"No; I am merely passing through, that is all. What do I owe you, Madame?"
The landlady, without replying, handed him the folded paper; he opened and looked at it, but his attention was visibly elsewhere.
"Do you do a good business here?" he asked.
"Tolerably well, sir," the landlady answered, stupefied at not seeing any other explosion; then she went on with an elegiac and lamentable accent,—
"Oh, sir, times are very bad! And then there are So few respectable people in these parts. It is lucky we have now and then generous and rich travellers like yourself, sir, for the expenses are so high. Why, that little girl costs us our eyes out of our head."
"What little girl?"
"Why, you know, Cosette, the Lark, as they call her hereabout."
"Oh!" said the man.
She continued,—
"What asses these peasants are with these nick-names! She looks more like a bat than a lark. You see, sir, we don't ask for charity, but we can't give it; our earnings are small and our expenses great,—the license, the door and window tax, and so on! You know, sir, that the Government claims a terrible deal of money. And then I have my own daughters, and do not care to support another person's child."