district-attorney,” said the President, “that
Police-Inspector Javert, recalled by his duties to the capital of a
neighboring arrondissement, left the court-room and the town as soon as
he had made his deposition; we have accorded him permission, with the
consent of the district-attorney and of the counsel for the prisoner.”
“That is true, Mr. President,” responded the district-attorney. “In the
absence of sieur Javert, I think it my duty to remind the gentlemen of
the jury of what he said here a few hours ago. Javert is an estimable
man, who does honor by his rigorous and strict probity to inferior but
important functions. These are the terms of his deposition: ‘I do not
even stand in need of circumstantial proofs and moral presumptions to
give the lie to the prisoner’s denial. I recognize him perfectly. The
name of this man is not Champmathieu; he is an ex-convict named Jean
Valjean, and is very vicious and much to be feared. It is only with
extreme regret that he was released at the expiration of his term. He
underwent nineteen years of penal servitude for theft. He made five or
six attempts to escape. Besides the theft from Little Gervais, and from
the Pierron orchard, I suspect him of a theft committed in the house of
His Grace the late Bishop of D—— I often saw him at the time when I was
adjutant of the galley-guard at the prison in Toulon. I repeat that I
recognize him perfectly.’”
This extremely precise statement appeared to produce a vivid impression
on the public and on the jury. The district-attorney concluded by
insisting, that in default of Javert, the three witnesses Brevet,
Chenildieu, and Cochepaille should be heard once more and solemnly
interrogated.
The President transmitted the order to an usher, and, a moment later,
the door of the witnesses’ room opened. The usher, accompanied by a
gendarme ready to lend him armed assistance, introduced the convict
Brevet. The audience was in suspense; and all breasts heaved as though
they had contained but one soul.
The ex-convict Brevet wore the black and gray waistcoat of the central
prisons. Brevet was a person sixty years of age, who had a sort of
business man’s face, and the air of a rascal. The two sometimes go
together. In prison, whither fresh misdeeds had led him, he had become
something in the nature of a turnkey. He was a man of whom his
superiors said, “He tries to make himself of use.” The chaplains bore
good testimony as to his religious habits. It must not be forgotten
that this passed under the Restoration.
“Brevet,” said the President, “you have undergone an ignominious
sentence, and you cannot take an oath.”
Brevet dropped his eyes.
“Nevertheless,” continued the President, “even in the man whom the law
has degraded, there may remain, when the divine mercy permits it, a