Page 1490 - les-miserables

As for Cosette’s education, it was almost finished and
complete.
His determination once taken, he awaited an opportu-
nity. It was not long in presenting itself. Old Fauchelevent
died.
Jean Valjean demanded an audience with the revered pri-
oress and told her that, having come into a little inheritance
at the death of his brother, which permitted him hence-
forth to live without working, he should leave the service of
the convent and take his daughter with him; but that, as it
was not just that Cosette, since she had not taken the vows,
should have received her education gratuitously, he humbly
begged the Reverend Prioress to see fit that he should offer
to the community, as indemnity, for the five years which
Cosette had spent there, the sum of five thousand francs.
It was thus that Jean Valjean quitted the convent of the
Perpetual Adoration.
On leaving the convent, he took in his own arms the lit-
tle valise the key to which he still wore on his person, and
would permit no porter to touch it. This puzzled Cosette,
because of the odor of embalming which proceeded from
it.
Let us state at once, that this trunk never quitted him
more. He always had it in his chamber. It was the first and
only thing sometimes, that he carried off in his moving
when he moved about. Cosette laughed at it, and called this
valise his inseparable, saying: ‘I am jealous of it.’
Nevertheless, Jean Valjean did not reappear in the open
air without profound anxiety.

1490 Les Miserables