Kabanata Kabanata 298 · WHILE COSETTE AND TOUSSAINT ARE ASLEEP

Jean Valjean went into the house with Marius’ letter.

He groped his way up the stairs, as pleased with the darkness as an owl

who grips his prey, opened and shut his door softly, listened to see

whether he could hear any noise,—made sure that, to all appearances,

Cosette and Toussaint were asleep, and plunged three or four matches

into the bottle of the Fumade lighter before he could evoke a spark, so

greatly did his hand tremble. What he had just done smacked of theft.

At last the candle was lighted; he leaned his elbows on the table,

unfolded the paper, and read.

In violent emotions, one does not read, one flings to the earth, so to

speak, the paper which one holds, one clutches it like a victim, one

crushes it, one digs into it the nails of one’s wrath, or of one’s joy;

one hastens to the end, one leaps to the beginning; attention is at

fever heat; it takes up in the gross, as it were, the essential points;

it seizes on one point, and the rest disappears. In Marius’ note to

Cosette, Jean Valjean saw only these words:—

“I die. When thou readest this, my soul will be near thee.”

In the presence of these two lines, he was horribly dazzled; he

remained for a moment, crushed, as it were, by the change of emotion

which was taking place within him, he stared at Marius’ note with a

sort of intoxicated amazement, he had before his eyes that splendor,

the death of a hated individual.

He uttered a frightful cry of inward joy. So it was all over. The

catastrophe had arrived sooner than he had dared to hope. The being who

obstructed his destiny was disappearing. That man had taken himself off

of his own accord, freely, willingly. This man was going to his death,

and he, Jean Valjean, had had no hand in the matter, and it was through

no fault of his. Perhaps, even, he is already dead. Here his fever

entered into calculations. No, he is not dead yet. The letter had

evidently been intended for Cosette to read on the following morning;

after the two discharges that were heard between eleven o’clock and

midnight, nothing more has taken place; the barricade will not be

attacked seriously until daybreak; but that makes no difference, from

the moment when “that man” is concerned in this war, he is lost; he is

caught in the gearing. Jean Valjean felt himself delivered. So he was

about to find himself alone with Cosette once more. The rivalry would

cease; the future was beginning again. He had but to keep this note in

his pocket. Cosette would never know what had become of that man. All

that there requires to be done is to let things take their own course.

This man cannot escape. If he is not already dead, it is certain that

he is about to die. What good fortune!

Having said all this to himself, he became gloomy.

Then he went downstairs and woke up the porter.

About an hour later, Jean Valjean went out in the complete costume of a

National Guard, and with his arms. The porter had easily found in the

neighborhood the wherewithal to complete his equipment. He had a loaded

gun and a cartridge-box filled with cartridges.

He strode off in the direction of the markets.