XII. Darkness
Sydney Carton paused in the street, not quite decided where to go. "AtTellson's banking-house at nine," he said, with a musing face. "Shall Ido well, in the mean time, to show myself? I think so. It is best thatthese people should know there is such a man as I here; it is a soundprecaution, and may be a necessary preparation. But care, care, care!Let me think it out!"
Checking his steps which had begun to tend towards an object, he took aturn or two in the already darkening street, and traced the thoughtin his mind to its possible consequences. His first impression wasconfirmed. "It is best," he said, finally resolved, "that these peopleshould know there is such a man as I here." And he turned his facetowards Saint Antoine.
Defarge had described himself, that day, as the keeper of a wine-shop inthe Saint Antoine suburb. It was not difficult for one who knew the citywell, to find his house without asking any question. Having ascertainedits situation, Carton came out of those closer streets again, and dinedat a place of refreshment and fell sound asleep after dinner. For thefirst time in many years, he had no strong drink. Since last night hehad taken nothing but a little light thin wine, and last night he haddropped the brandy slowly down on Mr. Lorry's hearth like a man who haddone with it.
It was as late as seven o'clock when he awoke refreshed, and went outinto the streets again. As he passed along towards Saint Antoine, hestopped at a shop-window where there was a mirror, and slightly alteredthe disordered arrangement of his loose cravat, and his coat-collar, andhis wild hair. This done, he went on direct to Defarge's, and went in.
There happened to be no customer in the shop but Jacques Three, of therestless fingers and the croaking voice. This man, whom he had seen uponthe Jury, stood drinking at the little counter, in conversation with theDefarges, man and wife. The Vengeance assisted in the conversation, likea regular member of the establishment.
As Carton walked in, took his seat and asked (in very indifferentFrench) for a small measure of wine, Madame Defarge cast a carelessglance at him, and then a keener, and then a keener, and then advancedto him herself, and asked him what it was he had ordered.
He repeated what he had already said.
"English?" asked Madame Defarge, inquisitively raising her darkeyebrows.
After looking at her, as if the sound of even a single French word wereslow to express itself to him, he answered, in his former strong foreignaccent. "Yes, madame, yes. I am English!"
Madame Defarge returned to her counter to get the wine, and, as hetook up a Jacobin journal and feigned to pore over it puzzling out itsmeaning, he heard her say, "I swear to you, like Evremonde!"
Defarge brought him the wine, and gave him Good Evening.
"How?"
"Good evening."
"Oh! Good evening, citizen," filling his glass. "Ah! and good wine. Idrink to the Republic."
Defarge went back to the counter, and said, "Certainly, a little like."Madame sternly retorted, "I tell you a good deal like." Jacques Threepacifically remarked, "He is so much in your mind, see you, madame."The amiable Vengeance added, with a laugh, "Yes, my faith! And youare looking forward with so much pleasure to seeing him once moreto-morrow!"
Carton followed the lines and words of his paper, with a slowforefinger, and with a studious and absorbed face. They were all leaningtheir arms on the counter close together, speaking low. After a silenceof a few moments, during which they all looked towards him withoutdisturbing his outward attention from the Jacobin editor, they resumedtheir conversation.
"It is true what madame says," observed Jacques Three. "Why stop? Thereis great force in that. Why stop?"
"Well, well," reasoned Defarge, "but one must stop somewhere. After all,the question is still where?"
"At extermination," said madame.
"Magnificent!" croaked Jacques Three. The Vengeance, also, highlyapproved.
"Extermination is good doctrine, my wife," said Defarge, rathertroubled; "in general, I say nothing against it. But this Doctor hassuffered much; you have seen him to-day; you have observed his face whenthe paper was read."
"I have observed his face!" repeated madame, contemptuously and angrily."Yes. I have observed his face. I have observed his face to be not theface of a true friend of the Republic. Let him take care of his face!"
"And you have observed, my wife," said Defarge, in a deprecatory manner,"the anguish of his daughter, which must be a dreadful anguish to him!"
"I have observed his daughter," repeated madame; "yes, I have observedhis daughter, more times than one. I have observed her to-day, and Ihave observed her other days. I have observed her in the court, andI have observed her in the street by the prison. Let me but lift myfinger--!" She seemed to raise it (the listener's eyes were always onhis paper), and to let it fall with a rattle on the ledge before her, asif the axe had dropped.
"The citizeness is superb!" croaked the Juryman.
"She is an Angel!" said The Vengeance, and embraced her.
"As to thee," pursued madame, implacably, addressing her husband, "if itdepended on thee--which, happily, it does not--thou wouldst rescue thisman even now."
"No!" protested Defarge. "Not if to lift this glass would do it! But Iwould leave the matter there. I say, stop there."
"See you then, Jacques," said Madame Defarge, wrathfully; "and see you,too, my little Vengeance; see you both! Listen! For other crimes astyrants and oppressors, I have this race a long time on my register,doomed to destruction and extermination. Ask my husband, is that so."
"It is so," assented Defarge, without being asked.
"In the beginning of the great days, when the Bastille falls, he findsthis paper of to-day, and he brings it home, and in the middle of thenight when this place is clear and shut, we read it, here on this spot,by the light of this lamp. Ask him, is that so."
"It is so," assented Defarge.
"That night, I tell him, when the paper is read through, and the lamp isburnt out, and the day is gleaming in above those shutters and betweenthose iron bars, that I have now a secret to communicate. Ask him, isthat so."
"It is so," assented Defarge again.
"I communicate to him that secret. I smite this bosom with these twohands as I smite it now, and I tell him, 'Defarge, I was brought upamong the fishermen of the sea-shore, and that peasant family so injuredby the two Evremonde brothers, as that Bastille paper describes, is myfamily. Defarge, that sister of the mortally wounded boy upon the groundwas my sister, that husband was my sister's husband, that unborn childwas their child, that brother was my brother, that father was my father,those dead are my dead, and that summons to answer for those thingsdescends to me!' Ask him, is that so."
"It is so," assented Defarge once more.
"Then tell Wind and Fire where to stop," returned madame; "but don'ttell me."
Both her hearers derived a horrible enjoyment from the deadly natureof her wrath--the listener could feel how white she was, without seeingher--and both highly commended it. Defarge, a weak minority, interposeda few words for the memory of the compassionate wife of the Marquis; butonly elicited from his own wife a repetition of her last reply. "Tellthe Wind and the Fire where to stop; not me!"
Customers entered, and the group was broken up. The English customerpaid for what he had had, perplexedly counted his change, and asked, asa stranger, to be directed towards the National Palace. Madame Defargetook him to the door, and put her arm on his, in pointing out the road.The English customer was not without his reflections then, that it mightbe a good deed to seize that arm, lift it, and strike under it sharp anddeep.
But, he went his way, and was soon swallowed up in the shadow of theprison wall. At the appointed hour, he emerged from it to presenthimself in Mr. Lorry's room again, where he found the old gentlemanwalking to and fro in restless anxiety. He said he had been with Lucieuntil just now, and had only left her for a few minutes, to come andkeep his appointment. Her father had not been seen, since he quitted thebanking-house towards four o'clock. Sh
e had some faint hopes that hismediation might save Charles, but they were very slight. He had beenmore than five hours gone: where could he be?
Mr. Lorry waited until ten; but, Doctor Manette not returning, andhe being unwilling to leave Lucie any longer, it was arranged that heshould go back to her, and come to the banking-house again at midnight.In the meanwhile, Carton would wait alone by the fire for the Doctor.
He waited and waited, and the clock struck twelve; but Doctor Manettedid not come back. Mr. Lorry returned, and found no tidings of him, andbrought none. Where could he be?
They were discussing this question, and were almost building up someweak structure of hope on his prolonged absence, when they heard him onthe stairs. The instant he entered the room, it was plain that all waslost.
Whether he had really been to any one, or whether he had been all thattime traversing the streets, was never known. As he stood staring atthem, they asked him no question, for his face told them everything.
"I cannot find it," said he, "and I must have it. Where is it?"
His head and throat were bare, and, as he spoke with a helpless lookstraying all around, he took his coat off, and let it drop on the floor.
"Where is my bench? I have been looking everywhere for my bench, and Ican't find it. What have they done with my work? Time presses: I mustfinish those shoes."
They looked at one another, and their hearts died within them.
"Come, come!" said he, in a whimpering miserable way; "let me get towork. Give me my work."
Receiving no answer, he tore his hair, and beat his feet upon theground, like a distracted child.
"Don't torture a poor forlorn wretch," he implored them, with a dreadfulcry; "but give me my work! What is to become of us, if those shoes arenot done to-night?"
Lost, utterly lost!
It was so clearly beyond hope to reason with him, or try to restore him,that--as if by agreement--they each put a hand upon his shoulder, andsoothed him to sit down before the fire, with a promise that he shouldhave his work presently. He sank into the chair, and brooded over theembers, and shed tears. As if all that had happened since the garrettime were a momentary fancy, or a dream, Mr. Lorry saw him shrink intothe exact figure that Defarge had had in keeping.
Affected, and impressed with terror as they both were, by this spectacleof ruin, it was not a time to yield to such emotions. His lonelydaughter, bereft of her final hope and reliance, appealed to them bothtoo strongly. Again, as if by agreement, they looked at one another withone meaning in their faces. Carton was the first to speak:
"The last chance is gone: it was not much. Yes; he had better be takento her. But, before you go, will you, for a moment, steadily attend tome? Don't ask me why I make the stipulations I am going to make, andexact the promise I am going to exact; I have a reason--a good one."
"I do not doubt it," answered Mr. Lorry. "Say on."
The figure in the chair between them, was all the time monotonouslyrocking itself to and fro, and moaning. They spoke in such a tone asthey would have used if they had been watching by a sick-bed in thenight.
Carton stooped to pick up the coat, which lay almost entangling hisfeet. As he did so, a small case in which the Doctor was accustomed tocarry the lists of his day's duties, fell lightly on the floor. Cartontook it up, and there was a folded paper in it. "We should lookat this!" he said. Mr. Lorry nodded his consent. He opened it, andexclaimed, "Thank _God!_"
"What is it?" asked Mr. Lorry, eagerly.
"A moment! Let me speak of it in its place. First," he put his hand inhis coat, and took another paper from it, "that is the certificate whichenables me to pass out of this city. Look at it. You see--Sydney Carton,an Englishman?"
Mr. Lorry held it open in his hand, gazing in his earnest face.
"Keep it for me until to-morrow. I shall see him to-morrow, youremember, and I had better not take it into the prison."
"Why not?"
"I don't know; I prefer not to do so. Now, take this paper that DoctorManette has carried about him. It is a similar certificate, enabling himand his daughter and her child, at any time, to pass the barrier and thefrontier! You see?"
"Yes!"
"Perhaps he obtained it as his last and utmost precaution against evil,yesterday. When is it dated? But no matter; don't stay to look; put itup carefully with mine and your own. Now, observe! I never doubted untilwithin this hour or two, that he had, or could have such a paper. It isgood, until recalled. But it may be soon recalled, and, I have reason tothink, will be."
"They are not in danger?"
"They are in great danger. They are in danger of denunciation by MadameDefarge. I know it from her own lips. I have overheard words of thatwoman's, to-night, which have presented their danger to me in strongcolours. I have lost no time, and since then, I have seen the spy. Heconfirms me. He knows that a wood-sawyer, living by the prison wall,is under the control of the Defarges, and has been rehearsed byMadame Defarge as to his having seen Her"--he never mentioned Lucie'sname--"making signs and signals to prisoners. It is easy to foresee thatthe pretence will be the common one, a prison plot, and that it willinvolve her life--and perhaps her child's--and perhaps her father's--forboth have been seen with her at that place. Don't look so horrified. Youwill save them all."
"Heaven grant I may, Carton! But how?"
"I am going to tell you how. It will depend on you, and it could dependon no better man. This new denunciation will certainly not take placeuntil after to-morrow; probably not until two or three days afterwards;more probably a week afterwards. You know it is a capital crime, tomourn for, or sympathise with, a victim of the Guillotine. She and herfather would unquestionably be guilty of this crime, and this woman (theinveteracy of whose pursuit cannot be described) would wait to add thatstrength to her case, and make herself doubly sure. You follow me?"
"So attentively, and with so much confidence in what you say, that forthe moment I lose sight," touching the back of the Doctor's chair, "evenof this distress."
"You have money, and can buy the means of travelling to the seacoastas quickly as the journey can be made. Your preparations have beencompleted for some days, to return to England. Early to-morrow have yourhorses ready, so that they may be in starting trim at two o'clock in theafternoon."
"It shall be done!"
His manner was so fervent and inspiring, that Mr. Lorry caught theflame, and was as quick as youth.
"You are a noble heart. Did I say we could depend upon no better man?Tell her, to-night, what you know of her danger as involving her childand her father. Dwell upon that, for she would lay her own fair headbeside her husband's cheerfully." He faltered for an instant; then wenton as before. "For the sake of her child and her father, press upon herthe necessity of leaving Paris, with them and you, at that hour. Tellher that it was her husband's last arrangement. Tell her that moredepends upon it than she dare believe, or hope. You think that herfather, even in this sad state, will submit himself to her; do you not?"
"I am sure of it."
"I thought so. Quietly and steadily have all these arrangements made inthe courtyard here, even to the taking of your own seat in the carriage.The moment I come to you, take me in, and drive away."
"I understand that I wait for you under all circumstances?"
"You have my certificate in your hand with the rest, you know, and willreserve my place. Wait for nothing but to have my place occupied, andthen for England!"
"Why, then," said Mr. Lorry, grasping his eager but so firm and steadyhand, "it does not all depend on one old man, but I shall have a youngand ardent man at my side."
"By the help of Heaven you shall! Promise me solemnly that nothing willinfluence you to alter the course on which we now stand pledged to oneanother."
"Nothing, Carton."
"Remember these words to-morrow: change the course, or delay in it--forany reason--and no life can possibly be saved, and many lives mustinevitably be sacrificed."
"I will remember them. I hop
e to do my part faithfully."
"And I hope to do mine. Now, good bye!"
Though he said it with a grave smile of earnestness, and though he evenput the old man's hand to his lips, he did not part from him then. Hehelped him so far to arouse the rocking figure before the dying embers,as to get a cloak and hat put upon it, and to tempt it forth to findwhere the bench and work were hidden that it still moaningly besoughtto have. He walked on the other side of it and protected it to thecourtyard of the house where the afflicted heart--so happy inthe memorable time when he had revealed his own desolate heart toit--outwatched the awful night. He entered the courtyard and remainedthere for a few moments alone, looking up at the light in the window ofher room. Before he went away, he breathed a blessing towards it, and aFarewell.
A Tale of Two Cities Page 42
