LES MISERABLES (Illustrated Edition). Victor Hugo

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ

      “Well, in two hours, then.”

      “Impossible to-day. Two new spokes and a hub must be made. Monsieur will not be able to start before to-morrow morning.”

      “The matter cannot wait until to-morrow. What if you were to replace this wheel instead of repairing it?”

      “How so?”

      “You are a wheelwright?”

      “Certainly, sir.”

      “Have you not a wheel that you can sell me? Then I could start again at once.”

      “A spare wheel?”

      “Yes.”

      “I have no wheel on hand that would fit your cabriolet. Two wheels make a pair. Two wheels cannot be put together hap-hazard.”

      “In that case, sell me a pair of wheels.”

      “Not all wheels fit all axles, sir.”

      “Try, nevertheless.”

      “It is useless, sir. I have nothing to sell but cart-wheels. We are but a poor country here.”

      “Have you a cabriolet that you can let me have?”

      The wheelwright had seen at the first glance that the tilbury was a hired vehicle. He shrugged his shoulders.

      “You treat the cabriolets that people let you so well! If I had one, I would not let it to you!”

      “Well, sell it to me, then.”

      “I have none.”

      “What! not even a spring-cart? I am not hard to please, as you see.”

      “We live in a poor country. There is, in truth,” added the wheelwright, “an old calash under the shed yonder, which belongs to a bourgeois of the town, who gave it to me to take care of, and who only uses it on the thirty-sixth of the month—never, that is to say. I might let that to you, for what matters it to me? But the bourgeois must not see it pass—and then, it is a calash; it would require two horses.”

      “I will take two post-horses.”

      “Where is Monsieur going?”

      “To Arras.”

      “And Monsieur wishes to reach there to-day?”

      “Yes, of course.”

      “By taking two post-horses?”

      “Why not?”

      “Does it make any difference whether Monsieur arrives at four o’clock to-morrow morning?”

      “Certainly not.”

      “There is one thing to be said about that, you see, by taking post-horses—Monsieur has his passport?”

      “Yes.”

      “Well, by taking post-horses, Monsieur cannot reach Arras before to-morrow. We are on a cross-road. The relays are badly served, the horses are in the fields. The season for ploughing is just beginning; heavy teams are required, and horses are seized upon everywhere, from the post as well as elsewhere. Monsieur will have to wait three or four hours at the least at every relay. And, then, they drive at a walk. There are many hills to ascend.”

      “Come then, I will go on horseback. Unharness the cabriolet. Some one can surely sell me a saddle in the neighborhood.”

      “Without doubt. But will this horse bear the saddle?”

      “That is true; you remind me of that; he will not bear it.”

      “Then—”

      “But I can surely hire a horse in the village?”

      “A horse to travel to Arras at one stretch?”

      “Yes.”

      “That would require such a horse as does not exist in these parts. You would have to buy it to begin with, because no one knows you. But you will not find one for sale nor to let, for five hundred francs, or for a thousand.”

      “What am I to do?”

      “The best thing is to let me repair the wheel like an honest man, and set out on your journey to-morrow.”

      “To-morrow will be too late.”

      “The deuce!”

      “Is there not a mail-wagon which runs to Arras? When will it pass?”

      “To-night. Both the posts pass at night; the one going as well as the one coming.”

      “What! It will take you a day to mend this wheel?”

      “A day, and a good long one.”

      “If you set two men to work?”

      “If I set ten men to work.”

      “What if the spokes were to be tied together with ropes?”

      “That could be done with the spokes, not with the hub; and the felly is in a bad state, too.”

      “Is there any one in this village who lets out teams?”

      “No.”

      “Is there another wheelwright?”

      The stableman and the wheelwright replied in concert, with a toss of the head.

      “No.”

      He felt an immense joy.

      It was evident that Providence was intervening. That it was it who had broken the wheel of the tilbury and who was stopping him on the road. He had not yielded to this sort of first summons; he had just made every possible effort to continue the journey; he had loyally and scrupulously exhausted all means; he had been deterred neither by the season, nor fatigue, nor by the expense; he had nothing with which to reproach himself. If he went no further, that was no fault of his. It did not concern him further. It was no longer his fault. It was not the act of his own conscience, but the act of Providence.

      He breathed again. He breathed freely and to the full extent of his lungs for the first time since Javert’s visit. It seemed to him that the hand of iron which had held his heart in its grasp for the last twenty hours had just released him.

      It seemed to him that God was for him now, and was manifesting Himself.

      He said himself that he had done all he could, and that now he had nothing to do but retrace his steps quietly.

      If his conversation СКАЧАТЬ