Page 2348 - les-miserables

that is, instead of being with me!’
Jean Valjean shuddered.
‘Cosette! …’ stammered Marius.
And he paused. One would have said that they were two
criminals.
Cosette, who was radiant, continued to gaze at both of
them. There was something in her eyes like gleams of para-
dise.
‘I have caught you in the very act,’ said Cosette. ‘Just now,
I heard my father Fauchelevent through the door saying:
‘Conscience … doing my duty …’ That is politics, indeed it
is. I will not have it. People should not talk politics the very
next day. It is not right.’
‘You are mistaken. Cosette,’ said Marius, ‘we are talking
business. We are discussing the best investment of your six
hundred thousand francs …’
‘That is not it at all,’ interrupted Cosette. ‘I am coming.
Does any body want me here?’
And, passing resolutely through the door, she entered
the drawing-room. She was dressed in a voluminous white
dressing-gown, with a thousand folds and large sleeves
which, starting from the neck, fell to her feet. In the gold-
en heavens of some ancient gothic pictures, there are these
charming sacks fit to clothe the angels.
She contemplated herself from head to foot in a long mir-
ror, then exclaimed, in an outburst of ineffable ecstasy:
‘There was once a King and a Queen. Oh! how happy I
am!’
That said, she made a curtsey to Marius and to Jean

2348 Les Miserables