My success in managing to fend off the writer's block appears to be continuing! Third chapter on this story this week, and I've also got a great start on my Les Mis/Lord of the Rings crossover. If you're enjoying this story, I suggest checking that one out too, it's some of the most fun I've had writing in a while! Also, if you enjoy the story, please leave a review, feedback is always helpful and good motivation to keep going!

Chapter 6

When Cosette awoke, she was lying in a warm bed in a small cabin. There was a fire going in the fireplace, and her papa was there watching her. He seemed relieved that she was awake.

"Papa, where are we?" she asked curiously.

"We're safe now, Cosette. We're in a small house at a convent," he told her gently.

"Will we be staying here?" she asked.

Her papa nodded as the door opened and another man came in. "Listen carefully, my little Cosette," her papa began. "We have to leave this house and go away, but we'll be back and we'll be as happy as can be here. This good man here," he gestured to the man that had just come in, "will carry you out on his back in that." He gestured to a basked that was hanging on the wall. Cosette looked at the basked nervously. "You'll wait for me at a lady's place," her papa went on. "I'll come and get you there. Above all, if you don't want mother Thénardier to take you away again, do what you're told and don't say a thing!"

Cosette nodded gravely, a twinge of panic setting in again at the thought of Madame taking her away again. Her papa then turned to look at the man that had come in.

"Well?" he asked the man.

"Everything's arranged – and nothing is," the man replied. "I've got permission to bring you in; but before I can bring you in, I've got to get you out. That's where we come unstuck. For the little one, it's easy as pie."

"You'll carry her out?"

"Will she keep quiet?"

"I can vouch for that," her papa assured the man. Cosette sat silently, listening intently.

"But what about you, father Madeleine?" the man asked. After a moment he spoke again though, full of excitement. "I know! You go out the way you came in!"

Her papa responded immediately. "Not possible."

The man sighed and looked down, almost mumbling as he spoke. "There's something else that's tormenting me. I said I'd put some dirt in it. Trouble is, I don't think dirt instead of a body inside is going to do the trick; it' won't work, it'll move around, it'll shake. The men will feel it." He looked up again. "You see, father Madeleine, the government will be onto it. How in Chri- stmas," he caught himself habitually, and quickly altered his word choice, despite not currently speaking to the nuns, "are you going to get out of here? Because everything has to be done tomorrow! It's tomorrow that I'll be bringing you in. The prioress is expecting you. She's allowing it as payment for a service that I'm doing for them."

"And what service is that?" her papa asked curiously.

"One of my duties is to assist with the burials. I nail the coffins and help the gravedigger," the man explained. "The nun who died this morning asked to be buried in the coffin she used as a bed and interred in the vault beneath the chapel altar. It goes against the police regulations, but she's the sort of dead woman that always gets their way. The prioress and vocal mothers have every intention of carrying out the dead woman's wishes. Which means I'll nail up the coffin, lift up the stone in the chapel, and lower her into the vault. And so, to thank me, the prioress will allow my brother and niece to come in, my brother as a gardener, and my niece as a boarder. This, of course, is you and the little girl. You're to come along tomorrow evening, after the fake burial in the cemetery. Of course, I can't bring you in from outside if you're inside. And what am I to do about the empty coffin?"

"What is this empty coffin?" her papa asked.

"The coffin from the administration."

"What coffin? What administration?"

"A nun dies. The municipal doctor comes along and says: There is a dead nun. The government sends in a coffin. The next day it sends a hearse and undertakers to pick up the coffin and take it to the cemetery. The undertakers will come and lift up the coffin and there won't be anything in it," the man explained, clearly concerned.

"Put something in it."

"A dead body? I don't have one."

"No," her papa replied.

"What then?"

"A live body."

The man looked at him blankly. "What live body?"

"Me," her papa said simply.

The man shot up in surprise. "You!"

"Why not?" her papa smiled. "You know, Fauchelevent, how you said, Mother Crucifixion is dead, and I added, and father Madeleine is buried. Well, that's how it's going to be."

Cosette continued to watch and listen silently. Was her papa seriously planning to go in a coffin?

"Ah, right, you're having a laugh. You're not serious," the man, whose name was apparently Fauchelevent, commented. Cosette prayed he was right.

"I'm perfectly serious. Don't I have to get out of here?"

"Of course."

"I told you to get a basket and a lid for me as well."

"Well?"

"The basket will be made of pine and the lid will be a black sheet."

"To start with, it's a white sheet. Nuns are buried in white."

"A white sheet, then."

"You're not like other men, father Madeleine," Fauchelevent said, shaking his head slightly.

Cosette's mind was whirling now. Her papa couldn't hide in a coffin! The coffin was meant to be buried. What if something went wrong and he was buried alive? She would lose him forever, and he was all that she had in the world. Without him, she could be sent back to the Thénardiers, and she would be doomed. She couldn't bear the thought of going back. She remained silent, however, unwilling to complain, choosing instead to hug Catherine tightly.

"When does the concierge open that door?" her papa asked. The conversation had continued on while she'd been lost in her thoughts.

"Only to let the undertakers in when they come for the coffin. Once the coffin's out, the door is shut again."

"Who puts the nails in the coffin?

"I do," Fauchelevent told him.

"Who puts the cloth over it?"

"I do."

"Are you alone?"

"No other man, apart from the police doctor, can go into the room of the dead. It's even written on the wall." Clearly the nuns were very strict. They couldn't be as bad as Madame was, however. Cosette was certain of that.

"Could you, tonight, when everyone in the convent is asleep, hide me in that room?" her papa asked. Cosette stiffened slightly at that. She didn't want to be away from her papa, not in a new place like this.

"No, but I can hide you in a little dark cubbyhole that opens into the room of the dead, where I put my burial tools and which I look after and have the key for.

"What time will the hearse come to pick up the coffin tomorrow?"

"Around three in the afternoon. The burial takes place at the Vaugirard Cemetery just before nightfall. It's quite a way away."

The more they talked it over, the more anxious Cosette grew. If this plan failed, her little life that had only just begun would suddenly be over and she'd be back with Madame. Back to being a skinny, malnourished servant with no hope and no future, back being tormented endlessly by Éponine and Azelma, back to being beaten black and blue by Madame while Monsieur drank and swindled the customers. She couldn't go back, she just couldn't!

"But how will you manage to breathe?" Fauchelevent asked one of the two questions that had been tormenting Cosette the whole time.

"I'll breathe."

"In that box! I'm suffocating just thinking about it."

"Surely you must have a gimlet, you can put a few small holes here and there around the mouth and you can nail it without making the lid too tight." Of course her papa had thought about it. How could she have been so foolish as to doubt him? He had an answer for everything. There was, however, a nagging voice in her head still driving in her other concern, that something would go wrong and he would be buried alive. She could only pray that nothing would go wrong.

"And if you should cough or sneeze?"

"An escapee never coughs or sneezes," her papa assured Fauchevelent. "Father Fauchelevent, I have to decide; either get caught here or take my chances going out in the hearse. Indeed, there is no other way. The only thing that worries me is what happens in the cemetery."

"That is just what doesn't bother me!" Fauchelevent exclaimed. "If you're sure you can get out of the coffin, I'm sure I can get you out of the grave. The gravedigger's a drunk and a friend of mine. Name of father Mestienne. A good old stick, one of the old school. The gravedigger puts the dead in the grave and I put the gravedigger in my pocket. I'll tell you what will happen. We'll arrive a bit before sundown, three quarters of an hour before they shut the gates of the cemetery. The hearse will drive right up to the grave. I'll follow behind it; that's my job. I'll have a hammer, a chisel, and some pliers in my pocket. The hearse stops, the undertakers tie a rope around your coffin for you and lower you down. The priest says the prayers, makes the sign of the cross, chuck some holy water in, and clears off. I remain alone with father Mestienne. He's my friend, like I told you." Cosette was listening closely. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad after all. Fauchelevent seemed confident enough in this. He went on. "Either he'll be plastered or he won't be plastered – it's all the same," Fauchelevent continued. "If he's not plastered, I say to him: 'Come and have a drink while the Bon Coing's still open.' I drag him away, I get him drunk – it doesn't take long to get father Mestienne drunk, he's always halfway there – I drink him under the table for you, I take his pass to get back into the cemetery, and I come back without him. Then you'll only have me to deal with. If he's plastered, I say to him: 'Off you go, I'll stand in for you.' Off he goes and I pull you out of the hole."

It seemed mostly reasonable to Cosette, and her papa certainly seemed happy with the plan. Her papa stuck his hand out and shook hands with Fauchelevent.

"Agreed, father Fauchelevent," her papa said with a small smile. "It will be all right."

Cosette could only pray that her papa was right about that.

Note: Bon Coing is a bar near the graveyard, mentioned in the novel