MARIUS FINDS SOMETHING.
Marius still lived at the Gorbeau house, but he paid no attention to
his fellow-lodgers. At this, period, in truth, there were no other
tenants in the house but himself and those Jondrettes whose rent he had
once paid, without ever having spoken to father, mother, or daughters.
The other lodgers had removed, were dead, or turned out for not paying
their rent. On one day of this winter the sun had shown itself a little
during the afternoon, but it was Feb. 2, that old Candlemas day, whose
treacherous sun, the precursor of a six weeks' frost, inspired Matthew
Laensberg with these two lines, which have justly become classical,--
"Qu'il luise oil qu'il luiserne
L'ours rentre en sa caverne."
Marius had just left his cavern, for night was falling. It was the hour
to go and dine, for he had been obliged to revert to that practice,
such is the infirmity of ideal passions. He had just crossed the
threshold of his door, which Mame Bougon was sweeping at this very
moment, while uttering the memorable soliloquy,--
"What is there cheap at present? Everything is dear. There is only
trouble which is cheap, and it may be had for nothing."
Marius slowly walked along the boulevard, in the direction of the Rue
St. Jacques. He walked thoughtfully with hanging head. All at once he
felt himself elbowed in the fog. He turned and saw two girls in rags,
one tall and thin, the other not quite so tall, who passed hurriedly,
panting, frightened, and as if running away; they were coming toward
him, and ran against him as they passed. Marius noticed in the twilight
their livid faces, uncovered heads, dishevelled hair, their ragged
petticoats, and bare feet. While running they talked together, and the
elder said,--
"The slops came, and nearly caught me."
And the other answered, "I saw them, and so I bolted, bolted, bolted."
Marius understood, from this sinister slang, that the police had nearly
caught the two girls, and that they had managed to escape. They buried
themselves beneath the trees behind him, and for a few minutes produced
a sort of vague whiteness in the obscurity. Marius had stopped for a
moment, and was just going on, when he noticed a small gray packet
lying at his feet. He stooped down and picked it up; it was a sort of
envelope, apparently containing papers.
"Why," he said, "these poor girls must have let it fall."
He turned back and called to them, but could not find them. He thought
they must be some distance off, so he thrust the parcel into his
pocket and went to dinner. On his way he saw in a lane turning out
of the Rue Mouffetard, a child's coffin, covered with a black pall,
laid on three chairs, and illumined by a candle. The two girls in the
twilight reverted to his thoughts.
"Poor mothers!" he thought, "there is something even more sad than to
see one's children die,--it is to see them live badly."
Then these shadows, which varied his melancholy, left his thoughts, and
he fell back into his usual reflections. He began thinking of his six
months of love and happiness in the open air and broad daylight under
the glorious Luxembourg trees.
"How sad my life has become!" he said to himself; "girls constantly
appear to me, but formerly they were angels, and now they are ghouls."