Les Misérables, page 249
CHAPTER VII--TO ONE SADNESS OPPOSE A SADNESS AND A HALF
All situations have their instincts. Old and eternal Mother Naturewarned Jean Valjean in a dim way of the presence of Marius. Jean Valjeanshuddered to the very bottom of his soul. Jean Valjean saw nothing, knewnothing, and yet he scanned with obstinate attention, the darknessin which he walked, as though he felt on one side of him something inprocess of construction, and on the other, something which was crumblingaway. Marius, also warned, and, in accordance with the deep law of God,by that same Mother Nature, did all he could to keep out of sight of"the father." Nevertheless, it came to pass that Jean Valjean sometimesespied him. Marius' manners were no longer in the least natural. Heexhibited ambiguous prudence and awkward daring. He no longer came quiteclose to them as formerly. He seated himself at a distance and pretendedto be reading; why did he pretend that? Formerly he had come in his oldcoat, now he wore his new one every day; Jean Valjean was not surethat he did not have his hair curled, his eyes were very queer, he woregloves; in short, Jean Valjean cordially detested this young man.
Cosette allowed nothing to be divined. Without knowing just what was thematter with her she was convinced that there was something in it, andthat it must be concealed.
There was a coincidence between the taste for the toilet which hadrecently come to Cosette, and the habit of new clothes developed bythat stranger which was very repugnant to Jean Valjean. It might beaccidental, no doubt, certainly, but it was a menacing accident.
He never opened his mouth to Cosette about this stranger. One day,however, he could not refrain from so doing, and, with that vaguedespair which suddenly casts the lead into the depths of its despair, hesaid to her: "What a very pedantic air that young man has!"
Cosette, but a year before only an indifferent little girl, would havereplied: "Why, no, he is charming." Ten years later, with the loveof Marius in her heart, she would have answered: "A pedant, andinsufferable to the sight! You are right!"--At the moment in lifeand the heart which she had then attained, she contented herself withreplying, with supreme calmness: "That young man!"
As though she now beheld him for the first time in her life.
"How stupid I am!" thought Jean Valjean. "She had not noticed him. It isI who have pointed him out to her."
Oh, simplicity of the old! oh, the depth of children!
It is one of the laws of those fresh years of suffering and trouble, ofthose vivacious conflicts between a first love and the first obstacles,that the young girl does not allow herself to be caught in any trapwhatever, and that the young man falls into every one. Jean Valjeanhad instituted an undeclared war against Marius, which Marius, withthe sublime stupidity of his passion and his age, did not divine. JeanValjean laid a host of ambushes for him; he changed his hour, he changedhis bench, he forgot his handkerchief, he came alone to the Luxembourg;Marius dashed headlong into all these snares; and to all theinterrogation marks planted by Jean Valjean in his pathway, heingenuously answered "yes." But Cosette remained immured in her apparentunconcern and in her imperturbable tranquillity, so that Jean Valjeanarrived at the following conclusion: "That ninny is madly in love withCosette, but Cosette does not even know that he exists."
None the less did he bear in his heart a mournful tremor. The minutewhen Cosette would love might strike at any moment. Does not everythingbegin with indifference?
Only once did Cosette make a mistake and alarm him. He rose from hisseat to depart, after a stay of three hours, and she said: "What,already?"
Jean Valjean had not discontinued his trips to the Luxembourg, as hedid not wish to do anything out of the way, and as, above all things,he feared to arouse Cosette; but during the hours which were so sweetto the lovers, while Cosette was sending her smile to the intoxicatedMarius, who perceived nothing else now, and who now saw nothing in allthe world but an adored and radiant face, Jean Valjean was fixing onMarius flashing and terrible eyes. He, who had finally come to believehimself incapable of a malevolent feeling, experienced moments whenMarius was present, in which he thought he was becoming savage andferocious once more, and he felt the old depths of his soul, whichhad formerly contained so much wrath, opening once more and rising upagainst that young man. It almost seemed to him that unknown craterswere forming in his bosom.
What! he was there, that creature! What was he there for? He camecreeping about, smelling out, examining, trying! He came, saying: "Hey!Why not?" He came to prowl about his, Jean Valjean's, life! to prowlabout his happiness, with the purpose of seizing it and bearing it away!
Jean Valjean added: "Yes, that's it! What is he in search of? Anadventure! What does he want? A love affair! A love affair! And I? What!I have been first, the most wretched of men, and then the most unhappy,and I have traversed sixty years of life on my knees, I have sufferedeverything that man can suffer, I have grown old without having beenyoung, I have lived without a family, without relatives, withoutfriends, without life, without children, I have left my blood on everystone, on every bramble, on every mile-post, along every wall, I havebeen gentle, though others have been hard to me, and kind, althoughothers have been malicious, I have become an honest man once more, inspite of everything, I have repented of the evil that I have done andhave forgiven the evil that has been done to me, and at the momentwhen I receive my recompense, at the moment when it is all over, at themoment when I am just touching the goal, at the moment when I have whatI desire, it is well, it is good, I have paid, I have earned it, allthis is to take flight, all this will vanish, and I shall lose Cosette,and I shall lose my life, my joy, my soul, because it has pleased agreat booby to come and lounge at the Luxembourg."
Then his eyes were filled with a sad and extraordinary gleam.
It was no longer a man gazing at a man; it was no longer an enemysurveying an enemy. It was a dog scanning a thief.
The reader knows the rest. Marius pursued his senseless course. One dayhe followed Cosette to the Rue de l'Ouest. Another day he spoke tothe porter. The porter, on his side, spoke, and said to Jean Valjean:"Monsieur, who is that curious young man who is asking for you?" On themorrow Jean Valjean bestowed on Marius that glance which Marius at lastperceived. A week later, Jean Valjean had taken his departure. He sworeto himself that he would never again set foot either in the Luxembourgor in the Rue de l'Ouest. He returned to the Rue Plumet.
Cosette did not complain, she said nothing, she asked no questions, shedid not seek to learn his reasons; she had already reached the pointwhere she was afraid of being divined, and of betraying herself. JeanValjean had no experience of these miseries, the only miseries whichare charming and the only ones with which he was not acquainted; theconsequence was that he did not understand the grave significance ofCosette's silence.
He merely noticed that she had grown sad, and he grew gloomy. On hisside and on hers, inexperience had joined issue.
Once he made a trial. He asked Cosette:--
"Would you like to come to the Luxembourg?"
A ray illuminated Cosette's pale face.
"Yes," said she.
They went thither. Three months had elapsed. Marius no longer wentthere. Marius was not there.
On the following day, Jean Valjean asked Cosette again:--
"Would you like to come to the Luxembourg?"
She replied, sadly and gently:--
"No."
Jean Valjean was hurt by this sadness, and heart-broken at thisgentleness.
What was going on in that mind which was so young and yet already soimpenetrable? What was on its way there within? What was taking placein Cosette's soul? Sometimes, instead of going to bed, Jean Valjeanremained seated on his pallet, with his head in his hands, and he passedwhole nights asking himself: "What has Cosette in her mind?" and inthinking of the things that she might be thinking about.
Oh! at such moments, what mournful glances did he cast towards thatcloister, that chaste peak, that abode of angels, that inaccessibleglacier of virtue! How he contemplated, with despairing ecstasy, thatconvent garden, full of ignored flowers and cloistered virgins, whereall perfumes and all souls mount straight to heaven! How he adored thatEden forever closed against him, whence he had voluntarily and madlyemerged! How he regretted his abnegation and his folly in having broughtCosette back into the world, poor hero of sacrifice, seized and hurledto the earth by his very self-devotion! How he said to himself, "Whathave I done?"
However, nothing of all this was perceptible to Cosette. No ill-temper,no harshness. His face was always serene and kind. Jean Valjean'smanners were more tender and more paternal than ever. If anything couldhave betrayed his lack of joy, it was his increased suavity.
On her side, Cosette languished. She suffered from the absence of Mariusas she had rejoiced in his presence, peculiarly, without exactly beingconscious of it. When Jean Valjean ceased to take her on their customarystrolls, a feminine instinct murmured confusedly, at the bottom of herheart, that she must not seem to set store on the Luxembourg garden, andthat if this proved to be a matter of indifference to her, her fatherwould take her thither once more. But days, weeks, months, elapsed. JeanValjean had tacitly accepted Cosette's tacit consent. She regretted it.It was too late. So Marius had disappeared; all was over. The day onwhich she returned to the Luxembourg, Marius was no longer there. Whatwas to be done? Should she ever find him again? She felt an anguish ather heart, which nothing relieved, and which augmented every day; she nolonger knew whether it was winter or summer, whether it was raining orshining, whether the birds were singing, whether it was the season fordahlias or daisies, whether the Luxembourg was more charming thanthe Tuileries, whether the linen which the laundress brought homewas starched too much or not enough, whether Toussaint had done "hermarketing" well or ill; and she remained dejected, absorbed, attentiveto but a single thought, her eyes vague and staring as when one gazes bynight at a black and fathomless spot where an apparition has vanished.
However, she did not allow Jean Valjean to perceive anything of this,except her pallor.
She still wore her sweet face for him.
This pallor sufficed but too thoroughly to trouble Jean Valjean.Sometimes he asked her:--
"What is the matter with you?"
She replied: "There is nothing the matter with me."
And after a silence, when she divined that he was sad also, she wouldadd:--
"And you, father--is there anything wrong with you?"
"With me? Nothing," said he.
These two beings who had loved each other so exclusively, and with sotouching an affection, and who had lived so long for each othernow suffered side by side, each on the other's account; withoutacknowledging it to each other, without anger towards each other, andwith a smile.
