The sergeant led, his face glowing, his steps like clockwork. Javert strode behind him, his face scrunched up in a wolf's snarl, his hands in his pockets, his chin down, his feet dragging. He was muttering several unforgivable words. His fingers nervously fumbled with his snuff box, heightening his distress by brushing against temptation.
If things weren't hard enough, the sky then decided to split open like a great blue water balloon, spilling it contents over Paris. Javert reached up with his unoccupied hand and pulled his hat brim ridiculously low over his face. The sergeant let the rain plaster him; the rain didn't seem to bother him--he looked ready to sing in it.
They turned a corner and soon came to the building that contained Javert's flat.
Javert looked up to his home, then at the sergeant, and ran his hand down his face, letting out a serrated sigh of misery. "Home sweet home. Fah!"
The sergeant turned to him. "You had better give me your keys."
"My keys? Why on earth do you want my KEYS?"
"I can't very well have you running off in the night to get your fix."
Javert threw his hands in the air, but did not bring them down. He tensed his fingers and towered over the sergeant like a rabid bear. "You're locking me in???!!"
The sergeant was not in the least perturbed. "Well, of course! How else am I to keep you from running out and purchasing any nasty tobacco products?" He held out his hand. "And while we're on the subject, hand over the box, Inspector."
Javert let out a low moan. His lower lip trembled in a sincere pout, and with shaking hands he finally succeeded in lifting the box from his coat pocket. Letting it go, however, proved a little more difficult.
The sergeant pulled at Javert's long, strong fingers, and one by one he loosened them and managed to pull away the little box. Javert let out a sharp cry when it came away.
"Good God, Javert! This is absolutely the single most pathetic sight I have ever, ever beheld! You have got a real problem, you know that?"
Javert mumbled half-heartedly and by instinct, "That's `Inspector' to you, Sergeant."
The Sergeant laughed. "At this rate, it won't be for long, Inspector." He smiled and, making a rather large show of it, opened the box and tipped it upside-down, spilling all of the contents into a murky puddle. They were soon swept away with the rain into the gutter. Javert's eyes were glassy.
"Now, hand over the keys."
He obeyed, this time with less resistance.
"Good!" The sergeant turned towards the door of the building. There was an obvious spring in his step, as though he had just climbed from cloud nine to cloud ten.
Javert felt a wave of nausea wash over him.
He blamed it on everything.
To be continued . . .