Fantine, when she reached home, was furious, and told her good neighbor Marguerite what had happened. "Can you understand it? Is he not an abominable man? How can people like that be allowed to go about the country? Pull out my two front teeth! Why, I should look horrible; hair grows again, but teeth! oh, the monster! I would sooner throw myself head first out of a fifth-floor window on to the pavement." "And what did he offer you?" Marguerite asked. "Two napoleons." "That makes forty francs." "Yes," said Fantine, "that makes forty francs." She became thoughtful and sat down to her work. At the end of a quarter of an hour, she left the room and read Thénardier's letter again on the staircase. When she returned, she said to Marguerite,-- "Do you know what a miliary fever is?" "Yes," said the old woman, "it is an illness." "Does it require much medicine?" "Oh, an awful lot!" "Does it attack children?" "More than anybody." "Do they die of it?" "Plenty," said Marguerite. Fantine went out and read the letter once again on the staircase. At night she went out, and could be seen proceeding in the direction of the Rue de Paris, where the inns are. The next morning, when Marguerite entered Fantine's room before day-break, for they worked together, and they made one candle do for them both, she found her sitting on her bed, pale and chill. Her cap had fallen on her knees, and the candle had been burning all night, and was nearly consumed. Marguerite stopped in the doorway, horrified by this enormous extravagance, and exclaimed,-- "Oh, Lord! the candle nearly burnt out! something must have happened." Then she looked at Fantine, who turned her close-shaven head towards her, and seemed to have grown ten years older since the previous day. "Gracious Heaven!" said Marguerite, "what is the matter with you, Fantine?" "Nothing," the girl answered; "I am all right. My child will not die of that frightful disease for want of assistance, and I am satisfied." As she said this, she pointed to two napoleons that glistened on the table. "Oh, Lord!" said Marguerite; "why,'t is a fortune; where ever did you get them from?" "I had them by me," Fantine answered. At the same time she smiled, the candle lit up her face, and it was a fearful smile. A reddish saliva stained the corner of her lips, and she had a black hole in her mouth; the two teeth were pulled out. She sent the forty francs to Montfermeil. It had only been a trick of the Thénardiers to get money, for Cosette was not ill.