Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com 1493
ors, like those on the bed, hung at the windows of the first
floor. On the ground floor, the curtains were of tapestry.
All winter long, Cosette’s little house was heated from top
to bottom. Jean Valjean inhabited the sort of porter’s lodge
which was situated at the end of the back courtyard, with
a mattress on a folding-bed, a white wood table, two straw
chairs, an earthenware water-jug, a few old volumes on a
shelf, his beloved valise in one corner, and never any fire. He
dined with Cosette, and he had a loaf of black bread on the
table for his own use.
When Toussaint came, he had said to her: ‘It is the
young lady who is the mistress of this house.’—‘And you,
monsieur?’ Toussaint replied in amazement.—‘I am a much
better thing than the master, I am the father.’
Cosette had been taught housekeeping in the convent,
and she regulated their expenditure, which was very mod-
est. Every day, Jean Valjean put his arm through Cosette’s
and took her for a walk. He led her to the Luxembourg, to
the least frequented walk, and every Sunday he took her
to mass at Saint-Jacques-du-Haut-Pas, because that was
a long way off. As it was a very poor quarter, he bestowed
alms largely there, and the poor people surrounded him
in church, which had drawn down upon him Thenardier’s
epistle: ‘To the benevolent gentleman of the church of Saint-
Jacques-du-Haut-Pas.’ He was fond of taking Cosette to visit
the poor and the sick. No stranger ever entered the house
in the Rue Plumet. Toussaint brought their provisions, and
Jean Valjean went himself for water to a fountain near by on
the boulevard. Their wood and wine were put into a half-