3.V.3.2. EXPLANATION
ON the day of the sixth of June, a battue of the sewers had
been ordered. It was feared that the vanquished might have
taken to them for refuge, and Prefect Gisquet was to search
occult Paris while General Bugeaud swept public Paris; a
double and connected operation which exacted a double
strategy on the part of the public force, represented above by
the army and below by the police. Three squads of agents
and sewermen explored the subterranean drain of Paris, the
first on the right bank, the second on the left bank, the third
in the city. The agents of police were armed with carabines,
with bludgeons, swords and poignards.
That which was directed at Jean Valjean at that moment,
was the lantern of the patrol of the right bank.
This patrol had just visited the curving gallery and the
three blind alleys which lie beneath the Rue du Cadran.
While they were passing their lantern through the depths of
these blind alleys, Jean Valjean had encountered on his path
the entrance to the gallery, had perceived that it was narrower
than the principal passage and had not penetrated thither. He
had passed on. The police, on emerging from the gallery du
Cadran, had fancied that they heard the sound of footsteps in
the direction of the belt sewer. They were, in fact, the steps
of Jean Valjean. The sergeant in command of the patrol had
raised his lantern, and the squad had begun to gaze into the
mist in the direction whence the sound proceeded.
This was an indescribable moment for Jean Valjean.
Happily, if he saw the lantern well, the lantern saw him
but
ill. It was light and he was shadow. He was very far off,
and mingled with the darkness of the place. He hugged the
wall and halted. Moreover, he did not understand what it
was that was moving behind him. The lack of sleep and food,
and his emotions had caused him also to pass into the state of
a visionary. He beheld a gleam, and around that gleam,
forms. What was it? He did not comprehend.
Jean Valjean having paused, the sound ceased.
The men of the patrol listened, and heard nothing, they
looked and saw nothing. They held a consultation.
There existed at that epoch at this point of the
Montmartre
sewer a sort of cross-roads called de service, which was
afterwards suppressed, on account of the little interior lake
which formed there, swallowing up the torrent of rain in
heavy storms. The patrol could form a cluster in this open
space. Jean Valjean saw these spectres form a sort of circle.
These bull-dogs' heads approached each other closely and
whispered together.
The result of this council held by the watch dogs was,
that
they had been mistaken, that there had been no noise, that it
was useless to get entangled in the belt sewer, that it would
only be a waste of time, but that they ought to hasten towards
Saint-Merry; that if there was anything to do, and any
"bousingot" to track out, it was in that quarter.
From time to time, parties re-sole their old insults. In
1832, the word bousingot formed the interim between the
word jacobin, which had become obsolete, and the word demagogue
which has since rendered such excellent service.
The sergeant gave orders to turn to the left, towards the
watershed of the Seine.
If it had occurred to them to separate into two squads,
and
to go in both directions, Jean Valjean would have been captured.
All hung on that thread. It is probable that the instructions
of the prefecture, foreseeing a possibility of combat
and insurgents in force, had forbidden the patrol to part
company.
The patrol resumed its march, leaving Jean Valjean
behind it. Of all this movement, Jean Valjean perceived
nothing, except the eclipse of the lantern which suddenly
wheeled round.
Before taking his departure, the Sergeant, in order to
acquit
his policeman's conscience, discharged his gun in the direction
of Jean Valjean. The detonation rolled from echo to echo
in the crypt, like the rumbling of that titanic entrail. A bit
of
plaster which fell into the stream and splashed up the water a
few paces away from Jean Valjean, warned him that the ball
had struck the arch over his head.
Slow and measured steps resounded for some time on the
timber work, gradually dying away as they retreated to a
greater distance; the group of black forms vanished, a glimmer
of light oscillated and floated, communicating to the
vault a reddish glow which grew fainter, then disappeared;
the silence became profound once more, the obscurity became
complete, blindness and deafness resumed possession of the
shadows; and Jean Valjean, not daring to stir as yet, remained
for a long time leaning with his back against the wall,
with straining ears, and dilated pupils, watching the
disappearance
of that phantom patrol.