Les miserables (Abridged) - Victor Hugo [184]
The name of Fantine was well known to him. He remembered that Jean Valjean had actually made him—Javert—laugh aloud by asking of him a respite of three days, in order to go for the child of this creature. He recalled the fact that Jean Valjean had been arrested at Paris, at the moment he was getting into the Montfermeil stage. Some indications had even led him to think then that it was the second time that he had taken it, and that he had already, the night previous, made another excursion to the environs of this village, for he had not been seen in the village itself. What was he doing in this region of Montfermeil? Nobody could guess. Javert understood it. The daughter of Fantine was there. Jean Valjean was going after her. Now this child had been stolen by an unknown man! Who could this man be? Could it be Jean Valjean? But Jean Valjean was dead. Javert, without saying a word to any one, took the stage at the Plat d’Etain, cul-de-sac de Planchette, and took a trip to Monfermeil.
He expected to find great developments there; he found great obscurity.
For the first few days, the Thénardiers, in their spite, had blabbed the story about. The disappearance of the Lark had made some noise in the village. There were soon several versions of the story, which ended by becoming a case of kidnapping. Hence the police notice. However, when the first ebullition was over, Thénardier, with admirable instinct, very soon arrived at the conclusion that it is never useful to set in motion the Procureur du Roi; that the first result of his complaints in regard to the kidnapping of Cosette would be to fix upon himself, and on many business troubles which he had, the keen eye of justice. The last thing that owls wish is a candle. And first of all, how should he explain the fifteen hundred francs he had received? He stopped short, and enjoined secrecy upon his wife, and professed to be astonished when anybody spoke to him of the stolen child. He knew nothing about it; undoubtedly he had made some complaint at the time that the dear little girl should be “taken away” so suddenly; he would have liked, for affection’s sake, to keep her two or three days; but it was her “grandfather” who had come for her, the most natural thing in the world. He had added the grandfather, which sounded well. It was upon this story that Javert fell on reaching Montfermeil. The grandfather put Jean Valjean out of the question.
Javert, however, dropped a few questions like plummets into Thénardier’s story. Who was this grandfather, and what was his name? Thénardier answered with simplicity: “He is a rich farmer. I saw his passport. I believe his name is M. Guillaume Lambert.”
Lambert is a very respectable reassuring name. Javert returned to Paris.
“Jean Valjean is really dead,” said he, “and I am a fool.”
He had begun to forget all this story, when, in the month of March, 1824, he heard an odd person spoken of who lived in the parish of Saint Médard, and who was called “the beggar who gives alms.” This person was, it was said, a man living on his income whose name nobody knew exactly, and who lived alone with a little girl eight years old, who knew nothing of herself except that she came from Montfermeil. Montfermeil! This name constantly recurring, excited Javert’s attention anew. An old begging police spy, formerly a beadle, to whom this person had extended his charity, added some other details. “This man was very unsociable, never going out except at night, speaking to nobody, except to the poor sometimes, and allowing nobody to get acquainted with him. He wore a horrible