And he showed her on the grass a shadow which the moon designed, and
which really looked rather like the spectre of a man wearing a round
hat. It was an outline produced by a zinc chimney-pot with a cowl,
which rose above an adjoining roof. Cosette also began laughing,
all her mournful suppositions fell away, and the next morning at
breakfast she jested at the ill-omened garden, haunted by the ghost of
chimney-pots. Jean Valjean quite regained his ease; as for Cosette,
she did not notice particularly whether the chimney-pot were really in
the direction of the shadow which she had seen or fancied she saw,
and whether the moon were in the same part of the heavens. She did not
cross-question herself as to the singularity of a chimney-pot which
is afraid of being caught in the act, and retires when its shadow is
looked at; for the shadow did retire when Cosette turned round, and
she fancied herself quite certain of that fact. Cosette became quite
reassured, for the demonstration seemed to her perfect, and the thought
left her brain that there could have been any one walking about the
garden by night. A few days after, however, a fresh incident occurred.
CHAPTER III.
ENRICHED WITH THE COMMENTS OF TOUSSAINT.
In the garden, near the railings looking out on the street, there was a
stone bench, protected from the gaze of passers-by by a hedge, but it
would have been an easy task to reach it by thrusting an arm through
the railings and the hedge. One evening in this same month of April,
Jean Valjean had gone out, and Cosette, after sunset, was seated on
this bench. The wind was freshening in the trees, and Cosette was
reflecting; an objectless sorrow was gradually gaining on her, the
invincible sorrow which night produces, and which comes perhaps--for
who knows?--from the mystery of the tomb which is yawning at the
moment. Possibly Fantine was in that shadow.
Cosette rose, and slowly went round the garden, walking on the
dew-laden grass and saying to herself through the sort of melancholy
somnambulism in which she was plunged: "I ought to have wooden shoes
to walk in the garden at this hour; I shall catch cold." She returned
to the bench; but at the moment when she was going to sit down, she
noticed at the place she had left a rather large stone, which had
evidently not been there a moment before. Cosette looked at the stone,
asking herself what it meant. All at once the idea that the stone had
not reached the bench of itself, that some one had placed it there, and
that an arm had been passed through the grating, occurred to her and
frightened her. This time it was a real fear, for there was the stone.
No doubt was possible. She did not touch it, but fled without daring
to look behind her, sought refuge in the house, and at once shuttered,
barred, and bolted the French window opening on the steps. Then she
asked Toussaint,--
"Has my father come in?"
"No, Miss."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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