“Yes.”
“Well! Make haste and get it here!”
M. Madeleine shuddered.
Fantine inquired:—
“What did the doctor say?”
M. Madeleine forced himself to smile.
“He said that your child was to be brought speedily. That that would restore your health.”
“Oh!” she rejoined, “he is right! But what do those Thénardiers mean by keeping my Cosette from me! Oh! she is coming. At last I behold happiness close beside me!”
In the meantime Thénardier did not “let go of the child,” and gave a hundred insufficient reasons for it. Cosette was not quite well enough to take a journey in the winter. And then, there still remained some petty but pressing debts in the neighborhood, and they were collecting the bills for them, etc. , etc.
“I shall send someone to fetch Cosette!” said Father Madeleine. “If necessary, I will go myself.”
He wrote the following letter to Fantine’s dictation, and made her sign it:—
Monsieur Thénardier:— You will deliver Cosette to this person. You will be paid for all the little things.