As soon as they were alone, Thenardier offered the traveller a chair. The traveller seated himself; Thenardier remained standing, and his face assumed a singular expression of good-fellowship and simplicity.
"Sir," said he, "what I have to say to you is this, that I adore that child."
The stranger gazed intently at him.
"What child?"
Thenardier continued:--
"How strange it is, one grows attached.
What money is that? Take back your hundred-sou piece.
I adore the child."
"Whom do you mean?" demanded the stranger.
"Eh! our little Cosette!
Are you not intending to take her away from us?
Well, I speak frankly; as true as you are an honest man, I will not consent to it.
I shall miss that child.
I saw her first when she was a tiny thing.
It is true that she costs us money; it is true that she has her faults; it is true that we are not rich; it is true that I have paid out over four hundred francs for drugs for just one of her illnesses!□思□兔□網□
But one must do something for the good God''s sake.
She has neither father nor mother. I have brought her up.
I have bread enough for her and for myself. In truth, I think a great deal of that child.
You understand, one conceives an affection for a person; I am a good sort of a beast, I am; I do not reason; I love that little girl; my wife is quick-tempered, but she loves her also.