Chapter 223 21. To catch a thief, the victim should always be caught first.

In the evening, Javert had already arranged his manpower, and he hid himself behind the trees on the Cobranbench Street across the road from Gorbo's old house.As soon as he came up, he "opened his pockets" and wanted to put the two girls who were waiting for the wind near the slums into it.But he only "basketed" Azma.As for Éponine, she was not at her post, she had deserted, so he could not catch her.Javert immediately lay in ambush, waiting for the agreed signal with his ears pricked up.The coming and going of the carriage had already disturbed him.In the end, he couldn't bear it any longer, and seeing that there was a "nest" in there, that there was a "good deal" in there, and that he recognized the faces of some gangsters who walked in, he decided not to Waiting for the gunshot again, went straight upstairs.

We remember him holding Marius' Passepartout key. He arrived just in time. The terrified gangsters all picked up the murder weapon that had been thrown in the corner of the house when they were about to escape.In less than a second, the seven men leaned against each other with their teeth bared, in a posture of resistance, one holding his club, one holding his key, one holding his hatchet, and the rest holding chisels, Pliers and a hammer, and Thenardier held his sharp knife.From the corner of the room by the window, Madame Thenardier took in her arms the enormous stone step on which her daughter used to sit as a stool.

Javert put on his hat and took two steps into the room, arms crossed, stick under his arm, sword in sheath. "Don't move!" he said. "You don't need to open the window to go out, but go through the door. It's safer that way. There are seven of you and fifteen of us. You don't have to work hard, everyone should be polite." Bignaille drew a pistol from under his shirt, put it in Thenardier's hand, and said into his ear: "He's Javert. I dare not shoot him. Would you, you?" "What dare not!" replied Thenardier. "Then, you go."

Thenardier took the pistol and pointed it at Javert. Javert was only three steps away from him, and he looked at him steadily, without paying attention to him, and only said: "Better not shoot, I say! You can't take aim." Thenardier cocked the trigger.Missed. "I have already said it!" said Javert. Bignaye dropped his bludgeon at Javert's feet. "You are the emperor of the devil! I surrender." "What about you?" Javert asked the rest of the bandits. They replied: "We surrender too." Javert said calmly: "By the way, that's good. I said earlier that everyone should be polite."

"I only ask for one thing," continued Bignaille, "that I must be given cigarettes in prison." "It must be done," replied Javert. He turned his head and shouted to the back: "Now you come in." A platoon of gendarmes with swords and policemen with bludgeons and batons rushed in at Javert's shout.They tied up all the gangsters.This large group of people, illuminated by the faint candlelight, squeezed the animal den into a black and dense place. "Shackle them all!" cried Javert. "You dare to touch me!" Someone yelled, the voice didn't sound like a man's, but no one could say it was a woman's voice.

Madame Thenardier, who had uttered the roar just now, was standing guard in a corner of the room near the window. Both the gendarme and the police backed away. She had thrown away her scarf, but she was still wearing her hat. Her husband, squatting behind her, was almost covered by the fallen scarf. She covered him with her body, raised the stone steps above her head with both hands, Baba was like a female mandrill about to throw a rock. "Be careful!" she yelled. Everyone retreated into the aisle.The middle of the broken house was suddenly empty. Madame Thenardier glanced at the bound bandits, and cursed in her hoarse voice:

"It's all cowards." Javert walked to the empty space with a smile, and Madame Thenardier stared at him with wide eyes. "Don't come here, get out of here," she yelled, "or I'll smash you." "What a grenadier!" said Javert. "Old mother! You have a man's beard, but I have a woman's paws." He walked on. Madame Thenardier, disheveled and murderous, spread her legs, threw her body backwards, and threw the stone step at Javert's head with all her strength.Javert stooped, and the stone ledge passed over his head, struck the opposite wall, dropped a large piece of limestone, bounced back, and rolled from one corner to the other, but fortunately the room was almost completely empty. was empty, and at last stood motionless at Javert's heels.

By this time Javert had gone up to the Thenardiers.One of his broad hands grasped the woman's shoulder, and the other pressed against her husband's scalp. "Bring the handcuffs," he yelled. The detectives poured in again, and in a few seconds Javert's order was carried out. Completely discouraged, Madame Thenardier, seeing herself and her husband handcuffed, fell to the ground, weeping, crying: "My niece!" "It's all taken care of," said Javert. At this moment, the police went to the drunk man who was sleeping behind the door and shook him vigorously.He woke up and asked in a daze:

"Is it all over, Jondrette?" "It's over," replied Javert. Then, with the air of Frederick II reviewing troops in Potsdam, he said to the three "chimney-passers" one by one: "Hello, Bignaille. Hello, Brujon. Hello, two billion." Then he turned to the three masks and said to the man with the axe: "Hello, Haizui." Say to the man with the thick stick: "Hello, Bob." And to the man who talks with his belly: "Salute, Iron Fang." At this time, he found the man who was captured by the bandits. Since the police came in, he hadn't said a word, and he kept his head down.

"Untie this gentleman!" said Javert. "No one is allowed to go out." After speaking, he sat down in front of the table in a grand manner. There were still candlesticks and writing utensils on the table. He took out a document paper from his pocket and began to write his report. When he had written the first few formulaic lines, he raised his eyes and said: "Bring up the gentleman who was tied up by these gentlemen just now." The policemen looked around. "What is the matter," asked Javert, "where is he?" The captives of the bandits, Mr. Bai, Mr. Yuerbang Faber, the father of Yuxiuer or Lark, disappeared.

The door is guarded, but the window is unguarded.He saw that he was untied, and when Javert was writing his report, he took advantage of the commotion, noise, jostling, dim candlelight, and the moment when people were not paying attention to him, and jumped out of the window. . A policeman ran to the window to look.No one was seen outside. The ladder was still vibrating. "Damn!" said Javert, gnashing his teeth, "perhaps this is the fattest one!"