Chapter Text
In the mysteries which have been studied, and in the books of learned men, there has been much talk of odds and fate; what actions are preordained and which might, by straining hands, be shifted. Of those such as Napoleon, this text and others have already spoken; that the excessive weight of destiny placed upon them disturbs nature’s equilibrium, so that which permits their rise co-authors their pre-determined end.
But what then, of the smaller folk? Those whose lives, wishes, and wants do not play out on an emperor’s stage, and who more than any, are vulnerable to the vagaries of chance? Might not Providence, on occasion, intercede? When taking into account the good deeds and suffering of Its meanest subjects, might It cheat, just a little? Nothing grand, near insignificant; to alter the path of one bullet, a matter of inches.
After all, the boy atop the barricade will still fall. Will still be shot. If the injury is not as grievous as it might be, what worldly force could protest? He is still where he is, when he is, and by all reasonable measures, has been doomed from the start.
Marius’ head buzzed. Consciousness flowed in and out of him like a tide, dredging in snatches of memory; gunfire, darkness, a terrible stench. Light, at one point, then the sensation of water splashed on his face, and voices. There were no voices now, only pain and a terrible motion. As his mind surfaced from deep gloom, he recognized it as that of a carriage over cobbled streets. La corbillard, he guessed, then could not say from where the thought had come. He felt a crust across his eyes and worked for several moments to open them. The task was completed with immediate regret, as the fading twilight illuminated a countenance that was well-known and more awful for it.
“Mon Dieu!” He croaked, “But you’re dead!”
Indeed, Inspector Javert was hunched on the bench across from him, the spy’s garb he had worn to his execution replaced by that more anticipated uniform of scowl, coat, and hat. Perhaps, Marius reflected faintly, it was the way of all dead; to wear the clothes that best suited them in life. He wondered muzzily about the nature of his own appearance, but at that moment the cab jerked and his world shifted into agony. For a time, light, sound, and reason fled. When they returned, he registered the sensation of being gently repositioned back onto his seat. I have flopped, he thought with chagrin. Miserably aware of his audience, he fought through the ringing in his ears to regain sight of the cabin, where a second figure, filth-streaked and ragged, had come up beside him. A demon, he supposed with a touch of the hysteric, or the damned. In his haste to retreat from it, he triggered a fresh wave of hurt.
“Please be still,” the creature soothed, voice implausibly familiar. “You’ll aggravate your injuries.” Concern shone in its large brown eyes. Agog, Marius recognized the wretch; it was none other than M. Fauchelevent!
“Monsieur!” He stammered, “what-?”
Vertigo threatened. He could not make sense of it! His attempts to recall the barricade were a muddle, distant and dream-like even before the end; the sight of the inspector, dragged to his execution. The moment of being struck. Strong arms seizing him, being carried. A descent into foul-aired darkness. The proposed idea to study the state of his person was rediscovered and implemented, and Marius observed himself covered in the same filth as M. Fauchelevent.
The truth, though it had taken its time rising, dawned: Marius yet lived.
What surprise! What horror! What unanticipated joy and despair! But if it was so, if his beloved’s father had truly snatched him alone from the mouth of hell, it must be because she had interceded; that if he drew breath, his angel, his joy, must be the cause! She had gifted her own dearest Papa as the implement of Marius’ salvation, risked everything she cherished for him. He bowed his head, surrendering to tears.
“Monsieur you have saved my life. I think– oh, I am nearly sure; you have carried me out through the sewers! Ah!” He was overcome by the enormity of it, too humbled to meet the good man’s gaze. Instead, Marius looked over his shoulder at the tight, pinched-up expression of Javert. His revelation doubled. “But– why, you must be a saint! For you have saved Monsieur l’inspector as well!”
“Hush,” M. Fauchlevent cautioned. As the carriage slowed, he sent a strained, uneasy glance at Javert. “We arrive.”
“Handle this.” Javert instructed. “I’ll alert the porter.”
Then there was a great commotion of exits, waiting and knocking, and once again M. Fauchlevent’s surprising strength, easing him forth ‘til he beheld once more No. 6 on the Rue des Filles du Calvaire. Deep inside Marius, a voice soft with childhood and comfort whispered: home.
“Oh,” he spoke under his breath. It was almost too much, after all that had transpired. He registered himself in a kind of shock. There was the pull of a dark current at his feet and wretched gratefulness putrefying in his heart. His soul felt several inches outside his body, like his essence had come unfixed from his form, and he watched himself half-walked and half-carried to the door. “Now you see, he is here.” The inspector was telling the porter, somewhere very far off. “Open up and send for a doctor, or tomorrow you will have a funeral.”
Marius allowed himself to be guided within, weeping in open relief at the arrivals of Basque and Nicollete, but unwilling to surrender his hold on M. Fachelevent for the climb up the stairs. “Get my grandfather–” he insisted, when the gentleman and manservant attempted to initiate such a transfer. “This man, Monsieur Fauchelevent, Monsieur L’inspector Javert– they saved my life. We - I - owe a debt. Please. My grandfather.”
The trek was agony. He’d thought at the bottom that he had the stamina to assist, but that delusion passed quickly. In the carriage, his injuries had been a great dull ache; upright they were an orchestra of torture. Worse still were the images that filled up his head; Mabeuf, Gavroche, Courfeyrac, all his friends left behind while he was dragged on, up and up and up.
By the time M. Fachelevent got him onto the antechamber’s couch, he’d dissolved into the gasping, wracked sobs of a child. Pain had left no room for shame, and through it, grief rose like a great bleak wave, threatening to smash him to pieces.
In the days that followed, it was said that when M. Gillenormand arrived, Marius had called out for him like he’d done as a boy, over and over, until at last he’d slipped into unconsciousness.
In this way, against the odds, a young man survived twice, and many small events were undone and woven back differently. Of those principally affected, let us first speak of Jean Valjean. Having surrendered his future to the police, only two desires remained; to complete the retrieval of Marius, and convey whatever information he could to Cosette. To those ends, the boy’s waking had provided several dilemmas, the foremost of which was Javert.
Valjean had not known what moved the inspector from his usual mein, to postpone satisfaction and permit Marius’ delivery, but guessed it must be at least in part because he had thought him as-good-as-dead. After all, no matter their age or tenderness, those at the barricades were criminals in the eyes of the law, and Javert served that master without mercy. Yet, the near-corpse had spoken, disproving its state, and the hunter had stayed his claws. From that point forward, Valjean had existed in the shadow of a new threat; to see Marius in chains, his mission failed, and to lose even his frail hope of petitioning a goodbye with his daughter.
Arriving at no. 6 on the Rue des Filles du Calvaire, he faced the second complexity. Until that moment, Valjean’s primary experience of Marius had been as a thief, bent on stealing the meager joy he’d scratched from an unhappy existence. It was easy to dislike such a man; it was much harder to resent a boy in pain, not so much older than Cosette, who clung and called him ‘savior’, and cried for friends and a cause so recently perished. Initially, Valjean had resisted the change in perspective. He could see no point, not with the Damocles sword of Javert hanging over their heads, until, at the top of the stairs Marius cried “Gavroche!” in the same piteous tones Fantine had once begged, “Cosette!”
There had been no helping it then. By the time he reached the antechamber’s worn couch, the hated rival had transformed in his eyes to a heartsick child. Marius had buried his face against his neck, as Cossette had done when she was little, and he was compelled to get down on one knee to ease him from around his shoulders onto the cushions. “Take me back, take me back,” he was whispering, eyes glassy and fixed on visions only he could see. Sweat beaded his brow. Valjean wiped it, hesitating to find the skin already fever-hot. When he removed his hand, Marius focused enough to grab and clutch it desperately. “You saved me. Monsieur, maybe, there might still be time—” he begged without begging.
Behind Valjean, the inspector’s boots clicked on approach, as if to say: there is not enough time. There will never be again. “Hush, you are home. Basque is getting your grandfather.”
“Pépé?”
“He’s coming. Hush.” Javert’s touch, when it alighted on Valjean’s shoulder, burned like a brand. He nodded stiffly and rose, pressing Marius’ arms to his chest, disentangling them.
“Marius!” A horrible exclamation issued from a far door; Valjean and the inspector turned as one. M. Gillenormand had entered, pale as a specter and in great disarray, frock coat askew over a nightgown that fell like a shroud. He trembled with the wild desperation of all old men, charged with seeing their descendents fall before them. “Monsieurs Fauchlevent, Inspector! They say you have brought him from the barricades! Oh terrible child! Tell me he is not dead!”
Javert’s grip on Valjean tightened to a vice. A dizzying terror swept him. Long decades of flight had given him the pattern-recognition of a prey animal sensing the shadow of a hawk overhead, and in his bones he knew that this must be the moment Javert sprung his trap. His vision swam. It was as if two rooms had been laid one-over-the-other in a single space; the parlor couch blurred into a hospital bed, its only facts in common Jean Valjean and this accursed man, who at any moment would surely bare his fangs and declare, “there is no Monsieur Fauchelevent,” before once more ripping his world to shreds. Whatever security Marius’ family might’ve provided for Cosette would be gone; Javert would never tolerate a citizen mistaking a convict, nor spare the lineage of a prostitute’s get.
“He lives.” When he finally spoke, the inspector’s tone was gruff and strange. From below, there was the clang of a gate, voices, and tramping feet on the stairs. Javert went so far as to tip his hat. “A doctor comes. Excuse us, Monsieur.”
Valjean was struck by the intense disorientation of a missed step; the rabbit, having felt the wolf’s teeth on its neck, set free. He dared a look at that dreaded face and saw, beneath its polite affect, a sort of disorientated surprise; as if Javert too had not anticipated the words until they’d left him. In Valjean, an ancient and contemptible wisdom gloated; here is weakness. Use it.
It was at this instant that the doctor and porter entered, blocking up the exit and calling for a cot. Before they could slip away, Gillenormand caught them. “Mousier Fauchevent. I understand if the inspector must go, but please. You have saved my grandson. Do not leave before I can give proper thanks. Nicolette has already gone for food, fresh clothes. She will draw a bath—”
Valjean's throat threatened to close. “That is kind,” he demurred, “but the inspector and I have pressing business, Monsieur. Go to your grandson. He calls for you.” Valjean did not lie; attended now by the physic, Marius’ murmured again, “Pépé? Pépé, are you there?”
Gillenormand appeared momentarily overwhelmed. He wet his lips, and looked beseechingly to Javert. “Mousier l’Inspector, please! I understand your rush, things being as they are, but a quick refresh will not take so long. Think of how it will reflect on the force! Dragging this heroic man about in rags, as if, why– as if he were some sort of convict!”
And there at last was the terrible smile, that barking laughter that haunted nightmares. M. Gillenormand shook, but did not stand down. “I do not jest, Mousier! You see? Nicolette is already returned, with fresh clothes in hand! It will take but a moment.”
Valjean could not have said what he thought would happen next; life was a farce. The world had titled from its axis. Slowly, Javert’s lips crept back over his gums. “Ha, so she is. A convict! Haha! Very well. Come,” he said to Valjean. “Let us follow Nicolette.”
It has been proposed that fate is only inexorable in the lives of great men; let us not say that Javert was one of these, but that his convictions were great, and that their shattering numbered among those events which are unstoppable. To this end, Marius’ wakefulness in the carriage had served as accelerant, and M. Gillenormand, a lighted match. Action, that great balm against thought, had so far protected him; now, abandoned to a neat little guest room with fresh clothes, rinse tub, and convict, he was adrift.
For some hours, he had not been himself, though he’d worn the shell of it; allowed this detour believing at its end, he would seize his prey. Which he would do, he assured himself. Another part snarled: You have not!
For indeed, here was Jean Valjean, wrapped again in false gentleman’s airs, and Javert did nothing! Worse than nothing! Was he not, at that very instant, permitting the devil to add another layer to his disguise? To primp himself and be called an insurgent’s “saint”, to be lauded “savior” by his grandfather? The legal tiger inside the inspector roared: grab him, devour him, fall upon him and make him yours!
Javert, who had not been behind bars since the accident of his birth, felt himself a prisoner. He wished to move, to speak, and could not. He sought himself, and didn’t find him. He watched as if from a great distance as Jean Valjean approached the wash basin, and unbuttoned the rags of his coat with trembling hands. There was the urge to grant him privacy, and the equal urge to throw him to the floor in chains.
“Who is the boy to you?” He recalled suddenly that he had asked earlier, on the banks of the Seine, and been distracted. Though the predator inside him had faltered, the Interrogator raised its head, scenting secrets.
Valjean didn't turn. “Someone I could save.”
“Don’t be obtuse. You could’ve saved any one of them,” he snapped, with that familiar curl of bitter admiration always roused by Valjean’s feats. “I have eyes. He was the only one you watched at the barricade.”
“Not the only one,” Valjean corrected, with a dry look over his shoulder so akin to Madeleine it disoriented. Startled, Javert realized that the quiet humor he’d taken as disguise was instead a core characteristic. More disturbing; Valjean had thrown him from the trail again. He snarled, stalking forward to seize the convict’s arm. Their eyes locked in the vanity mirror.
“Do you wish me to call the house down on you, Valjean?”
“Why haven’t you?”
“A life saved must count for something!” He hissed past bared teeth. Through the thin layer of a shirt, he gripped muscles and heat. “I must bring you in, but there is no need to– to humiliate you. Tell me or don’t, but I think you know; it would be better to have it out now than let me discover on my own. Why this boy?”
“...My daughter loves him.”
“Daughter?”
“I– no. Fantine’s child.” Valjean seemed to shrink when he spoke, face open and haunted. “You saw us, Javert! You must know I raised her!”
“I–.” Javert swallowed. Eight years; of course he’d known that Valjean had had her. But that he’d kept her? That he’d loved her?
“Hurry it up.” He barked; a guard’s command, weilded like a baton crack. He watched it hit Valjean between the shoulder blades, and something like rage tense and go out of him. It stoked an awful hunger in him; he’d never processed Madeleine, and those who had had kept poor notes. Personally, he hadn’t seen Jean Valjean’s back since Toulon. He wanted--
Javert jerked away suddenly, and put several backwards steps between them. A policeman’s instinct howled at a danger he couldn’t yet see. Already, Jean Valjean was bowing his head, removing his shirt. There was a flash of skin, then all at once, the unmistakable shape of 24601, age-worn but nearly unchanged from his memory, save for the pink and puckered T.P. across his right shoulder. Involuntarily, Javert’s breath hitched.
He felt winded, shocked without knowing why. Of course Jean Valjean wore the travaux forcés à perpétuité; of course, he hadn’t on his first arrest. It was a simple shift in juridical codes made manifest; branding had been banned under the Revolutionary government. Nine years ago, when the Mayor was sentenced, the old rule had been restored. Now the evidence was stamped on the skin of a man that damnable boy had called “saint”; the law disagreed with itself. It changed.
There was a sudden lightness in his head. His vision tripled, so that Valjean, Madeleine, and 24601 overlaid each other, and each was washing themselves, water dripping over that mark that represented the immutability of Javert.
Javert was no longer natural. He was missing something, and it seemed that if he found it, it would destroy him. He remembered the prostitute’s child; he could not remember her name. Why couldn’t he remember her name? There was something unbalanced here. His focus, which to him had always appeared to follow all crime equally and give special attention only to those aberrations which demanded it, now insinuated something of the self-serving. Had this broad back, this monstrous strength, first drawn his attention not because of any special defect in its owner, but in the one who had observed him?
Javert knew, with abrupt certainty, that he could no longer be in that room. He must not be in that space. Had he a duty? Only one.
“Finish here. I’ll wait outside.”
Closing the guest chamber’s door behind him, he walked directly to the exit of No. 6 and did not stop for anyone.
Valjean’s mouth tasted of bile. Despite the quality of the soap, his skin burned from the scrub and lingering weight of Javert’s gaze. His brand, unseen by any since his dive from the Orion, ached under his borrowed clothes. He’d known the comforts he was giving up when he’d surrendered to the inspector, privacy chief amongst them, but he’d misremembered the invasiveness. This reminder had put cracks in the dam he’d built around his memories, which now returned in flashes; stripped to his waist in Draguignan’s square, forced to kneel and writhe before a jeering crowd as hot-metal made roast-meat from the flesh of his back. That first night back on a plank, his ribs cracked. The fall of the whip against a still-healing burn. His heart was squeezed by that great sense of unfairness which had poisoned him in Toulon, and in his hot blood, it became anger of the kind he hadn’t felt since the bishop. Valjean trembled, fell to the ground, and prayed until it had passed.
Rising slowly, his knees cracked. He reminded himself that his suffering had been his own handiwork, as it must be again, and Javert’s contributions were only his duty. Even now the Inspector waited outside; Valjean would go to him, and when they were at the carriage, ask to see Cosette. If he was lucky, the man’s permissive mood would continue; he could not allow any baser part of himself to endanger that. Taking a steadying breath, he opened the door of the guest room.
The hall outside was empty. Unease prickled the fine hairs at the nape of his neck. He crept with soft steps to the parlor, where the doctor and household remained preoccupied by their wounded young man. Quiet as he was, none noticed when he slipped past them down the stairs. A terrible suspicion had come over Valjean; that Javert had lost patience and decided to make good on his threat, and even now a host of policemen were descending to seize him with a fanfare that would guarantee Cosette’s name be dragged through the mud.
His breath was coming short and fast, on the edge of panic, when he passed the porter and stumbled out to discover the carriage that had brought them yet remained. Relief hit with the force of a bullet. He hurried to the driver’s side, where the man was writing in a little book, four napoleons on the seat beside him.
“Excuse me, Monsieur. The gentleman I came with – have you seen him?”
The driver squinted from beneath heavy brows, and seemed to take a moment to reconcile the wretch he’d carried with this new gentleman. He shrugged. “He has paid for my velvet and gone.” Valjean glanced back at the gold; it represented more than he would’ve guessed the damage to the cabin’s seats worth. He could not put any reason to it, but the sight evoked equal parts exhaustion and dread; he’d never known Javert to be generous.
“Did he say where he was going?”
“No, Monsieur.”
“Did you see what direction he was headed?”
“Southwest, Monsieur. Perhaps towards the river.”
“Will you take me there?”
“Have you coin?”
He did not.
Valjean, who had already surrendered his future, did not fully understand what he feared on his walk to the Seine. He was a man who could not allow himself a past, for which Javert was both the reason and exception, and it made reflection difficult. What did he know of the inspector, after all? During his time as Madeline, he had judged him merciless but fair. Unpleasant in his dealings, but intolerant of corruption, and so preferable to many on the force. With chagrin, Valjean realized that despite his attempts to view others foremost as themselves, he’d always conceived of Javert as more idea than individual, and struggled to imagine any human motive which could’ve explained his aberrance.
The Rue Vieille du Temple was quiet at that time of night, and he saw no living soul, though there was shattered glass beneath many lampposts. Those dark sentinels reminded him of the gammin who’d delivered Marius’ letter for Cosette. Dead now, certainly, and still the city clamored with distant unrest. How many corpses would line the streets come morning, he wondered? How many Marius’ had he failed to protect?
At the turnoff for the Rue Sainte-Croix de la Bretonnerie, blocks from the Rue de l’Homme-Armé, Valjean felt his feet slow. For nearly two full days he’d labored without respite, surrendering first the primacy of his daughter’s love and then his freedom to causes greater than himself. He’d struggled with his whole might, believing his labors would soon be finished, only to discover himself diminished in a world without certainty. Surely God could ask nothing else from him? If Javert wished to find him, he’d done his part when he’d given his address. If the inspector struggled with Valjean’s mercy or what it meant for the correctness of his own work — well, perhaps Parisian citizenry would benefit. Valjean could not imagine giving more, save to make whatever arrangements he could for Cosette. He wrestled with inner angels and demons. Eventually, he continued south.
He found Javert, of course, as he’d suspected he must. Whenever he’d resolved to follow a difficult path in his life, the way had been cleared for him; from the courtroom at Arras to the bullets of the barricade, he’d consistently been spared long enough to condemn himself. This time, he uncovered his would-be-jailer with breathtaking speed, ten minutes hence at the Pont Notre Dame. Javert appeared first as a tall shadow at the bridge’s eastmost parapet, wreathed in fog red-tinged by lamplight. His hands were clasped in an unfamiliar attitude behind his back, and he glared statue-still down into the rapids. The river, so dangerous at this particular point, roared.
In that dark, Valjean became suddenly aware of an inversion in their natures. That the wolf had fled and the fox had followed; that he, who’d forever hidden in shadows, now hunted and that some responsibility for this present fell to him. Inexplicably he remembered his factory and the beads of jet, which had to be treated and cut just-so or would shatter.
Then his window for thinking shut. Javert broke his stillness to take off his hat, which he lay - absurdity of absurdities! - upon the quai. There was an intense gloominess to him, a resigned abdication; all at once Valjean understood what he witnessed. Again, fate had proffered that wretched bargain; to do nothing and have his problems erased; to exchange another’s life for his own. It was a familiar carrot, dangled too many times, and he was well-versed in rebuking it. Javert was a difficult man, yes, but they had worked together before; while his heart was immovable, he would yield when pressed before the letter of the law, and deferred to hierarchy.
“Monsieur le’Inspector!”
The great gray form froze. Valjean approached, unease turning in the pit of his belly. Decades of instinct screamed for him to run. He settled beside the inspector instead, nearly shoulder to shoulder.
“You left”
“Go away, Valjean.”
Valjean was surprised by his surprise. To be told “go away” by a man that had sniffed and grabbed after him most of his life! To be known, alone, and dismissed with -vous! It echoed through him strangely. He felt lightheaded. He, who’d required a mask for every interaction, was unsure how to operate without one. His mouth tasted of salt.
“Not yet. You gave the cabby more than his velvet was worth. Was that charity?”
“Go, or I’ll arrest you”
“I’ve already said; I’m yours.”
“Are you so desperate for the galleys?” The venom in Javert’s voice was undercut by his whisper; the panicked way his blood-shot gaze scanned the street. A suspicion, nursed for some hours but entirely preposterous, articulated itself: Javert did not want Valjean as his prisoner! Or at least, not yet. It perplexed him. It thrilled him. He misliked it. Valjean reached for the comfort of a time when words came easier and found Madeleine.
“I’m not, though I will go when you ask. Why didn’t you wait?”
“It doesn’t concern you”
“Respectfully, I disagree.”
“Then leave!” Javert exploded, “Leave, and be safe! You know I’m a man of my word, I–”. His voice cracked. Valjean reeled back. Their eyes locked in mutual horror. To have this uncertainty, these emotions spoken aloud was ridiculous – almost obscene. Madness, for Javert to even hint he’d sacrifice himself for a convict. He’s gone insane, Valjean thought with a sudden wrench of pity. Observing it, Javert’s expression twisted in dismay that smoothed immediately to glass; the pained flickering behind his stare shuttered and went out. He spoke with a weariness so intense it was tangible. “Or do not. It’s all the same.”
Valjean felt himself wrong-footed, as if he were back at one of those society events in M—— sur M—— and had misstepped. He recognized, perhaps, that he had been unfair; that he’d encountered this strain of self-destructive courage in the inspector before. He glanced at the misery etched into that granite face. “You have the look of someone seeking dismissal,” He chanced, and knew he’d hit his mark at the inspector’s hiss.
“What?”
“You look as you did on that day you asked for a dismissal you hadn’t earned.”
Confusion cracked Javert’s mask, followed by a rough snort. “Well I thought I’d earned it.” He frowned. “Why didn’t you? Dismiss me, I mean? Even if you’d already decided to give yourself up, it would’ve bought time.”
How surreal, to be asked without rancor or shackles, Valjean thought faintly, like a conversation with one of those folklore monsters designed to scare children. A croque-mitaine who could discuss tactics. “And punish an innocent man for being correct? No. I meant what I said at the time.”
“What?” Javert’s sneer contained agony. “That I'm ‘a man of honor’? That you ’esteem’ me?”
“I stand by it.”
“Of course you do. The convict saint! The kidnapping father! The charitable thief!” ” Again, that terrible laugh; “Thank god I no longer need your dismissal!”
“So you admit you seek one?” The inspector looked away. “From who? Not the police, or you’d be at a station. If from some higher authority….” Valjean peered into the river, unsure how to address this next. “You must know, God doesn’t permit us to choose our own exits.” For anyone else, he would’ve reached out to offer comfort, but already it seemed that they were too close, the heat emanating from that steel gray jacket dangerous as an open flame.
“A subordinate who cannot obey his superior has the right to resign,” Javert croaked at last.
“To tender his resignation, not preemptively accept it!” Frustration roared through Jean Valjean, both at the situation and his inadequacy to it. “For Christ’s sake, man! You might’ve gone to a priest!”
Javert blanched, then bared his teeth. “Perhaps! Perhaps! But what does a priest know of law?”
“We aren’t speaking of law!”
“Of course we are!” Javert spat. “Since I was a child–” he cut himself off with an aborted shake of his head. “....It is a question of whose law. Do you understand?” The last came with the whine of a beaten dog; a man with yellow papers begging for grace, not believing it would come. Then Valjean began to comprehend; here was a lost soul, teetering on the edge of damned, and instead of a Bishop, there was only him. He could’ve howled. It wasn’t fair. He sensed his own age in his answer.
“When serving two masters, I’ve always felt God must be supreme.”
“And you would speak for Him?”
“If I must.”
“So you accept responsibility?” There was hunger in Javert’s gaze. Valjean shivered.
“I accept I must take you to a priest.”
“I would think a saint ranked higher, even if he’s a convict.”
“Do not jest!” Revulsion seized him. It was as if a great hand was pressing against his back, placing a mantle about his neck for which he could never be prepared. The brand on his shoulder burned.
“What jest?” Javert shrugged. “You have jurisdiction, or you do not.”
Infuriating man! Valjean, who hadn’t had a violent impulse in decades, wanted to punch him. He sensed himself chosen and raged to deny the choice. He felt himself filthy, clad all in red. Then from across the years he heard a voice that arrested him; the cry of a poor angry woman on her door-stone in M—— sur M——, “are you afraid of the good you can do?” He bowed his head.
“Very well. You wish for a dismissal from God? Gather your reasons; I’ll hear your report.”
Javert scoffed. “My report?”
“You have named me as an authority, I accept, but I cannot serve His will without knowing yours first.” Valjean’s voice was calm, his back was straight. Blasphemy sat like a torturer’s instrument on his tongue. “You understand protocol. Take your time. You have no right to discharge yourself until it is done.”
“And meanwhile make mockery of the law?”
“Whose law?” Valjean snapped, with a shameful wriggle of gratification at how Javert stumbled back. “...I would really rather you had a priest, Javert. I’m not suited to this.” There was no answer. He sighed and, thinking for several long moments, finally managed, “There is no active warrant. A good spy has no obligation to report a suspect, or take him in immediately, while involved in an investigation of higher cause. You remember my address?”
“Rue de l’Homme-Armé, number 7.”
“Send a letter when you’re ready. I will arange things.” Valjean leaned down, lifted Javert’s hat from the quai, and returned it. “Now go home, Inspector. Sleep easy. You haven’t betrayed yourself.”
Javert’s face, forever a mirror to his soul’s heretofore simple truths, twisted in a riot of inexpessable conflicts. There was a straining in him, like a camel that had pressed itself against the eye of a needle and was attempting to push through. Let him do it, Valjean startled himself with the prayer. Let him accept this foolishness and be saved.
“Well!” Javert muttered at last, when the worst of the storm had passed and claimed only the crushed brim of his hat as victim. His enormous hands did their best to return it to order. He placed it on his head, started to bow, then stopped himself. Distaste, followed by a doleful sort of amusement, touched him. “I will continue until I am relieved. Good night, Monsieur.”
Then he turned and walked into the fog. Valjean waited. When the last of those resolute steps had faded, he let out a breath and began his own journey towards Cosette and home.
Behold: the first great change of a bullet’s path! The first life, transformed from extinguished to spared! Yet it would be an error to presume that this benediction of Providence sprang from chance, impulse or haste; if tragedy alone were enough to move God, the earth would be paradise. Instead, imagine that Its love and knowledge are infinite, and that It has an Opponent who is opposite but the same. Any action from one side must prompt an equal response from the other… unless subtle enough to go unnoticed.
What was there to notice?
Most events, you must remember, were unaltered. Marius lived; he had done so before. Javert, having failed to die, did the next most expected thing. The delay at No. 6 had not given him time for his letter at the Place du Châtelet, and there was still a note in his pocket in the Prefect’s own hand. He went straight to the Hôtel de la Préfecture de Police and reported Thénardier's skulking and the barred sewer grate to M. Gisquet directly, with a request for further observation, which was granted. If Paris’ chief of police, an observant and unusually detail-oriented man, didn’t question his irregularities, who might? The whole force was in disarray; Javert had been captured by insurgents. He’d escaped. He had not slept.
Valjean was less improved. Though his circumstances had changed, there was in him a new terror of regression. He, who’d been so good for so long, had gotten angry; like hearing his old name had summoned the convict he’d been. It was an awful place, inside his head.
This, we might imagine, is what it looks like when God and the Devil play chess.