Les miserables (Abridged) - Victor Hugo [155]
All at once, the Thénardiess, who was continually going and coming about the room, noticed that Cosette’s attention was distracted, and that instead of working she was watching the little girls who were playing.
“Ah! I’ve caught you!” cried she. “That is the way you work! I’ll make you work with the strap, I will.”
The stranger, without leaving his chair, turned towards the Thénardiess.
“Madame,” said he, smiling diffidently. “Pshaw! let her play!”
On the part of any traveller who had eaten a slice of mutton, and drunk two bottles of wine at his supper, and who had not had the appearance of a horrid pauper, such a wish would have been a command. But that a man who wore that hat should allow himself to have a desire, and that a man who wore that coat should permit himself to have a wish, was what the Thénardiess thought ought not to be tolerated. She replied sharply:
“She must work, for she eats. I don’t support her to do nothing.”
“What is it she is making?” said the stranger, in that gentle voice which contrasted so strangely with his beggar’s clothes and his porter’s shoulders.
The Thénardiess deigned to answer.
“Stockings, if you please. Stockings for my little girls who have none, worth speaking of, and will soon be going barefooted.”
The man looked at Cosette’s poor red feet, and continued:
“When will she finish that pair of stockings?”
“It will take her at least three or four good days, the lazy thing.”
“And how much might this pair of stockings be worth, when it is finished?”
The Thénardiess cast a disdained glance at him.
“At least thirty sous.”
“Would you take five francs for them?” said the man.
“Goodness!” exclaimed a waggoner who was listening, with a horse-laugh, “five francs? It’s a humbug! five bullets!”
Thénardier now thought it time to speak. “Yes, monsieur, if it is your fancy, you can have that pair of stockings for five francs. We can’t refuse anything to travellers.”
“You must pay for them now,” said the Thénardiess, in her short and peremptory way.
“I will buy that pair of stockings,” answered the man, “and,” added he, drawing a five-franc coin from his pocket and laying it on the table, “I will pay for them.”
Then he turned towards Cosette.
“Now your work belongs to me. Play, my child.”
The waggoner was so affected by the five-franc coin, that he left his glass and went to look at it.
“It’s so, that’s a fact!” cried he, as he looked at it. “A regular hindwheel! and no counterfeit!”
Thénardier approached, and silently put the coin in his pocket.
The Thénardiess had nothing to reply. She bit her lips, and her face assumed an expression of hatred.
Meanwhile Cosette trembled. She ventured to ask:
“Madame, is it true? can I play?”
“Play!” said the Thénardiess in a terrible voice.
“Thank you, madame,” said Cosette. And, while her mouth thanked the Thénardiess, all her little soul was thanking the traveller.
Thénardier returned to his drink. His wife whispered in his ear:
“What can that yellow man be?”
“I have seen,” answered Thénardier, in a commanding tone, “millionaires with coats like-that.”
Cosette had left her knitting, but she had not moved from her place. Cosette always stirred as little as was possible. She had taken from a little box behind her a few old rags, and her little lead sword.
Eponine and Azelma paid no attention to what was going on. They had just performed a very important operation; they had caught the kitten. They had thrown the doll on the floor, and Eponine, the elder, was dressing the kitten, in spite of her mewings and contortions, with a lot of clothes and red and blue rags. While she was engaged in this serious and difficult labour, she was talking to her sister in that sweet and charming language of children, the grace of which, like the splendour of the butterfly’s wings, escapes when we try to preserve it.
“Look! look, sister, this doll is more amusing than the other. She moves, she cries, she is warm. Come, sister, let us play with her. She shall be my little girl; I will be a lady. I’ll come to see you, and you must look at