Gavroche walks, or skips, or strolls down the street, depending on when one watches him. He seems to be on some sort of an errand, but there's nothing in his hands.

Grantaire meanders homeward in the late afternoon, hands in his pockets as usual. "Hey, gamin," he says amiably enough.

That seems to be what the boy was seeking. "You!" he calls out like an inspector calling after a crook. "Are you making sense yet, m'sieur? Met any little girls in the street?"

"I always make sense," Grantaire lies with great dignity. "No, I haven't, not today. You looking for one?"

"I might be," Gavroche allows. "She used to live under a bridge. Now she lives in a wine cask, or so I hear."

Grantaire pauses, bracing his feet, and regards the child quizzically. "That, my boy, was positively Delphic. Are you trying to tell me you're in search of young Maquis?"

Gavroche appears to be considering this carefully. "Maquis, yes, I think that's her, unless it was Regina."

Grantaire quirks a brow, amused. "She's too young for you."

"Regina? No, she's too old for you, last I heard." An observer from the 20th century might want to use the term 'attention deficit disorder,' but they would be ignoring the fact that Gavroche is just playing, and knows precisely where he wants this conversation to go.

Grantaire sighs a longsuffering adult sigh. "What are you driving at, gamin?"

"You're taking care of her, aren't you, not just playing with the little thing." He has some faith in Grantaire, but one needs to be certain of the welfare of one's friends and courtiers. In a slightly wary voice, he adds, "She's not a rag doll, even if she looks like one. You can't hold her too tight."

Grantaire blinks. Confound the child, just when you start to think he's only a flighty little boy, he comes out with something like that. The R's demeanor alters somewhat, to allow of a little more respect. "I know that," he says mildly. "She's been sick. She needs looking after."

Gavroche knows Grantaire's habits. His eyebrows lift, and he pauses, then nods. "I've always heard that spirits had medicinal uses."

Grantaire's face tightens. This finds a sore spot, as he has been going to some trouble to moderate said habits while Maquis is in his care. "So it's said," he says rather coldly.

"I know that; I just said it." He peers up at Grantaire's face. "Are they working for her? I never liked them much myself, but then, I'm not an invalid."

Grantaire snorts slightly. "I don't know. I haven't tried them on her. The doctor gave her little white pills, and she's mending."

Gavroche says with some scorn, "Most of the doctors I know couldn't mend a plate. But if she's getting better, you must have found a good one." Switching directions again, he asks, "When are you turning her out?" All gamins have been turned out of their homes, or left them. When they hear of one of their number acquiring a new residence, it is natural to inquire how long it will last.

Oddly enough, this query seems to startle Grantaire. He blinks at Gavroche, and shoves his hands deeper into his pockets, suddenly uncertain. "I don't know."

Gavroche is not bothered by this. "Whistle me a warning, when you do, so I can find her another blanket. I think a dog took her old one." He shrugs. "You know how it is. We'll manage." His part of the conversation is over, since he has accomplished what he wanted to know.

Grantaire glances at the pavement. "I'll tell her you were asking after her."

"Merci." And, to return the favor, "I won't tell the rats where she's gone, if anyone asks. I'm sure you've got plenty." Gavroche sets off down the street again, singing a song that he may have written.

Grantaire watches him go, shaking his head, and turns to go home.

Ask Dr. Combeferre
SCENE: Musain.

Combeferre sits at a table, reading.

Grantaire wanders in, hands in his pockets, soberer than usual in more
senses than one. He's kicked out a chair before he notes Combeferre
nearby. "'lo," he offers.

Combeferre looks up, and closes the book with a smile. "Hello. How are
you?"

Grantaire sighs deeply, and drops into the chair. "I don't know," he says
simply.

Combeferre raises his eyebrows. "That doesn't sound good. Do you want to
talk about it?"

If it was anyone else, Grantaire wouldn't. But Combeferre's knack for
drawing people out works again. He leans back, folding his arms. "You know
Maquis." He could hardly not, by now.

Combeferre nods. "Yes, we've met."

Grantaire nods slightly. "Well. She's been staying with me, you know,
being sick... She's mostly better now." He pauses.

"Mostly better?" It's a gentle question. "Has she seen a doctor?"

"Oh yes." Grantaire waves a hand. "We've had the doctor in half a dozen
times. Claims she ought to be fine in a day or so." Again he hesitates,
glancing at the floor.

Combeferre glances at the floor, but, no, it's just a floor, nothing
interesting there. "Why do you keep asking the doctor, then, if he's
always wrong?"

Grantaire looks up at him quizzically. "Who said he was wrong?"

Combeferre is puzzled. "Then does she get sick again?"

"Not so far. Why?"

Combeferre shakes his head. "Have I got this right? You just said that the
doctor's been to see her six times, and he says she'll get better in a
day, and he's not wrong, but she's still only mostly better?"

Grantaire blinks a couple of times, then shakes his head. "Never mind the
doctor. The doctor is minor."

"So Maquis is healthy?"

"Pretty much, yes." Grantaire pushes a hand through his hair. "It's not
that. I-- oh, hell."

To avoid further confusion, Combeferre waits for him to talk. He's still
trying to work out what the other stuff was about, if he can.

Grantaire is silent for a moment while he tries to collect his thoughts.
At last, not quite looking at Combeferre, he says, "So in a couple of days
she'll be going. Back to wherever it is she scampered out from." Another
hesitation.

Ah, so that's the point. "And you'll miss her?" Combeferre guesses. He's
heard something like this before: boys talking about girls going away.
They're usually more depressed and lovey-dovey, though.

Grantaire sags back in his chair with a sigh. "And I'll miss her." He
looks at his hands a moment. "It's not even just that. I-- hell, I can't
just throw her back into the street, can I? I'm responsible for her, now."
And /there's/ a word you probably never expected to hear from Grantaire.

Combeferre rests his elbows on the table and his chin on his hands. "Does
she want you to be responsible for her? She's a gamine, after all, and she
probably likes her freedom."

"I know. I thought of that. We talked about it, sort of." Grantaire scowls
at the table in front of him for a moment, then glances up again. "We get
on together, you know... I don't know what to do." It ends on a note of
supplication.

Combeferre muses. "Does she want to stay with you?" If you don't get a
real answer one way, try another angle.

Grantaire leans his head in one hand. "I don't know that, either. She
doesn't seem to mind, but then she doesn't seem to mind otherwise either.
I don't know."

Combeferre suggests, "I think you need to talk to her about it more than
me. I can try to help you when you figure out what it is you need for both
of you to be happy," and if you've ever heard a sweeter offer of money,
quote it for me.

"But what if she wants to stay?" It's almost a cry. "What then,
Combeferre?"

Combeferre had thought he was being rather clear. "You have friends, don't
you? We'll all help you with anything you need."

Grantaire rakes his fingers through his hair. "I know, I know. It isn't
that. I mean... /I/ can't look after a child."

"She's a gamine, isn't she? She can't take that much looking after."
Combeferre smiles. "You want to give her a place to stay, and some
affection. That's what she needs, not a nursemaid."

Grantaire considers this, looking at his hands. "There's that," he admits
at last.

Combeferre continues, "So it won't be too hard, not on the personal
level." He tries losing a little subtlety. "And if you have financial
trouble, I'm sure you can find help."

"Yes," Grantaire says bitterly, "I'm very good at living on charity." He
holds up a hand against any protests. "No, no, I know."

Combeferre protests, "It wouldn't be charity for you, Francois. It'd be
for your friend, and isn't she living on your charity now, besides?"

"I /know/." He sighs. "Don't mind me. I do know. It's good of you." His
tone is mild now. "I just... Am I entirely a fool even to be contemplating
this? Should I just let her be?"

Combeferre leans back in his chair slightly. "I don't think it's foolish
to want to make other people happy. I'd like to talk with your Maquis
again; you seem to like her quite a bit, and she likes you, so why not
take care of her? If it's that or the street, she's much better off with
you."

Grantaire nods slowly. "I'd like to think so." After an extended pause, he
notes, "She's not /my/ Maquis."

"All right, point taken. Your friend Maquis, then."

Grantaire grins crookedly, almost in embarrassment. "Right." He does look
up, then. "Combeferre..."

Combeferre looks around, teasingly. "That's me."

What he wants to say is 'Thank you', but he's never really learned how to
do that. All he can come up with is, with typical R flippancy, "I don't
know how you do it."

"Do what?" It's a perfectly innocent question.

"What you do... I appreciate this, you know." It's as close as Grantaire
ever comes to graceful.

Combeferre understands, now. "You're welcome. Tell me if you have any
difficulties, won't you?"

Grantaire nods, almost diffidently. "I will."

SCENE: Musain.

Grantaire slouches in his usual chair, regarding Maquis benignly from
across the table.

Maquis is perched in her usual position at Grand-R's side. Much improved,
valitudinarily, she rocks back and forth on her toes like a creature about
to pounce.

Grantaire has been quiet for a bit. Now he speaks. "Doctor says you're
about fixed."

Maquis leaps out of the chair, over two wooden arms, and crouches one
chair closer to the friend. "I feel lots better." she agrees.

Grantaire winces. "God, you're going to break your neck, doing that." He
rakes a hand through his hair, and tilts his head at her. "I suppose
you'll have had about enough of being cooped up."

Maquis flits onto the next chair, then nimbly climbs onto Grantaire's lap,
wrapping her arms around his neck and half-reclining there. "Yeh." she
says rather dismissively.

Grantaire laughs, slinging an arm around her. Luckily they have the cafe
to themselves at this hour of the afternoon; were any of the Amis here, he
would likely bat her off for the sake of his pride. "You little monkey,"
he remarks, tousling her hair.

Maquis makes a wholly convincing simian face by puffing up her cheeks and
sucking in her lips, crossing her eyes at him.

Grantaire chuckles again delightedly. "Yes, exactly. Next you'll be
swinging from trees." He gives her a rough brief hug. After a moment he
adds, rather diffidently, "I do believe I'm going to miss your company,
enfant."

Maquis stows a stray bit of emotion and just kind of hiccup-giggles. "I'll
still see you, like when you come here all of the time, right?"

Grantaire grins crookedly, but without much humor. "Right." He ruffles her
hair again, and remarks, "Gamine," half in affection, half to remind
himself what he's dealing with.

Maquis extangles one arm from Grantaire's neck, and waves it about
fancifully in front of her, bobbing her head in an elegant bow of
appreciation of the title.

Grantaire chuckles a bit once more. "You," he mock-scolds. Then: "Maquis.
If you ever have trouble again, you come to me, right?"

Maquis re-attatches her arm to Grantaire, then curls her knees up tighter
to herself, scrunching into his lap, and nods.

Grantaire warns, "No 'I-can-take-care-of-myself' idiocy, right? If you
need help, you ask." The futility of saying this to a street child does
flit across his mind, but he ignores it steadfastly.

Maquis nods again. "If I need help, I ask." she agrees. Now: the exact
circumstances of her needing help might be called into question. After
all, she's put up with a lot before, and she can again.

Grantaire adds, even more pointlessly, "And stay warm." Then he looks
away, one hand still scruffling at her hair.

Maquis rubs up against him with the new clothes he got her. "How can I
not?" she grins.

Grantaire agrees with a wry smile, "How can you not." He glances back at
her.

Maquis leans her head down on his shoulder softly. "I think I might miss
you a little, too." she admits.

"Will you?" There goes all the resignation the R's built up thus far,
though his tone is light enough. "That won't do."

Maquis loosely clings around his neck, "Uh?" she asks, uncomprehending.

Grantaire shakes his head. "Nothing." And he dares to drop a kiss in
amongst her curls.

Maquis tilts her neck back and applies a little mouth to Grantaire's chin,
and it prickles her a bit.

Grantaire grins faintly. He's quiet for a moment: then he says suddenly,
in a tone of annoyance with his own folly, "Ah, hell, Maquis, I don't want
you to go."

Maquis blinks. "Don't wamme to go where?" For she does not in fact
consider herself to be leaving, anymore than one leaves when one moves
next-door or downstairs.

Grantaire takes this for mere childlike forgetfulness. "Away. Out. Back to
the street. I can't just send you back to that-- Hell." He sits back with
a sigh.

Maquis sits up a little bit, and after a bit of interpretation, she
replies, "I like you, too."

Grantaire grins a bit, but he's distracted, and it fades quickly. He
appears, now, almost to be arguing with an unseen third party inside his
head. "Isn't anything else to do. I can't support you. I don't even
support myself."

Maquis tilts her head at this internal dialogue, "Let us both agree: I
will support YOU." she attests to her powers.

Grantaire blinks at her, then chuckles. "Well, I appreciate the thought."
He shifts in his chair under the child's weight. "I wouldn't be much of a
guardian anyway. God, I don't know what I'm thinking."

Maquis slips out of his lap and stands behind his chair. "Would you tell
me to put that down and don't put it in my mouth if it was bad for me?"

Grantaire tilts his head back to peer at her, which does nothing to
improve his looks. He weighs his answer carefully. "Depends on /how/ bad
it was for you."

Maquis smiles. "If it was really, really, really bad." she rests a hand on
hs upside-down cheek.

"If it was really, really, really bad, then yes, I would." Brown eyes fix
on hers quizzically.

Maquis smiles, "Well, see? So you can't be that bad."

Grantaire reaches back to lay two fingers against her temple. "You put an
awful lot of faith in me, p'tite," he says, rather wistfully.

Maquis smiles, not at all wistfully, "You're a gamin at heart, great-R."

He breaks into bemused laughter. "Lord. Am I really?"

Maquis nods definitively, "I think you are."

Grantaire shakes his head. "What a discovery, at my age." You'd think he
was fifty-three. "From you, I'll take that as a compliment."

Maquis steps up closer to the chair and puts her other hand on his other
cheek. "Oh! You've got to."

Grantaire's contrary streak threatens to surface. "Why have I got to?" he
inquires with teasing challenge.

"You got to take it for a compliment," Maquis explains simply.

Grantaire gives in. "Very well. Since you insist." He grins at her.

Maquis shuts her eyes and declares that she insists.

Grantaire declaims, mock-sententiously, "Thou art a tyrant, O Mockus."

Maquis grins at the prospect, "I'll be King, next." she informs him.

"Now there's an idea." Grantaire squints at her approvingly. "I'll bet
even Enjolras wouldn't mind a King with freckles. Particularly a
little-girl one."

Maquis plans, "And I'd let anyone do whatever they want, all the time. And
I'd have lots of ice, in the summer time, for people to suck on."

Grantaire grins. "That sounds like excellent policy to me."

Maquis smiles, "Did you ever get one of them down your shirt? It aches a
little, but it feels nice, all melted."

Grantaire laughs. "I never did."

Maquis grins. "You ought to." The typical gamin responce: Ow, that hurts!
You try it...

Grantaire grins back. "Maybe." He straightens, finally, and reaches back
to hook an arm around her thin shoulders. "You're a good brat, Maquis. You
know that?"

Maquis giggles. "Yeah." and she blinks significantly at him.

Grantaire chuckles. "Modest, too." He glances out the window. "I suppose
we should head back."

Maquis looks out the window, as well, "What time is it?"

"Past time," the R says wisely. He starts to clamber to his feet.

Maquis grabs at the beloved hands, to help to pull him upward.

Grantaire grins, and leans on her a tad, to let her feel important. Not
that she needs help in that. "Thank you kindly, young mam'selle."