ise of
which might awaken the sick woman; then he entered Fantine's chamber,
approached the bed and drew aside the curtains. She was asleep. Her
breath issued from her breast with that tragic sound which is peculiar
to those maladies, and which breaks the hearts of mothers when they are
watching through the night beside their sleeping child who is condemned
to death. But this painful respiration hardly troubled a sort of
ineffable serenity which overspread her countenance, and which
transfigured her in her sleep. Her pallor had become whiteness; her
cheeks were crimson; her long golden lashes, the only beauty of her
youth and her virginity which remained to her, palpitated, though they
remained closed and drooping. Her whole person was trembling with an
indescribable unfolding of wings, all ready to open wide and bear her
away, which could be felt as they rustled, though they could not be
seen. To see her thus, one would never have dreamed that she was
an invalid whose life was almost despaired of. She resembled rather
something on the point of soaring away than something on the point of
dying.

The branch trembles when a hand approaches it to pluck a flower, and
seems to both withdraw and to offer itself at one and the same time.
The human body has something of this tremor when the instant arrives in
which the mysterious fingers of Death are about to pluck the soul.

M. Madeleine remained for some time motionless beside that bed, gazing
in turn upon the sick woman and the crucifix, as he had done two months
before, on the day when he had come for the first time to see her
in that asylum. They were both still there in the same attitude--she
sleeping, he praying; only now, after the lapse of two months, her hair
was gray and his was white.

The sister had not entered with him. He stood beside the bed, with his
finger on his lips, as though there were some one in the chamber whom he
must enjoin to silence.

She opened her eyes, saw him, and said quietly, with a smile:--

"And Cosette?"

CHAPTER II--FANTINE HAPPY

She made no movement of either surprise or of joy; she was joy itself.
That simple question, "And Cosette?" was put with so profound a faith,
with so much certainty, with such a complete absence of disquiet and of
doubt, that he found not a word of reply. She continued:--

"I knew that you were there. I was asleep, but I saw you. I have seen
you for a long, long time. I have been following you wit