Les Misérables, v. 5

CHAPTER V

A NIGHT BEHIND WHICH IS DAY

At the knock he heard at his door Jean Valjean turned round.

"Come in," he said feebly.

The door opened, and Cosette and Marius appeared. Cosette rushed into the room. Marius remained on the threshold, leaning against the doorpost.

"Cosette!" said Jean Valjean, and he sat up in his chair, with his arms outstretched and opened, haggard, livid, and sinister, but with an immense joy in his eyes. Cosette, suffocated with emotion, fell on Jean Valjean's breast.

"Father!" she said.

Jean Valjean, utterly overcome, stammered, "Cosette! She – you – Madame! It is thou! Oh, my God!"

And clasped in Cosette's arms, he exclaimed, —

"It is you! You are here; you forgive me, then!"

Marius, drooping his eyelids to keep his tears from flowing, advanced a step, and muttered between his lips, which were convulsively clenched to stop his sobs, —

"Father!"

"And you too, you forgive me!" said Jean Valjean.

Marius could not find a word to say, and Jean Valjean added, "Thank you." Cosette took off her shawl, and threw her bonnet on the bed.

"It is in my way," she said.

And sitting down on the old man's knees, she parted his gray hair with an adorable movement, and kissed his forehead. Jean Valjean, who was wandering, let her do so. Cosette, who only comprehended very vaguely, redoubled her caresses, as if she wished to pay Marius's debt, and Jean Valjean stammered, —

"How foolish a man can be! I fancied that I should not see her again. Just imagine, Monsieur Pontmercy, that at the very moment when you came in I was saying, 'It is all over.' There is her little dress. 'I am a wretched man, I shall not see Cosette again,' I was saying at the very moment when you were coming up the stairs. What an idiot I was! A man can be as idiotic as that! But people count without the good God, who says, 'You imagine that you are going to be abandoned; no, things will not happen like that. Down below there is a poor old fellow who has need of an angel.' And the angel comes, and he sees Cosette again, and he sees his little Cosette again. Oh, I was very unhappy!"

For a moment he was unable to speak; then he went on, —

"I really wanted to see Cosette for a little while every now and then, for a heart requires a bone to gnaw. Still, I knew well that I was in the way. I said to myself, 'They do not want you, so stop in your corner; a man has no right to pay everlasting visits,' Ah, blessed be God! I see her again. Do you know, Cosette, that your husband is very handsome? What a pretty embroidered collar you are wearing; I like that pattern. Your husband chose it, did he not? And then, you will need cashmere shawls. Monsieur Pontmercy, let me call her Cosette, it will not be for long."

And Cosette replied, —

"How unkind to have left us like that! Where have you been to? Why were you away so long? Formerly your absences did not last over three or four days. I sent Nicolette, and the answer always was, 'He has not returned.' When did you get back? Why did you not let us know? Are you aware that you are greatly changed? Oh, naughty papa, he has been ill, and we did not know it. Here, Marius, feel how cold his hand is!"

"So you are here! So you forgive me, Monsieur Pontmercy?" Jean Valjean repeated.

At this remark, all that was swelling in Marius's heart found a vent, and he burst forth, —

"Do you hear, Cosette? He asks my pardon. And do you know what he did for me, Cosette? He saved my life; he did more, he gave you to me, and, after saving me, and after giving you to me, Cosette, what did he do for himself? He sacrificed himself. That is the man. And to me, who am so ungrateful, so pitiless, so forgetful, and so guilty, he says, 'Thank you!' Cosette, my whole life spent at this man's feet would be too little. That barricade, that sewer, that furnace, that pit, – he went through them all for me and for you, Cosette! He carried me through every form of death, which he held at bay from me and accepted for himself. This man possesses every courage, every virtue, every heroism, and every holiness, and he is an angel, Cosette!"

"Stop, stop!" Jean Valjean said in a whisper; "why talk in that way?"

"But why did you not tell me of it?" exclaimed Marius, with a passion in which was veneration; "it is your fault also. You save people's lives, and conceal the fact from them! You do more; under the pretext of unmasking yourself, you calumniate yourself. It is frightful!"

"I told the truth," Jean Valjean replied.

"No!" Marius retorted, "the truth is the whole truth, and you did not tell that. You were Monsieur Madeleine; why not tell me so? You saved Javert; why not tell me so? I owed you my life; why not tell me so?"

"Because I thought like you, and found that you were right. It was necessary that I should leave you. Had you known of the sewer, you would have compelled me to remain with you, and hence I held my tongue. Had I spoken, I should have been in the way."

"Been in the way of whom, – of what?" Marius broke out. "Do you fancy that you are going to remain here? We mean to take you back with us. Oh, good heaven! when I think that I only learned all this by accident! We shall take you away with us, for you form a part of ourselves. You are her father and mine. You shall not spend another day in this frightful house, so do not fancy you will be here to-morrow."

"To-morrow," said Jean Valjean, "I shall be no longer here; but I shall not be at your house."

"What do you mean?" Marius asked. "Oh, no! we shall not let you travel any more. You shall not leave us again, for you belong to us, and we will not let you go."

"This time it is for good," Cosette added. "We have a carriage below, and I mean to carry you off; if necessary, I shall employ force."

And laughing, she feigned to raise the old man in her arms.

"Your room is still all ready in our house," she went on. "If you only knew how pretty the garden is just at present! The azaleas are getting on splendidly; the walks are covered with river sand, and there are little violet shells. You shall eat my strawberries, for it is I who water them. And no more Madame and no more Monsieur Jean, for we live in a republic, do we not, Marius? The programme is changed. If you only knew, father, what a sorrow I had; a redbreast had made its nest in a hole in the wall, and a horrible cat killed it for me. My poor, pretty little redbreast, that used to thrust its head out of its window and look at me! I cried at it, and could have killed the cat! But now, nobody weeps, everybody laughs, everybody is happy. You will come with us; how pleased grandfather will be! You will have your bed in the garden, you will cultivate it, and we will see whether your strawberries are as fine as mine. And then, I will do all you wish, and you will obey me."

Jean Valjean listened without hearing; he heard the music of her voice rather than the meaning of her words, and one of those heavy tears, which are the black pearls of the soul, slowly collected in his eye. He murmured, —

"The proof that God is good is that she is here."

"My father!" said Cosette.

Jean Valjean continued, —

"It is true it would be charming to live together. They have their trees full of birds, and I should walk about with Cosette. It is sweet to be with persons who live, who say to each other good-morning, and call each other in the garden. We should each cultivate a little bed; she would give me her strawberries to eat, and I would let her pick my roses. It would be delicious, but – "

He broke off, and said gently, "It is a pity!"

The tear did not fall, it was recalled, and Jean Valjean substituted a smile for it. Cosette took both the old man's hands in hers.

"Good Heaven!" she said, "your hands have grown colder. Can you be ill? Are you suffering?"

"I – no," Jean Valjean replied, "I am quite well. It is only – " He stopped.

"Only what?"

"I am going to die directly."

Marius and Cosette shuddered.

"Die!" Marius exclaimed.

"Yes; but that is nothing," said Jean Valjean.

He breathed, smiled, and added, —

"Cosette, you were talking to me; go on, speak again. Your redbreast is dead, then? Speak, that I may hear your voice."

Marius, who was petrified, looked at the old man, and Cosette uttered a piercing shriek.

"Father, father, you will live! You are going to live. I insist on your living, do you hear?"

Jean Valjean raised his head to her with adoration.

"Oh, yes, forbid me dying. Who knows? Perhaps I shall obey. I was on the road to death when you arrived, but that stopped me. I fancied I was coming to life again."

"You are full of strength and life," Marius exclaimed; "can you suppose that a man dies like that? You have known grief, but you shall know no more. It is I who ask pardon of you, and on my knees! You are going to live, and live with us, and live a long time. We will take you with us, and shall have henceforth but one thought, your happiness!"

"You hear," said Cosette, who was all in tears. "Marius says that you will not die."

Jean Valjean continued to smile.

"Even if you were to take me home with you, Monsieur Pontmercy, would that prevent me being what I am? No. God has thought the same as you and I, and he does not alter his opinion. It is better for me to be gone. Death is an excellent arrangement, and God knows better than we do what we want. I am certain that it is right, that you should be happy, that Monsieur Pontmercy should have Cosette, that youth should espouse the dawn, that there should be around you, my children, lilacs and nightingales, that your life should be a lawn bathed in sunlight, that all the enchantments of Heaven should fill your souls, and that I who am good for nothing should now die. Come, be reasonable; nothing is possible now, and I fully feel that all is over. An hour ago I had a fainting-fit, and last night I drank the whole of that jug of water. How kind your husband is, Cosette! You are much better with him than with me!"

There was a noise at the door; it was the physician come to pay his visit.

"Good-day, and good-by, doctor," said Jean Valjean; "here are my poor children."

Marius went up to the physician, and addressed but one word to him, "Sir?" – but in the manner of pronouncing it there was a whole question. The physician answered the question by an expressive glance.

"Because things are unpleasant," said Jean Valjean, "that is no reason to be unjust to God."

There was a silence, and every breast was oppressed. Jean Valjean turned to Cosette, and began contemplating her, as if he wished to take the glance with him into eternity. In the deep shadow into which he had already sunk ecstasy was still possible for him in gazing at Cosette. The reflection of her sweet countenance illumined his pale face, for the sepulchre may have its brilliancy. The physician felt his pulse.

"Ah, it was you that he wanted," he said, looking at Marius and Cosette.

And bending down to Marius's ear, he whispered, "Too late!"

Jean Valjean, almost without ceasing to regard Cosette, looked at Marius and the physician with serenity, and the scarcely articulated words could be heard passing his lips.

"It is nothing to die, but it is frightful not to live."

All at once he rose; such return of strength is at times a sequel of the death-agony. He walked with a firm step to the wall, thrust aside Marius and the doctor, who wished to help him, detached from the wall the small copper crucifix hanging on it, returned to his seat with all the vigor of full health, and said, as he laid the crucifix on the table, —

"There is the great Martyr."

Then his chest sank in, his head vacillated, as if the intoxication of the tomb were seizing on him, and his hands, lying on his knees, began pulling at the cloth of his trousers. Cosette supported his shoulders, and sobbed, and tried to speak to him, but was unable to do so. Through the words mingled with that lugubrious saliva which accompanies tears, such sentences as this could be distinguished: "Father, do not leave us. Is it possible that we have only found you again to lose you?" It might be said that the death-agony moves like a serpent; it comes, goes, advances toward the grave, and then turns back toward life; there is groping in the action of death. Jean Valjean, after this partial syncope, rallied, shook his forehead as if to make the darkness fall off it, and became again almost lucid. He caught hold of Cosette's sleeve and kissed it.

"He is recovering, doctor, he is recovering," Marius cried.

"You are both good," said Jean Valjean, "and I am going to tell you what causes me sorrow. It causes me sorrow, Monsieur Pontmercy, that you have refused to touch that money; but it is really your wife's. I will explain to you, my children, and that is why I am so glad to see you. Black jet comes from England, and white jet from Norway; it is all in that paper there, which you will read. I invented the substitution of rolled-up snaps for welded snaps in bracelets; they are prettier, better, and not so dear. You can understand what money can be earned by it; so Cosette's fortune is really hers. I give you these details that your mind may be at rest!"

The porter's wife had come up, and was peeping through the open door; the physician sent her off, but could not prevent the zealous old woman shouting to the dying man before she went, —

"Will you have a priest?"

"I have one," Jean Valjean answered.

And he seemed to point with his finger to a spot over his head, where it seemed as if he saw some one; it is probable, in truth, that the Bishop was present at this death-scene. Cosette gently placed a pillow behind Jean Valjean's loins, and he continued, —

"Monsieur Pontmercy, have no fears, I conjure you. The six hundred thousand francs are really Cosette's! I should have thrown away my life if you did not enjoy them! We had succeeded in making those beads famously, and we competed with what is called Berlin jewelry. For instance, the black beads of Germany cannot be equalled; for a gross, which contains twelve hundred well-cut beads, only costs three francs."

When a being who is dear to us is about to die, we regard him with a gaze which grapples him, and would like to retain him. Cosette and Marius stood before him hand in hand, dumb through agony, not knowing what to say to death, despairing and trembling. With each moment Jean Valjean declined and approached nearer to the dark horizon. His breathing had become intermittent, and a slight rattle impeded it. He had a difficulty in moving his fore-arm, his feet had lost all movement, and at the same time, as the helplessness of the limbs and the exhaustion of the body increased, all the majesty of the soul ascended and was displayed on his forehead. The light of the unknown world was already visible in his eyeballs. His face grew livid and at the same time smiling; life was no longer there, but there was something else. His breath stopped, but his glance expanded; he was a corpse on whom wings could be seen. He made Cosette a sign to approach, and then Marius; it was evidently the last minute of the last hour, and he began speaking to them in so faint a voice that it seemed to come from a distance, and it was as if there were a wall between them and him.

"Come hither, both of you; I love you dearly. Oh, how pleasant it is to die like this! You too love me, my Cosette; I felt certain that you had always a fondness for the poor old man. How kind it was of you to place that pillow under my loins! You will weep for me a little, will you not? But not too much, for I do not wish you to feel real sorrow. You must amuse yourselves a great deal, my children. I forgot to tell you that more profit was made on the buckles without tongues than on all the rest; the gross cost two francs to produce, and sold for sixty. It was really a good trade, so you must not feel surprised at the six hundred thousand francs, Monsieur Pontmercy. It is honest money. You can be rich without any fear. You must have a carriage, now and then a box at the opera, handsome ball-dresses, my Cosette, and give good dinners to your friends, and be very happy. I was writing just now to Cosette. She will find my letter. To her I leave the two candlesticks on the mantel-piece. They are silver, but to me they are made of gold, of diamonds; they change the candles placed in them into consecrated tapers. I know not whether the man who gave them to me is satisfied with me above, but I have done what I could. My children, you will not forget that I am a poor man, you will have me buried in some corner with a stone to mark the spot. That is my wish. No name on the stone. If Cosette comes to see it now and then, it will cause me pleasure. And you, too, Monsieur Pontmercy. I must confess to you that I did not always like you, and I ask your forgiveness. Now, she and you are only one for me. I am very grateful to you, for I feel that you render Cosette happy. If you only knew, Monsieur Pontmercy; her pretty pink cheeks were my joy, and when I saw her at all pale, I was miserable. There is in the chest of drawers a five-hundred-franc note. I have not touched it; it is for the poor, Cosette. Do you see your little dress there on the bed? Do you recognize it? And yet it was only ten years ago! How time passes! We have been very happy, and it is all over. Do not weep, my children; I am not going very far, and I shall see you from there. You will only have to look when it is dark, and you will see me smile. Cosette, do you remember Montfermeil? You were in the wood and very frightened: do you remember when I took the bucket-handle? It was the first time I touched your pretty little hand. It was so cold. Ah, you had red hands in those days, Miss, but now they are very white. And the large doll? Do you remember? You christened it Catherine, and were sorry that you did not take it with you to the convent. How many times you have made me laugh, my sweet angel! When it had rained, you used to set straws floating in the gutter, and watched them go. One day I gave you a wicker battledore and a shuttlecock with yellow, blue, and green feathers. You have forgotten it. You were so merry when a little girl. You used to play. You would put cherries in your ears. All these are things of the past. The forests through which one has passed with one's child, the trees under which we have walked, the convent in which we hid, the sports, the hearty laughter of childhood, are shadows. I imagined that all this belonged to me, and that was my stupidity. Those Thénardiers were very wicked, but we must forgive them. Cosette, the moment has arrived to tell you your mother's name. It was Fantine. Remember this name, – Fantine. Fall on your knees every time that you pronounce it. She suffered terribly. She loved you dearly. She knew as much misery as you have known happiness. Such are the distributions of God. He is above. He sees us all, and he knows all that he does, amid his great stars. I am going away, my children. Love each other dearly and always. There is no other thing in the world but that: love one another. You will sometimes think of the poor old man who died here. Ah, my Cosette, it is not my fault that I did not see you every day, for it broke my heart. I went as far as the corner of the street, and must have produced a funny effect on the people who saw me pass, for I was like a madman, and even went out without my hat. My children, I can no longer see very clearly. I had several things to say to you, but no matter. Think of me a little. You are blessed beings. I know not what is the matter with me, but I see light. Come hither. I die happy. Let me lay my hands on your beloved heads."