She counted the minutes that passed in this manner, and wished it were the next morning.

From time to time one of the drinkers looked into the street, and exclaimed, “It’s as black as an oven!” or, “One must needs be a cat to go about the streets without a lantern at this hour!” And Cosette trembled.

All at once one of the peddlers who lodged in the hostelry entered, and said in a harsh voice:⁠—

“My horse has not been watered.”

“Yes, it has,” said Madame Thénardier.

“I tell you that it has not,” retorted the peddler.

Cosette had emerged from under the table.

“Oh, yes, sir!” said she, “the horse has had a drink; he drank out of a bucket, a whole bucketful, and it was I who took the water to him, and I spoke to him.”

It was not true; Cosette lied.