Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
CHAPTER XI—CHAMPMATHIEU MORE AND MORE ASTONISHED
1623 words | Chapter 140
It was he, in fact. The clerk’s lamp illumined his countenance. He held
his hat in his hand; there was no disorder in his clothing; his coat
was carefully buttoned; he was very pale, and he trembled slightly; his
hair, which had still been gray on his arrival in Arras, was now
entirely white: it had turned white during the hour he had sat there.
All heads were raised: the sensation was indescribable; there was a
momentary hesitation in the audience, the voice had been so
heart-rending; the man who stood there appeared so calm that they did
not understand at first. They asked themselves whether he had indeed
uttered that cry; they could not believe that that tranquil man had
been the one to give that terrible outcry.
This indecision only lasted a few seconds. Even before the President
and the district-attorney could utter a word, before the ushers and the
gendarmes could make a gesture, the man whom all still called, at that
moment, M. Madeleine, had advanced towards the witnesses Cochepaille,
Brevet, and Chenildieu.
“Do you not recognize me?” said he.
All three remained speechless, and indicated by a sign of the head that
they did not know him. Cochepaille, who was intimidated, made a
military salute. M. Madeleine turned towards the jury and the court,
and said in a gentle voice:—
“Gentlemen of the jury, order the prisoner to be released! Mr.
President, have me arrested. He is not the man whom you are in search
of; it is I: I am Jean Valjean.”
Not a mouth breathed; the first commotion of astonishment had been
followed by a silence like that of the grave; those within the hall
experienced that sort of religious terror which seizes the masses when
something grand has been done.
In the meantime, the face of the President was stamped with sympathy
and sadness; he had exchanged a rapid sign with the district-attorney
and a few low-toned words with the assistant judges; he addressed the
public, and asked in accents which all understood:—
“Is there a physician present?”
The district-attorney took the word:—
“Gentlemen of the jury, the very strange and unexpected incident which
disturbs the audience inspires us, like yourselves, only with a
sentiment which it is unnecessary for us to express. You all know, by
reputation at least, the honorable M. Madeleine, mayor of M. sur M.; if
there is a physician in the audience, we join the President in
requesting him to attend to M. Madeleine, and to conduct him to his
home.”
M. Madeleine did not allow the district-attorney to finish; he
interrupted him in accents full of suavity and authority. These are the
words which he uttered; here they are literally, as they were written
down, immediately after the trial by one of the witnesses to this
scene, and as they now ring in the ears of those who heard them nearly
forty years ago:—
“I thank you, Mr. District-Attorney, but I am not mad; you shall see;
you were on the point of committing a great error; release this man! I
am fulfilling a duty; I am that miserable criminal. I am the only one
here who sees the matter clearly, and I am telling you the truth. God,
who is on high, looks down on what I am doing at this moment, and that
suffices. You can take me, for here I am: but I have done my best; I
concealed myself under another name; I have become rich; I have become
a mayor; I have tried to re-enter the ranks of the honest. It seems
that that is not to be done. In short, there are many things which I
cannot tell. I will not narrate the story of my life to you; you will
hear it one of these days. I robbed Monseigneur the Bishop, it is true;
it is true that I robbed Little Gervais; they were right in telling you
that Jean Valjean was a very vicious wretch. Perhaps it was not
altogether his fault. Listen, honorable judges! a man who has been so
greatly humbled as I have has neither any remonstrances to make to
Providence, nor any advice to give to society; but, you see, the infamy
from which I have tried to escape is an injurious thing; the galleys
make the convict what he is; reflect upon that, if you please. Before
going to the galleys, I was a poor peasant, with very little
intelligence, a sort of idiot; the galleys wrought a change in me. I
was stupid; I became vicious: I was a block of wood; I became a
firebrand. Later on, indulgence and kindness saved me, as severity had
ruined me. But, pardon me, you cannot understand what I am saying. You
will find at my house, among the ashes in the fireplace, the forty-sou
piece which I stole, seven years ago, from Little Gervais. I have
nothing farther to add; take me. Good God! the district-attorney shakes
his head; you say, ‘M. Madeleine has gone mad!’ you do not believe me!
that is distressing. Do not, at least, condemn this man! What! these
men do not recognize me! I wish Javert were here; he would recognize
me.”
Nothing can reproduce the sombre and kindly melancholy of tone which
accompanied these words.
He turned to the three convicts, and said:—
“Well, I recognize you; do you remember, Brevet?”
He paused, hesitated for an instant, and said:—
“Do you remember the knitted suspenders with a checked pattern which
you wore in the galleys?”
Brevet gave a start of surprise, and surveyed him from head to foot
with a frightened air. He continued:—
“Chenildieu, you who conferred on yourself the name of ‘Jenie-Dieu,’
your whole right shoulder bears a deep burn, because you one day laid
your shoulder against the chafing-dish full of coals, in order to
efface the three letters T. F. P., which are still visible,
nevertheless; answer, is this true?”
“It is true,” said Chenildieu.
He addressed himself to Cochepaille:—
“Cochepaille, you have, near the bend in your left arm, a date stamped
in blue letters with burnt powder; the date is that of the landing of
the Emperor at Cannes, March 1, 1815; pull up your sleeve!”
Cochepaille pushed up his sleeve; all eyes were focused on him and on
his bare arm.
A gendarme held a light close to it; there was the date.
The unhappy man turned to the spectators and the judges with a smile
which still rends the hearts of all who saw it whenever they think of
it. It was a smile of triumph; it was also a smile of despair.
“You see plainly,” he said, “that I am Jean Valjean.”
In that chamber there were no longer either judges, accusers, nor
gendarmes; there was nothing but staring eyes and sympathizing hearts.
No one recalled any longer the part that each might be called upon to
play; the district-attorney forgot he was there for the purpose of
prosecuting, the President that he was there to preside, the counsel
for the defence that he was there to defend. It was a striking
circumstance that no question was put, that no authority intervened.
The peculiarity of sublime spectacles is, that they capture all souls
and turn witnesses into spectators. No one, probably, could have
explained what he felt; no one, probably, said to himself that he was
witnessing the splendid outburst of a grand light: all felt themselves
inwardly dazzled.
It was evident that they had Jean Valjean before their eyes. That was
clear. The appearance of this man had sufficed to suffuse with light
that matter which had been so obscure but a moment previously, without
any further explanation: the whole crowd, as by a sort of electric
revelation, understood instantly and at a single glance the simple and
magnificent history of a man who was delivering himself up so that
another man might not be condemned in his stead. The details, the
hesitations, little possible oppositions, were swallowed up in that
vast and luminous fact.
It was an impression which vanished speedily, but which was
irresistible at the moment.
“I do not wish to disturb the court further,” resumed Jean Valjean. “I
shall withdraw, since you do not arrest me. I have many things to do.
The district-attorney knows who I am; he knows whither I am going; he
can have me arrested when he likes.”
He directed his steps towards the door. Not a voice was raised, not an
arm extended to hinder him. All stood aside. At that moment there was
about him that divine something which causes multitudes to stand aside
and make way for a man. He traversed the crowd slowly. It was never
known who opened the door, but it is certain that he found the door
open when he reached it. On arriving there he turned round and said:—
“I am at your command, Mr. District-Attorney.”
Then he addressed the audience:—
“All of you, all who are present—consider me worthy of pity, do you
not? Good God! When I think of what I was on the point of doing, I
consider that I am to be envied. Nevertheless, I should have preferred
not to have had this occur.”
He withdrew, and the door closed behind him as it had opened, for those
who do certain sovereign things are always sure of being served by some
one in the crowd.
Less than an hour after this, the verdict of the jury freed the said
Champmathieu from all accusations; and Champmathieu, being at once
released, went off in a state of stupefaction, thinking that all men
were fools, and comprehending nothing of this vision.
BOOK EIGHTH—A COUNTER-BLOW
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