RESS

While this sort of a dog with a human face was mounting guard over the
gate, and while the six ruffians were yielding to a girl, Marius was by
Cosette's side.

Never had the sky been more studded with stars and more charming, the
trees more trembling, the odor of the grass more penetrating; never had
the birds fallen asleep among the leaves with a sweeter noise; never had
all the harmonies of universal serenity responded more thoroughly to the
inward music of love; never had Marius been more captivated, more happy,
more ecstatic.

But he had found Cosette sad; Cosette had been weeping. Her eyes were
red.

This was the first cloud in that wonderful dream.

Marius' first word had been: "What is the matter?"

And she had replied: "This."

Then she had seated herself on the bench near the steps, and while he
tremblingly took his place beside her, she had continued:--

"My father told me this morning to hold myself in readiness, because he
has business, and we may go away from here."

Marius shivered from head to foot.

When one is at the end of one's life, to die means to go away; when one
is at the beginning of it, to go away means to die.

For the last six weeks, Marius had little by little, slowly, by degrees,
taken possession of Cosette each day. As we have already explained, in
the case of first love, the soul is taken long before the body; later
on, one takes the body long before the soul; sometimes one does not take
the soul at all; the Faublas and the Prudhommes add: "Because there is
none"; but the sarcasm is, fortunately, a blasphemy. So Marius possessed
Cosette, as spirits possess, but he enveloped her with all his soul, and
seized her jealously with incredible conviction. He possessed her smile,
her breath, her perfume, the profound radiance of her blue eyes, the
sweetness of her skin when he touched her hand, the charming mark which
she had on her neck, all her thoughts. Therefore, he possessed all
Cosette's dreams.

He incessantly gazed at, and he sometimes touched lightly with his
breath, the short locks on the nape of her neck, and he declared to
himself that there was not one of those short hairs which did not belong
to him, Marius. He gazed upon and adored the things that she wore, her
knot of ribbon, her gloves, her sleeves, her shoes, her cuffs, as sacred
objects of which he was the master. He dreamed that he was the lord of
those pretty shell combs which she wore in her hair, and he