Page 671 - les-miserables

it was a very dark December night. Not more than two or
three stars were visible in the sky.
It is at this point that the ascent of the hill begins. The
man did not return to the road to Montfermeil; he struck
across the fields to the right, and entered the forest with
long strides.
Once in the forest he slackened his pace, and began a
careful examination of all the trees, advancing, step by step,
as though seeking and following a mysterious road known
to himself alone. There came a moment when he appeared
to lose himself, and he paused in indecision. At last he ar-
rived, by dint of feeling his way inch by inch, at a clearing
where there was a great heap of whitish stones. He stepped
up briskly to these stones, and examined them attentively
through the mists of night, as though he were passing them
in review. A large tree, covered with those excrescences
which are the warts of vegetation, stood a few paces distant
from the pile of stones. He went up to this tree and passed
his hand over the bark of the trunk, as though seeking to
recognize and count all the warts.
Opposite this tree, which was an ash, there was a chest-
nut-tree, suffering from a peeling of the bark, to which a
band of zinc had been nailed by way of dressing. He raised
himself on tiptoe and touched this band of zinc.
Then he trod about for awhile on the ground comprised
in the space between the tree and the heap of stones, like a
person who is trying to assure himself that the soil has not
recently been disturbed.
That done, he took his bearings, and resumed his march

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