orm a
clear idea of this man, and while pursuing Jean Valjean, so to speak, in
the depths of his thought, lost him and found him again in a fatal mist.

The deposit honestly restored, the probity of the confession--these were
good. This produced a lightening of the cloud, then the cloud became
black once more.

Troubled as were Marius' memories, a shadow of them returned to him.

After all, what was that adventure in the Jondrette attic? Why had that
man taken to flight on the arrival of the police, instead of entering a
complaint?

Here Marius found the answer. Because that man was a fugitive from
justice, who had broken his ban.

Another question: Why had that man come to the barricade?

For Marius now once more distinctly beheld that recollection which had
re-appeared in his emotions like sympathetic ink at the application of
heat. This man had been in the barricade. He had not fought there. What
had he come there for? In the presence of this question a spectre sprang
up and replied: "Javert."

Marius recalled perfectly now that funereal sight of Jean Valjean
dragging the pinioned Javert out of the barricade, and he still heard
behind the corner of the little Rue Mondetour that frightful pistol
shot. Obviously, there was hatred between that police spy and the
galley-slave. The one was in the other's way. Jean Valjean had gone to
the barricade for the purpose of revenging himself. He had arrived late.
He probably knew that Javert was a prisoner there. The Corsican vendetta
has penetrated to certain lower strata and has become the law there; it
is so simple that it does not astonish souls which are but half turned
towards good; and those hearts are so constituted that a criminal, who
is in the path of repentance, may be scrupulous in the matter of theft
and unscrupulous in the matter of vengeance. Jean Valjean had killed
Javert. At least, that seemed to be evident.

This was the final question, to be sure; but to this there was no reply.
This question Marius felt like pincers. How had it come to pass that
Jean Valjean's existence had elbowed that of Cosette for so long a
period?

What melancholy sport of Providence was that which had placed that child
in contact with that man? Are there then chains for two which are forged
on high? and does God take pleasure in coupling the angel with the
demon? So a crime and an innocence can be room-mates in the mysterious
galleys of wretchedness? In that defiling of conde