3.V.6.3. THE INSEPARABLE
WHAT had become of Jean Valjean?
Immediately after having laughed, at Cosette's graceful
command, when no one was paying any heed to him, Jean
Valjean had risen and had gained the antechamber unperceived.
This was the very room which, eight months before,
he had entered black with mud, with blood and powder,
bringing back the grandson to the grandfather. The old
wainscoting was garlanded with foliage and flowers; the musicians
were seated on the sofa on which they had laid Marius
down. Basque, in a black coat, knee-breeches, white stockings
and white gloves, was arranging roses round all of the dishes
that were to be served. Jean Valjean pointed to his arm in
its sling, charged Basque to explain his absence, and went
away.
The long windows of the dining-room opened on the street.
Jean Valjean stood for several minutes, erect and motionless
in the darkness, beneath those radiant windows. He listened.
The confused sounds of the banquet reached his ear. He
heard the loud, commanding tones of the grandfather, the
violins, the clatter of the plates, the bursts of laughter, and
through all that merry uproar, he distinguished Cosette's sweet
and joyous voice.
He quitted the Rue des Filles-du-Calvaire, and returned to
the Rue de l'Homme Arme.
In order to return thither, he took the Rue Saint-Louis,
the
Rue Culture-Sainte-Catherine, and the Blancs-Manteaux; it
was a little longer, but it was the road through which, for the
last three months, he had become accustomed to pass every
day on his way from the Rue de l'Homme Arme to the Rue
des Filles-du-Calvaire, in order to avoid the obstructions and
the mud in the Rue Vielle-du-Temple.
This road, through which Cosette had passed, excluded for
him all possibility of any other itinerary.
Jean Valjean entered his lodgings. He lighted his candle
and mounted the stairs. The apartment was empty. Even
Toussaint was no longer there. Jean Valjean's step made
more noise than usual in the chambers. All the cupboards
stood open. He penetrated to Cosette's bedroom. There were
no sheets on the bed. The pillow, covered with ticking, and
without a case or lace, was laid on the blankets folded up on
the foot of the mattress, whose covering was visible, and on
which no one was ever to sleep again. All the little feminine
objects which Cosette was attached to had been carried away;
nothing remained except the heavy furniture and the four
walls. Toussaint's bed was despoiled in like manner. One
bed only was made up, and seemed to be waiting some one,
and this was Jean Valjean's bed.
Jean Valjean looked at the walls, closed some of the
cupboard
doors, and went and came from one room to another.
Then he sought his own chamber once more, and set his
candle on a table.
He had disengaged his arm from the sling, and he used his
right hand as though it did not hurt him.
He approached his bed, and his eyes rested, was it by
chance? was it intentionally? on the inseparable of
which Cosette
had been jealous, on the little portmanteau which never
left him. On his arrival in the Rue de l'Homme Arme, on
the 4th of June, he had deposited it on a round table near the
head of his bed. He went to this table with a sort of vivacity,
took a key from his pocket, and opened the valise.
From it he slowly drew forth the garments in which, ten
years before, Cosette had quitted Montfermeil; first the little
gown, then the black fichu, then the stout, coarse child's shoes
which Cosette might almost have worn still, so tiny were her
feet, then the fustian bodice, which was very thick, then the
knitted petticoat, next the apron with pockets, then the
woollen stockings. These stockings, which still preserved the
graceful form of a tiny leg, were no longer than Jean Valjean's
hand. All this was black of hue. It was he who had
brought those garments to Montfermeil for her. As he removed
them from the valise, he laid them on the bed. He
fell to thinking. He called up memories. It was in winter,
in a very cold month of December, she was shivering, half-naked,
in rags, her poor little feet were all red in their wooden
shoes. He, Jean Valjean, had made her abandon those rags
to clothe herself in these mourning habiliments. The mother
must have felt pleased in her grave, to see her daughter
wearing mourning for her, and, above all, to see that she
was properly clothed, and that she was warm. He thought of
that forest of Montfermeil; they had traversed it together,
Cosette and he; he thought of what the weather had been, of
the leafless trees, of the wood destitute of birds, of the
sunless
sky; it mattered not, it was charming. He arranged the
tiny garments on the bed, the fichu next to the petticoat, the
stockings beside the shoes, and he looked at them, one after
the other. She was no taller than that, she had her big doll
in her arms, she had put her louis d'or in the pocket of that
apron, she had laughed, they walked hand in hand, she had no
one in the world but him.
Then his venerable, white head fell forward on the bed,
that
stoical old heart broke, his face was engulfed, so to speak, in
Cosette's garments, and if any one had passed up the stairs at
that moment, he would have heard frightful sobs.