At that epoch there were no gas-jets in the streets of Paris. At nightfall lanterns placed at regular distances were lighted; they were ascended and descended by means of a rope, which traversed the street from side to side, and was adjusted in a groove of the post. The pulley over which this rope ran was fastened underneath the lantern in a little iron box, the key to which was kept by the lamp-lighter, and the rope itself was protected by a metal case.
Jean Valjean, with the energy of a supreme struggle, crossed the street at one bound, entered the blind alley, broke the latch of the little box with the point of his knife, and an instant later he was beside Cosette once more.
He had a rope.
These gloomy inventors of expedients work rapidly when they are fighting against fatality.
We have already explained that the lanterns had not been lighted that night.
The lantern in the Cul-de-Sac Genrot was thus naturally extinct, like the rest; and one could pass directly under it without even noticing that it was no longer in its place.
Nevertheless, the hour, the place, the darkness, Jean Valjean's absorption, his singular gestures, his goings and comings, all had begun to render Cosette uneasy.
Any other child than she would have given vent to loud shrieks long before.
She contented herself with plucking Jean Valjean by the skirt of his coat.
They could hear the sound of the patrol's approach ever more and more distinctly.
"Father," said she, in a very low voice, "I am afraid.
Who is coming yonder?"
"Hush!" replied the unhappy man; "it is Madame Thenardier."
Cosette shuddered.
He added:--
"Say nothing.
Don't interfere with me.
If you cry out, if you weep, the Thenardier is lying in wait for you.
She is coming to take you back."
Then, without haste, but without making a useless movement, with firm and curt precision, the more remarkable at a moment when the patrol and Javert might come upon him at any moment, he undid his cravat, passed it round Cosette's body under the armpits, taking care that it should not hurt the child, fastened this cravat to one end of the rope, by means of that knot which seafaring men call a "swallow knot," took the other end of the rope in his teeth, pulled off his shoes and stockings, which he threw over the wall, stepped upon the mass of masonry, and began to raise himself in the angle of the wall and the gable with as much solidity and certainty as though he had the rounds of a ladder under his feet and elbows. Half a minute had not elapsed when he was resting on his knees on the wall.