Page 2283 - les-miserables

CHAPTER VIII

TWO MEN IMPOSSIBLE

TO FIND

Marius’ enchantment, great as it was, could not efface
from his mind other pre-occupations.
While the wedding was in preparation, and while await-
ing the date fixed upon, he caused difficult and scrupulous
retrospective researches to be made.
He owed gratitude in various quarters; he owed it on his
father’s account, he owed it on his own.
There was Thenardier; there was the unknown man who
had brought him, Marius, back to M. Gillenormand.
Marius endeavored to find these two men, not intending
to marry, to be happy, and to forget them, and fearing that,
were these debts of gratitude not discharged, they would
leave a shadow on his life, which promised so brightly for
the future.
It was impossible for him to leave all these arrears of suf-
fering behind him, and he wished, before entering joyously
into the future, to obtain a quittance from the past.
That Thenardier was a villain detracted nothing from

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