On the very evening Valjean dropped his pen, Marius finished dinner and went into his study to look over a brief. Just then Basque brought him a letter; its writer, he said, was waiting in the hall. Cosette was strolling in the garden on the grandfather’s arm.
It was coarse paper, coarsely folded. When Marius took it, he smelled tobacco. Nothing wakes a memory like a smell. He knew that tobacco, and then he knew the handwriting on the envelope too. The garret in the Gorbeau house rose before his eyes. One of the two men he had searched for so hard had come to him of his own accord.
In a grand style riddled with spelling mistakes, the letter offered a secret concerning a certain person who had found his way into the baron’s household. It promised the means of driving such a person from the noble baroness’s home. It was signed Thénard. The name was only shortened, not false. Marius took a few banknotes from a drawer, put them in his pocket, and told Basque to show the man in.