Unseen

While all this had happened, where was Gavroche?

After meeting with Eponine on Thursday evening, he'd continued searching for the children he'd taken in so long ago. At last, on Friday evening, he struck gold.

He found them seated on the Rue de St. Martin, looking almost as he'd last seen them, save that their clothes had larger holes, and perhaps they were a little thinner. "Ah momes! There you are!" Gavroche had greeted.

The bigger of the two boys had laughed, the younger had only nodded. This strange response though was enough for Gavroche; he promptly dragged them back to the elephant.

On Sunday, as he'd promised Eponine again, Gavroche ventured out to the Rue de la Verrerie. And he brought the two children with him.

Madame Vigny had found them there, and chased them away with a broom. "If you're looking for that dirty wench, you'd best look elsewhere!" she screeched. She'd just chased off Courfeyrac and Eponine fifteen minutes before.

"Now what will we do?" the older of the boys asked Gavroche.

Gavroche scratched his head. "No problem. We shall have to find some other roof. Ah very well, follow me. Another adventure," he said simply.

Their wanderings brought them out to another street, the Rue de Richelieu. This was a rather long street where all kinds of people lived; a microcosm of the rapidly flourishing Republic. It was no wonder that here, many revolutionaries passed by, met, or even lived.

Gavroche picked up a good sized rock and had been about to fling it in a half-open window when a harsh hand grabbed his arm. "Don't do that, brat!" a girl hissed at him. Judging by the calluses on her hands, she was a washerwoman.

"Why and who so-and-so lives there?" Gavroche asked saucily.

The washerwoman let go of him. "Two students. Monsieur Enjolras and Monsieur Combeferre. Both now heroes of this Republic. What poor thanks you give them!"

Gavroche brightened. "Ah so are they there now?"

"Haven't seen them in a few days," the woman replied. "Well, Monsieur Enjolras returns sometimes to see to things here. He and Monsieur Combeferre stopped by last night, but they've gone out,"

Gavroche nodded. "Ah, I'll wait with my momes then,"

Before he could be stopped, he'd brought the boys up into the house that the washerwoman had pointed out: Number Twelve. They sat in a row on the staircase, quietly looking out over the street.

"Monsieur, what is your name?" the younger boy asked Gavroche.

"Gavroche. And yours, kid?"

"Jacques,"

"And I'm Neville. Once known as Magnon," the older one chimed in. "And you...it is not just Gavroche, isn't it?"

"Gavroche of the streets, Gavroche, what does it matter?" Gavroche said cheerily. "And names like Magnon mean nothing in the outside...hush, someone is a coming!"

They listened with pricked ears to the footsteps from outside.

"Bonjour Mademoiselle de Vaux," Combeferre's voice said, not losing its usual amiability and elegance.

"Good you've come back. There were three dirty gamins asking for you both," Mademoiselle de Vaux replied in her bitter tone. "And I see you've brought a fourth?"

"If you do not mind, I shall go in first," said a third voice, that of Enjolras.

Gavroche stood up. "Good morn there sir. Forgive me for keeping your door," he greeted Enjolras. "And good day to you too, Ponine!" he added, noticing the girl who'd entered just after the revolutionary.

Enjolras nodded to Gavroche. "Who are these boys? Your brothers?"

"Brothers? They're my momes," Gavroche grinned.

Eponine stared at the little boys. "Mon frere, they are our brothers. Oh you were small then, Vroche, when Mamma sent them away to Magnon. And I'm sure you won't remember me, you two...big Ponine, your oldest sister,"

"Sister?" Neville asked quizzically. "But I thought..."

"You're too little to remember," Eponine laughed. "Isn't it funny, Monsieur Enjolras? To have brothers and sisters not remembering each other?"

"Perhaps it is, and perhaps it isn't," Enjolras said, walking past the entire group in order to get to the rooms upstairs.

"Don't you have any of your own?" Jacques piped up.

"No," Enjolras replied, unlocking the door to the flat he shared with Combeferre.

Gavroche looked at Eponine. "How have you come here?"

Eponine sighed. "Oh we all went to see Monsieur Marius. But that Mamselle Cosette was there, so I..." she trailed off. She fought to compose herself. "Anyway, Monsieur Courfeyrac is staying with Monsieur Prouvaire, and I would have gone too, but Monsieur Combeferre said that there was more room here. I can stay till I find a better place to live, and work. Though what work that could be, I do not know,"

Gavroche bit his lip thoughtfully. "May we stay too?" he asked Enjolras.

Enjolras hesitated, then nodded. He opened the door to the flat and motioned for Combeferre to join them. "We shall have to make do with six in this place," he told his friend in an undertone.

Combeferre smiled. "Think of it as repaying your debts,"

"I expected you to come up with a more chimeric rationalization,"

"Do I need to always?"

A laugh tugged at the corners of Enjolras' lips, but he quickly became somber again.