lark_in_flight | (no subject)

Entry tags:

marius,
valjean

(no subject)

Marius has ducked into the hall to call for hot drinks. So it's Cosette and her father, alone at last in his Milliways room.

Part of her wants to weep once more for joy. Part of her wants to shout at him. She turns away abruptly to grab a quilt from his bed.

"Here," she says, "put this quilt over your lap, Father. It's winter here. You must take care of yourself! I tell you, we will be here often. You will grow quite sick of us! And then in Paris you will come to live with us. I have a room all ready. I won't hear a word against it. You will be with us, we will all be together, you will be a father to your little Cosette again, and we will all be very happy."

As she chatters she tucks the quilt around him, and pulls a footstool near. If he wants, he can put his feet onto it. Otherwise, she'll settle onto it, to sit at his feet like a confiding child.

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Valjean, who had turned his gaze down to his hands when Marius entered, looks up at him beseechingly.

'But, monsieur-'

Surely he does not have to explain to Marius why it is dangerous?

"There, you see?"

Oh, how she loves Marius. Her face brightened into a delighted beam at his words, and even now that she's focused intently on her father again, the joy remains.

"I tell you nothing anyone can tell me will change our minds. Nothing you have ever been. You have your whims, you have your secrets, very well. I know you, Father. You are so very good. There is nothing about you that you need to protect me from."

"She knows, Monsieur," Marius says. "Monsieur Javert explained-- though I do not doubt there is more that only you can tell. Indeed, there is much you did not tell even to me, though you claimed to confess all!"

Oh.

So, it was not a dream. Not some nightmare from his near-death fever.

He will just look at his hands again.

"Father--"

She catches at his hands, draws them to her rosy face, frees a hand after all to stroke back his white hair.

"I know, Father, I know that you suffered terribly, and you hid away to protect us, and -- and I know people would think awful things, if they didn't know you. Of course it was a shock. I knew you had secrets but I didn't -- I didn't know anything, you never told me a thing. Someone who didn't know how good you were might think something awful. But you see, I do know you. Don't you see? You are so very good! Mother has told me too, you did so much good for me, even when I was a little child, you did so much good for everyone. Please -- please, Papa, please, don't hide away from me again. Not from your Cosette. I tell you if I have my father and my husband I don't care a thing for anybody else, I will be ever so happy. The three of us will be so happy together! As long as I have both of you I don't mind anything."

Marius sinks to his knees beside Cosette.

"And for my part--" He bows his head, for a moment unable to go on. "You have done me a service I can never repay, and I have done you an injustices can never repair. And yet, you tell your own history all amiss! Any man could seem the monster you painted yourself to me, if he leaves out every good deed he has done-- and such deeds, Monsieur-- father!"

He is quiet for a long time.

Then he draws a long breath, and tries to order his words.

'It is because you are good,' he says, to Marius. 'If I told you anything, you would have insisted on what you insist on now. You would have let one or two deeds colour all else, and...and I did want to be honest.'

Because nineteen years a convict, silver stolen from a Bishop, a coin taken from a child, the hateful creature he once was...these are not crimes that can be erased by a day in a sewer, or a single confession of his past.

'Cosette-'

Words are so inadequate for what he feels for her, and how happy she makes him just by sitting at his knee.

'-there are some wrongs that can never be left behind. I have tried. But if you say we will be happy, it will be so. I will not go away again.'

He wants to tell her that some convicts are still men and he does not feel like one very often, but when he does it is because of her. But it all feels too big - her comment when she saw the chaine, the fact of what he was and how close he came to losing her because of it. It is too close to the bone, and he does not want to dwell on it.

"But you're wrong," she tells him earnestly, beseechingly.

"The good God has told us so. Have you confessed? Have you begged God to forgive your sins?"

He smiles then, and makes a gesture to the air above him.

'My confession has been heard.'

One day, he will give it to Bishop Myriel in person, kneeling at his feet.

'But I know God has listened before. He has protected me more times than I can say. And he gave me the chance to find you.'

Proof enough.

"If you have confessed yourself to God-- if you have proved your repentance with good deeds-- and deeds beyond goodness! Why, what more may be asked of any man?" Marius ventures a small smile. "And for myself, from this moment forward, I count it a cardinal sin to cross Cosette in the least of her wishes. That you cannot do."

"Then you see, Papa, you are forgiven! You can leave those wrongs behind. It's very proud to consider your sins greater than God's forgiveness, you know, you mustn't do such a thing."

She's laughing a little, but her eyes are wet too, as she pleads. To her this is obvious truth.

"God has forgiven you the sins you repented, Father. So you must be good, and listen to him, and come and live with your children who love you so, and be happy with them."

He is quiet again.

And then again, he smiles, and nods.

'Yes. Of course, I will come. I will not refuse either of you.'

You can leave those wrongs behind. He will not tell her that it is not so easy, that he wishes it were, and that he has tried. But concealing the truth from Marius would not be leaving it behind, it would only keep it with him longer. Leaving Champmatheiu to his fate would not have been leaving it behind, it would only make it worse. Allowing Javert to be killed would not have been any kind of freedom. Conscience is a strange thing. Strange, and harsh, and it twists everything into what it should not be. He can be forgiven by any person but himself.

But he will not let any of this show, because he has no way to explain it. He tried once, to Marius, and could not make himself understood then.

Marius grabs hold of Cosette's hand, then reaches for Valjean's.

"Good," he says. "Good. I am so very glad."

And he is, and not only because Valjean's acceptance has lightened some small portion of the great guilt pressing on him.

"Oh, Father!"

She clutches Marius's hand tightly, and her father's too. For a moment her heart is too full to do anything else. Then, with a teary little laugh, she darts up from her footstool without releasing either of their hands, just enough to press a kiss to her father's aged forehead.

"Oh, I thank God, I do. He has given you back to me."

'And He has given you both to me.'

He will never not be thankful. No matter what else, Cosette has been worth everything and now Marius makes her happy. He wants nothing more. And now he will live with them! He does not know what to do with such happiness, and can only clasp their hands, his chest tight with joy.

For a few moments more she only clings to both of them, her heart full of an overflowing desperate joy.

At last she finds other words. As so often, she takes refuge in fussing over one of them: "But there, Father, you must regain your strength. You must get well again! Here, I will bring you tea. And Bar has sent some good soft bread. Look how white it is! You will have some, I insist." And she chatters on, as she brings him tea and a small plate, and tucks the blanket close around him, and pours tea for Marius and herself too.

But instead of drinking hers right away, she settles down to rest her head on Marius's shoulder, and shed a few quiet tears of joy, and smile to see her father -- her dear father, who will live with them as she always wanted, and be well and happy -- sitting before her, alive and better after yesterday's horrors.

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