One day, while his daughter was putting the phials and cups in order, the grandfather bent over Marius and said in his tenderest accents that if he were in his place, he would eat meat now in preference to fish. A fried sole is excellent to begin a convalescence with, but a good cutlet is needed to put a sick man on his feet. Marius, who had almost entirely recovered his strength, collected the whole of it, drew himself up into a sitting posture, laid his two clenched fists on the sheets, looked his grandfather in the face, assumed a terrible air, and said that this led him to say something. That I wish to marry. Agreed, said his grandfather, and he burst out laughing. How agreed. Yes, agreed. You shall have your little girl.
Marius, stunned and overwhelmed with the dazzling shock, trembled in every limb. The old man went on. She comes every day in the shape of an old gentleman to inquire after you. She has passed her time in weeping and making lint. He has made inquiries. She lives in the street of the Armed Man. Ah, so you want her. Well, you shall have her. You are caught. You had arranged your little plot against this mummy of two directories, and you answer a cutlet with a marriage. You reckoned on a bickering. You do not know that I am an old coward. I'll do whatever you wish, and that cuts you short. He has made his inquiries. She is charming, she is discreet, it is not true about the lancer, she has made heaps of lint, she adores you. He had had an idea of simply planting her at the bedside, but young girls are not brought to the bedsides of wounded men. You were nude three quarters of the time. A pretty girl does not cure a man of fever. In short, all's settled, take her. He had perceived that Marius did not love him. He said to himself that if he gave him his little Cosette, the boy would be obliged to love him a little then. Cosette, so be it. Love, so be it. Be happy, my well-beloved child. That said, the old man burst forth into sobs. He seized Marius's head and pressed it with both arms against his breast, and both fell to weeping. This is one of the forms of supreme happiness. Father, cried Marius. Ah, so you love me, said the old man. They were choking and could not speak. At length the old man stammered that his mouth was unstopped at last. He has said father to me.
Marius disengaged his head and said gently that now that he was quite well, it seemed to him that he might see her. Agreed again, you shall see her to-morrow. Father. Why not to-day. Well, to-day then. You have called me father three times, and it is worth it. She shall be brought hither. The old man, trying to make a verse of the ending, tripped over a poet whose throat was cut by the giants of that year, fancied that he detected a faint frown, and rushed precipitately into a repair that clutched him by his own phrase. Being able neither to finish it nor to retract it, he rushed from the bed-chamber, purple, choking, and found himself nose to nose with Basque, who was blacking boots. He seized Basque by the collar and shouted that those ruffians did assassinate him. Who, sir. The poet. Yes, sir, said Basque in alarm.
