ius did
not understand, which made the goodman furious.

He began again:--

"What! you deserted me, your grandfather, you left my house to go no
one knows whither, you drove your aunt to despair, you went off, it is
easily guessed, to lead a bachelor life; it's more convenient, to play
the dandy, to come in at all hours, to amuse yourself; you have given me
no signs of life, you have contracted debts without even telling me to
pay them, you have become a smasher of windows and a blusterer, and, at
the end of four years, you come to me, and that is all you have to say
to me!"

This violent fashion of driving a grandson to tenderness was productive
only of silence on the part of Marius. M. Gillenormand folded his arms;
a gesture which with him was peculiarly imperious, and apostrophized
Marius bitterly:--

"Let us make an end of this. You have come to ask something of me, you
say? Well, what? What is it? Speak!"

"Sir," said Marius, with the look of a man who feels that he is falling
over a precipice, "I have come to ask your permission to marry."

M. Gillenormand rang the bell. Basque opened the door half-way.

"Call my daughter."

A second later, the door was opened once more, Mademoiselle Gillenormand
did not enter, but showed herself; Marius was standing, mute, with
pendant arms and the face of a criminal; M. Gillenormand was pacing back
and forth in the room. He turned to his daughter and said to her:--

"Nothing. It is Monsieur Marius. Say good day to him. Monsieur wishes to
marry. That's all. Go away."

The curt, hoarse sound of the old man's voice announced a strange degree
of excitement. The aunt gazed at Marius with a frightened air, hardly
appeared to recognize him, did not allow a gesture or a syllable to
escape her, and disappeared at her father's breath more swiftly than a
straw before the hurricane.

In the meantime, Father Gillenormand had returned and placed his back
against the chimney-piece once more.

"You marry! At one and twenty! You have arranged that! You have only
a permission to ask! a formality. Sit down, sir. Well, you have had a
revolution since I had the honor to see you last. The Jacobins got the
upper hand. You must have been delighted. Are you not a Republican since
you are a Baron? You can make that agree. The Republic makes a good
sauce for the barony. Are you one of those decorated by July? Have you
taken the Louvre at all, sir? Quite near here, in the Rue Saint-Antoine,