Les Miserables: Volume 1, Book 8 Summary & Analysis

As the next day dawns, Valjean returns to Fantine. Sister Simplice says that Fantine will be upset not to see Cosette. Sister Simplice says that they cannot tell a lie and pretend that Cosette is here—but if Fantine just doesn’t see the mayor, they won’t have to. But Valjean insists on seeing her. Fantine is asleep and looks pale and angelic. Then she wakes up, smiles, and says, “And Cosette?”

Chapter 2 Valjean is rendered speechless by Fantine’s certainty. She asks him again to bring Cosette into the room, but the doctor enters, and says that she must be cured first. Fantine protests, saying that she cannot wait, but then bows her head and apologizes for contradicting the doctor. She asks Valjean how Cosette is doing, and he says she is beautiful and well and that Fantine will see her soon. A child is playing and singing in the yard outside the window, and Fantine imagines it is Cosette.

Suddenly Fantine turns silent and pale, and as Valjean turns around he sees Javert in the doorway.

Chapter 3 Immediately after Valjean had left the court earlier that day, the district attorney had insisted the man was mad. He was at odds with what everyone else believed, but ultimately the district attorney was committed to convicting a Jean Valjean, so he sent Javert off to arrest Madeleine. Javert had seemed cool and calm, and upon reaching Fantine’s room his face took on the terrible aspect of the demon who has just found a damned soul and feels enormously satisfied—especially after his pride had been wounded by accusing the wrong man. Javert feels that he has authority, reason, and the law on his side against evil. The narrator notes that sincerity, conviction, and duty can be noble and majestic, but can become hideous when misdirected by error.

Chapter 4 Fantine is terrified and shouts to Madeleine to save her, but he tells her that Javert has not come for her. Javert grabs Valjean by the collar, and while Fantine shrieks, Valjean asks Javert if he can say a word to him alone. Javert refuses to give him a private ear, so Valjean asks right there if he may be given three days to fetch the child of this woman. Fantine then realizes that Cosette is not there. Javert tells her that the mayor is in fact a common thief. Fantine looks from one to the other, opening her mouth as if to speak, but her teeth chatter and she falls back on the pillow, dead.

Valjean says to Javert that he’s murdered her, but Javert angrily yells at him to follow him. Valjean whispers to him not to disturb him for a moment, and Javert trembles but stays still. For a few moments, Valjean speaks to Fantine. No one hears him, but to Sister Simplice it seems Fantine’s lips break into a smile. Then, Valjean says he is at Javert’s disposal.

Chapter 5 Javert brings Valjean to prison. At the word “convict,” nearly everyone in town deserts him, forgetting all the good he had done, and the indignant gossip spreads through the town. Only a few people remember him fondly and sadly, including the porter who had served him.

The first evening after his arrest, the porter prepares Madeleine’s room without thinking, then sighs at the realization that he’s gone. But at that moment the lodge’s window opens and a hand seizes the key—it’s Valjean. He broke a window bar and escaped. He asks the porter to fetch Sister Simplice but doesn’t explain how he got past the large courtyard gates (and no one ever finds out). He takes the 40-sou piece and candlesticks that he had thrown into the fire and writes a note saying that these are the stolen goods he had mentioned at court. Sister Simplice comes into the room, her eyes red, and Valjean gives her money and asks her to use it for the funeral of Fantine.

They hear the porter downstairs swearing that no one has entered the house all day. Javert ’s voice responds saying that there’s a light in the upstairs room. Valjean blows out the light, and Javert enters, as the nun is praying. Javert has great respect for all authority, and his first instinct is to withdraw, but he knows Sister Simplice has never told a lie in her life. He asks if she’s alone, and she says yes. Then says she has not seen Valjean —lying twice. Javert asks her forgiveness and withdraws: he pays no attention to the candle, just extinguished, on the table.

The priest responsible for the money that Valjean had given to Sister Simplice for Fantine’s proper burial believed he was doing right in not using all of it, since the affair concerned only a convict and a prostitute. Fantine is thus buried in a pauper’s grave, where only God knows where to find her.