Page 298 - les-miserables

He treated Javert with ease and courtesy, as he did all the
rest of the world.
It was divined, from some words which escaped Javert,
that he had secretly investigated, with that curiosity which
belongs to the race, and into which there enters as much
instinct as will, all the anterior traces which Father Mad-
eleine might have left elsewhere. He seemed to know, and he
sometimes said in covert words, that some one had gleaned
certain information in a certain district about a family
which had disappeared. Once he chanced to say, as he was
talking to himself, ‘I think I have him!’ Then he remained
pensive for three days, and uttered not a word. It seemed
that the thread which he thought he held had broken.
Moreover, and this furnishes the necessary corrective for
the too absolute sense which certain words might present,
there can be nothing really infallible in a human creature,
and the peculiarity of instinct is that it can become con-
fused, thrown off the track, and defeated. Otherwise, it
would be superior to intelligence, and the beast would be
found to be provided with a better light than man.
Javert was evidently somewhat disconcerted by the per-
fect naturalness and tranquillity of M. Madeleine.
One day, nevertheless, his strange manner appeared to
produce an impression on M. Madeleine. It was on the fol-
lowing occasion.

298 Les Miserables