CHAPTER IV.
MARIUS HAS AN APPARITION.
A few days after this visit of a ghost to Father Mabœuf,--it wason a Monday, the day of the five-franc piece which Marius borrowed ofCourfeyrac for Thénardier,--Marius placed the coin in his pocket, andbefore carrying it to the prison, resolved to "take a little walk,"hoping that on his return this would make him work. It was, however,eternally thus. As soon as he rose, he sat down before a book andpaper to set about some translation, and his work at this time was thetranslation into French of a celebrated German quarrel, the controversybetween Gans and Savigny. He took up Gans, he took up Savigny, readfour pages, tried to write one but could not, saw a star between hispaper and himself, and got up from his chair, saying, "I will go out,that will put me in the humor," and he proceeded to the Lark's field,where he saw the star more than ever, and Gans and Savigny less. Hewent home, tried to resume his task, and did not succeed; he couldnot join a single one of the threads broken in his brain, and so saidto himself, "I will not go out to-morrow, for it prevents me fromworking." But he went out every day.
He lived in the Lark's field more than at Courfeyrac's lodging, andhis right address was Boulevard de la Santé, at the seventh tree pastthe Rue Croulebarbe. On this morning he had left the seventh tree andwas seated on the parapet of the bridge over the little stream. Themerry sunbeams were flashing through the expanded and luminous leaves.He thought of "Her," and his reverie, becoming a reproach, fell backon himself; he thought bitterly of the indolence and mental paralysiswhich were gaining on him, and of the night which constantly grewdenser before him, so that he could no longer even see the sun. Still,through this painful evolution of indistinct ideas which was not evena soliloquy, as action was so weak in him, and he had no longer thestrength to try to feel sad; through this melancholy absorption, wesay, sensations from without reached him. He heard behind, below, andon both sides of him, the washerwomen of the Gobelins beating theirlinen, and above him the birds twittering and singing in the elms. Onone side the sound of liberty, happy carelessness, and winged leisure,on the other the sound of labor. Two joyous sounds made him thinkdeeply and almost reflect. All at once he heard amid his depressedecstasy a voice he knew, that said,--
"Ah, here he is!"
He raised his eyes and recognized the unhappy girl who had come tohim one morning, Éponine, the elder of Thénardier's daughters; he nowknew what her name was. Strange to say, she had grown poorer and morebeautiful, two things which he had not thought possible. She hadaccomplished a double progress, toward light and toward distress. Herfeet were bare and her clothes torn, as on the day when she so boldlyentered his room, but the tatters were two months older, the holeslarger, and the rags filthier. She had the same hoarse voice, the sameforehead wrinkled and bronzed by exposure, the same free, absent, andwandering look, but she had, in addition, on her countenance, somethingstartled and lamentable, which passing through prisons adds to misery.She had pieces of straw and hay in her hair, not that, like Ophelia,she had gone mad through contagion with Hamlet's lunacy, but becauseshe had slept in some stable-loft.
And with all that she was beautiful. What a star thou art, O youth!
She had stopped in front of Marius with a little joy on her livid face,and something like a smile, and it was some minutes ere she could speak.
"I have found you!" she said at last. "Father Mabœuf was right, itwas in this boulevard! How I have sought you, if you only knew! Doyou know that I have been in quod for a fortnight? They let me go asthere was no charge against me, and besides I had not attained years ofdiscretion by two months. Oh, how I have looked for you the last sixweeks! So you no longer live down there?"
"No," said Marius.
"Ah, I understand, on account of that thing; well, such disturbancesare unpleasant, and you moved. Hilloh, why do you wear an old hat likethat? A young man like you ought to be handsomely dressed. Do youknow, Monsieur Marius, that M. Mabœuf calls you Baron Marius,--Iforget what, but you are not a Baron, are you? Barons are old swells,who walk in front of the Luxembourg Palace, where there is the mostsun, and read the _Quotidienne_ for a sou. I went once with a letterfor a Baron who was like that, and more than a hundred years of age.Tell me, where do you live now?"
Marius did not answer.
"Ah," she added, "you have a hole in your shirt-front, I must mend itfor you."
Then she continued with an expression which gradually grew gloomier,--
"You do not seem pleased to see me?"
Marius held his tongue. She was also silent for a moment, and thenexclaimed,--
"If I liked, I could compel you to look pleased."
"What do you mean?" Marius asked.
She bit her lip, and apparently hesitated, as if suffering from someinternal struggle. At length she seemed to make up her mind.
"All the worse, but no matter, you look sad and I wish you to bepleased, only promise me, though, that you will laugh, for I want tosee you laugh and hear you say, 'Ah! that is famous!' Poor MonsieurMarius! you know you promised you would give me all I wanted."
"Yes, but speak, can't you?"
She looked at Marius intently and said, "I have the address."
Marius turned pale, and all his blood flowed to his heart.
"What address?"
"The address which you asked me for;" and she added, as if with a greateffort, "the address,--you surely understand?"
"Yes," stammered Marius.
"The young lady's."
These words uttered, she heaved a deep sigh. Marius leaped from theparapet on which he was sitting, and wildly seized her hand.
"Oh, lead me to it! Tell me! Ask of me what you please! Where is it?"
"Come with me," she answered; "I don't exactly know the street or thenumber, and it is quite on the other side of town; but I know the housewell, and will take you to it."
She withdrew her hand, and continued in a tone which would have made anobserver's heart bleed, but did not at all affect the intoxicated andtransported lover,--
"Oh, how pleased you are!"
A cloud passed over Marius's forehead, and he clutched Éponine's arm.
"Swear one thing."
"Swear?" she said. "What do you mean by that? Indeed, you want me toswear?"
And she burst into a laugh.
"Your father! Promise me, Éponine,--swear to me that you will nevertell your father that address."
She turned to him with an air of stupefaction. "Éponine! how do youknow that is my name?"
"Promise me what I ask you."
But she did not seem to hear him.
"That is nice! You called me Éponine!"
Marius seized both her arms.
"Answer me in Heaven's name! Pay attention to what I am saying,--swearto me that you will not tell your father the address which you know."
"My father?" she remarked, "oh, yes, my father. He's all right in asecret cell. Besides, what do I care for my father?"
"But you have not promised!" Marius exclaimed.
"Let me go!" she said, as she burst into a laugh; "how you are shakingme! Yes, yes, I promise it; I swear it! How does it concern me? I willnot tell my father the address. There, does that suit you; is that it?"
"And no one else?" said Marius.
"And no one else."
"Now," Marius continued, "lead me there."
"At once?"
"Yes."
"Come on! Oh, how glad he is!" she said.
A few yards farther on she stopped.
"You are following me too closely, Monsieur Marius; let me go on infront and do you follow me, as if you were not doing so. A respectableyoung man like you must not be seen with such a woman as I am."
No language could render all that was contained in the word "woman,"thus pronounced by this child. She went a dozen paces and stoppedagain. Marius rejoined her, and she said to him aside without turningto him,--
"By the bye, you know that you promised me something?"
Marius felt in his poc
ket; he had nothing in the world but thefive-franc piece destined for Father Thénardier, but he laid the coinin Éponine's hand. She let it slip through her fingers on the ground,and looking at him frowningly said,--
"I do not want your money."
BOOK III.
THE HOUSE OF THE RUE PLUMET.