DAWN.
At this moment Cosette awoke: her bed-room was narrow, clean,
circumspect, with a long window on the east side looking out into the
court-yard of the house. Cosette knew nothing of what was going on in
Paris, for she had returned to her bed-room at the time when Toussaint
said, "There is a row." Cosette had slept but a few hours, though well.
She had had sweet dreams, which resulted perhaps from the fact that
her small bed was very white. Somebody, who was Marius, appeared to
her in light; and she rose with the sun in her eyes, which at first
produced the effect of a continuation of her dream upon her. Her first
thought on coming out of the dream was of a smiling nature, and she
felt quite reassured. Like Jean Valjean a few hours before, she was
passing through that reaction of the soul which absolutely desires no
misfortune. She began hoping with all her strength, without knowing
why, and then suffered from a contraction of the heart. She had not
seen Marius for three days; but she said to herself that he must have
received her letter, that he knew where she was, that he was clever and
would find means to get to her,--certainly to-day, and perhaps that
very morning. It was bright day, but the sunbeam was nearly horizontal,
and so she thought that it must be early, but that she ought to rise
in order to receive Marius. She felt that she could not live without
Marius, and that consequently was sufficient, and Marius would come. No
objection was admissible; all this was certain. It was monstrous enough
to have suffered for three days: Marius absent for three days, that was
horrible on the part of le bon Dieu. Now this cruel suspense sent from
on high was a trial passed through; Marius was about to come and bring
good news. Thus is youth constituted: it wipes away its tears quickly,
and finding sorrow useless, does not accept it. Youth is the smile of
the future of an unknown thing, which is itself: it is natural for it
to be happy, and it seems as if its breath were made of hope.
However, Cosette could not succeed in recalling to mind what Marius had
said to her on the subject of this absence, which was only to last one
day, and what explanation he had given her about it. Every one will
have noticed with what skill a coin let fall on the ground runs to
hide itself, and what art it has in rendering itself invisible. There
are thoughts which play us the same trick; they conceal themselves
in a corner of our brain: it is all over, they are lost, and it is
impossible to recall them to memory. Cosette felt somewhat vexed at the
little useless effort her memory made, and said to herself that it was
very wrong and culpable of her to forget words pronounced by Marius.
She left her bed, and performed the two ablutions of the soul and the
body, her prayers and her toilette.
We may, if absolutely required, introduce a reader into a nuptial
chamber, but not into a virgin's room. Verse could hardly venture
it, prose ought not. It is the interior of a still closed flower, a
whiteness in the gloaming, the inner cell of a closed lily, which must
not be gazed at by man till it has been gazed at by the sun. Woman
in the bud is sacred: this innocent bud which discovers itself, this
adorable semi-nudity which is afraid of itself, this white foot which
takes refuge in a slipper, this throat which veils itself before a
mirror as if the mirror were an eye, this chemise which hurriedly rises
and covers the shoulder at the sound of a piece of furniture creaking
or a passing vehicle, these knotted strings, this stay-lace, this
tremor, this shudder of cold and shame, this exquisite shyness in every
movement, this almost winged anxiety when there is nothing to fear,
the successive phases of the apparel, which are as charming as the
clouds of dawn,--it is not befitting that all this should be described,
and it is too much to have merely indicated it. The eye of man must
to even more religious before the rising of a maiden than before the
rising of a star. The possibility of attaining ought to be turned into
augmented respect. The down of the peach, the first bloom of the plum,
the crystal radiate of the snow, the butterfly's wing Powdered with
feathers, are but coarse things by the side of this chastity, which
does not know itself that it is chaste. The maiden is only the flash
of the dream, and is not yet a statue; her alcove is concealed in the
dim part of the ideal, and the indiscreet touch of the eye brutalizes
this vague twilight. In this case contemplation is profanation. We will
therefore say nothing about the sweet awaking and rising of Cosette. An
Eastern fable tells us that the rose was made white by God, but that
Adam having looked at it for a moment when it opened, it felt ashamed,
and turned pink. We are of those who feel themselves abashed in the
presence of maidens and flowers, for we find them worthy of veneration.
Cosette dressed herself very rapidly, and combed and dressed her hair,
which was very simple at that day, when women did not swell their
ringlets and plaits with cushions and pads, and placed no crinoline
in their hair. Then she opened the window and looked all around,
hoping to discern a little of the street, an angle of the house, or
a corner of the pavement, to watch for Marius. But nothing could be
seen of the outside: the court-yard was surrounded by rather lofty
walls, and was bounded by other gardens. Cosette declared these gardens
hideous, and for the first time in her life considered flowers ugly.
The paltriest street gutter would have suited her purpose better; and
she resolved to look up to heaven, as if she thought that Marius might
possibly come thence. Suddenly she burst into tears, not through any
fickleness of temperament, but her situation consisted of hopes dashed
with despondency. She confusedly felt something horrible; that it was
really in the air. She said to herself that she was sure of nothing,
that letting herself out of sight was losing herself; and the idea
that Marius might return to her from heaven appeared to her no longer
charming but lugubrious. Then--for such these clouds are--calmness
returned, and hope, and a species of smile, unconscious, but trusting
in God.
Everybody was still asleep in the house, and a provincial silence
prevailed. No shutter was opened, and the porter's lodge was still
closed. Toussaint was not up, and Cosette naturally thought that her
father was asleep. She must have suffered greatly, and must still be
suffering, for she said to herself that her father had been unkind,
but she reckoned on Marius. The eclipse of such a light was decidedly
impossible. At moments she heard some distance off a sort of heavy
shock, and thought how singular it was that gates were opened and shut
at so early an hour; it was the sound of the cannon-balls battering
the barricade. There was a martin's nest a few feet below Cosette's
window in the old smoke-blackened cornice, and the mouth of the
nest projected a little beyond the cornice, so that the interior of
this little Paradise could be seen from above. The mother was there
expanding her wings like a fan over her brood; the male bird fluttered
round, went away, and then returned, bringing in his bill food and
kisses. The rising day gilded this happy thing; the great law, increase
and multiply, was there smiling and august; and the sweet mystery
was unfolded in the glory of the morn. Cosette, with her hair in the
sunshine, her soul in flames, enlightened by love within and the dawn
without, bent forward as if mechanically, and, almost without daring to
confess to herself that she was thinking at the same time of Marius,
she began looking at these birds, this family, this male and female,
this mother and her little ones, with all the profound agitation which
the sight of a nest occasions a virgin.