Page 174 - les-miserables

in a cellar, before which the passersby come and go. On ar-
riving at the window, Jean Valjean examined it. It had no
grating; it opened in the garden and was fastened, accord-
ing to the fashion of the country, only by a small pin. He
opened it; but as a rush of cold and piercing air penetrated
the room abruptly, he closed it again immediately. He scru-
tinized the garden with that attentive gaze which studies
rather than looks. The garden was enclosed by a tolerably
low white wall, easy to climb. Far away, at the extremity, he
perceived tops of trees, spaced at regular intervals, which
indicated that the wall separated the garden from an avenue
or lane planted with trees.
Having taken this survey, he executed a movement like
that of a man who has made up his mind, strode to his al-
cove, grasped his knapsack, opened it, fumbled in it, pulled
out of it something which he placed on the bed, put his shoes
into one of his pockets, shut the whole thing up again, threw
the knapsack on his shoulders, put on his cap, drew the vi-
sor down over his eyes, felt for his cudgel, went and placed
it in the angle of the window; then returned to the bed, and
resolutely seized the object which he had deposited there. It
resembled a short bar of iron, pointed like a pike at one end.
It would have been difficult to distinguish in that darkness
for what employment that bit of iron could have been de-
signed. Perhaps it was a lever; possibly it was a club.
In the daytime it would have been possible to recognize
it as nothing more than a miner’s candlestick. Convicts
were, at that period, sometimes employed in quarrying
stone from the lofty hills which environ Toulon, and it was

174 Les Miserables