“Hullo! it’s my father! Oh, that won’t hinder.”
And taking the rope in his teeth, he resolutely began the ascent.
He reached the summit of the hut, bestrode the old wall as though it had been a horse, and knotted the rope firmly to the upper crossbar of the window.
A moment later, Thénardier was in the street.
As soon as he touched the pavement, as soon as he found himself out of danger, he was no longer either weary, or chilled or trembling; the terrible things from which he had escaped vanished like smoke, all that strange and ferocious mind awoke once more, and stood erect and free, ready to march onward.
These were this man’s first words:—
“Now, whom are we to eat?”
It is useless to explain the sense of this frightfully transparent remark, which signifies both to kill, to assassinate, and to plunder. “To eat,” true sense: “to devour.”
“Let’s get well into a corner,” said Brujon. “Let’s settle it in three words, and part at once. There was an affair that promised well in the Rue Plumet, a deserted street, an isolated house, an old rotten gate on a garden, and lone women.”
“Well! why not?” demanded Thénardier.
“Your girl, Éponine, went to see about the matter,” replied Babet.
“And she brought a biscuit to Magnon,” added Guelemer. “Nothing to be made there.”
“The girl’s no fool,” said Thénardier. “Still, it must be seen to.”