, Cosette, in whom the woman
was beginning to dawn, was delighted to be a Baroness.

"Monsieur le Baron?" repeated Basque. "I will go and see. I will tell
him that M. Fauchelevent is here."

"No. Do not tell him that it is I. Tell him that some one wishes to
speak to him in private, and mention no name."

"Ah!" ejaculated Basque.

"I wish to surprise him."

"Ah!" ejaculated Basque once more, emitting his second "ah!" as an
explanation of the first.

And he left the room.

Jean Valjean remained alone.

The drawing-room, as we have just said, was in great disorder. It seemed
as though, by lending an air, one might still hear the vague noise of
the wedding. On the polished floor lay all sorts of flowers which
had fallen from garlands and head-dresses. The wax candles, burned
to stumps, added stalactites of wax to the crystal drops of the
chandeliers. Not a single piece of furniture was in its place. In the
corners, three or four arm-chairs, drawn close together in a circle,
had the appearance of continuing a conversation. The whole effect was
cheerful. A certain grace still lingers round a dead feast. It has been
a happy thing. On the chairs in disarray, among those fading flowers,
beneath those extinct lights, people have thought of joy. The sun
had succeeded to the chandelier, and made its way gayly into the
drawing-room.

Several minutes elapsed. Jean Valjean stood motionless on the spot where
Basque had left him. He was very pale. His eyes were hollow, and so
sunken in his head by sleeplessness that they nearly disappeared in
their orbits. His black coat bore the weary folds of a garment that
has been up all night. The elbows were whitened with the down which the
friction of cloth against linen leaves behind it.

Jean Valjean stared at the window outlined on the polished floor at his
feet by the sun.

There came a sound at the door, and he raised his eyes.

Marius entered, his head well up, his mouth smiling, an indescribable
light on his countenance, his brow expanded, his eyes triumphant. He had
not slept either.

"It is you, father!" he exclaimed, on catching sight of Jean Valjean;
"that idiot of a Basque had such a mysterious air! But you have come too
early. It is only half past twelve. Cosette is asleep."

That word: "Father," said to M. Fauchelevent by Marius, signified:
supreme felicity. There had always existed, as the reader knows, a lofty
wall, a coldness and a constraint between them; ice