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‘Who?’ asked M. Leblanc.
‘Parbleu!’ cried Thenardier, ‘the little one, the Lark.’
M. Leblanc replied without the slightest apparent
emotion:—
‘I do not know what you mean.’
‘Go on, nevertheless,’ ejaculated Thenardier, and he
continued to dictate:—
‘Come immediately, I am in absolute need of thee. The
person who will deliver this note to thee is instructed to
conduct thee to me. I am waiting for thee. Come with con-
fidence.’
M. Leblanc had written the whole of this.
Thenardier resumed:—
‘Ah! erase ‘come with confidence’; that might lead her to
suppose that everything was not as it should be, and that
distrust is possible.’
M. Leblanc erased the three words.
‘Now,’ pursued Thenardier, ‘sign it. What’s your name?’
The prisoner laid down the pen and demanded:—
‘For whom is this letter?’
‘You know well,’ retorted Thenardier, ‘for the little one I
just told you so.’
It was evident that Thenardier avoided naming the
young girl in question. He said ‘the Lark,’ he said ‘the little
one,’ but he did not pronounce her name—the precaution of
a clever man guarding his secret from his accomplices. To
mention the name was to deliver the whole ‘affair’ into their
hands, and to tell them more about it than there was any
need of their knowing.