were cold. Cosette often accompanied Jean Valjean on these
visits to the poor, on which they recovered some remnants of their
former free intercourse; and sometimes, when the day had been a good
one, and they had assisted many in distress, and cheered and warmed many
little children, Cosette was rather merry in the evening. It was at this
epoch that they paid their visit to the Jondrette den.

On the day following that visit, Jean Valjean made his appearance in the
pavilion in the morning, calm as was his wont, but with a large wound on
his left arm which was much inflamed, and very angry, which resembled a
burn, and which he explained in some way or other. This wound resulted
in his being detained in the house for a month with fever. He would not
call in a doctor. When Cosette urged him, "Call the dog-doctor," said
he.

Cosette dressed the wound morning and evening with so divine an air and
such angelic happiness at being of use to him, that Jean Valjean felt
all his former joy returning, his fears and anxieties dissipating, and
he gazed at Cosette, saying: "Oh! what a kindly wound! Oh! what a good
misfortune!"

Cosette on perceiving that her father was ill, had deserted the pavilion
and again taken a fancy to the little lodging and the back courtyard.
She passed nearly all her days beside Jean Valjean and read to him
the books which he desired. Generally they were books of travel. Jean
Valjean was undergoing a new birth; his happiness was reviving in these
ineffable rays; the Luxembourg, the prowling young stranger, Cosette's
coldness,--all these clouds upon his soul were growing dim. He had
reached the point where he said to himself: "I imagined all that. I am
an old fool."

His happiness was so great that the horrible discovery of the
Thenardiers made in the Jondrette hovel, unexpected as it was, had,
after a fashion, glided over him unnoticed. He had succeeded in making
his escape; all trace of him was lost--what more did he care for! he
only thought of those wretched beings to pity them. "Here they are in
prison, and henceforth they will be incapacitated for doing any harm,"
he thought, "but what a lamentable family in distress!"

As for the hideous vision of the Barriere du Maine, Cosette had not
referred to it again.

Sister Sainte-Mechtilde had taught Cosette music in the convent; Cosette
had the voice of a linnet with a soul, and sometimes, in the evening,
in the wounded man's humble abode, she warbled