Éponine might have gotten along perfectly well and left-alone if she hadn't let herself become distracted.
Sorting through crates and trunks in the hold is less tedious than keeping watch, and, she imagines, an easier task than dragging the crates down in the first place.
The assignment is not much, for all the wheedling it took – having to persuade someone that she wanted to work is a new experience – but she could not bear sitting idle.
However, rendezvous with the Cyclamen apparently having occurred slightly earlier than expected, they have the remains from the previous ship to go through.
She wonders how often such raids occur, and how it is they pick their targets.
In any case, she is to sort through the pilfered chests for anything useful or valuable,
There is another, down below, where luggage and boxes of all sizes litter the floor, a soft-spoken man with a sort of contemplative air about him who introduces himself as Jean Prouvaire. Éponine's reference to herself as simply 'Jondrette' conveys the sense that she does not wish to talk, thankfully, and he speaks little, merely refers her to the particular crates likely to contain something useful.
And so she sets to work.
The contents are largely unremarkable, composed of clothes, of papers, and of standard traveling fare, although the third that she opens is, inexplicably enough, composed entirely of bars of soap. The heavy scent of tallow from the thick yellowy blocks makes her gag, and she closes it up quickly to move on to the next.
The most she manages to find that looks remotely useful is a little lockbox of gunpowder.
At least, she thinks it's gunpowder.
When she gets to boxes plundered from the Cyclamen, Éponine's mouth draws down. Giving these… Amis (she settles on the word lightly, and regards it with a measure of interest; students they may have been, once, and though now her capturers by definition, she cannot quite reconcile the word with them) that which belongs to Marius does not sit right with her. Sifting through, she recognizes more than one dress belonging to Cosette. It fills her with a strange feeling – not quite guilt, and not quite pity, all wriggling in an uncomfortable tangle in her stomach.
She considers, briefly, bringing something to Cosette, some dress, or necklace, more likely. The thought comes as she slides a scarf around in her hands, feeling it slide smoothly over her knuckles and between her fingers. It could be comforting.
But she shrugs this off soon. Though Éponine may wonder at the trinkets, Cosette, even draped in them, seems less taken in by the trinkets – and it still would seem strange to the Amis.
For the sake of the disguise, she removes the most ornate jewelry, but for obligation to Marius, she leaves that which she knows Cosette is fond of.
Because of this, she is already in the beginning of a foul mood, and so does not notice the contents of the next until her fingers brush against something hard and she jolts from her reverie.
She probes until she finds an edge, tugs it loose – and finds a book, bound in green. She runs a finger down the spine before opening it. The lettering is not quite new, and a few of the pages are crumpled, but the words are shorter than those of others, and she can make out one or two.
Now curious, she reaches in again, repeats the process, and is rewarded once more. This one is the color of rust, handwritten, looking old and formal.
Éponine sets both of these books in her lap, cradling them, and peers a little closer.
Though it does indeed bear clothes, now long wrinkled, it is not filled as fully as she had thought. In the light afforded her here, she can make out torn and folded papers scattered throughout.
She plucks out one and smoothes it, squinting to see the lettering.
She knows Marius' writing. She has been his messenger for years, sometimes watching as he finished the letters he would then send off with her. She knows the way it looks, neat and smooth at first, and tnarrowing at the edges of lines as if in a rush.
This is written in the same style.
Her heart beats faster as her fingers clutch at the paper. She pulls another, then, another, then another, all in the same style.
Slowly, carefully, she traces the name at the end with a ragged nail, curling over the letters. Marius.
Though she does not know it, her face softens, looking more relaxed than it has been in a week.
So it is, thus occupied, that Éponine is not even halfway finished when voices start up. "I thought you'd be up there until noon, at least."
She clutches tighter at the startle, and her fingers nearly rip through. She shoves them hastily into pockets of her coat, and they crinkle terribly. Despite the noise, the voices continue.
"So did I. Seems they prefer Bossuet to the task, now."
"Oh, you didn't." This is the voice of… of… Jean, she remembers. The other is familiar, but she cannot fully place it. She stands slowly, clutching the books and the lockbox to her, and chances a look towards the voices. The person standing on the stairs is the same she saw talking to Joly, before, though he now speaks with Jean.
The man on the stairs laughs, grinning brightly as he holds up hands in deference. "Only talked! Even that's too much."
"How is he now?" She inches closer to the pair, along the wall. Perhaps, if she is quick, she can give the box to someone and be off.
"His arm is bound about as well as it can be, now. Joly says it was quite a fall and he's lucky it wasn't worse, but Bossuet swears his luck is getting worse with a woman aboard."
This is met with a laugh, "it isn't possible." She inches closer – and therein lies her mistake.
"And you, Jondrette? What of your luck?"
Éponine had certainly not anticipated being addressed, yet, she does not freeze in place. The habit dissipated once she learned that it rarely worked, and more often the target of suspicions. Instead, she shifts the contents of the current trunk – clothes now fallen into disarray – slowly, her mind working.
"No luck, M'sieur," she mutters, feeling small.
"None at all?" The man on the stairs does not appear to be malicious in his questioning, but she wishes he would stop. "Come to think of it, we know so little about you. Your luck may be the least of our worries."
She shakes her head vehemently. "I've none, and there's not much to tell."
"No? What do you do?"
Her brow furrows. Do?
"Your trade, I mean," he clarifies.
"Whatever pays." She tightens her hold and says, pointedly, "whatever needs doing." To punctuate, she attempts to hand the lockbox to Jean – assuming his proximity made him the default recipient – fumbling minutely in her haste.
She's like to take the books and go, but his eyes are still on her, so she, reluctantly, thrusts the green-bound book towards him. "What's this about?" 'What does this say' is too much – betrays too much ignorance.
He takes it from her, turns it over with a small frown, flips it open. "Poetry," he says, looking up, and it seems as though he would have said more, but she pushes the other one at him, asks the same. He takes longer to sift through this one, nodding slowly at the pages. "Ah – plans," he answers, after an extended silence. "Logs and navigation marks, and…" He is looking the pages over still, and she does not think she will get any more of an answer from him.
She takes a step back, and pauses. "If you don't need the – the poetry." She is clumsy and inelegant in her words but she reaches anyway. "Can I have it?"
He nods again and shifts the logbook to one hand to hold the other out.
She pushes past the other and must force herself not to run up the stairs.
"—Ain't supposed to be talking, is she?" She juts out a skinny hip as she says this. She thought there'd be some resistance to it – not yet sure why she's doing this herself – so she's got retorts on her tongue. "This'll keep her quiet, won't it?"
The man before her looks both amused and bemused. He shrugs with his good shoulder, which seems answer enough. He hadn't really been arguing anyway, and Éponine slides into the room.
Cosette's hair is in disarray, and she is sitting with her legs folded up beneath her. Éponine cannot suppress a laugh at finding the girl in so unladylike a pose, which makes Cosette take note. "É – Jondrette," she greets faintly.
Éponine hands off the book before speaking. "Here. Dunno what it says," she mutters, "but it's not as bad as the textbooks, and it's something."
Cosette's eyes light up, but a frown tugs at her mouth as Éponine begins to back away.
Éponine glances back, unsure if the man on watch could hear, or if he would even care. "Look," she hisses softly, "just don't tell them anything – they could use. And I'll… be back."
And if anyone asked her, Éponine would blame the mouthed 'later' on the lingering flicker of guilt.
A/N: I think I'm sleep deprived and my beta is not available so I don't know it this is great or terrible but I hope you hate this less than I do.