"At least thirty sous." "Will you sell them to me for five francs?" the man continued. "Pardieu!" a carrier who was listening exclaimed, with a coarse laugh, "I should think so,--five balls!" Thénardier thought it his duty to speak. "Yes, sir, if such be your fancy, you can have the pair of stockings for five francs; we cannot refuse travellers anything." "Cash payment," the landlady said in her peremptory voice. "I buy the pair of stockings," the man said, and added, as he drew a five-franc piece from his pocket and laid it on the table, "I pay for them." Then he turned to Cosette,-- "Your labor is now mine; so play, my child." The carrier was so affected by the five-franc piece that he left his glass and hurried up. "It is real," he exclaimed, after examining it; "a true hind-wheel, and no mistake." Thénardier came up and silently put the coin in his pocket. The landlady could make no answer, but she bit her lips, and her face assumed an expression of hatred. Cosette was trembling, but still ventured to ask,-- "Is it true, Madame? May I play?" "Play!" her mistress said, in a terrible voice. And while her lips thanked the landlady, all her little soul thanked the traveller. Thénardier had returned to his glass, and his wife whispered in his ear,-- "What can this yellow man be?" "I have seen," Thénardier replied, with a sovereign air, "millionnaires who wore a coat like his." Cosette had laid down her needle, but did not dare leave her place, for, as a rule, she moved as little as possible. She took from a box behind her a few old rags and her little leaden sword, Éponine and Azelma paid no attention to what was going on, for they were carrying out a very important operation. They had seized the cat, thrown the doll on the ground, and Éponine, who was the elder, was wrapping up the kitten, in spite of its meawings and writhings, in a quantity of red and blue rags. While performing this serious and difficult task, she was saying to her sister in the sweet and adorable language of children, the grace of which, like the glistening of butterflies' wings, disappears when you try to fix it,-- "This doll, sister, is more amusing than the other, you see, for it moves, cries, and is warm; so we will play with it. It is my little daughter, and I am a lady; you will call upon me, and look at it. By degrees you will see its whiskers, and that will surprise you, and then you will see its ears and its tail, and that will surprise you too, and you will say to me, 'Oh, my goodness!' and I shall answer, 'Yes, Madame, it is a little child I have like that; little children are so at present.'"