At that epoch, Father Gillenormand was well past his ninety-first birthday. He still lived with his daughter in the old house in the Rue des Filles-du-Calvaire. He was one of those antique old men who await death perfectly erect, whom age bears down without bending, and whom even sorrow cannot curve. Still, his daughter had been saying for some time: My father is sinking. He no longer boxed the maids' ears. He did not bend, he did not yield, but he felt himself giving way internally. For four years he had been waiting for Marius, with his foot firmly planted, in the conviction that that good-for-nothing young scamp would ring at his door some day. Now, at certain gloomy hours, he said to himself that if Marius made him wait much longer. It was not death that was insupportable to him; it was the idea that perhaps he should never see Marius again. Absence had only served to augment the grandfather's love for the ungrateful child who had gone off like a flash. He would die rather than take a single step toward his grandson. Without acknowledging it to himself, he had never loved a mistress as he loved Marius. He had placed opposite the head of his bed an old portrait of Madame Pontmercy at eighteen, so that it should be the first thing on which his eyes fell on waking, and he gazed incessantly at that portrait. I think the likeness is strong. To my sister? And to him also. Are you as angry with him as ever? With that poor Marius. Poor Marius, do you say. That gentleman is a knave, a wretched scoundrel, a vain little ingrate, a heartless, soulless, haughty, and wicked man. And he turned away so that his daughter might not see the tear that stood in his eye. Three days later he broke a silence of four hours to ask that the name never be mentioned. Aunt Gillenormand pronounced this acute diagnosis: it is clear that he detests Marius. The attempt to substitute her favourite, the officer of lancers, had not been a success. A vacancy in the heart does not accommodate itself to a stop-gap. The goodman bored the lancer, and the lancer shocked the goodman. I have had enough of that Théodule, the grandfather had said. Keep your Théodule for yourself. In fact, Théodule had only served to make him regret Marius all the more. One evening, it was the 24th of June, which did not prevent a rousing fire on the hearth, he had dismissed his daughter. He was alone, half enveloped in his huge screen of coromandel lacquer, engulfed in his tapestry armchair, and in his hand a book which he was not reading. He was thinking of Marius lovingly and bitterly, and as usual bitterness predominated. He was trying to accustom himself to the thought that all was over, and that he should die without having beheld that gentleman again. Well, he will not return. His bald head had fallen upon his breast, and he fixed a melancholy and irritated gaze upon the ashes on his hearth.
In the very midst of his reverie, his old servant Basque entered and inquired whether he could receive Marius. The old man sat up erect, pallid, and like a corpse which rises under the influence of a galvanic shock. All his blood had retreated to his heart. Show him in. A young man entered. It was Marius. Marius halted at the door, as though waiting to be bidden to enter. It was several minutes before the grandfather, dulled with amazement and joy, could see anything except a brightness as when one is in the presence of an apparition. At last. After the lapse of four years. He found him noble, handsome, distinguished, well-grown, a complete man. He felt a desire to open his arms, to call him, to fling himself forward; affectionate words swelled and overflowed his breast; at length all his tenderness came to the light and reached his lips, and, by a contrast which constituted the very foundation of his nature, what came forth was harshness. What have you come here for? Then why did you come? Have you come to beg my pardon? Do you acknowledge your faults? He thought he was putting Marius on the right road, and that the child would yield. Marius shivered; it was the denial of his father that was required of him; he dropped his eyes and replied: No, sir. Then what do you want of me? Marius clasped his hands, advanced a step, and said in a feeble and trembling voice: Sir, have pity on me. These words touched the old man; uttered a little sooner, they would have rendered him tender, but they came too late. The grandfather rose; he supported himself with both hands on his cane; his lips were white, his brow wavered, but his lofty form towered above Marius as he bowed. Pity on you, sir. It is youth demanding pity of the old man of ninety-one. You have your thirty-two teeth, a good digestion, bright eyes, a forest of black hair; I have no longer even white hair, I have lost my teeth, I am losing my legs, I am losing my memory; you have before you the whole future, full of sunshine, and I am beginning to lose my sight, so far am I advancing into the night; you are in love, that is a matter of course, I am beloved by no one in all the world; and you ask pity of me. Come, now, what do you want of me? Sir, I know that my presence is displeasing to you, but I have come merely to ask one thing of you, and then I shall go away immediately. You are a fool. Who said that you were to go away? This was the translation of the tender words which lay at the bottom of his heart: Ask my pardon. Throw yourself on my neck. He would have liked to have Marius understand, and Marius did not understand, which made the goodman furious.
What. You deserted me, your grandfather, you left my house to go no one knows whither, you have given me no signs of life, you have contracted debts without even telling me to pay them, and, at the end of four years, you come to me, and that is all you have to say to me. This violent fashion of driving a grandson to tenderness was productive only of silence on the part of Marius. You have come to ask something of me, you say? Well, what? Speak. Sir, said Marius, with the look of a man who feels that he is falling over a precipice, I have come to ask your permission to marry. The grandfather rang the bell. Nothing. It is Monsieur Marius. Say good day to him. Monsieur wishes to marry. That's all. Go away. The aunt gazed at Marius with a frightened air, hardly appeared to recognise him, and disappeared at her father's breath more swiftly than a straw before the hurricane. You marry. At one and twenty. You have arranged that. You have only a permission to ask. A formality. Sit down, sir. How much do you earn at your trade of lawyer? Nothing, said Marius, with a sort of firmness and resolution that was almost fierce. Nothing? Then all that you have to live upon is the twelve hundred livres that I allow you? Then I understand the girl is rich? As rich as I am. No dowry. Expectations? I think not. Utterly naked. What's the father? I don't know. And what's her name? Mademoiselle Fauchelevent. Fauchewhat? That's right, one and twenty years of age, no profession, twelve hundred livres a year. Sir, I entreat you, I conjure you in the name of Heaven, with clasped hands, I throw myself at your feet, permit me to marry her. The old man burst into a shout of strident and mournful laughter, coughing and laughing at the same time. Never, sir, never. At the tone in which that never was uttered, Marius lost all hope. He traversed the chamber with slow steps, with bowed head, tottering and more like a dying man than like one merely taking his departure. At the moment when the door opened, and Marius was on the point of going out, the old man advanced four paces, with the senile vivacity of impetuous and spoiled old gentlemen, seized Marius by the collar, brought him back energetically into the room, flung him into an armchair, and said to him: Tell me all about it. It was that single word father which had effected this revolution. The grandsire had given way before the grandfather. Come, see here, speak, tell me about your love affairs, jabber, tell me everything. Yes, that's right, call me father, and you'll see.
Well, father, said Marius. You really have not a penny then? You are dressed like a pickpocket. He rummaged in a drawer, drew forth a purse, which he laid on the table: Here are a hundred louis, buy yourself a hat. Father, my good father, if you only knew. I love her. The first time I saw her was at the Luxembourg. Now, at last, I see her every day, at her own home, her father does not know it, just fancy, they are going away, it is in the garden that we meet, in the evening, her father means to take her to England, then I said to myself I will go and see my grandfather and tell him all about the affair. I absolutely must marry her, since I should go mad otherwise. She lives in a garden with an iron fence, in the Rue Plumet. It is in the neighbourhood of the Invalides. At the words Rue Plumet the old man interrupted his inhalation and allowed the remainder of his snuff to fall upon his knees. The Rue Plumet. Your cousin Théodule has spoken to me about it. The lancer, the officer. A gay girl, my good friend, a gay girl. I have heard of that little girl of the iron railing in the Rue Plumet. In a garden, a Pamela. I like you better as a lover than as a Jacobin. She receives you without her father's knowledge. That's in the established order of things. I have had adventures of that same sort myself. One does not take the matter ferociously. One does not make one's mind to marriage. Slip along, mortals; don't marry. You come and look up your grandfather, who is a good-natured fellow at bottom, and who always has a few rolls of louis in an old drawer. Here are two hundred pistoles. Amuse yourself. You don't marry, but that does no harm. You understand me? Marius, petrified and incapable of uttering a syllable, made a sign with his head that he did not. The old man burst out laughing, winked his aged eye, gave him a slap on the knee, and said to him, with the tenderest of shrugs of the shoulder: Booby. Make her your mistress. Those words entered the heart of the strict young man like a sword. He rose, picked up his hat which lay on the floor, and walked to the door with a firm, assured step. There he turned round, bowed deeply to his grandfather, raised his head erect again, and said: Five years ago you insulted my father; today you have insulted my wife. I ask nothing more of you, sir. Farewell. Father Gillenormand, utterly confounded, opened his mouth, extended his arms, tried to rise, and before he could utter a word, the door closed once more, and Marius had disappeared. The old man remained for several minutes motionless and as though struck by lightning, without the power to speak or breathe, as though a clenched fist grasped his throat. At last he tore himself from his armchair, ran, so far as a man can run at ninety-one, to the door, opened it, and cried: Help. Help. Run after him. Bring him back. What have I done to him? This time he will not come back. He went to the window which looked out on the street, threw it open with his aged and palsied hands, leaned out more than half-way, while Basque and Nicolette held him behind, and shouted: Marius. Marius. Marius. Marius. But Marius could no longer hear him, for at that moment he was turning the corner of the Rue Saint-Louis. The octogenarian raised his hands to his temples two or three times with an expression of anguish, recoiled tottering, and fell back into an armchair, pulseless, voiceless, tearless, with quivering head and lips which moved with a stupid air, with nothing in his eyes and nothing any longer in his heart except a gloomy and profound something which resembled night.
