Chapter 68 The eighth volume spreads

It was dawn.Fantine had a fever and insomnia all night, but the night was filled with pleasurable visions, and in the morning she fell asleep.Sister Sanpris, who was on watch at night, ran to get another tonic while she fell asleep.The industrious mother had been in the pharmacy in the convalescent room for some time, stooping to look carefully at her medicines and bottles, which were covered in a mist before daybreak.She turned around suddenly and gave a soft cry.M. Madeleine appeared before her.He just walked in quietly. "It's you, Monsieur Mayor!" she cried. He replied in a low voice:

"What about the poor woman?" "It's okay now. We are very worried!" She told him what had happened, that Fantine had been in a very bad condition that night, and that she was getting better now, because she thought that the mayor had gone to Montfermeil to fetch her child.Mum dared not ask Mr. Mayor, but she knew he was not from there. "That's good," he said. "You didn't tell her illusions. You did well." "Yes," continued Sister, "but now, Monsieur Mayor, she will see you, but not her child, and what shall we tell her?"

He thought blankly for a while. "God will enlighten us," he said. "But we can't lie," said Mumu in a soft voice. It was already bright in the room.The sun was shining on M. Madeleine's face.Mumu raised her head inadvertently. "My God, sir!" she cried, "what has happened to you? Your hair is all white!" "It's white!" he said. Sister Sanpris never had a mirror, and she searched a medicine bag and brought out a small mirror, which the doctors in the wards use to test whether a patient has passed out. M. Madeleine took the mirror, looked at his hair, and said, "What a strange thing!"

He said this casually, as if he was still thinking about something else. Mumu found it strange and incomprehensible, and immediately turned cold. He said: "Can I see her?" "Isn't the Mayor going to take her baby back?" said Sister, hardly daring to ask even that. "Of course I'll bring her back, but at least two or three days." "If she doesn't see Mr. Mayor before the baby comes," said Sister tremblingly, "she won't know that Mr. Mayor has come back, and we will ease her mind; when the baby arrives, she will naturally think The mayor came with the child. We need not lie."

M. Madeleine seemed to reflect for a moment, and then he said again with his calm gravity: "No, my sister, I must go and see her. My time may be short." The word "perhaps" gave M. Madeleine's words a profound and strange quality, but the priestess did not seem to notice it.She lowered her eyes and replied respectfully: "Since that's the case, Mr. Mayor just went in. She is resting." The door could not be opened and closed very well. He was afraid that the sound would waken the patient. He opened it carefully, went into Fantine's room, went to the bed, and drew back the curtain a little.She is falling asleep.The hush of her breath was painful to hear, the sound peculiar to those who suffer from that disease, and unbearable to mothers who watch over their irretrievably sleeping children at night. of.But in her face, there was an indescribable ease, which made her look different in sleep, and the painful breathing did not affect her very much.Her face had turned from yellow to white, but her cheeks were flushed.Her two pairs of slender golden eyelashes are the only beauty remaining from her virginity and youth, and although they are closed, they are still trembling frequently.Her whole body was also trembling, the kind of trembling that others could only feel but not see, like the wings that were about to help her fly, ready to fly and stay there.Seeing her in this manner, we would never believe that what lay there was a dying patient.Rather than saying that she is like a person whose life is dying, it is better to say that she is like a bird with wings ready to fly.

When we reach out to pick flowers, the flower branches tremble with half-rejection.When the ghost hand captures the human soul, the human body also has a similar trembling. M. Madeleine stood for a moment by the bed, looking from the invalid to the crucifix, just as he had done when he first came to see her in the room two months before.Then, as now, they were both asleep, and the other praying; but now, after two months, her hair had turned gray, and his white. Mumu didn't come in with him.He stood by the bed, with a finger to his mouth, as if if he didn't, someone in the room would make a fuss.

She opened her eyes, saw him, and said calmly with a smile: "Where is Cosette?"