» Chapter 112
» Chapter 1
» Chapter 2
» Chapter 3
» Chapter 4
» Chapter 5
» Chapter 6
» Chapter 7
» Chapter 8
» Chapter 9
» Chapter 10
» Chapter 11
» Chapter 12
» Chapter 13
» Chapter 14
» Chapter 15
» Chapter 16
» Chapter 17
» Chapter 18
» Chapter 19
» Chapter 20
» Chapter 21
» Chapter 22
» Chapter 23
» Chapter 24
» Chapter 25
» Chapter 26
» Chapter 27
» Chapter 28
» Chapter 29
» Chapter 30
» Chapter 31
» Chapter 32
» Chapter 33
» Chapter 34
» Chapter 35
» Chapter 36
» Chapter 37
» Chapter 38
» Chapter 39
» Chapter 40
» Chapter 41
» Chapter 42
» Chapter 43
» Chapter 44
» Chapter 45
» Chapter 46
» Chapter 47
» Chapter 48
» Chapter 49
» Chatper 50
» Chapter 51
» Chapter 52
» Chapter 53
» Chapter 54
» Chapter 55
» Chapter 56
» Chapter 57
» CHAPTER 58
» Chapter 59
» Chapter 60
» CHAPTER 61
» Chapter 62
» Chapter 63
» Chapter 64
» Chapter 65
» Chapter 66
» Chapter 67
» Chapter 68
» Chapter 69
» Chapter 70
» Chapter 71
» Chapter 72
» Chapter 73
» Chapter 74
» Chapter 75
» Chapter 76
» Chapter 77
» Chapter 78
» Chapter 79
» Chapter 80
» Chapter 81
» Chapter 82
» Chapter 83
» Chapter 84
» Chapter 85
» Chapter 86
» Chapter 87
» Chapter 88
» Chapter 89
» Chapter 90
» Chapter 91
» Chapter 92
» Chapter 93
» Chapter 94
» Chapter 95
» Chapter 96
» Chapter 97
» Chapter 98
» Chapter 99
» Chapter 100
» Chapter 110
» Chapter 101
» Chapter 102
» Chapter 103
» Chapter 104
» Chapter 105
» Chapter 106
» Chapter 107
» Chapter 108
» Chapter 109
» Chapter 111
» Chapter 112
» Chapter 113
» Chapter 114
» Chapter 115
» Chapter 116
» Chapter 117
» Chapter 118
» Chapter 119
» Chapter 120
» Chapter 121
» Chapter 122
» Chapter 123
» Chapter 124
» Chapter 125
» Chapter 126
» Chapter 127
» Chapter 128
» Chapter 129
» Chapter 130
» Chapter 131
» Chapter 132
» Chapter 133
» Chapter 134
» Chapter 135
» Chapter 136
» Chapter 138
» Chapter 139
» Chapter 140
» Chatper 141
» Chapter 142
» Chapter 143
» Chapter 144
» Chaoter 145
» Chapter 146
» Chaoter 147
» Chapter 147
» Chatper 148
» Chapter 149
» Chapter 150
» Chapter 151
» Chapter 152
» Chapter 153
» Chapter 154
» Chapter 155
» Chapter 156
» Chapter 158
» Chapter 157
» Chapter 158
» Chapter 159
» Chapter 160
» Chapter 161
» Chapter 162
» Chapter 163
» Chapter 164
» Chapter 165
» Chapter 166
» Chapter 167
» Chapter 168
» Chapter 169
» Chapter 170
» Chapter 171
» Chapter 172
» Chapter 173
» Chapter 137
» Chapter 174
» Chapter 175
» Chapter 176
» Chapter 177
» Chapter 178
» Chapter 179
» Chapter 180
» Chapter 181
» Chapter 182
» Chatper 183
» Chapter 184
» Chapter 185
» Chapter 186
» Chapter 187
» Chapter 188
» Chgapter 189
» Chapter 190
» Chapter 191
» Chatper 192
» Chapter 193
» Chapter 194
» Chapter 195
» Chapter 196
» Chapter 197
» Chatper 198
» Chapter 199
» Chapter 200
» Chapter 201
» Chapter 202
» Chapter 203
» Chapter 204
» Chapter 205
» Chapter 206
» Chapter 207
» Chapter 208
» Chapter 210
» Chapter 210
» Chjapter 211
» Chapter 212
» Chapter 213
» Chater 214
» Chapter 215
» Chapter 216
» Chapter 217
» Chapter 218
» Chapter 219
» Chapter 220
» CHAPTER 221
» Chapter 222
» Chapter 223
» Chapter 224
» Chapter 225
» Chapter 226
» Chapter 226
» Chapter 227
» Chapter 229
» Chapter 230
» Chapter 231
» Chapter 232
» Chapter 233
» Chapter 234
» Chapter 235
» Chaoter 236
» Chapter 237
» Chapter 238
» Chapter 239
» Chapter 239
» Chapter 240
» Chapter 241
» Chapter 242
» Chapter 243
» Chapter 244
» Chapter 245
» Chapter 246
» Chapter 247
» Chapter 248
» Chapter 249
» Chapter 25
» Chapter 251
» Chapter 252
» Chapter 253
» Chapter 254
» Chapter 323
» Chapter 324
» Chapter 325
» Chapter 365
» Chapter 327
» Chapter 328
» Chapter 329
» Chapter 330
» Chapter 331
» Chapter 332
» Chapter 333
» Chapter 322
» Chapter 321
» Chapter 320
» Chapter 309
» Chapter 310
» Chapter 311
» Chapter 312
» Chapter 313
» Chapter 314
» Chapter 315
» Chapter 316
» Chapter 317
» Chapter 318
» Chapter 319
» Chapter 334
» Chapter 335
» Chaptrer 336
» Chapter 353
» Chapter 354
» Chapter 355
» Chapter 356
» Chapter 357
» Chapter 358
» Chapter 359
» Chapter 360
» Chapter 361
» Chapter 362
» Chapter 363
» Chapter 352
» Chapter 351
» Chapter 338
» Chapter 339
» Chapter 340
» Chapter 342
» Chapter 342
» Chapter 344
» Chapter 346
» Chapter 347
» Chapter 348
» Chapter 349
» Chapter 350
» Chapter 364
» Chapter 308
» Chapter 213
» Chapter 269
» Chapter 270
» Chapter 271
» Chapter 272
» Chapter 273
» Chapter 274
» Chapter 275
» Chapter 276
» Chapter 277
» Chapter 278
» Chapter 279
» Chapter 268
» Chapter 267
» Chapter 266
» Chapter 255
» Chapter 256
» Chapter 257
» Chapter 258
» Chapter 259
» Chapter 260
» Chapter 261
» Chapter 262
» Chapter 263
» Chapter 264
» Chapter 265
» Chapter 280
» Chapter 281
» Chapter 296
» Chapter 297
» Chapter 298
» Chapter 299
» Chapter 300
» Chapter 301
» Chapter 302
» Chapter 304
» Chapter 304
» Chapter 305
» CHAPTER 306
» Chapter 295
» Chapter 294
» Chapter 293
» Chapter 282
» Chapter 283
» Chapter 284
» Chapter 285
» Chapter 286
» Chapter 287
» Chapter 288
» Chapter 289
» Chapter 290
» Chapter 291
» Chapter 292
» Chapter 307
|
Volume II. Book Fifth.--For A Black Hunt, A Mute Pack. Chapter IV. The Gropings of Flight
In order to understand what follows, it is requisite to form an exact idea of the Droit-Mur lane, and, in particular, of the angle which one leaves on the left when one emerges from the Rue Polonceau into this lane. Droit-Mur lane was almost entirely bordered on the right, as far as the Rue Petit-Picpus, by houses of mean aspect; on the left by a solitary building of severe outlines, composed of numerous parts which grew gradually higher by a story or two as they approached the Rue Petit-Picpus side; so that this building, which was very lofty on the Rue Petit-Picpus side, was tolerably low on the side adjoining the Rue Polonceau. There, at the angle of which we have spoken, it descended to such a degree that it consisted of merely a wall. This wall did not abut directly on the Street; it formed a deeply retreating niche, concealed by its two corners from two observers who might have been, one in the Rue Polonceau, the other in the Rue Droit-Mur.
Beginning with these angles of the niche, the wall extended along the Rue Polonceau as far as a house which bore the number 49, and along the Rue Droit-Mur, where the fragment was much shorter, as far as the gloomy building which we have mentioned and whose gable it intersected, thus forming another retreating angle in the street. This gable was sombre of aspect; only one window was visible, or, to speak more correctly, two shutters covered with a sheet of zinc and kept constantly closed.
The state of the places of which we are here giving a description is rigorously exact, and will certainly awaken a very precise memory in the mind of old inhabitants of the quarter.
The niche was entirely filled by a thing which resembled a colossal and wretched door; it was a vast, formless assemblage of perpendicular planks, the upper ones being broader than the lower, bound together by long transverse strips of iron. At one side there was a carriage gate of the ordinary dimensions, and which had evidently not been cut more than fifty years previously.
A linden-tree showed its crest above the niche, and the wall was covered with ivy on the side of the Rue Polonceau.
In the imminent peril in which Jean Valjean found himself, this sombre building had about it a solitary and uninhabited look which tempted him. He ran his eyes rapidly over it; he said to himself, that if he could contrive to get inside it, he might save himself. First he conceived an idea, then a hope.
In the central portion of the front of this building, on the Rue Droit-Mur side, there were at all the windows of the different stories ancient cistern pipes of lead. The various branches of the pipes which led from one central pipe to all these little basins sketched out a sort of tree on the front. These ramifications of pipes with their hundred elbows imitated those old leafless vine-stocks which writhe over the fronts of old farm-houses.
This odd espalier, with its branches of lead and iron, was the first thing that struck Jean Valjean. He seated Cosette with her back against a stone post, with an injunction to be silent, and ran to the spot where the conduit touched the pavement. Perhaps there was some way of climbing up by it and entering the house. But the pipe was dilapidated and past service, and hardly hung to its fastenings. Moreover, all the windows of this silent dwelling were grated with heavy iron bars, even the attic windows in the roof. And then, the moon fell full upon that facade, and the man who was watching at the corner of the street would have seen Jean Valjean in the act of climbing. And finally, what was to be done with Cosette? How was she to be drawn up to the top of a three-story house?
He gave up all idea of climbing by means of the drain-pipe, and crawled along the wall to get back into the Rue Polonceau.
When he reached the slant of the wall where he had left Cosette, he noticed that no one could see him there. As we have just explained, he was concealed from all eyes, no matter from which direction they were approaching; besides this, he was in the shadow. Finally, there were two doors; perhaps they might be forced. The wall above which he saw the linden-tree and the ivy evidently abutted on a garden where he could, at least, hide himself, although there were as yet no leaves on the trees, and spend the remainder of the night.
Time was passing; he must act quickly.
He felt over the carriage door, and immediately recognized the fact that it was impracticable outside and in.
He approached the other door with more hope; it was frightfully decrepit; its very immensity rendered it less solid; the planks were rotten; the iron bands--there were only three of them--were rusted. It seemed as though it might be possible to pierce this worm-eaten barrier.
On examining it he found that the door was not a door; it had neither hinges, cross-bars, lock, nor fissure in the middle; the iron bands traversed it from side to side without any break. Through the crevices in the planks he caught a view of unhewn slabs and blocks of stone roughly cemented together, which passers-by might still have seen there ten years ago. He was forced to acknowledge with consternation that this apparent door was simply the wooden decoration of a building against which it was placed. It was easy to tear off a plank; but then, one found one's self face to face with a wall. |
