There was silence in the coffin, and Fauchelevent, who could not breathe for trembling, took out his cold-chisel and hammer and pried off the coffin lid. He could see Jean Valjean's face in the gloom, pale, and with the eyes closed. The gardener's hair stood on end; he got up, and then fell against the side of the grave. He gazed at Jean Valjean, who lay livid and motionless. Fauchelevent murmured in a voice faint as a breath, "He is dead!"
And drawing himself up, he folded his arms so violently that his clenched fists struck his shoulders, and cried, "That is the way in which I save him!"
Then the poor old man began sobbing and soliloquizing; for it is a mistake to suppose that there is no soliloquy in nature. Powerful agitations often talk aloud.
"It is Father Mestienne's fault. Why did that ass die? Had he any occasion to go off the hooks so unexpectedly? It is he who has killed M. Madeleine. Father Madeleine! he is in his coffin, and it is all over with him. Has such a thing as this any common-sense? Oh, my goodness, he is dead! Well, and what shall I do with his little girl? What will the green-grocer say? Is it possible that such a man can die in such a way? When I think how he got under my cart! Father Madeleine! Father Madeleine! By Heaven, he is suffocated, as I said he would be, and he would not believe me. Well I this is a pretty trick of my performance. The worthy man is dead, the best man among all God's good people; and his little one! Well, I sha'n't go back to the convent, but stop here. To have done such a thing as this! it is not worth while being two old men to be two old fools. But how did he manage to get into the convent? That was the beginning, and a man ought not to do things like that. Father Madeleine, Madeleine, Monsieur Madeleine, Monsieur le Maire! He does not hear me. Get out of it now as best you can."
And he tore his hair. A shrill grating sound was audible at a distance through the trees; it was the closing of the cemetery gate. Fauchelevent bent over Jean Valjean, and all at once bounded back to the further end of the grave,—Jean Valjean's eyes were open and staring at him.
If seeing a death is fearful, seeing a resurrection is nearly as frightful. Fauchelevent became like stone. He was pale, haggard, confounded by such excessive emotion, not knowing if he had to do with a dead man or a living man, and looking at Jean Valjean, who looked at him.
"I was falling asleep," said Valjean.
And he sat up. Fauchelevent fell on his knees.
"Holy Virgin! how you frightened me!"
Then he rose and cried,—"Thank you, Father Madeleine!"