CHAPTER VIII--AN ENTRANCE BY FAVOR

  Although he did not suspect the fact, the mayor of M. sur M. enjoyeda sort of celebrity. For the space of seven years his reputation forvirtue had filled the whole of Bas Boulonnais; it had eventually passedthe confines of a small district and had been spread abroad throughtwo or three neighboring departments. Besides the service which he hadrendered to the chief town by resuscitating the black jet industry,there was not one out of the hundred and forty communes of thearrondissement of M. sur M. which was not indebted to him for somebenefit. He had even at need contrived to aid and multiply theindustries of other arrondissements. It was thus that he had, whenoccasion offered, supported with his credit and his funds the linenfactory at Boulogne, the flax-spinning industry at Frévent, and thehydraulic manufacture of cloth at Boubers-sur-Canche. Everywhere thename of M. Madeleine was pronounced with veneration. Arras and Douaienvied the happy little town of M. sur M. its mayor.

  The Councillor of the Royal Court of Douai, who was presiding over thissession of the Assizes at Arras, was acquainted, in common with the restof the world, with this name which was so profoundly and universallyhonored. When the usher, discreetly opening the door which connectedthe council-chamber with the court-room, bent over the back of thePresident's arm-chair and handed him the paper on which was inscribedthe line which we have just perused, adding: "The gentleman desires tobe present at the trial," the President, with a quick and deferentialmovement, seized a pen and wrote a few words at the bottom of the paperand returned it to the usher, saying, "Admit him."

  The unhappy man whose history we are relating had remained near the doorof the hall, in the same place and the same attitude in which the usherhad left him. In the midst of his revery he heard some one saying tohim, "Will Monsieur do me the honor to follow me?" It was the same usherwho had turned his back upon him but a moment previously, and who wasnow bowing to the earth before him. At the same time, the usher handedhim the paper. He unfolded it, and as he chanced to be near the light,he could read it.

  "The President of the Court of Assizes presents his respects to M.Madeleine."

  He crushed the paper in his hand as though those words contained for hima strange and bitter aftertaste.

  He followed the usher.

  A few minutes later he found himself alone in a sort of wainscotedcabinet of severe aspect, lighted by two wax candles, placed upon atable with a green cloth. The last words of the usher who had justquitted him still rang in his ears: "Monsieur, you are now in thecouncil-chamber; you have only to turn the copper handle of yonder door,and you will find yourself in the court-room, behind the President'schair." These words were mingled in his thoughts with a vague memory ofnarrow corridors and dark staircases which he had recently traversed.

  The usher had left him alone. The supreme moment had arrived. He soughtto collect his faculties, but could not. It is chiefly at the momentwhen there is the greatest need for attaching them to the painfulrealities of life, that the threads of thought snap within the brain. Hewas in the very place where the judges deliberated and condemned. Withstupid tranquillity he surveyed this peaceful and terrible apartment,where so many lives had been broken, which was soon to ring with hisname, and which his fate was at that moment traversing. He stared atthe wall, then he looked at himself, wondering that it should be thatchamber and that it should be he.

  He had eaten nothing for four and twenty hours; he was worn out by thejolts of the cart, but he was not conscious of it. It seemed to him thathe felt nothing.

  He approached a black frame which was suspended on the wall, and whichcontained, under glass, an ancient autograph letter of Jean NicolasPache, mayor of Paris and minister, and dated, through an error, nodoubt, the _9th of June_, of the year II., and in which Pache forwardedto the commune the list of ministers and deputies held in arrest bythem. Any spectator who had chanced to see him at that moment, and whohad watched him, would have imagined, doubtless, that this letter struckhim as very curious, for he did not take his eyes from it, and he readit two or three times. He read it without paying any attention to it,and unconsciously. He was thinking of Fantine and Cosette.

  As he dreamed, he turned round, and his eyes fell upon the brass knobof the door which separated him from the Court of Assizes. He had almostforgotten that door. His glance, calm at first, paused there, remainedfixed on that brass handle, then grew terrified, and little by littlebecame impregnated with fear. Beads of perspiration burst forth amonghis hair and trickled down upon his temples.

  At a certain moment he made that indescribable gesture of a sort ofauthority mingled with rebellion, which is intended to convey, andwhich does so well convey, _"Pardieu! who compels me to this?"_ Thenhe wheeled briskly round, caught sight of the door through which he hadentered in front of him, went to it, opened it, and passed out. He wasno longer in that chamber; he was outside in a corridor, a long, narrowcorridor, broken by steps and gratings, making all sorts of angles,lighted here and there by lanterns similar to the night taper ofinvalids, the corridor through which he had approached. He breathed, helistened; not a sound in front, not a sound behind him, and he fled asthough pursued.

  When he had turned many angles in this corridor, he still listened. Thesame silence reigned, and there was the same darkness around him. He wasout of breath; he staggered; he leaned against the wall. The stone wascold; the perspiration lay ice-cold on his brow; he straightened himselfup with a shiver.

  Then, there alone in the darkness, trembling with cold and withsomething else, too, perchance, he meditated.

  He had meditated all night long; he had meditated all the day: he heardwithin him but one voice, which said, "Alas!"

  A quarter of an hour passed thus. At length he bowed his head, sighedwith agony, dropped his arms, and retraced his steps. He walked slowly,and as though crushed. It seemed as though some one had overtaken him inhis flight and was leading him back.

  He re-entered the council-chamber. The first thing he caught sight ofwas the knob of the door. This knob, which was round and of polishedbrass, shone like a terrible star for him. He gazed at it as a lambmight gaze into the eye of a tiger.

  He could not take his eyes from it. From time to time he advanced a stepand approached the door.

  Had he listened, he would have heard the sound of the adjoining halllike a sort of confused murmur; but he did not listen, and he did nothear.

  Suddenly, without himself knowing how it happened, he found himself nearthe door; he grasped the knob convulsively; the door opened.

  He was in the court-room.