g to
light the star of truth; the exile consoled in his tomb; the heir given
back to his inheritance; the crime of the king repaired; divine
premeditation obeyed; the little, the weak, the deserted child with
infinity for a guardian--all this Barkilphedro might have seen in the
event on which he triumphed. This is what he did not see. He did not
believe that it had all been done for Gwynplaine. He fancied that it had
been effected for Barkilphedro, and that he was well worth the trouble.
Thus it is ever with Satan.

Moreover, ere we feel astonished that a waif so fragile should have
floated for fifteen years undamaged, we should seek to understand the
tender care of the ocean. Fifteen years is nothing. On the 4th of
October 1867, on the coast of Morbihan, between the Isle de Croix, the
extremity of the peninsula de Gavres, and the Rocher des Errants, the
fishermen of Port Louis found a Roman amphora of the fourth century,
covered with arabesques by the incrustations of the sea. That amphora
had been floating fifteen hundred years.

Whatever appearance of indifference Barkilphedro tried to exhibit, his
wonder had equalled his joy. Everything he could desire was there to his
hand. All seemed ready made. The fragments of the event which was to
satisfy his hate were spread out within his reach. He had nothing to do
but to pick them up and fit them together--a repair which it was an
amusement to execute. He was the artificer.

Gwynplaine! He knew the name. _Masca ridens_. Like every one else, he
had been to see the Laughing Man. He had read the sign nailed up against
the Tadcaster Inn as one reads a play-bill that attracts a crowd. He had
noted it. He remembered it directly in its most minute details; and, in
any case, it was easy to compare them with the original. That notice, in
the electrical summons which arose in his memory, appeared in the depths
of his mind, and placed itself by the side of the parchment signed by
the shipwrecked crew, like an answer following a question, like the
solution following an enigma; and the lines--"Here is to be seen
Gwynplaine, deserted at the age of ten, on the 29th of January, 1690, on
the coast at Portland"--suddenly appeared to his eyes in the splendour
of an apocalypse. His vision was the light of _Mene, Tekel, Upharsin_,
outside a booth. Here was the destruction of the edifice which made the
existence of Josiana. A sudden earthquake. The lost child was found.
There was a Lord Clan