Friends like These

Disclaimer: I do not own Les Misérables.

Courfeyrac only caught sight of it out of the corner of his eye but the moment he did he completely forgot what he was supposed to be doing (he had been in a hurry, hadn't he?) and stopped to stare.

There stood Enjolras speaking amiably with a member of the female species. Quite an attractive, member, too. The two of them looked good together. He wished that Grantaire were here so he could get his opinion on the matter.

Neither seemed to notice him and so he approached them, wondering what on Earth they could possibly be talking about.

It wasn't that he didn't think that Enjolras ever spoke to women, he had just never actually seen Enjolras speaking to an attractive young woman. He'd never heard of it happening, either, despite all the time he and the others spent speculating on Enjolras' personal life so he felt reasonably safe in saying that if their dear leader did go around doing these things then he did them in secret.

"Farewell, then, Mademoiselle Patria," Enjolras said, nodding. "Thank your father for me."

The power of Courfeyrac's smirk eventually attracted Enjolras' attention.

"What?" Enjolras asked warily.

"Oh, nothing," Courfeyrac said casually.

Enjolras looked skeptically at him. "Really."

"I just cannot believe that I've finally caught a glimpse of the fair Patria! She's beautiful, of course, but then she'd have to be to catch your attention. The others will be so excited to hear this." Courfeyrac considered it. "Except Grantaire, perhaps. I had better break it to him gently."

Enjolras was looking more confused at every wood coming from Courfeyrac's mouth. "Why would you care about seeing Patria, let alone any of the others?"

Courfeyrac wondered if Enjolras could really be this dense or if he were just trying to downplay things so that Courfeyrac might be persuaded to keep it a secret.

"Because, Citizen Enjolras, we have all been desperately curious about your lovely mistress Mademoiselle Patria ever since you revealed her existence to us at the barricade," Courfeyrac explained.

Enjolras winced. "Courfeyrac, I do not actually have a mistress named Patria."

"See, that's what Combeferre thought, mostly on the strength of his doubting that there would actually be a young woman named Patria in existence," Courfeyrac told him. "But I have seen the proof! Even if 'Patria' is just a nickname or something, it is what you address her as."

"This is all a complete coincidence," Enjolras claimed.

Now it was Courfeyrac's turn to look skeptical. "Really?"

"Mademoiselle Patria is the daughter of one of my colleagues in the government," Enjolras explained. "We are on cordial terms and so I have occasionally seen his daughter. He has recently done me a good turn and so I asked her to thank him for me. That is all."

Courfeyrac frowned slightly. Leave it to Enjolras to turn a perfectly good romance into a boring chance association stemming from a work relationship. "If you don't have a mistress named Patria then why on Earth would you have claimed that you did?"

"I was being symbolic," Enjolras replied. "Everyone else had someone that they cared for deeply and what fills that place in my life is my love for Patria, that is my love for my homeland."

Courfeyrac sighed, accepting this with reluctance. "And after all this time you still don't have a mistress?"

"After all this time, there is still not a woman in my life," Enjolras swore.

Courfeyrac wondered if he had just said woman because that was the question he had been asked and the natural assumption or if there was still room for him to speculate on the love life Enjolras insisted on not having.

Courfeyrac was, in fact, rather fond of Madame Cosette Pontmercy. She was very beautiful and that was certainly a point in her favor and she was so charming and sweet that he likely would have been won over if she had not been. He had met worse conversationalists, too, though she was not particularly interested in politics. He still had trouble believing that she was really Mademoiselle Lanoir as she had not been half as pretty but Marius insisted that she was and he had certainly spent long enough obsessing over her before they had drawn up the marriage contracts for him to doubt him on this matter.

The only problem with seeing her was that he only ever saw her when she was with Marius and the two of them had a rather unfortunate tendency to forget that anyone else was in the room when they were together. Oh, they did not do it maliciously or even intentionally but Courfeyrac found it trying nonetheless.

Courfeyrac had to fake a violent coughing fit for three entire minutes before Marius could tear his eyes away from his lovely bride.

"I'm sorry, Courfeyrac, what were you saying?" Marius asked, meeting Courfeyrac's eyes for all of five seconds.

"I'm saying that I finally met Enjolras' mistress!" Courfeyrac exclaimed. "He denies it, of course, but I choose not to believe him."

"I hope that he does have a mistress," Cosette spoke up. "Then the two can be married and be blissfully happy just as we are. I think that everyone should be married."

Marius smiled at her. "You are just too good, my angel."

Cosette blushed. "Oh, no, you are the one who is too good."

"You want everybody else to be happy," Marius replied.

"Only because this kind of happiness is the kind where you cannot help but wish to share it," Cosette said. "And since our happiness comes from our marriage, it seems only naturally that other people can find similar happiness if they get married."

"It is difficult to imagine that anybody could be married and not be happy," Marius agreed. "But I've seen it happen."

Cosette gasped. "Truly? How did this happen?"

Was she truly that sheltered? Courfeyrac knew she had been raised in a convent but he knew for a fact that if she were really Mademoiselle Lanoir than she had left the convent a few years ago.

Marius considered. "Well, some simply do not marry for love."

"Then why get married?" Cosette asked, astonished.

"A lot of people from rich and powerful families are expected to marry someone…appropriate for their station," Marius said delicately. "Whether or not they love the person in question is decidedly beside the point. The first time I asked my grandfather to marry you, back before we knew of the size of your dowry, he turned me down for just that reason."

Despite the fact that Marius had spent weeks complaining that his grandfather had suggested that he behave as if she were his wife without marrying her, he notably did not mention this to Cosette. It was probably for the best as she did have to live with Marius' grandfather, too.

"And if it were not for my very serious injuries at the barricade, we might never have gotten to the point where your fa…where we found out that you had such a sizable dowry," Marius quickly amended. "We were very lucky."

Cosette smiled brightly at him. "I know that and I thank God every day. There were so many ways that our marriage might not have happened at all. One or both of us might not have been looking at the other the day that it started or we could have missed being in the Luxembourg at all! Or you might never have found me or I might have gone to England. You might not have received permission to marry me or I might not have received permission to marry you. You could have died at the barricade!"

A shadowed look crossed Marius' face. "I wish I knew who it was that saved me."

"I do, too. We owe him everything," Cosette said fervently, gripping her husband's hand.

"You know that in some cases, people do marry for love and still end up miserable," Courfeyrac said, more to remind them of his presence than anything else.

It only partially worked.

Cosette looked horrified. "Is that true, Marius?"

Marius nodded solemnly. "Some people are too young when they marry or do not have the means to live happily. Sometimes people change when they get older or they do not know each other enough before their marriage and find that they are quite incompatible afterwards."

"That might be the worst thing of all," Cosette said sadly. "They think that they marry for love and end up quite miserable. Oh, Marius! Do you think that that could ever happen to us?"

"Never," Marius said hotly, taking her face in his hands. "Our love is pure and true and will outlast these Earthly lives."

Courfeyrac had reached the limit of his patience. "Right," he said, standing up. "That's quite enough torture for today. Marius, I will see you on Wednesday. Cosette, it was lovely, as always, to see you."

They didn't look up.

"I wonder how long it will take them to notice I left," Courfeyrac said curiously.

"I thought you said you weren't going to tell everybody that you met my mistress, Patria," Enjolras said, looking almost annoyed.

"I don't believe that I ever said that," Courfeyrac said breezily. "I might have said that I believed that you didn't have one but that's hardly the same thing."

"It should be," Enjolras declared.

"If you didn't want us to be so interested in Mademoiselle Patria then you shouldn't have been so uninterested in everyone else's love affairs and then, when asked about your own mistress, said 'Patria'," Grantaire informed him, looking longingly at the bottle of brandy.

Since the revolution and Enjolras had given him a little glimmer of approval for waking up in time to save his life, Grantaire had been trying to quit drinking. Courfeyrac gave it another half an hour before the man gave in for the night and poured himself a glass. It was progress, he supposed.

"Forgive me for thinking that highly educated students would understand something figurative," Enjolras said wryly.

"I understood it," Combeferre said promptly. "But you have only yourself to blame for letting Courfeyrac catch you speaking with someone whose name was literally Patria."

Here Enjolras held up his hands. "I have no control over what her parents chose to name her and I didn't even know that he was there."

"It was your mistake," Courfeyrac said seriously. "Always assume that I'm there."

"That sounds a little disturbing," Grantaire noted. "What do you think, Marius?"

Marius, who had been looking downcast all night, glanced up. "Hm? I think that I heard something about this Mademoiselle Patria before but I can't remember where."

"I told you all about it the other day," Courfeyrac reminded him.

"Oh, that's right," Marius said unconvincingly.

"I think that we should at least meet this girl so that we may judge for ourselves whether or not she is Enjolras' mistress," Courfeyrac declared. "What do you think, Combeferre?"

Combeferre kept a straight face as he responded, "That would certainly settle the matter."

"That would be completely inappropriate!" Enjolras objected. "We do not have a relationship outside of her being the daughter of a colleague of mine and it might give people ideas! I have no desire to and so it simply will not happen."

"It might happen," Courfeyrac corrected. "Give me time."

"So, Combeferre," Enjolras said in an effort to change the subject. "You were telling me that your mother came to Paris to visit you?"

Combeferre greeted the reminder with a sigh. "Indeed, she arrived just yesterday."

"You don't sound pleased," Grantaire noted.

"I'm always pleased to see my mother and I love her dearly," Combeferre insisted.

"I feel as though there is a 'but' coming," Courfeyrac remarked.

Another sigh. "She…has spent most of the time that I have been in her company talking about our revolution."

"All of our parents did the same thing," Enjolras pointed out.

"Yes but it has been nearly a year since the revolution," Combeferre replied. "I had expected, and indeed endured, a little distress about my political activities but I would have thought she would have exhausted the subject by now."

"Mothers never exhaust the subject when it comes to their sons nearly getting themselves killed," Courfeyrac said sagely.

"What is she on about this time?" Grantaire inquired.

"I don't know who told her this but she somehow found out about those five men we sent away from the barricade in those national guard uniforms when we weren't sure if the barricade was going to be overrun or not," Combeferre informed them.

"And she somehow objects to our seeking to save those of us who would ruin lives if we died?" Enjolras asked, puzzled.

Combeferre shook his head. "No, she heard that I…Well, you all remember how nobody wanted to leave and so we had to convince them. One of the things that I said was that if you had an elderly mother you should live if you are all she has."

"Ah," Courfeyrac said, understanding immediately.

"Ah indeed," Combeferre echoed. "Never mind that my mother is hardly financially dependent upon me or that I am not her only child, she feels…betrayed, perhaps, is the right word that I spent all that time appealing to people to live for their aged mothers and did not think of my own."

"You didn't tell her that she did not cross your mind, surely," Grantaire said.

Combeferre hesitated.

"Combeferre!" Grantaire exclaimed.

"What was I supposed to do?" Combeferre demanded. "Lie to my own mother?"

"You didn't tell her about our revolution, did you?" Grantaire challenged.

"She didn't ask," Combeferre said delicately.

"I told my parents," Enjolras informed them.

"How did they take it?" Courfeyrac asked, intrigued.

"They didn't believe me," Enjolras replied. "In fact, they still find it difficult to believe that I had anything to do with the revolution at all."

Courfeyrac laughed. "My parents are proud of me since we won and have let me know that they would have disowned me had we lost."

"How very practical," Grantaire said cynically. "As for my parents, I'm not convinced that they've noticed there was a revolution at all."

Courfeyrac glanced over at Marius again. He had said nothing in quite some time (and then only when directly addressed) and it was hard to say whether he was even listening.

He sighed. "Alright, what is it?"

Marius didn't stir so Courfeyrac nudged him gently with his foot.

Marius blinked. "What is what?"

"You've been looking like you have the weight of the world on your shoulders all evening and it's very distracting," Courfeyrac told him frankly.

Marius flushed. "I'm sorry, I don't-"

"Marius, you are a close friend of mine and keep in mind that I let you stay with me for free for months when I tell you that if you don't tell me what is bothering you right now then I will have to refuse to see you ever again," Courfeyrac said dramatically.

Marius looked uncertain. "He's not serious, is he?"

Combeferre shrugged noncommittally. "It's hard to tell."

Marius bit his lip, looking troubled. "It's not that I don't want to tell you. In fact, I could really use the advice. I just…technically, I only promised that I wouldn't tell Cosette but the 'don't tell anyone besides Cosette' was probably implied."

"I cannot tell you if you should tell us or not," Enjolras began, "but we do promise that, should you confide in us, we will keep the secret."

Marius looked at him incredulously. "But you don't even know what it is!"

"If by that you mean 'it's illegal' then you seem to be forgetting that you're in the company of myself and several dedicated revolutionists," Grantaire pointed out.

"You were willing to die right alongside us, Grantaire," Enjolras said quietly.

Grantaire merely shrugged and looked away.

Marius was still looking undecided. "I've never asked," he said suddenly. "But how did you fall in with this crowd, Grantaire? You know how I got involved."

"I promised him chocolate," Courfeyrac deadpanned.

"It was a vicious, vicious lie," Marius replied.

"We had plenty of chocolate," Courfeyrac claimed. "We had whole weeks where all we did was eat chocolate and listen to Enjolras lecturing us about how we were ignoring our responsibilities! You had just stopped coming by that point."

Marius rolled his eyes.

"How I became a revolutionary? There's not much to tell," Grantaire replied. "I was out walking one day and saw Enjolras delivering a speech. I don't even remember what it was about."

"He followed me as I was leaving, sat down in the Cafe Musain, and never left," Enjolras finished. "But we were talking about whatever was troubling you."

"I…Do you what my wife's doing right now?" Marius asked abruptly.

Courfeyrac looked around. Everyone else looked as bewildered as he felt. "I'm sure that I don't."

"Her father comes to call around this time," Marius replied. "Or maybe a little after this. I try not to be in the house when he comes and he comes every night."

Combeferre frowned. "I don't understand. Do you still dislike her father? I thought you and Cosette planned to have him live with you after you were married?"

"That was the plan, yes," Marius agreed. "But it's really better for everyone involved if he doesn't."

"And by 'better for everyone' you mean 'better for you'," Grantaire observed. "I'm sure your wife and her father would disagree."

"Oh, her father is just happy that I'm letting her see him at all," Marius said grimly.

"I'm going to have to stop you there," Courfeyrac said, honestly astounded. "You would even think of depriving the woman you've driven us all mad singing the praises of her only family in the world?"

Marius pouted. "You're making me sound terrible but you don't know the whole story."

"Then please tell us so we do not have to jump to conclusions," Enjolras told him.

"To begin with, he's not actually her father," Marius announced.

"Everyone knows that," Grantaire said dismissively. "He's her uncle that she calls father."

But Marius shook her head. "I'm not positive but I don't think that that man was her father, either, and he is of no relation to her."

Combeferre voiced what everyone else was thinking. "Perhaps you'd better start at the beginning."

Marius nodded and took a deep breath. "The day after we were married, Cosette's 'father' came to call on me. He told me that he was an ex-convict who had broken his ban and that he had spent nineteen years in the galley."

Grantaire let out a low whistle. "Nineteen years. He had better have killed someone for that. More than one someone. Maybe three. Definitely no more than five."

Enjolras looked thoughtful. "What was he in prison for?"

Marius frowned. "I'm not sure he said, exactly. Maybe something about theft?"

"That is certainly less distressing than murder," Combeferre decided.

"I suppose so," Marius said and it was clear that the fact that Cosette's father was a convict was troubling him far more than whatever he had happened to do to become one. "His name is Jean Valjean. Javert-"

"Wait, who is 'Javert'?" Courfeyrac interrupted.

"That police spy at the barricade," Marius told him. "I needed help once and he gave it to me. He gave me those pistols I used to save you and Gavroche, Courfeyrac. And Jean Valjean just killed him."

"Are you seriously upset over that?" Grantaire couldn't believe it. "What does it matter who killed him? He was always going to die."

"And I gave my permission for him to execute the spy," Enjolras added.

Marius shook his head. "You don't understand. Any of us, except me once I'd recognized him, might have killed him but it would have been because he was a spy there to see us all dead. Jean Valjean did so because he wanted revenge."

"I don't see what difference that makes," Grantaire persisted. "He's just as dead either way."

"It makes a difference," Marius said stubbornly.

"I think…" Enjolras began slowly. "I had forgotten Javert's name in the midst of everything else that happened but I have read each and every piece of news I could find about our revolution. I believe that your Javert drowned himself."

"That's impossible," Marius protested. "We all heard the shot. I was on the verge of going out and trying to reason with Valjean or something when they rang out."

"The article also mentioned that he told his superiors that he had been supposed to be executed at a barricade but had been saved by the mercy of a revolutionary," Enjolras added. "I am not pleased to see that this was our barricade that did not properly execute our spy but he did die that same night so I suppose it all ends the same."

Grantaire nodded. "Exactly, he's just as dead now as he would have been if this Valjean blew his head off."

Marius looked startled. "I don't understand. Why wouldn't Valjean kill the man who had the potential to imprison him again and who had been hunting him all this time?"

"So first you are upset that he did kill this Javert and now you're upset that he didn't?" Courfeyrac asked, shaking his head. "You are a difficult man to please, Marius."

"I'm not upset, of course I'm not, I just don't understand," Marius replied.

"Well, it's not as if we hadn't all noticed his strange refusal to kill or seriously harm anyone at the barricade," Combeferre pointed out. "Perhaps he was never a violent man if he went to prison for theft. Perhaps if he was ever a violent man, he changed his ways."

"Perhaps," Marius said reluctantly. "But then there's the money!"

"What money?" Courfeyrac asked.

"My bride, as you may be aware, brought a very large dowry to our marriage. Haven't any of you wondered why I don't live or really look like I have that much money?" Marius inquired.

Courfeyrac shrugged. "Honestly, we sort of thought that you had just gotten into the habit of living like you were poor or were maybe being nostalgic."

"I thought it was to annoy your grandfather," Grantaire suggested.

"Cosette's fortune remains a source of uncertainty because no one knows where it came from," Marius explained. "No one asks questions when they hear that it's over half a million francs and I hadn't, either, but then the deposit was left to a thief…I just have to wonder…"

"You think that the money was stolen," Enjolras realized. "Did you ask Valjean where the money came from? Even if you think he would lie, it would give you a solid place to investigate and see if his story is true."

"I didn't, no," Marius admitted. "I didn't think of it at the time and now I'm not sure I want to know."

"Well we can be reasonably sure, given his disinclination towards violence, that he did not kill anybody for the money," Combeferre said logically. "And as such, the truth cannot possibly be worse than what you're imagining. If you're at the point where you won't use the money entirely because you don't know where it came from then you really do need to ask. Who knows? You might be refusing to use a perfectly legitimate fortune."

"I highly doubt it," Marius told him glumly. "I have a contact at a bank that says…Well, I think I will ask. Once I get confirmation, I can start to decide what I should do with it. Leaving it just sitting around isn't helping anybody." He shuddered. "I still cannot believe that that man raised my beautiful Cosette for so many years! It's a nightmarish prospect."

"I have a question," Courfeyrac said suddenly. "If you're so suspicious of Valjean then why are you only considering not letting her see him?"

"He asked me to allow Cosette to see him still and I was so moved by how heartbroken he looked that I said that he could see her every evening but I really didn't intend for him to take it that literally!" Marius said helplessly, placing his head in his hands. "He made some good points about how people would wonder if he never came and Cosette would certainly never accept it but every night? It's intolerable!"

"I think you're being ungrateful," Grantaire announced.

"Ungrateful?" Marius repeated, flabbergasted. "For what? Giving me Cosette? Saving her by surrendering contact with her shouldn't be rewarded by being granted contact with her! And I'm not sure how she came to be with him in the first place so she might not have even been his to give."

"No," Grantaire said, looking at him as if he were a particularly slow child. "I'm talking about your ingratitude for how he saved you at the barricade."

Everyone turned to look at Grantaire in surprise.

Marius looked like all the blood had drained out of his face. "I…what?"

Grantaire nodded. "I saw him, right after I killed the man attacking Enjolras. We were winning but there was nowhere safe for a wounded man. I saw him drag you to the sewers, Marius. He brought you home through the sewer system and saved your life before letting you marry his daughter and all you want to talk about is how annoying it is to let him see her at all."

"Grantaire," Marius said, his voice deceptively calm. "Do you recall when I spent weeks going around asking everybody who was at the barricade – on both sides! – if they knew what happened?"

Grantaire thought about it and shook his head. "I can't say that I do. I would have told you if I had."

"You were right there when I was asking at least a dozen of those people!" Marius burst out.

Grantaire shrugged. "I don't know what to tell you, Marius. I simply don't remember it. Was I drinking? I don't always remember what happens when I'm drinking."

"Possibly," Marius conceded. "But I also asked you and you assured me that you had no idea what I was talking about!"

"There is a good chance that I literally did not have any idea what you were talking about and didn't understand the question," Grantaire told him.

Marius, if possible, became even paler. "But that means…Dear God!" He jumped to his feet and glared at Grantaire. "If I didn't have to go right now, I would probably kill you for this."

Grantaire gave in and reached for the bottle. "Once again, fortune smiles down upon me."

Enjolras exchanged a long-suffering look with Combeferre.

Courfeyrac watched Marius gather his things and race towards the door and sighed. "I should probably go after him."

"Probably," Combeferre agreed, making no indication that he was willing to go instead.

Courfeyrac caught up to Marius just as he was about to enter a hackney-coach and got in right behind him.

"Courfeyrac, what are you doing here?" Marius asked blankly after he gave the driver instructions to take him home.

"We were concerned when you just ran off like that," Courfeyrac said. Well, he was sufficiently concerned – and curious – to follow him out at any rate.

"I just realized that I may have made a huge mistake," Marius said, not looking at Courfeyrac.

"A mistake?" Courfeyrac prompted.

"I had mentioned that I was annoyed that Va-that my father-in-law," Marius quickly corrected with a look to the driver, "was visiting every day."

Courfeyrac felt a vague suspicion begin to form. "What did you do?"

"You have to understand," Marius said desperately. "I had no idea that he saved my life! I cannot count the number of times I wondered who did that while he was sitting right there and I can only conclude he kept it from me deliberately. I don't know why but he did."

"What did you do?" Courfeyrac asked again.

"I had expected that the visits would slowly taper out over time but they weren't. If anything they just kept getting longer. Cosette said that they just lost track of time discussing how wonderful I was and I thought that was just the topic he used so that he could stay longer," Marius explained.

"Even so," Courfeyrac remarked, "don't you feel kind of like a terrible person to be so eager to rid yourself of a man who has only wonderful things to say about you?"

Marius winced. "Now maybe. Then…not so much."

"So what did you do?" Courfeyrac asked for the third time.

"I might have…begun to subtly encourage him to shorten his visits," Marius admitted.

He really was going to have to drag this out of him, wasn't he? "How?"

"Oh, little things," Marius said dismissively. "He always met with her in the worst room in the house but lately I've been taking Cosette places and not being back when he normally came to call, not lighting the fire, moving the furniture towards the door…He didn't seem to understand, though. Maybe he didn't want to understand. And tonight…"

"Tonight?" Courfeyrac repeated.

"There…might not be any furniture at all in the room," Marius said reluctantly.

"Well he can hardly avoid getting the message now!" Courfeyrac exclaimed.

"I know," Marius said miserably, nodding. "And he's been so good about following all of my instructions and not telling Cosette about how I've been making things inhospitable, she told me the other day she didn't understand why he insisted on no fire, that I think he'll just let it happen."

Courfeyrac understood perfectly. "We should hurry."

"I just…I'm not quite sure what to do," Marius admitted. "I'd rather Cosette not find out I was trying to throw her father out of our lives if I can avoid it and because he does not want Cosette to know about that and there's no way I can explain why if I can't tell her I do not think he'd want her to know, either. But how am I supposed to let him know that I've changed my mind, then? Take him aside? That would probably be the most awkward conversation I've ever had."

"You could always do that," Courfeyrac agreed. "Or you could just lie your head off."

Marius furrowed his brow. "I don't follow."

"Just go there and make a comment about how you hope he stays for dinner or how you really had no idea that the room they were meeting in was so drab and you absolutely insist that he comes into a different room, little things like that," Courfeyrac suggested. "It should confuse him but, from what I understand about him, he should be able to follow along."

Marius thought it over and then nodded. "I'm glad you came along, Courfeyrac. That sounds better than anything I could have come up with on my own."

"Everyone is always glad whenever I come along," Courfeyrac said confidently. "And who knows? Maybe at last I'll have someone to commiserate with when you and Cosette forget that everyone else is in the room."

Marius blinked. "When we do what?"

Courfeyrac waved him off. "Oh, never mind."

They rode the rest of the way in silence. Marius left Courfeyrac to pay the hackney-driver as he ran to the door and knocked.

Marius was just being let in when Courfeyrac came up behind him and the two of them went into a room that, while clean, was completely devoid of any sort of cheer or maintenance as well as lacking furniture of any kind.

"Subtle, you say," Courfeyrac muttered.

"You told Basque to take the chairs away," Cosette was saying. "And the other day you told him not to light the fire. You really are very peculiar."

Cosette did not notice them standing in the doorway and the man whom Courfeyrac had once known as Monsieur Leblanc and later Monsieur Fauchelevent and now Jean Valjean had his back to them.

He made no reply for one very long, terrible moment before he said, "Goodbye."

Cosette's eyes widened in confusion. That had sounded rather final. "Already? But-"

Valjean turned and saw the pair of them standing there. He nodded respectfully. "I was just leaving, Monsieur."

"Leaving? What nonsense is this?" Marius demanded.

Valjean could not disguise the surprise on his face but quickly recovered. "I had only intended to stay for a few minutes, I have other things that I need to do."

"Oh, but you must stay!" Marius insisted. "We have so much to talk about."

"Yes, do stay!" Cosette pleaded.

"That's really very kind," Valjean demurred, clearly believing that Marius was just pretending to want him there for Cosette's sake.

Marius made a show of looking around. "Is this really where you've been seeing each other all these weeks?"

Cosette huffed. "I told you that this room was unpleasant and so meeting here was incredibly peculiar!"

"I'm sorry, my love," Marius apologized. "I had just never been in here personally so, aside from sending the servants to clean it after you complained it was dirty, I never had anything to do with this room. I hadn't thought that my grandfather would let a room here be in such a state!"

Cosette believed him. "Nicolette told me that it's used as a cellar sometimes."

"Your father coming to call in the cellar! Ridiculous!" Marius declared.

"I don't mind," Valjean said quietly.

"Well we shall have to mind for you, then," Cosette decided. "Oh, do come and stay for dinner!"

"I have already eaten," Valjean replied though it was plain just how much he wanted to accept the offer.

"I never turn down a free meal," Courfeyrac declared. "Especially not here. Their chef is amazing. Have you had the pleasure?"

"I have but simple tastes," Valjean said, glancing Courfeyrac's way.

"You say that now but wait until you try the food," Courfeyrac said encouragingly.

"And like I said, we do have much to discuss," Marius said enthusiastically. "Cosette, darling, I have finally found the man who saved me at the barricade!"

Cosette had never been as interested in the identity of that person as Marius was but she looked pleased enough that his quest was at an end. "Oh? Is it anybody I know?"

"I should say so," Marius said, laughing. "Your father, Cosette! He saved my life! And I know how non-political he is so he was probably only there in the first place to ensure that I would be okay so that I could return to you!"

Valjean was looking at the floor.

There was such a look of joy on Cosette's face that if Valjean had seen it, Courfeyrac was sure he never would have been able to leave. "Really? But how did he…Oh, what does it matter? Papa, you saved my Marius!"

At being addressed as 'papa', Valjean's head snapped up and he was just as radiant as Cosette. "Monsieur Jean, please," he managed to say.

Courfeyrac caught Marius' eye. 'Monsieur Jean?' he mouthed.

Marius looked distinctly uncomfortable for a moment before pasting on a smile. "When Cosette asked me about it before I felt that she should respect your wishes about what to be called but I cannot imagine her calling you anything else, now! In fact, I might have so start calling you 'Father'!"

"Because of the barricade," Valjean realized.

"You say that like it is such a little thing!" Marius exclaimed. "All this time you knew I was trying to find him, trying to find you!"

"I did not think it was important," Valjean replied. "You wanted to find me, yes, but while I do not wish to imply that your life or your wife's happiness is not every bit as important as you think, I did not feel that my little act was worthy of all that praise."

"Grantaire said that you carried him through the sewers to safety," Courfeyrac said helpfully. "I've seen enough of the sewers to be twice as impressed as if you had just managed to take him by land through the fighting."

"So you see there's really no way we can let you just walk away now!" Marius declared. "You will come upstairs and have dinner with us and then we can discuss the details of your moving in with us."

There were tears of happiness in Cosette's eyes now and this was only encouraging her husband. "I have been saying that he should do that for weeks now!"

"Madame-" Valjean began, a catch in his voice.

She stepped closer to him and embraced him. "Cosette, Papa, Cosette. And do say that you'll agree! At least come to dinner." She pulled back to look at him.

Courfeyrac could see him weakening.

Cosette must have seen it, too, for her next words were so bewitching that Courfeyrac was fairly certain that, had they been directed his way, he would have done anything that this woman asked of him. "Please, Papa."

In the end, Valjean was only human. "Very well, Cosette. I only ever wanted you to be happy."

"I am happy," Cosette said, with a smile that lit up her whole face. She couldn't have looked less like Mademoiselle Lanoir in that moment. "And you are a part of that, dear Papa."

"Excellent," Marius said, beaming. He took Cosette's arm and she took her father's and the three of them began to walk towards the door. "I shall tell Grandfather."

Courfeyrac watched them go, feeling a little miffed. It was one thing for Cosette and Marius to be so caught up in marital bliss to forget about him but now they managed to sweep a third person up and still ignore him? Ah, well. By all accounts, Valjean had had a hard time of it and they might have been just in time to fix things.

But still, it was abominably rude.

"Am I even invited?" Courfeyrac asked as he went after them. "Because I have to tell you that if I'm going to be ignored all evening I at least demand a good meal for my trouble!"

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