A Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations (Oprah's Book Club)

by Charles Dickens

  ‘You see?’ said Carton, looking up at him, as he kneeled on one knee beside the insensible figure, putting the paper in the breast: ‘is your hazard very great?’

  ‘Mr Carton,’ the Spy answered, with a timid snap of his fingers, ‘my hazard is not that, in the thick of business here, if you are true to the whole of your bargain.’

  ‘Don’t fear me. I will be true to the death.’

  ‘You must be, Mr Carton, if the tale of fifty-two is to be right. Being made right by you in that dress, I shall have no fear.’

  ‘Have no fear! I shall soon be out of the way of harming you, and the rest will soon be far from here, please God! Now, get assistance and take me to the coach.’

  ‘You?’ said the spy, nervously.

  ‘Him, man, with whom I have exchanged. You go out at the gate by which you brought me in?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I was weak and faint when you brought me in, and I am fainter now you take me out. The parting interview has overpowered me. Such a thing has happened here, often, and too often. Your life is in your own hands. Quick! Call assistance!’

  ‘You swear not to betray me?’ said the trembling spy, as he paused for a last moment.

  ‘Man, man!’ returned Carton, stamping his foot; ‘have I sworn by no solemn vow already, to go through with this, that you waste the precious moments now? Take him yourself to the court-yard you know of, place him yourself in the carriage, show him yourself to Mr Lorry, tell him yourself to give him no restorative but air, and to remember my words of last night and his promise of last night, and drive away!’

  The spy withdrew, and Carton seated himself at the table, resting his forehead on his hands. The Spy returned immediately, with two men.

  ‘How, then?’ said one of them, contemplating the fallen figure. ‘So afflicted to find that his friend has drawn a prize in the lottery of Sainte Guillotine?’

  ‘A good patriot,’ said the other, ‘could hardly have been more afflicted if the Aristocrat had drawn a blank.’

  They raised the unconscious figure, placed it on a litter they had brought to the door, and bent to carry it away.

  ‘The time is short, Evrémonde,’ said the Spy, in a warning voice.

  ‘I know it well,’ answered Carton. ‘Be careful of my friend, I entreat you, and leave me.’

  ‘Come, then, my children,’ said Barsad. ‘Lift him, and come away!’

  The door closed, and Carton was left alone. Straining his powers of listening to the utmost, he listened for any sound that might denote suspicion or alarm. There was none. Keys turned, doors clashed, footsteps passed along distant passages: no cry was raised, or hurry made, that seemed unusual. Breathing more freely in a little while, he sat down at the table, and listened again until the clocks struck Two.

  Sounds that he was not afraid of, for he divined their meaning, then began to be audible. Several doors were opened in succession, and finally his own. A gaoler, with a list in his hand, looked in, merely saying, ‘Follow me, Evrémonde!’ and he followed into a large dark room, at a distance. It was a dark winter day, and what with the shadows within, and what with the shadows without, he could but dimly discern the others who were brought there to have their arms bound. Some were standing; some seated. Some were lamenting, and in restless motion; but, these were few. The great majority were silent and still, looking fixedly at the ground.

  As he stood by the wall in a dim corner, while some of the fifty-two were brought in after him, one man stopped in passing, to embrace him, as having a knowledge of him. It thrilled him with a great dread of discovery; but, the man went on. A very few moments after that, a young woman, with a slight girlish form, a sweet spare face in which there was no vestige of colour, and large widely opened patient eyes, rose from the seat where he had observed her sitting, and came to speak to him.

  ‘Citizen Evrémonde,’ she said, touching him with her cold hand. ‘I am a poor little seamstress who was with you in La Force.’

  He murmured for answer: ‘True. I forget what you were accused of?’

  ‘Plots. Though the just Heaven knows I am innocent of any. Is it likely? Who would think of plotting with a poor little weak creature like me?’

  The forlorn smile with which she said it, so touched him that tears started from his eyes.

  ‘I am not afraid to die, Citizen Evrémonde, but I have done nothing. I am not unwilling to die, if the Republic, which is to do so much good to us poor, will profit by my death; but I do not know how that can be, Citizen Evrémonde. Such a poor weak little creature!’

  As the last thing on earth that his heart was to warm and soften to, it warmed and softened to this pitiable girl.

  ‘I heard you were released, Citizen Evrémonde. I hoped it was true?’

  ‘It was. But, I was again taken and condemned.’

  ‘If I may ride with you, Citizen Evrémonde, will you let me hold your hand? I am not afraid, but I am little and weak, and it will give me more courage.’

  As the patient eyes were lifted to his face, he saw a sudden doubt in them, and then astonishment. He pressed the work-worn, hunger-worn young fingers, and touched his lips.

  ‘Are you dying for him?’ she whispered.

  ‘And his wife and child. Hush! Yes.’

  ‘O you will let me hold your brave hand, stranger?’

  ‘Hush! Yes, my poor sister; to the last.’

  The same shadows that are falling on the prison, are falling, in that same hour of the early afternoon, on the Barrier with the crowd about it, when a coach going out of Paris drives up to be examined.

  ‘Who goes here? Whom have we within? Papers!’

  The papers are handed out, and read.

  ‘Alexandre Manette. Physician. French. Which is he?’

  This is he; this helpless, inarticulately murmuring, wandering old man pointed out.

  ‘Apparently the Citizen-Doctor is not in his right mind? The Revolution-fever will have been too much for him?’

  Greatly too much for him.

  ‘Hah! Many suffer with it. Lucie. His daughter. French. Which is she?’

  This is she.

  ‘Apparently it must be. Lucie, the wife of Evrémonde; is it not?’

  It is.

  ‘Hah! Evrémonde has an assignation elsewhere. Lucie, her child. English. This is she?’

  She and no other.

  ‘Kiss me, child of Evrémonde. Now, thou hast kissed a good Republican; something new in thy family; remember it! Sydney Carton. Advocate. English. Which is he?’

  He lies here, in this corner of the carriage. He, too, is pointed out.

  ‘Apparently the English advocate is in a swoon?’

  It is hoped he will recover in the fresher air. It is represented that he is not in strong health, and has separated sadly from a friend who is under the displeasure of the Republic.

  ‘Is that all? It is not a great deal, that! Many are under the displeasure of the Republic, and must look out at the little window. Jarvis Lorry. Banker. English. Which is he?’

  ‘I am he. Necessarily, being the last.’

  It is Jarvis Lorry who has replied to all the previous questions. It is Jarvis Lorry who has alighted and stands with his hand on the coach door, replying to a group of officials. They leisurely walk round the carriage and leisurely mount the box, to look at what little luggage it carries on the roof; the country-people hanging about, press nearer to the coach-doors and greedily stare in; a little child, carried by its mother, has its short arm held out for it, that it may touch the wife of an aristocrat who has gone to the Guillotine.

  ‘Behold your papers, Jarvis Lorry, countersigned.’

  ‘One can depart, citizen?’

  ‘One can depart. Forward, my postilions! A good journey!’

  ‘I salute you, citizens. – And the first danger passed!’

  These are again the words of Jarvis Lorry, as he clasps his hands, and looks upward. There is terror in the carriage, there is weeping, there is the he
avy breathing of the insensible traveller.

  ‘Are we not going too slowly? Can they not be induced to go faster?’ asks Lucie, clinging to the old man.

  ‘It would seem like flight, my darling. I must not urge them too much: it would rouse suspicion.’

  ‘Look back, look back, and see if we are pursued!’

  ‘The road is clear, my dearest. So far, we are not pursued.’

  Houses in twos and threes pass by us, solitary farms, ruinous buildings, dye-works tanneries and the like, open country, avenues of leafless trees. The hard uneven pavement is under us, the soft deep mud is on either side. Sometimes, we strike into the skirting mud, to avoid the stones that clatter us and shake us, and sometimes we stick in ruts and sloughs there. The agony of our impatience is then so great, that in our wild alarm and hurry we are for getting out and running – hiding – doing anything but stopping.

  Out of the open country, in again among ruinous buildings, solitary farms, dye-works, tanneries and the like, cottages in twos and threes, avenues of leafless trees. Have these men deceived us, and taken us back by another road? Is not this the same place twice over? Thank Heaven no. A village. Look back, look back, and see if we are pursued! Hush; the posting-house.

  Leisurely, our four horses are taken out; leisurely, the coach stands in the little street, bereft of horses, and with no likelihood upon it of ever moving again; leisurely, the new horses come into visible existence, one by one; leisurely, the new postilions follow, sucking and plaiting the lashes of their whips; leisurely, the old postilions count their money, make wrong additions, and arrive at dissatisfied results. All the time, our overfraught hearts are beating at a rate that would far outstrip the fastest gallop of the fastest horses ever foaled.

  At length the new postilions are in their saddles, and the old are left behind. We are through the village, up the hill, and down the hill, and on the low watery grounds. Suddenly, the postilions exchange speech with animated gesticulation, and the horses are pulled up, almost on their haunches. We are pursued!

  ‘Ho! Within the carriage there. Speak then!’

  ‘What is it?’ asks Mr Lorry, looking out at window.

  ‘How many did they say?’

  ‘I do not understand you.’

  ‘- At the last post. How many to the Guillotine to-day?’

  ‘Fifty-two.’

  ‘I said so! A brave number! My fellow-citizen here, would have it forty-two; ten more heads are worth having. The Guillotine goes handsomely. I love it. Hi forward. Whoop then!’

  The night comes on dark. He moves more; he is beginning to revive, and to speak intelligibly; he thinks they are still together; he asks him, by his name, what he has in his hand. O pity us, kind Heaven, and help us! Look out, look out, and see if we are pursued.

  The wind is rushing after us, and the clouds are flying after us, and the moon is plunging after us, and the whole wild night is in pursuit of us; but, so far, we are pursued by nothing else.

  [END OF INSTALMENT 29]

  CHAPTER 14

  The Knitting Done

  In that same juncture of time when the Fifty-Two awaited their fate, Madame Defarge held darkly ominous council with The Vengeance and Jacques Three of the Revolutionary Jury. Not in the wine-shop did Madame Defarge confer with these ministers, but in the shed of the wood-sawyer, erst a mender of roads. The sawyer himself did not participate in the conference, but abided at a little distance, like an outer satellite who was not to speak until required, or to offer an opinion until invited.

  ‘But our Defarge,’ said Jacques Three, ‘is undoubtedly a good Republican? Eh?’

  ‘There is no better,’ the voluble Vengeance protested in her shrill notes, ‘in France.’

  ‘Peace, little Vengeance,’ said Madame Defarge, laying her hand with a slight frown on her lieutenant’s lips, ‘hear me speak. My husband, fellow-citizen, is a good Republican and a bold man; he has deserved well of the Republic, and possesses its confidence. But my husband has his weaknesses, and he is so weak as to relent towards this Doctor.’

  ‘It is a great pity,’ croaked Jacques Three, dubiously shaking his head, with his cruel fingers at his hungry mouth; ‘it is not quite like a good citizen; it is a thing to regret.’

  ‘See you,’ said madame, ‘I care nothing for this Doctor, I. He may wear his head or lose it, for any interest I have in him; it is all one to me. But, the Evrémonde people are to be exterminated, and the wife and child must follow the husband and father.’

  ‘She has a fine head for it,’ croaked Jacques Three. ‘I have seen blue eyes and golden hair there, and they looked charming when Samson held them up.’ Ogre that he was, he spoke like an epicure.

  Madame Defarge cast down her eyes, and reflected a little.

  ‘The child also,’ observed Jacques Three, with a meditative enjoyment of his words, ‘has golden hair and blue eyes. And we seldom have a child there. It is a pretty sight!’

  ‘In a word,’ said Madame Defarge, coming out of her short abstraction, ‘I cannot trust my husband in this matter. Not only do I feel, since last night, that I dare not confide to him the details of my projects; but also I feel that if I delay, there is danger of his giving warning, and then they might escape.’

  ‘That must never be,’ croaked Jacques Three; ‘no one must escape. We have not half enough as it is. We ought to have six score a day.’

  ‘In a word,’ Madame Defarge went on, ‘my husband has not my reason for pursuing this family to annihilation, and I have not his reason for regarding this Doctor with any sensibility. I must act for myself, therefore. Come hither, little citizen.’

  The wood-sawyer, who held her in the respect, and himself in the submission, of mortal fear, advanced with his hand to his red cap.

  ‘Touching those signals, little citizen,’ said Madame Defarge, sternly, ‘that she made to the prisoners; you are ready to bear witness to them this very day?’

  ‘Ay, ay, why not!’ cried the sawyer. ‘Every day, in all weathers, from two to four, always signalling, sometimes with the little one, sometimes without. I know what I know, I have seen with my eyes.’

  He made all manner of gestures while he spoke, as if in incidental imitation of some few of the great diversity of signals that he had never seen.

  ‘Clearly plots,’ said Jacques Three. ‘Transparently!’

  ‘There is no doubt of the Jury?’ inquired Madame Defarge, letting her eyes turn to him with a gloomy smile.

  ‘Rely upon the patriotic Jury, dear citizeness. I answer for my fellow-Jurymen.’

  ‘Now, let me see,’ said Madame Defarge, pondering again. ‘Yet once more! Can I spare this Doctor to my husband? I have no feeling either way. Can I spare him?’

  ‘He would count as one head,’ observed Jacques Three, in a low voice. ‘We really have not heads enough; it would be a pity, I think.’

  ‘He was signalling with her when I saw her,’ argued Madame Defarge; ‘I cannot speak of one without the other; and I must not be silent, and trust the case wholly to him, this little citizen here. For, I am not a bad witness.’

  The Vengeance and Jacques Three vied with each other in their fervent protestations that she was the most admirable and marvellous of witnesses. The little citizen, not to be outdone, declared her to be a celestial witness.

  ‘He must take his chance,’ said Madame Defarge. ‘No; I cannot spare him! You are engaged at three o’clock; you are going to see the batch of to-day executed. – You?’

  The question was addressed to the wood-sawyer, who hurriedly replied in the affirmative: seizing the occasion to add that he was the most ardent of Republicans, and that he would be in effect the most desolate of Republicans, if anything prevented him from enjoying the pleasure of smoking his afternoon pipe in the contemplation of the droll national barber. He was so very demonstrative herein, that he might have been suspected (perhaps was, by the dark eyes that looked contemptuously at him out of Madame Defarge’s head) of having his small individual f
ears for his own personal safety, every hour in the day.

  ‘I,’ said madame, ‘am equally engaged at the same place. After it is over – say at eight to-night – come you to me, in Saint Antoine, and we will give information against these people at my Section.’

  The wood-sawyer said he would be proud and flattered to attend the citizeness. The citizeness looking at him, he became embarrassed, evaded her glance as a small dog would have done, retreated among his wood, and hid his confusion over the handle of his saw.

  Madame Defarge beckoned the Juryman and The Vengeance a little nearer to the door, and there expounded her further views to them thus:

  ‘She will now be at home, awaiting the moment of his death. She will be mourning and grieving. She will be in a state of mind to impeach the justice of the Republic. She will be full of sympathy with its enemies. I will go to her.’

  ‘What an admirable woman; what an adorable woman!’ exclaimed Jacques Three, rapturously. ‘Ah, my cherished!’ cried The Vengeance; and embraced her.

  ‘Take you my knitting,’ said Madame Defarge, placing it in her lieutenant’s hands, ‘and have it ready for me in my usual seat. Keep me my usual chair. Go you there, straight, for there will probably be a greater concourse than usual, to-day.’

  ‘I willingly obey the orders of my Chief,’ said The Vengeance, with alacrity, and kissing her cheek. ‘You will not be late?’

  ‘I shall be there before the commencement.’

  ‘And before the tumbrils arrive. Be sure you are there, my soul,’ said The Vengeance, calling after her, for she had already turned into the street, ‘before the tumbrils arrive!’

  Madame Defarge slightly waved her hand, to imply that she heard, and might be relied upon to arrive in good time, and so went through the mud, and round the corner of the prison wall. The Vengeance and the Juryman, looking after her as she walked away, were highly appreciative of her fine figure, and her superb moral endowments.

  There were many women at that time, upon whom the time laid a dreadfully disfiguring hand; but, there was not one among them more to be dreaded than this ruthless woman, now taking her way along the streets. Of a strong and fearless character, of shrewd sense and readiness, of great determination, of that kind of beauty which not only seems to impart to its possessor firmness and animosity, but to strike into others an instinctive recognition of those qualities; the troubled time would have heaved her up, under any circumstances. But, imbued from her childhood with a brooding sense of wrong, and an inveterate hatred of a class, opportunity had developed her into a tigress. She was absolutely without pity. If she had ever had the virtue in her, it had quite gone out of her.