Another day he came to her with a timid, awkward air. “Listen to me,” said he with an effort; “I have something to tell you.” She signed to him that she was listening. Then he began to sigh, half opened his lips, seemed just about to speak, looked at her, shook his head, and retired slowly, pressing his hand to his head, leaving the gipsy utterly amazed.17
Among the grotesque images carved upon the wall, there was one of which he was particularly fond, and with which he often seemed to exchange fraternal glances. The girl once heard him say to it, “Oh, why am not I of stone, like you!”
Finally, one morning Esmeralda ventured out to the edge of the roof, and looked into the square over the steep top of Saint-Jean le Rond. Quasimodo stood behind her. He stationed himself there to spare the girl as far as possible the annoyance of seeing him. All at once she started; a tear and a flash of joy shone together in her eyes. She knelt on the edge of the roof, and stretched out her arms in anguish towards the square, crying, “Phoebus! Come! Come! One word, only one word, for the love of Heaven! Phoebus! Phoebus!” Her voice, her face, her gesture, her whole person, wore the heartrending expression of a shipwrecked mariner making signals of distress to a ship sailing merrily by in the distance, lit up by a sunbeam on the horizon.
Quasimodo bent over the parapet, and saw that the object of this frenzied entreaty was a young man, a captain, a handsome knight, glittering with arms and ornaments, who pranced and curveted through the square on horseback, waving his plumed helmet to a lovely damsel smiling from her balcony. However, the officer did not hear the unhappy girl’s appeal; he was too far away.
But the poor deaf man heard it. A deep sigh heaved his breast; he turned away; his heart swelled with suppressed tears; his clinched fists beat his brow, and when he withdrew them, each of them grasped a handful of red hair.
The gipsy paid no heed to him. He gnashed his teeth, and muttered,— “Damnation ! So that is how one should look! One only needs a handsome outside!”
Meantime, she remained on her knees, crying with great agitation,— “Oh, now he is dismounting from his horse! He is going into that house! Ph?bus! He does not hear! Ph?bus! How cruel of that woman to talk to him at the same time that I do! Ph?bus! Ph?bus!”
The deaf man watched her. He understood her pantomime. The poor bell-ringer’s eye filled with tears, but he did not let a single one flow. All at once he plucked her gently by the hem of her sleeve. She turned. He had assumed a tranquil air, and said,— “Shall I go and fetch him?”
She uttered a cry of joy.
“Oh, go! go! run, quick! that captain! that captain! bring him to me! I will love you!”
She clasped his knees. He could not help shaking his head sadly.
“I will bring him to you,” said he in a faint voice. Then he turned his head and hurried quickly down the stairs, choked with sobs.
When he reached the square, he saw nothing but the fine horse tied to the post at the door of the Gondelaurier house; the captain had already entered.
He raised his eyes to the roof of the church. Esmeralda was still in the same place, in the same position. He shook his head sorrowfully, then leaned against one of the posts before the Gondelaurier porch, determined to await the captain’s coming.
Within the house, it was one of those gala days which precede a wedding. Quasimodo saw many people go in, and none come out. From time to time he looked up at the roof; the gipsy girl was as motionless as he. A groom came, unfastened the horse, and led him into the stable.
The whole day passed thus,—Quasimodo against the pillar, Esmeralda on the roof, Phoebus, doubtless, at the feet of Fleur-de-Lys.
At last night came,—a moonless night, a dark night. In vain Quasimodo fixed his eyes upon Esmeralda; she soon ceased to be anything more than a white spot in the dusk; then she vanished. Everything faded out; all was dark.
Quasimodo saw the front windows of the Gondelaurier mansion lighted up from top to bottom; he saw the other windows on the square lighted, one by one; he also saw the lights extinguished to the very last, for he remained at his post all the evening. The officer did not come out. When the latest passers had gone home, when all the windows in the other houses were black, Quasimodo was left alone, entirely in the darkness. There were no street lamps in the Parvis then.
But the windows of the Gondelaurier house remained lighted, even after midnight. Quasimodo, motionless and alert, saw countless moving, dancing shadows pass across the many-colored panes. If he had not been deaf, as the noise of sleeping Paris ceased, he would have heard more and more distinctly, within the house, the sounds of revelry, music and laughter.