Les Mis/Sweeney-"A Barber and His Neighbor"
And while I remember...a while back an RP I'm in had its 1st birthday, and in honor of the event, we had a fic exchange. This is the one I wrote for strokemybow, who requested a Les Miserables/Sweeney Todd crossover, specifically with Javert and Sweeny. And since I'm a sucker for trying to write crossovers with plausable explanations, this is what I came up with.
A Barber and his Neighbor
I.
The news shocked Paris. Well, to be entirely precise, the news shocked the handful of people in Paris who were recovered enough from the shock of the massacre of the students to even notice the article. The Moniteur ran the small article, really no more than an epitaph, only two, or perhaps three days after the fiasco at the makeshift barricade. To be most brutally honest, few people gave the article a second thought. A small number of those on the police staff wore black ribbons as a token of mourning. In a small house tucked away in a corner of the busy city, a man read it and wept, though his may have been tears of relief. In this way the death of Javert, Police Inspector, 1st Class, was brought to light.
II.
In the massacre which occurred at those makeshift barricades, there were many who died. Students, soldiers, even a petite girl in boy's clothing and a young boy were numbered among those slain. However, most of those who died were very much alone. Only the slightest few had any family to come wishing to claim a body, and even of those none did. No one would have noticed if a body which should have been there was not.
III.
No one thought to ask any questions of the lonely man making the crossing. People traveled the English Channel every day. The man sat alone on the deck of the ferry boat, staring out across the grey waters and letting the wind whip at his long coat and his perfectly queued grey hair. Some of the women making the crossing wondered if perhaps he was leaving behind some sorrow, or pondering the new life ahead of him. In reality, he was wishing he could have brought his hat. The English Channel was bloody cold.
IV.
London was a busy, bustling place, constantly in motion. It wasn't that it was all that different from Paris, it was just ... different, he decided. And thus Javert expatriated himself and settled in a new country.
In retrospect, it had almost been too easy. He had slipped off to the silent barricades in the middle of the night, found a soldier of around his own stature, and beyond that is was a simple matter of switching their clothes and dumping the Poor fellow in the Seine. Knowing what he did about the way the force was run, they probably simply found the waterlogged body and his note and jumped to the necessary conclusions. Even if the did remove the unlucky corpse's shirt and notice he had been shot, they'd probably just bury him and not say a thing about it. It would be easier to save face in that manner than to admit a mistake.
Javert was suddenly very grateful for the time he had invested in learning English all those years ago. Some of it was bound to come back to him.
V.
One thing was entirely certain: Javert was far more accustomed to his clean four-room flat in the heart of Paris than the dingy single room he was renting in London above a milliner's shop. At least the company was pleasant on his street. The very day he had taken up residence he had met the Barkers from three doors down. Benjamin was a barber, a good-natured man with a warm smile and a smooth hand. Javert joked that Benjamin's was the closest shave he'd ever encountered since the time he had been shot. The jest had been received with a hearty laugh from Benjamin and a glowing smile from his young wife, Lucy. Then again, mused Javert, pretty Lucy Barker was always glowing. She and Benjamin had just been blessed with their first child, a tiny blond angel they had christened Johanna.
Javert had never been one drawn to children, but pretty little Johanna seemed drawn to him. He would often stop by Barker's Tonsorial Parlor to say hello to the Benjamin as he was passing to run his small errands, or even just to take a walk. However, if Lucy and the baby were there, he could count on quite a stay. Johanna, small as she was, would light up at the sight of him, and squall madly if he tried to leave before she was ready for him to go. He found it rather embarrassing, but Lucy found it sweet. "She needs an uncle like you," she said, "someone to be strict with her when her father is too busy giving into her every whim." Benjamin threw he head back and laughed his booming laugh as Javert carefully handed the baby back to her mother.
At that point Judge Turpin and his lackey, Beadle Bamford, entered the shop. Lucy excused herself quickly and disappeared upstairs with Johanna. Even Benjamin's usual smile faltered slightly as he nodded to the two. Javert observed, but said nothing, as he always had done. He excused himself and went to run his errands.
VI.
A few weeks later Javert and Benjamin went to the Lovett's Pie Shoppe, also located along their busy street. Henry Lovett, a burly red-faced man with almost as much sense of humor as Benjamin, whistled as he brought them their pies and ale. His wife Nellie watched from behind the counter, smiling when she thought they weren't looking.
"So what made you leave Paris then?" asked Benjamin when the pies were mostly gone and they had moved on to mindless chat. Javert shrugged. "All my life I believed in something, and then in a single night it all fell apart. I decided that must mean it was time to believe in something else."
Benjamin took a long drink of ale. "What was it you believed in so much?"
Javert pondered for a long moment as he too took a drink. "The Law," he said finally. Benjamin gave him a half-smile. "That's a funny thing to believe in. You live around here long enough, and you come to find the Law doesn't get you anything. Everything around here is based off of love, greed, or revenge in some form or another. I guess that narrows your choices down to three, eh?"
VII.
Javert had never been one to smile much, but there was something about the Barkers that made one want to. Lucy had invited him to Sunday dinner one week…and the next…by the fourth week he seemed to be an established entity at the Sunday table, and by the fourth month the Barkers couldn't start eating without him. They shared stories: Javert about his days as an Inspector, Benjamin about the strange customers he got. Much to Javert's delight, it had turned out that Lucy knew quite a bit of French. Sometimes they would switch language in the middle of a conversation, leaving Benjamin to laugh and threaten to take a razor to their throats if they didn't tell him what they were saying. Johanna seemed utterly enthralled by the stories, though even at almost eight months she probably couldn't understand a word of them.
After dinner Lucy would put angelic little Johanna with her halo of golden curls to bed, and "the boys" would tromp downstairs to the shop to have drinks. That was where they did their more serious talking.
"No family of your own then," commented Benjamin one night. "Any specific reason why, or just never struck your fancy?"
"Mostly the latter, I suppose," said Javert, leaning against the counter. "I never liked dealing with women, but then, most that I ran into were thieves and whores. It rather leaves a bad taste in your mouth, in any sense of the phase. Apparently I'm better with children than I thought though."
"Johanna adores you. I must say, better you than some of the others around here." There was a dark edge to Benjamin's voice. Javert didn't say anything, but his companion noticed the look on his face. "Yes, the judge. I've never liked the way he looks at Lucy. I haven't since the day we met."
There was a long silence before Benjamin spoke again. "I feel like I can trust you," he said simply. "That's why I want to ask something of you. If ... if something ever happened to me, you'd make sure that Lucy and Johanna were alright, wouldn't you?"
"Of course." It was one of the most resolute answers Javert had ever given to a request.
VIII.
When Benjamin Barker was arrested a day shy of his daughter's first birthday, the entire street was in shock. Lucy Barker hid herself away above the Tonsorial Parlor with Johanna. Even when Nellie Lovett stopped by with some supper, she refused to open the door. Nellie left the basket for her. Henry Lovett and Javert went down to the courthouse to try and find out what the charges were, or whether they could post bail.
Javert stayed there all night.
IX.
"Cor, I never would have expected a fine upstanding citizen like you to stoop to bribery," said Benjamin with a slight laugh. Javert gave him a half smile as he sat across from him on one of the cell's cold benches. It was true: less than a year ago, Javert wouldn't have been caught dead bribing anyone for anything. But after so many years as an inspector, he knew all the loopholes in the system. It hadn't been difficult to convince the gaoler to let him see Benjamin, especially with a heavy purse clinking in his pocket.
Benjamin leaned back with a heavy sigh against the wall of his cell. "How've things been, then? Is Lucy managing all right with Johanna?"
Javert nodded. The truth was things weren't very well at all, but he didn't have the heart to say so. He gave his same half smile.
"Things are fine. I look in on Mrs. Barker ever now and again to see that she's managing all right." He fell quiet for a moment, then quickly changed the subject. "Mr. Lovett and I have decided on our own form of quiet protestation against this injustice. We've agreed not to shave until you're released, and we're going to try and convince all your regular customers to do the same."
Benjamin grinned. "I'll bet you five pounds you get absolutely sick of the stubble and have the whole bloody thing shaved off within two weeks."
"That's hardly fair Benjamin. By the time two weeks is up you'll be out of here."
"So I figure it's a safe bet for me to make. Either way I come out on top. Now why don't we play cards or something before I start thinking about my situation again."
X.
A lot can change in fifteen years, Javert noted. Certainly he had lived far longer than that, but it was not until his move to England that he had really observed the passing of time so acutely.
After Benjamin Barker had been condemned and deported to Australia, the street had begun to fall apart. It was certainly not just his leaving that did it, but that certainly seemed to be the turning point.
Within less than a month after her husband's arrest, Lucy Barker had disappeared. Javert had tried to find her, but the farthest he ever got was that she had gone to plead with Judge Turpin on her husband's behalf, and hadn't been seen since. Nellie Lovett would often talk about the "poor dear", but never seemed to want to share whatever she might know.
Johanna Barker had been taken in by the judge. Javert watched her from a distance, as he had watched many a criminal in France. She would not have remembered him, but he remembered her, and more than that he remembered the promise he had given her father one night in the old Tonsorial Parlor. He remained a quiet observer and, if the need should ever arise, protector.
Henry Lovett's death some twelve or so years prior had turned the tables against Lovett's Pie Shoppe. Soon Mr. and Mrs. Moony had bought out poor widowed Nellie. Nellie, in turn, had taken the money and bought the Barker's old shop. Despite her best efforts to rent out the family's old rooms above it, the rumors of Benjamin Barker's vengeful ghost frightened too many people away. In the end, she simply started up the pie business again and did her best to make competition for the Moonys.
Yes, a lot had changed. The most shocking thing, perhaps, was that Javert for the first time started to notice the effects of his age. One day he sat down in his ever-dingy room, and calculated that he was now seventy-three years of age. It seemed impossible, but it was true.
His beard was practically to his waist now.
XI.
Javert didn't feel old, but a glance in the mirror told him he looked it. Actually, he thought, he looked a little the way he imagined Jean Valjean would have looked at this age: a creased forehead, poor but clean clothes, and a beard to make Moses envious. That was going to have to be the first thing to go, he decided sadly. For fifteen years he had grown it, and for all that time it had driven him utterly mad.
He stuffed his hands in his pockets and headed out. He was just passing the Mrs. Lovett's when he stopped. There was a hand-drawn sign hanging next to the stairs which led to the upstairs apartment, a simple sign on off-white paper depicting three red stripes. The sign of a barber. Javert ducked into the pie shop.
"Mrs. Lovett," he called, "Mrs. Lovett, have you found a tenant for the upstairs room?"
"That I 'ave, Mr. Jav; and 'e is a dear too," called the woman from the back room. "'Is name's Mr. Todd, and 'e is the finest barber y' ever did see. Absolute artist, 'e is."
Her tone was brighter than Javert had head in a long time. Even for the crazy old woman she was, it seemed odd. Calling a quick thank you to her, he hurried out and stared at the stairs. After a lengthy debate with himself, he mounted the steps.
At the top of the steps he knocked carefully on the door. "Come in," was the curt reply. He opened the door and stepped in.
Mr. Todd's back was to him as he crossed the room and sat in and old chair that had been placed there. He hesitated a moment, then spoke. "Mrs. Lovett tells me you're an absolute artist. You'll have to be to manage this beard of mine."
"How long is it?" said the barber with an odd note to his voice, his back still turned.
"Fifteen years long," Javert answered.
Suddenly a hand from behind the chair held a five pound note out to him. Javert turned around. The face was older than he remembered. There were more creases in the brow, and darker circle's under the eyes, and more grey at the temples, but he knew it as plainly as if he had last seen it yesterday.
"Well, sir, it would seem you won our bet," said the barber, "and I'll never had it said the Sweeney Todd doesn't follow through when he gives his word."
Both men smiled.
A Barber and his Neighbor
I.
The news shocked Paris. Well, to be entirely precise, the news shocked the handful of people in Paris who were recovered enough from the shock of the massacre of the students to even notice the article. The Moniteur ran the small article, really no more than an epitaph, only two, or perhaps three days after the fiasco at the makeshift barricade. To be most brutally honest, few people gave the article a second thought. A small number of those on the police staff wore black ribbons as a token of mourning. In a small house tucked away in a corner of the busy city, a man read it and wept, though his may have been tears of relief. In this way the death of Javert, Police Inspector, 1st Class, was brought to light.
II.
In the massacre which occurred at those makeshift barricades, there were many who died. Students, soldiers, even a petite girl in boy's clothing and a young boy were numbered among those slain. However, most of those who died were very much alone. Only the slightest few had any family to come wishing to claim a body, and even of those none did. No one would have noticed if a body which should have been there was not.
III.
No one thought to ask any questions of the lonely man making the crossing. People traveled the English Channel every day. The man sat alone on the deck of the ferry boat, staring out across the grey waters and letting the wind whip at his long coat and his perfectly queued grey hair. Some of the women making the crossing wondered if perhaps he was leaving behind some sorrow, or pondering the new life ahead of him. In reality, he was wishing he could have brought his hat. The English Channel was bloody cold.
IV.
London was a busy, bustling place, constantly in motion. It wasn't that it was all that different from Paris, it was just ... different, he decided. And thus Javert expatriated himself and settled in a new country.
In retrospect, it had almost been too easy. He had slipped off to the silent barricades in the middle of the night, found a soldier of around his own stature, and beyond that is was a simple matter of switching their clothes and dumping the Poor fellow in the Seine. Knowing what he did about the way the force was run, they probably simply found the waterlogged body and his note and jumped to the necessary conclusions. Even if the did remove the unlucky corpse's shirt and notice he had been shot, they'd probably just bury him and not say a thing about it. It would be easier to save face in that manner than to admit a mistake.
Javert was suddenly very grateful for the time he had invested in learning English all those years ago. Some of it was bound to come back to him.
V.
One thing was entirely certain: Javert was far more accustomed to his clean four-room flat in the heart of Paris than the dingy single room he was renting in London above a milliner's shop. At least the company was pleasant on his street. The very day he had taken up residence he had met the Barkers from three doors down. Benjamin was a barber, a good-natured man with a warm smile and a smooth hand. Javert joked that Benjamin's was the closest shave he'd ever encountered since the time he had been shot. The jest had been received with a hearty laugh from Benjamin and a glowing smile from his young wife, Lucy. Then again, mused Javert, pretty Lucy Barker was always glowing. She and Benjamin had just been blessed with their first child, a tiny blond angel they had christened Johanna.
Javert had never been one drawn to children, but pretty little Johanna seemed drawn to him. He would often stop by Barker's Tonsorial Parlor to say hello to the Benjamin as he was passing to run his small errands, or even just to take a walk. However, if Lucy and the baby were there, he could count on quite a stay. Johanna, small as she was, would light up at the sight of him, and squall madly if he tried to leave before she was ready for him to go. He found it rather embarrassing, but Lucy found it sweet. "She needs an uncle like you," she said, "someone to be strict with her when her father is too busy giving into her every whim." Benjamin threw he head back and laughed his booming laugh as Javert carefully handed the baby back to her mother.
At that point Judge Turpin and his lackey, Beadle Bamford, entered the shop. Lucy excused herself quickly and disappeared upstairs with Johanna. Even Benjamin's usual smile faltered slightly as he nodded to the two. Javert observed, but said nothing, as he always had done. He excused himself and went to run his errands.
VI.
A few weeks later Javert and Benjamin went to the Lovett's Pie Shoppe, also located along their busy street. Henry Lovett, a burly red-faced man with almost as much sense of humor as Benjamin, whistled as he brought them their pies and ale. His wife Nellie watched from behind the counter, smiling when she thought they weren't looking.
"So what made you leave Paris then?" asked Benjamin when the pies were mostly gone and they had moved on to mindless chat. Javert shrugged. "All my life I believed in something, and then in a single night it all fell apart. I decided that must mean it was time to believe in something else."
Benjamin took a long drink of ale. "What was it you believed in so much?"
Javert pondered for a long moment as he too took a drink. "The Law," he said finally. Benjamin gave him a half-smile. "That's a funny thing to believe in. You live around here long enough, and you come to find the Law doesn't get you anything. Everything around here is based off of love, greed, or revenge in some form or another. I guess that narrows your choices down to three, eh?"
VII.
Javert had never been one to smile much, but there was something about the Barkers that made one want to. Lucy had invited him to Sunday dinner one week…and the next…by the fourth week he seemed to be an established entity at the Sunday table, and by the fourth month the Barkers couldn't start eating without him. They shared stories: Javert about his days as an Inspector, Benjamin about the strange customers he got. Much to Javert's delight, it had turned out that Lucy knew quite a bit of French. Sometimes they would switch language in the middle of a conversation, leaving Benjamin to laugh and threaten to take a razor to their throats if they didn't tell him what they were saying. Johanna seemed utterly enthralled by the stories, though even at almost eight months she probably couldn't understand a word of them.
After dinner Lucy would put angelic little Johanna with her halo of golden curls to bed, and "the boys" would tromp downstairs to the shop to have drinks. That was where they did their more serious talking.
"No family of your own then," commented Benjamin one night. "Any specific reason why, or just never struck your fancy?"
"Mostly the latter, I suppose," said Javert, leaning against the counter. "I never liked dealing with women, but then, most that I ran into were thieves and whores. It rather leaves a bad taste in your mouth, in any sense of the phase. Apparently I'm better with children than I thought though."
"Johanna adores you. I must say, better you than some of the others around here." There was a dark edge to Benjamin's voice. Javert didn't say anything, but his companion noticed the look on his face. "Yes, the judge. I've never liked the way he looks at Lucy. I haven't since the day we met."
There was a long silence before Benjamin spoke again. "I feel like I can trust you," he said simply. "That's why I want to ask something of you. If ... if something ever happened to me, you'd make sure that Lucy and Johanna were alright, wouldn't you?"
"Of course." It was one of the most resolute answers Javert had ever given to a request.
VIII.
When Benjamin Barker was arrested a day shy of his daughter's first birthday, the entire street was in shock. Lucy Barker hid herself away above the Tonsorial Parlor with Johanna. Even when Nellie Lovett stopped by with some supper, she refused to open the door. Nellie left the basket for her. Henry Lovett and Javert went down to the courthouse to try and find out what the charges were, or whether they could post bail.
Javert stayed there all night.
IX.
"Cor, I never would have expected a fine upstanding citizen like you to stoop to bribery," said Benjamin with a slight laugh. Javert gave him a half smile as he sat across from him on one of the cell's cold benches. It was true: less than a year ago, Javert wouldn't have been caught dead bribing anyone for anything. But after so many years as an inspector, he knew all the loopholes in the system. It hadn't been difficult to convince the gaoler to let him see Benjamin, especially with a heavy purse clinking in his pocket.
Benjamin leaned back with a heavy sigh against the wall of his cell. "How've things been, then? Is Lucy managing all right with Johanna?"
Javert nodded. The truth was things weren't very well at all, but he didn't have the heart to say so. He gave his same half smile.
"Things are fine. I look in on Mrs. Barker ever now and again to see that she's managing all right." He fell quiet for a moment, then quickly changed the subject. "Mr. Lovett and I have decided on our own form of quiet protestation against this injustice. We've agreed not to shave until you're released, and we're going to try and convince all your regular customers to do the same."
Benjamin grinned. "I'll bet you five pounds you get absolutely sick of the stubble and have the whole bloody thing shaved off within two weeks."
"That's hardly fair Benjamin. By the time two weeks is up you'll be out of here."
"So I figure it's a safe bet for me to make. Either way I come out on top. Now why don't we play cards or something before I start thinking about my situation again."
X.
A lot can change in fifteen years, Javert noted. Certainly he had lived far longer than that, but it was not until his move to England that he had really observed the passing of time so acutely.
After Benjamin Barker had been condemned and deported to Australia, the street had begun to fall apart. It was certainly not just his leaving that did it, but that certainly seemed to be the turning point.
Within less than a month after her husband's arrest, Lucy Barker had disappeared. Javert had tried to find her, but the farthest he ever got was that she had gone to plead with Judge Turpin on her husband's behalf, and hadn't been seen since. Nellie Lovett would often talk about the "poor dear", but never seemed to want to share whatever she might know.
Johanna Barker had been taken in by the judge. Javert watched her from a distance, as he had watched many a criminal in France. She would not have remembered him, but he remembered her, and more than that he remembered the promise he had given her father one night in the old Tonsorial Parlor. He remained a quiet observer and, if the need should ever arise, protector.
Henry Lovett's death some twelve or so years prior had turned the tables against Lovett's Pie Shoppe. Soon Mr. and Mrs. Moony had bought out poor widowed Nellie. Nellie, in turn, had taken the money and bought the Barker's old shop. Despite her best efforts to rent out the family's old rooms above it, the rumors of Benjamin Barker's vengeful ghost frightened too many people away. In the end, she simply started up the pie business again and did her best to make competition for the Moonys.
Yes, a lot had changed. The most shocking thing, perhaps, was that Javert for the first time started to notice the effects of his age. One day he sat down in his ever-dingy room, and calculated that he was now seventy-three years of age. It seemed impossible, but it was true.
His beard was practically to his waist now.
XI.
Javert didn't feel old, but a glance in the mirror told him he looked it. Actually, he thought, he looked a little the way he imagined Jean Valjean would have looked at this age: a creased forehead, poor but clean clothes, and a beard to make Moses envious. That was going to have to be the first thing to go, he decided sadly. For fifteen years he had grown it, and for all that time it had driven him utterly mad.
He stuffed his hands in his pockets and headed out. He was just passing the Mrs. Lovett's when he stopped. There was a hand-drawn sign hanging next to the stairs which led to the upstairs apartment, a simple sign on off-white paper depicting three red stripes. The sign of a barber. Javert ducked into the pie shop.
"Mrs. Lovett," he called, "Mrs. Lovett, have you found a tenant for the upstairs room?"
"That I 'ave, Mr. Jav; and 'e is a dear too," called the woman from the back room. "'Is name's Mr. Todd, and 'e is the finest barber y' ever did see. Absolute artist, 'e is."
Her tone was brighter than Javert had head in a long time. Even for the crazy old woman she was, it seemed odd. Calling a quick thank you to her, he hurried out and stared at the stairs. After a lengthy debate with himself, he mounted the steps.
At the top of the steps he knocked carefully on the door. "Come in," was the curt reply. He opened the door and stepped in.
Mr. Todd's back was to him as he crossed the room and sat in and old chair that had been placed there. He hesitated a moment, then spoke. "Mrs. Lovett tells me you're an absolute artist. You'll have to be to manage this beard of mine."
"How long is it?" said the barber with an odd note to his voice, his back still turned.
"Fifteen years long," Javert answered.
Suddenly a hand from behind the chair held a five pound note out to him. Javert turned around. The face was older than he remembered. There were more creases in the brow, and darker circle's under the eyes, and more grey at the temples, but he knew it as plainly as if he had last seen it yesterday.
"Well, sir, it would seem you won our bet," said the barber, "and I'll never had it said the Sweeney Todd doesn't follow through when he gives his word."
Both men smiled.