Bab Bab 61 · SISTER SIMPLICE PUT TO THE PROOF

But at that moment Fantine was joyous.

She had passed a very bad night; her cough was frightful; her fever had

doubled in intensity; she had had dreams: in the morning, when the

doctor paid his visit, she was delirious; he assumed an alarmed look,

and ordered that he should be informed as soon as M. Madeleine arrived.

All the morning she was melancholy, said but little, and laid plaits in

her sheets, murmuring the while, in a low voice, calculations which

seemed to be calculations of distances. Her eyes were hollow and

staring. They seemed almost extinguished at intervals, then lighted up

again and shone like stars. It seems as though, at the approach of a

certain dark hour, the light of heaven fills those who are quitting the

light of earth.

Each time that Sister Simplice asked her how she felt, she replied

invariably, “Well. I should like to see M. Madeleine.”

Some months before this, at the moment when Fantine had just lost her

last modesty, her last shame, and her last joy, she was the shadow of

herself; now she was the spectre of herself. Physical suffering had

completed the work of moral suffering. This creature of five and twenty

had a wrinkled brow, flabby cheeks, pinched nostrils, teeth from which

the gums had receded, a leaden complexion, a bony neck, prominent

shoulder-blades, frail limbs, a clayey skin, and her golden hair was

growing out sprinkled with gray. Alas! how illness improvises old-age!

At midday the physician returned, gave some directions, inquired

whether the mayor had made his appearance at the infirmary, and shook

his head.

M. Madeleine usually came to see the invalid at three o’clock. As

exactness is kindness, he was exact.

About half-past two, Fantine began to be restless. In the course of

twenty minutes, she asked the nun more than ten times, “What time is

it, sister?”

Three o’clock struck. At the third stroke, Fantine sat up in bed; she

who could, in general, hardly turn over, joined her yellow, fleshless

hands in a sort of convulsive clasp, and the nun heard her utter one of

those profound sighs which seem to throw off dejection. Then Fantine

turned and looked at the door.

No one entered; the door did not open.

She remained thus for a quarter of an hour, her eyes riveted on the

door, motionless and apparently holding her breath. The sister dared

not speak to her. The clock struck a quarter past three. Fantine fell

back on her pillow.

She said nothing, but began to plait the sheets once more.

Half an hour passed, then an hour, no one came; every time the clock

struck, Fantine started up and looked towards the door, then fell back

again.

Her thought was clearly perceptible, but she uttered no name, she made

no complaint, she blamed no one. But she coughed in a melancholy way.

One would have said that something dark was descending upon her. She

was livid and her lips were blue. She smiled now and then.

Five o’clock struck. Then the sister heard her say, very low and

gently, “He is wrong not to come to-day, since I am going away

to-morrow.”

Sister Simplice herself was surprised at M. Madeleine’s delay.

In the meantime, Fantine was staring at the tester of her bed. She

seemed to be endeavoring to recall something. All at once she began to

sing in a voice as feeble as a breath. The nun listened. This is what

Fantine was singing:—

“Lovely things we will buy

As we stroll the faubourgs through.

Roses are pink, corn-flowers are blue,

I love my love, corn-flowers are blue.

“Yestere’en the Virgin Mary came near my stove, in a broidered mantle

clad, and said to me, ‘Here, hide ’neath my veil the child whom you one

day begged from me. Haste to the city, buy linen, buy a needle, buy

thread.’

“Lovely things we will buy

As we stroll the faubourgs through.

“Dear Holy Virgin, beside my stove I have set a cradle with ribbons

decked. God may give me his loveliest star; I prefer the child thou

hast granted me. ‘Madame, what shall I do with this linen fine?’—‘Make

of it clothes for thy new-born babe.’

“Roses are pink and corn-flowers are blue,

I love my love, and corn-flowers are blue.

“‘Wash this linen.’—‘Where?’—‘In the stream. Make of it, soiling not,

spoiling not, a petticoat fair with its bodice fine, which I will

embroider and fill with flowers.’—‘Madame, the child is no longer here;

what is to be done?’—‘Then make of it a winding-sheet in which to bury

me.’

“Lovely things we will buy

As we stroll the faubourgs through,

Roses are pink, corn-flowers are blue,

I love my love, corn-flowers are blue.”

This song was an old cradle romance with which she had, in former days,

lulled her little Cosette to sleep, and which had never recurred to her

mind in all the five years during which she had been parted from her

child. She sang it in so sad a voice, and to so sweet an air, that it

was enough to make any one, even a nun, weep. The sister, accustomed as

she was to austerities, felt a tear spring to her eyes.

The clock struck six. Fantine did not seem to hear it. She no longer

seemed to pay attention to anything about her.

Sister Simplice sent a serving-maid to inquire of the portress of the

factory, whether the mayor had returned, and if he would not come to

the infirmary soon. The girl returned in a few minutes.

Fantine was still motionless and seemed absorbed in her own thoughts.

The servant informed Sister Simplice in a very low tone, that the mayor

had set out that morning before six o’clock, in a little tilbury

harnessed to a white horse, cold as the weather was; that he had gone

alone, without even a driver; that no one knew what road he had taken;

that people said he had been seen to turn into the road to Arras; that

others asserted that they had met him on the road to Paris. That when

he went away he had been very gentle, as usual, and that he had merely

told the portress not to expect him that night.

While the two women were whispering together, with their backs turned

to Fantine’s bed, the sister interrogating, the servant conjecturing,

Fantine, with the feverish vivacity of certain organic maladies, which

unite the free movements of health with the frightful emaciation of

death, had raised herself to her knees in bed, with her shrivelled

hands resting on the bolster, and her head thrust through the opening

of the curtains, and was listening. All at once she cried:—

“You are speaking of M. Madeleine! Why are you talking so low? What is

he doing? Why does he not come?”

Her voice was so abrupt and hoarse that the two women thought they

heard the voice of a man; they wheeled round in affright.

“Answer me!” cried Fantine.

The servant stammered:—

“The portress told me that he could not come to-day.”

“Be calm, my child,” said the sister; “lie down again.”

Fantine, without changing her attitude, continued in a loud voice, and

with an accent that was both imperious and heart-rending:—

“He cannot come? Why not? You know the reason. You are whispering it to

each other there. I want to know it.”

The servant-maid hastened to say in the nun’s ear, “Say that he is busy

with the city council.”

Sister Simplice blushed faintly, for it was a lie that the maid had

proposed to her.

On the other hand, it seemed to her that the mere communication of the

truth to the invalid would, without doubt, deal her a terrible blow,

and that this was a serious matter in Fantine’s present state. Her

flush did not last long; the sister raised her calm, sad eyes to

Fantine, and said, “Monsieur le Maire has gone away.”

Fantine raised herself and crouched on her heels in the bed: her eyes

sparkled; indescribable joy beamed from that melancholy face.

“Gone!” she cried; “he has gone to get Cosette.”

Then she raised her arms to heaven, and her white face became

ineffable; her lips moved; she was praying in a low voice.

When her prayer was finished, “Sister,” she said, “I am willing to lie

down again; I will do anything you wish; I was naughty just now; I beg

your pardon for having spoken so loud; it is very wrong to talk loudly;

I know that well, my good sister, but, you see, I am very happy: the

good God is good; M. Madeleine is good; just think! he has gone to

Montfermeil to get my little Cosette.”

She lay down again, with the nun’s assistance, helped the nun to

arrange her pillow, and kissed the little silver cross which she wore

on her neck, and which Sister Simplice had given her.

“My child,” said the sister, “try to rest now, and do not talk any

more.”

Fantine took the sister’s hand in her moist hands, and the latter was

pained to feel that perspiration.

“He set out this morning for Paris; in fact, he need not even go

through Paris; Montfermeil is a little to the left as you come thence.

Do you remember how he said to me yesterday, when I spoke to him of

Cosette, _Soon, soon?_ He wants to give me a surprise, you know! he

made me sign a letter so that she could be taken from the Thénardiers;

they cannot say anything, can they? they will give back Cosette, for

they have been paid; the authorities will not allow them to keep the

child since they have received their pay. Do not make signs to me that

I must not talk, sister! I am extremely happy; I am doing well; I am

not ill at all any more; I am going to see Cosette again; I am even

quite hungry; it is nearly five years since I saw her last; you cannot

imagine how much attached one gets to children, and then, she will be

so pretty; you will see! If you only knew what pretty little rosy

fingers she had! In the first place, she will have very beautiful

hands; she had ridiculous hands when she was only a year old; like

this! she must be a big girl now; she is seven years old; she is quite

a young lady; I call her Cosette, but her name is really Euphrasie.

Stop! this morning I was looking at the dust on the chimney-piece, and

I had a sort of idea come across me, like that, that I should see

Cosette again soon. Mon Dieu! how wrong it is not to see one’s children

for years! One ought to reflect that life is not eternal. Oh, how good

M. le Maire is to go! it is very cold! it is true; he had on his cloak,

at least? he will be here to-morrow, will he not? to-morrow will be a

festival day; to-morrow morning, sister, you must remind me to put on

my little cap that has lace on it. What a place that Montfermeil is! I

took that journey on foot once; it was very long for me, but the

diligences go very quickly! he will be here to-morrow with Cosette: how

far is it from here to Montfermeil?”

The sister, who had no idea of distances, replied, “Oh, I think that he

will be here to-morrow.”

“To-morrow! to-morrow!” said Fantine, “I shall see Cosette to-morrow!

you see, good sister of the good God, that I am no longer ill; I am

mad; I could dance if any one wished it.”

A person who had seen her a quarter of an hour previously would not

have understood the change; she was all rosy now; she spoke in a lively

and natural voice; her whole face was one smile; now and then she

talked, she laughed softly; the joy of a mother is almost infantile.

“Well,” resumed the nun, “now that you are happy, mind me, and do not

talk any more.”

Fantine laid her head on her pillow and said in a low voice: “Yes, lie

down again; be good, for you are going to have your child; Sister

Simplice is right; every one here is right.”

And then, without stirring, without even moving her head, she began to

stare all about her with wide-open eyes and a joyous air, and she said

nothing more.

The sister drew the curtains together again, hoping that she would fall

into a doze. Between seven and eight o’clock the doctor came; not

hearing any sound, he thought Fantine was asleep, entered softly, and

approached the bed on tiptoe; he opened the curtains a little, and, by

the light of the taper, he saw Fantine’s big eyes gazing at him.

She said to him, “She will be allowed to sleep beside me in a little

bed, will she not, sir?”

The doctor thought that she was delirious. She added:—

“See! there is just room.”

The doctor took Sister Simplice aside, and she explained matters to

him; that M. Madeleine was absent for a day or two, and that in their

doubt they had not thought it well to undeceive the invalid, who

believed that the mayor had gone to Montfermeil; that it was possible,

after all, that her guess was correct: the doctor approved.

He returned to Fantine’s bed, and she went on:—

“You see, when she wakes up in the morning, I shall be able to say good

morning to her, poor kitten, and when I cannot sleep at night, I can

hear her asleep; her little gentle breathing will do me good.”

“Give me your hand,” said the doctor.

She stretched out her arm, and exclaimed with a laugh:—

“Ah, hold! in truth, you did not know it; I am cured; Cosette will

arrive to-morrow.”

The doctor was surprised; she was better; the pressure on her chest had

decreased; her pulse had regained its strength; a sort of life had

suddenly supervened and reanimated this poor, worn-out creature.

“Doctor,” she went on, “did the sister tell you that M. le Maire has

gone to get that mite of a child?”

The doctor recommended silence, and that all painful emotions should be

avoided; he prescribed an infusion of pure chinchona, and, in case the

fever should increase again during the night, a calming potion. As he

took his departure, he said to the sister:—

“She is doing better; if good luck willed that the mayor should

actually arrive to-morrow with the child, who knows? there are crises

so astounding; great joy has been known to arrest maladies; I know well

that this is an organic disease, and in an advanced state, but all

those things are such mysteries: we may be able to save her.”