Page 182 - les-miserables

CHAPTER XII

THE BISHOP WORKS

The next morning at sunrise Monseigneur Bienvenu was
strolling in his garden. Madame Magloire ran up to him in
utter consternation.
‘Monseigneur, Monseigneur!’ she exclaimed, ‘does your
Grace know where the basket of silver is?’
‘Yes,’ replied the Bishop.
‘Jesus the Lord be blessed!’ she resumed; ‘I did not know
what had become of it.’
The Bishop had just picked up the basket in a flower-bed.
He presented it to Madame Magloire.
‘Here it is.’
‘Well!’ said she. ‘Nothing in it! And the silver?’
‘Ah,’ returned the Bishop, ‘so it is the silver which trou-
bles you? I don’t know where it is.’
‘Great, good God! It is stolen! That man who was here
last night has stolen it.’
In a twinkling, with all the vivacity of an alert old wom-
an, Madame Magloire had rushed to the oratory, entered
the alcove, and returned to the Bishop. The Bishop had just
bent down, and was sighing as he examined a plant of co-

182 Les Miserables