Jean Valjean left the town as though he were fleeing from it. He set out at a very hasty pace through the fields, taking whatever roads and paths presented themselves to him, without perceiving that he was incessantly retracing his steps. He wandered thus the whole morning, without having eaten anything and without feeling hungry. He was the prey of a throng of novel sensations. He was conscious of a sort of rage; he did not know against whom it was directed. He could not have told whether he was touched or humiliated. There came over him at moments a strange emotion which he resisted and to which he opposed the hardness acquired during the last twenty years of his life. This state of mind fatigued him. He perceived with dismay that the sort of frightful calm which the injustice of his misfortune had conferred upon him was giving way within him. He asked himself what would replace this. At times he would have actually preferred to be in prison with the gendarmes, and that things should not have happened in this way; it would have agitated him less. Although the season was tolerably far advanced, there were still a few late flowers in the hedge-rows here and there, whose odor as he passed through them in his march recalled to him memories of his childhood. These memories were almost intolerable to him, it was so long since they had recurred to him.
Unutterable thoughts assembled within him in this manner all day long.
As the sun declined to its setting, casting long shadows athwart the soil from every pebble, Jean Valjean sat down behind a bush upon a large ruddy plain, which was absolutely deserted. There was nothing on the horizon except the Alps. Not even the spire of a distant village. Jean Valjean might have been three leagues distant from D----A path which intersected the plain passed a few paces from the bush.
In the middle of this meditation, which would have contributed not a little to render his rags terrifying to any one who might have encountered him, a joyous sound became audible.
He turned his head and saw a little Savoyard, about ten years of age, coming up the path and singing, his hurdy-gurdy on his hip, and his marmot-box on his back, One of those gay and gentle children, who go from land to land affording a view of their knees through the holes in their trousers.
Without stopping his song, the lad halted in his march from time to time, and played at knuckle-bones with some coins which he had in his hand--his whole fortune, probably.
Among this money there was one forty-sou piece.
The child halted beside the bush, without perceiving Jean Valjean, and tossed up his handful of sous, which, up to that time, he had caught with a good deal of adroitness on the back of his hand.
This time the forty-sou piece escaped him, and went rolling towards the brushwood until it reached Jean Valjean.
Jean Valjean set his foot upon it.
In the meantime, the child had looked after his coin and had caught sight of him.
He showed no astonishment, but walked straight up to the man. The spot was absolutely solitary. As far as the eye could see there was not a person on the plain or on the path. The only sound was the tiny, feeble cries of a flock of birds of passage, which was traversing the heavens at an immense height. The child was standing with his back to the sun, which cast threads of gold in his hair and empurpled with its blood-red gleam the savage face of Jean Valjean.
"Sir," said the little Savoyard, with that childish confidence which is composed of ignorance and innocence, "my money."
"What is your name?" said Jean Valjean.
"Little Gervais, sir."
"Go away," said Jean Valjean.
"Sir," resumed the child, "give me back my money."
Jean Valjean dropped his head, and made no reply.
The child began again, "My money, sir."
Jean Valjean's eyes remained fixed on the earth.
"My piece of money!" cried the child, "my white piece! my silver!"
It seemed as though Jean Valjean did not hear him. The child grasped him by the collar of his blouse and shook him. At the same time he made an effort to displace the big iron-shod shoe which rested on his treasure.
"I want my piece of money! my piece of forty sous!"
The child wept. Jean Valjean raised his head. He still remained seated. His eyes were troubled. He gazed at the child, in a sort of amazement, then he stretched out his hand towards his cudgel and cried in a terrible voice, "Who's there?"
"I, sir," replied the child. "Little Gervais! I! Give me back my forty sous, if you please! Take your foot away, sir, if you please!"
Then irritated, though he was so small, and becoming almost menacing:--
"Come now, will you take your foot away? Take your foot away, or we'll see!"
"Ah! It's still you!" said Jean Valjean, and rising abruptly to his feet, his foot still resting on the silver piece, he added:--
"Will you take yourself off!"
The frightened child looked at him, then began to tremble from head to foot, and after a few moments of stupor he set out, running at the top of his speed, without daring to turn his neck or to utter a cry.
Nevertheless, lack of breath forced him to halt after a certain distance, and Jean Valjean heard him sobbing, in the midst of his own revery.
At the end of a few moments the child had disappeared.
The sun had set.
The shadows were descending around Jean Valjean. He had eaten nothing all day; it is probable that he was feverish.
He had remained standing and had not changed his attitude after the child's flight. The breath heaved his chest at long and irregular intervals. His gaze, fixed ten or twelve paces in front of him, seemed to be scrutinizing with profound attention the shape of an ancient fragment of blue earthenware which had fallen in the grass. All at once he shivered; he had just begun to feel the chill of evening.
He settled his cap more firmly on his brow, sought mechanically to cross and button his blouse, advanced a step and stopped to pick up his cudgel.
At that moment he caught sight of the forty-sou piece, which his foot had half ground into the earth, and which was shining among the pebbles. It was as though he had received a galvanic shock. "What is this?" he muttered between his teeth. He recoiled three paces, then halted, without being able to detach his gaze from the spot which his foot had trodden but an instant before, as though the thing which lay glittering there in the gloom had been an open eye riveted upon him.
At the expiration of a few moments he darted convulsively towards the silver coin, seized it, and straightened himself up again and began to gaze afar off over the plain, at the same time casting his eyes towards all points of the horizon, as he stood there erect and shivering, like a terrified wild animal which is seeking refuge.
He saw nothing. Night was falling, the plain was cold and vague, great banks of violet haze were rising in the gleam of the twilight.
He said, "Ah!" and set out rapidly in the direction in which the child had disappeared. After about thirty paces he paused, looked about him and saw nothing.
Then he shouted with all his might:--
"Little Gervais! Little Gervais!"
He paused and waited.
There was no reply.
The landscape was gloomy and deserted. He was encompassed by space. There was nothing around him but an obscurity in which his gaze was lost, and a silence which engulfed his voice.
An icy north wind was blowing, and imparted to things around him a sort of lugubrious life. The bushes shook their thin little arms with incredible fury. One would have said that they were threatening and pursuing some one.
He set out on his march again, then he began to run; and from time to time he halted and shouted into that solitude, with a voice which was the most formidable and the most disconsolate that it was possible to hear, "Little Gervais! Little Gervais!"
Assuredly, if the child had heard him, he would have been alarmed and would have taken good care not to show himself. But the child was no doubt already far away.
He encountered a priest on horseback. He stepped up to him and said:--
"Monsieur le Cure, have you seen a child pass?"
"No," said the priest.
"One named Little Gervais?"
"I have seen no one."
He drew two five-franc pieces from his money-bag and handed them to the priest.
"Monsieur le Cure, this is for your poor people. Monsieur le Cure, he was a little lad, about ten years old, with a marmot, I think, and a hurdy-gurdy. One of those Savoyards, you know?"
"I have not seen him."
"Little Gervais? There are no villages here? Can you tell me?"
"If he is like what you say, my friend, he is a little stranger. Such persons pass through these parts. We know nothing of them."
Jean Valjean seized two more coins of five francs each with violence, and gave them to the priest.
"For your poor," he said.
Then he added, wildly:--
"Monsieur l'Abbe, have me arrested. I am a thief."
The priest put spurs to his horse and fled in haste, much alarmed.
Jean Valjean set out on a run, in the direction which he had first taken.
In this way he traversed a tolerably long distance, gazing, calling, shouting, but he met no one. Two or three times he ran across the plain towards something which conveyed to him the effect of a human being reclining or crouching down; it turned out to be nothing but brushwood or rocks nearly on a level with the earth. At length, at a spot where three paths intersected each other, he stopped. The moon had risen. He sent his gaze into the distance and shouted for the last time, "Little Gervais! Little Gervais! Little Gervais!" His shout died away in the mist, without even awakening an echo. He murmured yet once more, "Little Gervais!" but in a feeble and almost inarticulate voice. It was his last effort; his legs gave way abruptly under him, as though an invisible power had suddenly overwhelmed him with the weight of his evil conscience; he fell exhausted, on a large stone, his fists clenched in his hair and his face on his knees, and he cried, "I am a wretch!"
Then his heart burst, and he began to cry. It was the first time that he had wept in nineteen years.
When Jean Valjean left the Bishop's house, he was, as we have seen, quite thrown out of everything that had been his thought hitherto. He could not yield to the evidence of what was going on within him. He hardened himself against the angelic action and the gentle words of the old man. "You have promised me to become an honest man. I buy your soul. I take it away from the spirit of perversity; I give it to the good God."
This recurred to his mind unceasingly. To this celestial kindness he opposed pride, which is the fortress of evil within us. He was indistinctly conscious that the pardon of this priest was the greatest assault and the most formidable attack which had moved him yet; that his obduracy was finally settled if he resisted this clemency; that if he yielded, he should be obliged to renounce that hatred with which the actions of other men had filled his soul through so many years, and which pleased him; that this time it was necessary to conquer or to be conquered; and that a struggle, a colossal and final struggle, had been begun between his viciousness and the goodness of that man.
In the presence of these lights, he proceeded like a man who is intoxicated. As he walked thus with haggard eyes, did he have a distinct perception of what might result to him from his adventure at D----? Did he understand all those mysterious murmurs which warn or importune the spirit at certain moments of life? Did a voice whisper in his ear that he had just passed the solemn hour of his destiny; that there no longer remained a middle course for him; that if he were not henceforth the best of men, he would be the worst; that it behooved him now, so to speak, to mount higher than the Bishop, or fall lower than the convict; that if he wished to become good be must become an angel; that if he wished to remain evil, he must become a monster?
Here, again, some questions must be put, which we have already put to ourselves elsewhere: did he catch some shadow of all this in his thought, in a confused way? Misfortune certainly, as we have said, does form the education of the intelligence; nevertheless, it is doubtful whether Jean Valjean was in a condition to disentangle all that we have here indicated. If these ideas occurred to him, he but caught glimpses of, rather than saw them, and they only succeeded in throwing him into an unutterable and almost painful state of emotion. On emerging from that black and deformed thing which is called the galleys, the Bishop had hurt his soul, as too vivid a light would have hurt his eyes on emerging from the dark. The future life, the possible life which offered itself to him henceforth, all pure and radiant, filled him with tremors and anxiety. He no longer knew where he really was. Like an owl, who should suddenly see the sun rise, the convict had been dazzled and blinded, as it were, by virtue.
That which was certain, that which he did not doubt, was that he was no longer the same man, that everything about him was changed, that it was no longer in his power to make it as though the Bishop had not spoken to him and had not touched him.
In this state of mind he had encountered little Gervais, and had robbed him of his forty sous. Why? He certainly could not have explained it; was this the last effect and the supreme effort, as it were, of the evil thoughts which he had brought away from the galleys,-- a remnant of impulse, a result of what is called in statics, acquired force? It was that, and it was also, perhaps, even less than that. Let us say it simply, it was not he who stole; it was not the man; it was the beast, who, by habit and instinct, had simply placed his foot upon that money, while the intelligence was struggling amid so many novel and hitherto unheard-of thoughts besetting it.
When intelligence re-awakened and beheld that action of the brute, Jean Valjean recoiled with anguish and uttered a cry of terror.
It was because,--strange phenomenon, and one which was possible only in the situation in which he found himself,--in stealing the money from that child, he had done a thing of which he was no longer capable.
However that may be, this last evil action had a decisive effect on him; it abruptly traversed that chaos which he bore in his mind, and dispersed it, placed on one side the thick obscurity, and on the other the light, and acted on his soul, in the state in which it then was, as certain chemical reagents act upon a troubled mixture by precipitating one element and clarifying the other.
First of all, even before examining himself and reflecting, all bewildered, like one who seeks to save himself, he tried to find the child in order to return his money to him; then, when he recognized the fact that this was impossible, he halted in despair. At the moment when he exclaimed "I am a wretch!" he had just perceived what he was, and he was already separated from himself to such a degree, that he seemed to himself to be no longer anything more than a phantom, and as if he had, there before him, in flesh and blood, the hideous galley-convict, Jean Valjean, cudgel in hand, his blouse on his hips, his knapsack filled with stolen objects on his back, with his resolute and gloomy visage, with his thoughts filled with abominable projects.
Excess of unhappiness had, as we have remarked, made him in some sort a visionary. This, then, was in the nature of a vision. He actually saw that Jean Valjean, that sinister face, before him. He had almost reached the point of asking himself who that man was, and he was horrified by him.
His brain was going through one of those violent and yet perfectly calm moments in which revery is so profound that it absorbs reality. One no longer beholds the object which one has before one, and one sees, as though apart from one's self, the figures which one has in one's own mind.
Thus he contemplated himself, so to speak, face to face, and at the same time, athwart this hallucination, he perceived in a mysterious depth a sort of light which he at first took for a torch. On scrutinizing this light which appeared to his conscience with more attention, he recognized the fact that it possessed a human form and that this torch was the Bishop.
His conscience weighed in turn these two men thus placed before it,-- the Bishop and Jean Valjean. Nothing less than the first was required to soften the second. By one of those singular effects, which are peculiar to this sort of ecstasies, in proportion as his revery continued, as the Bishop grew great and resplendent in his eyes, so did Jean Valjean grow less and vanish. After a certain time he was no longer anything more than a shade. All at once he disappeared. The Bishop alone remained; he filled the whole soul of this wretched man with a magnificent radiance.
Jean Valjean wept for a long time. He wept burning tears, he sobbed with more weakness than a woman, with more fright than a child.
As he wept, daylight penetrated more and more clearly into his soul; an extraordinary light; a light at once ravishing and terrible. His past life, his first fault, his long expiation, his external brutishness, his internal hardness, his dismissal to liberty, rejoicing in manifold plans of vengeance, what had happened to him at the Bishop's, the last thing that he had done, that theft of forty sous from a child, a crime all the more cowardly, and all the more monstrous since it had come after the Bishop's pardon,--all this recurred to his mind and appeared clearly to him, but with a clearness which he had never hitherto witnessed. He examined his life, and it seemed horrible to him; his soul, and it seemed frightful to him. In the meantime a gentle light rested over this life and this soul. It seemed to him that he beheld Satan by the light of Paradise.
How many hours did he weep thus? What did he do after he had wept? Whither did he go! No one ever knew. The only thing which seems to be authenticated is that that same night the carrier who served Grenoble at that epoch, and who arrived at D---- about three o'clock in the morning, saw, as he traversed the street in which the Bishop's residence was situated, a man in the attitude of prayer, kneeling on the pavement in the shadow, in front of the door of Monseigneur Welcome.
冉阿让逃也似的出了城。他在田亩中仓皇乱窜，不问大路小路，遇着就走，也不觉得他老在原处兜圈子。他那样瞎跑了一早晨，没吃东西，也不知道饿。他被一大堆新的感触控制住了。他觉得自己怒不可遏，却又不知道怒为谁发。他说不出他是受了感动还是受了侮辱。有时他觉得心头有一种奇特的柔和滋味，他却和它抗拒，拿了他过去二十年中立志顽抗到底的心情来对抗。这种情形使他感到疲乏。过去使他受苦的那种不公平的处罚早已使他决心为恶，现在他觉得那种决心动摇了，反而感到不安。他问自己：以后将用什么志愿来代替那种决心？有时，他的确认为假使没有这些经过，他仍能和警察相处狱中，他也许还高兴些，他心中也就可以少起一些波动。当时虽然已近岁暮，可是在青树篱中，三三两两，偶然也还有几朵晚开的花，他闻到花香，触起了童年的许多往事。那些往事对他几乎是不堪回首的，他已有那么多年不去想它了。
因此，那一天，有许许多多莫名其妙的感触一齐涌上他的心头。
正当落日西沉、地面上最小的石子也拖着细长的影子时，冉阿让坐在一片绝对荒凉的红土平原中的一丛荆棘后面。远处，只望见阿尔卑斯山。连远村的钟楼也瞧不见一个。冉阿让离开迪涅城大致已有三法里了。在离开荆棘几步的地方，横着一条穿过平原的小路。
他正在胡思乱想，当时如果有人走来，见了他那种神情，必然会感到他那身褴褛衣服格外可怕。正在那时，他忽然听到一阵欢乐的声音。
他转过头，看见一个十岁左右的穷孩子顺着小路走来，嘴里唱着歌，腰间一只摇琴，背上一只田鼠笼子，这是一个那种嬉皮笑脸、四乡游荡、从裤腿窟窿里露出膝头的孩子中的一个。
那孩子一面唱，一面又不时停下来，拿着手中的几个钱，做“抓子儿”游戏，那几个钱，大致就是他的全部财产了。里面有一个值四十苏的钱。
孩子停留在那丛荆棘旁边，没有看见冉阿让，把他的一把钱抛起来，他相当灵巧，每次都个个接在手背上。
可是这一次他那个值四十苏的钱落了空，向那丛荆棘滚了去，滚到了冉阿让的脚边。
冉阿让一脚踏在上面。
可是那孩子的眼睛早随着那个钱，他看见冉阿让用脚踏着。
他一点也不惊慌，直向那人走去。
那是一处绝对没有人的地方。在视线所及的范围内，绝没有一个人在平原和小路上。他们只听见一群掠空而过的飞鸟从高空送来微弱的鸣声。那孩子背朝太阳，日光把他的头发照成缕缕金丝，用血红的光把冉阿让的凶悍的脸照成紫色。
“先生，”那穷孩子用蒙昧和天真合成的赤子之心说，“我的钱呢？”
“你叫什么？”冉阿让说。
“小瑞尔威，先生。”
“滚！”冉阿让说。
“先生，”那孩子又说，“请您把我的那个钱还我。”
冉阿让低下头，不答话。
那孩子再说：
“我的钱，先生！”
冉阿让的眼睛仍旧盯在地上。
“我的钱！”那孩子喊起来，“我的白角子！我的银钱！”
冉阿让好象全没听见。那孩子抓住他的布衫领，推他。同时使劲推开那只压在他宝贝上面的铁钉鞋。
“我要我的钱！我要我值四十个苏的钱！”
孩子哭起来了。冉阿让抬起头，仍旧坐着不动。他眼睛的神气是迷糊不清的。他望着那孩子有点感到惊奇，随后，他伸手到放棍子的地方，大声喊道：
“谁在那儿？”
“是我，先生，”那孩子回答，“小瑞尔威。我！我！请您把我的四十个苏还我！把您的脚拿开，先生，求求您！”
他年纪虽小，却动了火，几乎有要硬干的神气：
“哈！您究竟拿开不拿开您的脚？快拿开您的脚！听见了没有？”
“呀！又是你！”冉阿让说。
随后，他忽然站起来，脚仍旧踏在银币上，接着说：
“你究竟走不走！”
那孩子吓坏了，望着他，继而从头到脚哆嗦起来，发了一会呆，逃了，他拚命跑，不敢回头，也不敢叫。
但是他跑了一程过后，喘不过气了，只得停下来。冉阿让在紊乱的心情中听到了他的哭声。
过一会，那孩子不见了。
太阳也落下去了。
黑暗渐渐笼罩着冉阿让的四周。他整天没有吃东西，他也许正在发寒热。
他仍旧立着，自从那孩子逃走以后，他还没有改变他那姿势。他的呼吸，忽长忽促，胸膛随着起伏。他的眼睛盯在他前面一二十步的地方，仿佛在专心研究野草中的一块碎蓝瓷片的形状。
忽然，他哆嗦了一下，此刻他才感到夜寒。
他重新把他的鸭舌帽压紧在额头上，机械地动手去把他的布衫拉拢，扣上，走了一步，弯下腰去，从地上拾起他的棍子。
这时，他忽然看见了那个值四十个苏的钱，他的脚已把它半埋在土中了，它在石子上发出闪光。
这一下好象是触着电似的，“这是什么东西？”他咬紧牙齿说。他向后退了三步，停下来，无法把他的视线从刚才他脚踏着的那一点移开，在黑暗里闪光的那件东西，仿佛是一只盯着他的大眼睛。
几分钟过后，他慌忙向那银币猛扑过去，捏住它，立起身来，向平原的远处望去，把目光投向天边四处，站着发抖，好象一只受惊以后要找地方藏身的猛兽。
他什么也瞧不见。天黑了，平原一片苍凉。紫色的浓雾正在黄昏的微光中腾起。他说了声“呀”，急忙向那孩子逃跑的方向走去。走了百来步以后，他停下来，向前望去，可是什么也看不见。
于是他使出全身力气，喊道：
“小瑞尔威！小瑞尔威！”
他住口细听。没有人回答。
那旷野是荒凉凄黯的。四周一望无际，全是荒地。除了那望不穿的黑影和叫不破的寂静以外，一无所有。
一阵冷峭的北风吹来，使他四周的东西都呈现出愁惨的景象。几棵矮树，摇着枯枝，带有一种不可思议的愤怒，仿佛要恐吓追扑什么人似的。
他再往前走，随后又跑起来，跑跑停停，在那寂寥的原野上，吼出他那无比凄惨惊人的声音：
“小瑞尔威！小瑞尔威！”
如果那孩子听见了，也一定会害怕，会好好地躲起来。不过那孩子，毫无疑问，已经走远了。
他遇见一个骑马的神甫。他走到他身边，向他说：
“神甫先生，您看见一个孩子走过去吗？”
“没有。”神甫说。
“一个叫小瑞尔威的？”
“我谁也没看见。”
他从他钱袋里取出两枚五法郎的钱，交给神甫。
“神甫先生，这是给您的穷人的。神甫先生，他是一个十岁左右的孩子，他有一只田鼠笼子，我想，还有一把摇琴。他是向那个方向走去的。他是一个通烟囱的穷孩子，您知道吗？”
“我确实没有看见。”
“小瑞尔威？他不是这村子里的吗？您能告诉我吗？”
“如果他是象您那么说的，我的朋友，那就是一个从别处来的孩子了。他们经过这里，却不会有人认识他们。”
冉阿让另又拿出两个五法郎的钱交给神甫。
“给您的穷人。”他说。
随后他又迷乱地说：
“教士先生，您去叫人来捉我吧。我是一个窃贼。”
神甫踢动双腿，催马前进，魂飞天外似的逃了。
冉阿让又朝着他先头预定的方向跑去。
他那样走了许多路，张望，叫喊，呼号，但是再也没有碰见一个人。他在那原野里，看见一点象是卧着或蹲着的东西，他就跑过去，那样前后有两三次，他见到的只是一些野草，或是露在地面上的石头，最后，他走到一个三岔路口，停下来。月亮出来了。他张望远处，作了最后一次的呼唤：“小瑞尔威！小瑞尔威！小瑞尔威！”他的呼声在暮霭中消失，连回响也没有了。他嘴里还念着：“小瑞尔威！”但是声音微弱，几乎不成字音。那是他最后的努力，他的膝弯忽然折下，仿佛他良心上的负担已成了一种无形的威力突然把他压倒了似的，他精疲力竭，倒在一块大石头上，两手握着头发，脸躲在膝头中间，他喊道：
“我是一个无赖！”
他的心碎了，他哭了出来，那是他第一次流泪。
冉阿让从主教家里出来时，我们看得出来，他已完全摆脱了从前的那种思想。不过他一时还不能分辨自己的心情。他对那个老人的仁言懿行还强自抗拒。“您允诺了我做诚实人。我赎买了您的灵魂，我把它从污秽当中救出来交给慈悲的上帝。”这些话不停地回到他的脑子里。他用自己的傲气来和那种至高无上的仁德对抗，傲气真是我们心里的罪恶堡垒。他仿佛觉得，神甫的原有是使他回心转意的一种最大的迫击和最凶猛的攻势，如果他对那次恩德还要抵抗，那他就会死硬到底，永不回头；如果他屈服，他就应当放弃这许多年来别人种在他心里、也是他自鸣得意的那种仇恨。那一次是他的胜败关头，那种斗争，那种关系着全盘胜负的激烈斗争，已在他自身的凶恶和那人的慈善间展开了。
他怀着一种一知半解的心情，醉汉似的往前走。当他那样惝恍迷离往前走时，他对这次在迪涅的意外遭遇给他的后果是否有一种明确的认识呢？在人生的某些时刻，常有一种神秘的微音来惊觉或搅扰我们的心神，他是否也听到过这种微音呢？是否有种声音在他的耳边说他正在经历他生命中最严重的一刻呢？他已没有中立的余地，此后他如果不做最好的人，就会做最恶的人，现在他应当超过主教（不妨这样说），否则就会堕落到连苦役犯也不如，如果他情愿为善，就应当做天使，如果他甘心为恶，就一定做恶魔。
在此地，我们应当再提出我们曾在别处提出过的那些问题，这一切在他的思想上是否多少发生了一点影响呢？当然，我们曾经说过，艰苦的生活能教育人，能启发人，但是在冉阿让那种水平上，他是否能分析我们在此地指出的这一切，那却是一个疑问，如果他对那些思想能有所体会，那也只是一知半解，他一定看不清楚，并且那些思想也只能使他堕入一种烦恼，使他感到难堪，几乎感到痛苦。他从所谓牢狱的那种畸形而黑暗的东西里出来后，主教已伤了他的灵魂，正如一种太强烈的光会伤他那双刚从黑暗中出来的眼睛一样。将来的生活，摆在他眼前的那种永远纯洁、光彩、完全可能实现的生活，使他战栗惶感。他确实不知道怎么办。正如一只骤见日出的枭乌，这个罪犯也因见了美德而目眩，并且几乎失明。
有一点可以肯定，并且是他自己也相信的，那就是他已不是从前那个人了，他的心完全变了，他已没有能力再去做主教不曾和他谈到也不曾触及的那些事了。
在这样的思想状况下，他遇到了小瑞尔威，抢了他的四十个苏。那是为什么？他一定不能说明，难道这是他从监牢里带来的那种恶念的最后影响，好比临终的振作，冲动的余力，力学里所谓“惯性”的结果吗？是的。也许还不完全是。我们简单地说说，抢东西的并不是他，并不是他这个人，而是那只兽，当时他心里有那么多初次感到的苦恼，正当他作思想斗争时，那只兽，由于习惯和本能作用，便不自觉地把脚踏在那钱上了。等到心智清醒以后，看见了那种兽类的行为，冉阿让才感到痛心，向后退却，并且惊骇到大叫起来。
抢那孩子的钱，那已不是他下得了手的事，那次的非常现象只是在他当时的思想情况下才有发生的可能。
无论如何，这最后一次恶劣的行为对他起了一种决定性的效果。这次的恶劣行为突然穿过他的混乱思想并加以澄清，把黑暗的障碍置在一边，光明置在另一边，并且按照他当时的思想水平，影响他的心灵，正如某些化学反应体对一种混浊的混合物发生作用时的情况一样，它能使一种原素沉淀，另一种澄清。
最初，在自我检查和思考之先，他登时心情慌乱，正如一个逃命的人，狠命追赶，要找出那个孩子把钱还给他；后来等到他明白已经太迟，不可能追上时，他才大失所望，停了下来。当他喊着“我是一个无赖”时，他才看出自己是怎样一个人，在那时，他已离开他自己，仿佛觉得他自己只是一个鬼，并且看见那个有肉有骨、形相丑恶的苦役犯冉阿让就立在他面前，手里拿着棍，腰里围着布衫，背上的布袋里装满了偷来的东西，面目果决而忧郁，脑子里充满卑劣的阴谋。
我们已指出过，过分的痛苦使他成了一个多幻想的人，那正好象是一种幻境，他确实看见了冉阿让的那副凶恶面孔出现在他前面。他几乎要问他自己那个人是谁，并且对他起了强烈的反感。
人在幻想中，有时会显得沉静到可怕，继而又强烈地激动起来，惑于幻想的人，往往无视于实际，冉阿让当时的情况，正是那样。他看不见自己周围的东西，却仿佛看见心里的人物出现在自己的前面。
我们可以这样说，他正望着他自己，面面相觑，并且同时通过那种幻景，在一种神妙莫测的深远处看见一点光，起初他还以为是什么火炬，等到他再仔细去看那一点显现在他良心上的光时，他才看出那火炬似的光具有人形，并且就是那位主教。
他的良心再三再四地研究那样立在他面前的两个人，主教和冉阿让。要驯服第二个就非第一个不行。由于那种痴望所特具的奇异效力，他的幻想延续越久，主教的形象也越高大，越在他眼前显得光辉灿烂，冉阿让却越来越小，也越来越模糊。到某一时刻他已只是个影子。忽然一下，他完全消失了。
只剩下那个主教。
他让烂灿光辉充实了那个可怜人的全部心灵。
冉阿让哭了许久，淌着热泪，痛不成声，哭得比妇女更柔弱，比孩子更慌乱。
正在他哭时，光明逐渐在他脑子里出现了，一种奇特的光，一种极其可爱同时又极其可怕的光。他已往的生活，最初的过失，长期的赎罪，外貌的粗俗，内心的顽强，准备在出狱后痛痛快快报复一番的种种打算，例如在主教家里干的事，他最后干的事，抢了那孩子的四十个苏的那一次罪行，并且这次罪行是犯在获得主教的宥免以后，那就更加无耻，更加丑恶；凡此种种都回到了他脑子里，清清楚楚地显现出来，那种光的明亮是他生平从未见过的。他回顾他的生活，丑恶已极，他的心灵，卑鄙不堪。但是在那种生活和心灵上面有一片和平的光。
他好象是在天堂的光里看见了魔鬼。
他那样哭了多少时间呢？哭过以后，他做了些什么呢？他到什么地方去了呢？从来没有人知道。但有一件事似乎是可靠的，就是在那天晚上，有辆去格勒诺布尔的车子，在早晨三点左右到了迪涅，在经过主教院街时，车夫曾看见一个人双膝跪在卞福汝主教大门外的路旁，仿佛是在黑暗里祈铸。