"There's something falling," his wife cried.
"What is it?" her husband asked.
The woman had bounded forward, and picked up the lump of plaster wrapped in paper, which she handed to her husband.
"How did it get here?" Thénardier asked.
"Why, hang it!" his wife asked, "how do you expect that it did? Through the window, of course."
"I saw it pass," said Bigrenaille.
Thénardier rapidly unfolded the paper, and held it close to the candle.
"Éponine's handwriting—The devil!"
He made a signal to his wife, who hurried up to him, and showed her the line written on the paper, then added in a hollow voice,—
"Quick, the ladder! we must leave the bacon in the trap, and bolt."