1244 Les Miserables
Marius had just emerged from his: night was falling. It
was the hour for his dinner; for he had been obliged to take
to dining again, alas! oh, infirmities of ideal passions!
He had just crossed his threshold, where Ma’am Bougon
was sweeping at the moment, as she uttered this memorable
monologue:—
‘What is there that is cheap now? Everything is dear.
There is nothing in the world that is cheap except trouble;
you can get that for nothing, the trouble of the world!’
Marius slowly ascended the boulevard towards the barri-
er, in order to reach the Rue Saint-Jacques. He was walking
along with drooping head.
All at once, he felt some one elbow him in the dusk; he
wheeled round, and saw two young girls clad in rags, the
one tall and slim, the other a little shorter, who were passing
rapidly, all out of breath, in terror, and with the appearance
of fleeing; they had been coming to meet him, had not seen
him, and had jostled him as they passed. Through the twi-
light, Marius could distinguish their livid faces, their wild
heads, their dishevelled hair, their hideous bonnets, their
ragged petticoats, and their bare feet. They were talking as
they ran. The taller said in a very low voice:—
‘The bobbies have come. They came near nabbing me at
the half-circle.’ The other answered: ‘I saw them. I bolted,
bolted, bolted!’
Through this repulsive slang, Marius understood that
gendarmes or the police had come near apprehending these
two children, and that the latter had escaped.
They plunged among the trees of the boulevard behind