398 Les Miserables
the same step.
All at once his eye fell on the two silver candlesticks,
which shone vaguely on the chimney-piece, through the
glow.
‘Hold!’ he thought; ‘the whole of Jean Valjean is still in
them. They must be destroyed also.’
He seized the two candlesticks.
There was still fire enough to allow of their being put out
of shape, and converted into a sort of unrecognizable bar
of metal.
He bent over the hearth and warmed himself for a mo-
ment. He felt a sense of real comfort. ‘How good warmth
is!’ said he.
He stirred the live coals with one of the candlesticks.
A minute more, and they were both in the fire.
At that moment it seemed to him that he heard a voice
within him shouting: ‘Jean Valjean! Jean Valjean!’
His hair rose upright: he became like a man who is lis-
tening to some terrible thing.
‘Yes, that’s it! finish!’ said the voice. ‘Complete what you
are about! Destroy these candlesticks! Annihilate this sou-
venir! Forget the Bishop! Forget everything! Destroy this
Champmathieu, do! That is right! Applaud yourself! So it
is settled, resolved, fixed, agreed: here is an old man who
does not know what is wanted of him, who has, perhaps,
done nothing, an innocent man, whose whole misfortune
lies in your name, upon whom your name weighs like a
crime, who is about to be taken for you, who will be con-
demned, who will finish his days in abjectness and horror.