entered
upon its convalescence. Nature, spring, youth, love for her father,
the gayety of the birds and flowers, caused something almost resembling
forgetfulness to filter gradually, drop by drop, into that soul, which
was so virgin and so young. Was the fire wholly extinct there? Or was
it merely that layers of ashes had formed? The truth is, that she hardly
felt the painful and burning spot any longer.

One day she suddenly thought of Marius: "Why!" said she, "I no longer
think of him."

That same week, she noticed a very handsome officer of lancers, with
a wasp-like waist, a delicious uniform, the cheeks of a young girl, a
sword under his arm, waxed mustaches, and a glazed schapka, passing the
gate. Moreover, he had light hair, prominent blue eyes, a round face,
was vain, insolent and good-looking; quite the reverse of Marius. He
had a cigar in his mouth. Cosette thought that this officer doubtless
belonged to the regiment in barracks in the Rue de Babylone.

On the following day, she saw him pass again. She took note of the hour.

From that time forth, was it chance? she saw him pass nearly every day.

The officer's comrades perceived that there was, in that "badly kept"
garden, behind that malicious rococo fence, a very pretty creature,
who was almost always there when the handsome lieutenant,--who is not
unknown to the reader, and whose name was Theodule Gillenormand,--passed
by.

"See here!" they said to him, "there's a little creature there who is
making eyes at you, look."

"Have I the time," replied the lancer, "to look at all the girls who
look at me?"

This was at the precise moment when Marius was descending heavily
towards agony, and was saying: "If I could but see her before I
die!"--Had his wish been realized, had he beheld Cosette at that moment
gazing at the lancer, he would not have been able to utter a word, and
he would have expired with grief.

Whose fault was it? No one's.

Marius possessed one of those temperaments which bury themselves in
sorrow and there abide; Cosette was one of those persons who plunge into
sorrow and emerge from it again.

Cosette was, moreover, passing through that dangerous period, the fatal
phase of feminine revery abandoned to itself, in which the isolated
heart of a young girl resembles the tendrils of the vine which cling,
as chance directs, to the capital of a marble column or to the post of
a wine-shop: A rapid and decisive moment, critical for every or