บทที่ บทที่ 106 · A NEST FOR OWL AND A WARBLER

It was in front of this Gorbeau house that Jean Valjean halted. Like

wild birds, he had chosen this desert place to construct his nest.

He fumbled in his waistcoat pocket, drew out a sort of a pass-key,

opened the door, entered, closed it again carefully, and ascended the

staircase, still carrying Cosette.

At the top of the stairs he drew from his pocket another key, with

which he opened another door. The chamber which he entered, and which

he closed again instantly, was a kind of moderately spacious attic,

furnished with a mattress laid on the floor, a table, and several

chairs; a stove in which a fire was burning, and whose embers were

visible, stood in one corner. A lantern on the boulevard cast a vague

light into this poor room. At the extreme end there was a dressing-room

with a folding bed; Jean Valjean carried the child to this bed and laid

her down there without waking her.

He struck a match and lighted a candle. All this was prepared

beforehand on the table, and, as he had done on the previous evening,

he began to scrutinize Cosette’s face with a gaze full of ecstasy, in

which the expression of kindness and tenderness almost amounted to

aberration. The little girl, with that tranquil confidence which

belongs only to extreme strength and extreme weakness, had fallen

asleep without knowing with whom she was, and continued to sleep

without knowing where she was.

Jean Valjean bent down and kissed that child’s hand.

Nine months before he had kissed the hand of the mother, who had also

just fallen asleep.

The same sad, piercing, religious sentiment filled his heart.

He knelt beside Cosette’s bed.

lt was broad daylight, and the child still slept. A wan ray of the

December sun penetrated the window of the attic and lay upon the

ceiling in long threads of light and shade. All at once a heavily laden

carrier’s cart, which was passing along the boulevard, shook the frail

bed, like a clap of thunder, and made it quiver from top to bottom.

“Yes, madame!” cried Cosette, waking with a start, “here I am! here I

am!”

And she sprang out of bed, her eyes still half shut with the heaviness

of sleep, extending her arms towards the corner of the wall.

“Ah! mon Dieu, my broom!” said she.

She opened her eyes wide now, and beheld the smiling countenance of

Jean Valjean.

“Ah! so it is true!” said the child. “Good morning, Monsieur.”

Children accept joy and happiness instantly and familiarly, being

themselves by nature joy and happiness.

Cosette caught sight of Catherine at the foot of her bed, and took

possession of her, and, as she played, she put a hundred questions to

Jean Valjean. Where was she? Was Paris very large? Was Madame

Thénardier very far away? Was she to go back? etc., etc. All at once

she exclaimed, “How pretty it is here!”

It was a frightful hole, but she felt free.

“Must I sweep?” she resumed at last.

“Play!” said Jean Valjean.

The day passed thus. Cosette, without troubling herself to understand

anything, was inexpressibly happy with that doll and that kind man.