a tale of two cities(双城记)-41

“I forgot it,” he said.Mr. Lorry’s eyes were again attracted to his face. Taking note ofthe wasted air which clouded the naturally handsome features,and having the expression of prisoners’ faces fresh in his mind, hewas strongly reminded of that expression.“And your duties here have drawn to an end, sir?” said Carton,turning to him.“Yes. As I was telling you last night when Lucie came in sounexpectedly, I have at length done all that I can do here. I hopedto have left them in perfect safety, and then to have quitted Paris. Ihave my Leave to Pass. I was ready to go.”They were both silent.“Yours is a long life to look back upon, sir?” said Carton,wistfully.“I am in my seventy-eighth year.”“You have been useful all your life; steadily and constantlyoccupied; trusted, respected, and looked up to?”“I have been a man of business, ever since I have been a man.Indeed, I may say that I was a man of business when a boy.”“See what a place you fill at seventy-eight. How many peoplewill miss you when you leave it empty!”“A solitary old bachelor,” answered Mr. Lorry, shaking hishead. “There is nobody to weep for me.”“How can you say that! Wouldn’t She weep for you? Wouldn’ther child?”“Yes, yes, thank God. I didn’t quite mean what I said.”“It is a thing to thank God for; is it not?”Charles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsA Tale of Two Cities“Surely, surely.”“If you could say, with truth, to your own solitary heart, tonight,‘I have secured to myself the love and attachment, the gratitude orrespect, of no human creature; I have won myself a tender place inno regard; I have done nothing good or serviceable to beremembered by!’ your seventy-eight years would be seventy-eightheavy curses; would they not?”“You say truly, Mr. Carton; I think they would be.”Sydney turned his eyes again upon the fire, and, after a silenceof a few moments, said:“I should like to ask you:—Does your childhood seem far off?Do the days when you sat at your mother’s knee, seem days of verylong ago?”Responding to his softened manner, Mr. Lorry answered:“Twenty years back, yes; at this time of my life, no. For, as Idraw closer and closer to the end, I travel in the circle, nearer andnearer to the beginning. It seems to be one of the kind smoothingsand preparings of the way. My heart is touched now, by manyremembrances that have long fallen asleep, of my pretty youngmother (and I so old!), and by many associations of the days whenwhat we call the World was not so real with me, and my faultswere not confirmed in me.”“I understand the feeling!” exclaimed Carton, with a brightflush. “And you are the better for it?”“I hope so.”Carton terminated the conversation here, by rising to help himon with his outer coat. “But you,” said Mr. Lorry, reverting to thetheme, “you are young.”“Yes,” said Carton. “I am not old, but my young way was neverCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsA Tale of Two Citiesthe way to age. Enough of me.”“And of me, I am sure,” said Mr. Lorry. “Are you going out?”“I’ll walk with you to her gate. You know my vagabond andrestless habits. If I should prowl about the streets a long time,don’t be uneasy; I shall reappear in the morning. You go to theCourt tomorrow?”“Yes, unhappily.”“I shall be there, but only as one of the crowd. My Spy will finda place for me. Take my arm, sir.”Mr. Lorry did so, and they went down-stairs and out in thestreets. A few minutes brought them to Mr. Lorry’s destination.Carton left him there; but lingered at a little distance, and turnedback to the gate again when it was shut, and touched it. He hadheard of her going to the prison every day. “She came out here,”he said, looking about him, “turned this way, must have trod onthese stones often. Let me follow in her steps.”It was ten o’clock at night when he stood before the prison of LaForce, where she had stood hundreds of times. A little wood-sawyer, having closed his shop, was smoking his pipe at his shop-door.“Good night, citizen,” said Sydney Carton, pausing in going by;for the man eyed him inquisitively.“Good night, citizen.”“How goes the Republic?”“You mean the Guillotine. Not ill. Sixty-three today. We shallmount to a hundred soon. Samson and his men complainsometimes, of being exhausted. Ha, ha, ha! He is so droll, thatSamson. Such a barber!”“Do you often go to see him—” “Shave? Always. Every day.Charles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsA Tale of Two CitiesWhat a barber! You have seen him at work?”“Never.”“Go and see him when he has a good batch. Figure this toyourself, citizen; he shaved the sixty-three today, in less than twopipes. Less than two pipes. Word of honour!”As the grinning little man held out the pipe he was smoking toexplain how he timed the execution, Carton was so sensible of arising desire to strike the life out of him, that he turned away.“But you are not English,” said the wood-sawyer, “though youwear English dress?”“Yes,” said Carton, pausing again, and answering over hisshoulder.“You speak like a Frenchman.”“I am an old student here.”“Aha, a perfect Frenchman! Good night, Englishman.”“Good night, citizen.”“But go and see that droll dog,” the little man persisted, callingafter him. “And take a pipe with you!”Sydney had not gone far out of sight, when he stopped in themiddle of the street under a glimmering lamp, and wrote with hispencil on a scrap of paper. Then, traversing with the decided stepof one who remembered the way well, several dark and dirtystreets—much dirtier than usual, for the best public thoroughfaresremained uncleansed in those times of terror—he stopped at achemist’s shop, which the owner was closing with his own hands.A small, dim, crooked shop, kept in a tortuous, up-hillthoroughfare, by a small, dim, crooked man.Giving this citizen, too, good night, as he confronted him at hiscounter, he laid the scrap of paper before him. “Whew”; theCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsA Tale of Two Citieschemist whistled softly, as he read it. “Hi! hi, hi!”Sydney Carton took no heed, and the chemist said:“For you, citizen?”“For me.”“You will be careful to keep them separate, citizen. You knowthe consequences of mixing them?”“Perfectly.”Certain small packets were made and given to him. He putthem, one by one, in the breast of his inner coat, counted out themoney for them, and deliberately left the shop. “There is nothingmore to do,” said he, glancing upward at the moon, “untiltomorrow. I can’t sleep.”It was a reckless manner, the manner in which he said thesewords aloud under the fast-sailing clouds. nor was it moreexpressive of negligence than defiance. It was the settled mannerof a tired man, who had wandered and struggled and got lost, butwho at length struck into his road and saw its end.Long ago, when he had been famous among his earliestcompetitors as a youth of great promise, he had followed his fatherto the grave. His mother had died, years before. These solemnwords, which had been read at his father’s grave, arose in his mindas he went down the dark streets, among the heavy shadows, withthe moon and the clouds sailing on high above him. “I am theresurrection and the life, saith the Lord: he that believeth in me,though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth andbelieveth in me, shall never die.”In a city dominated by the axe, alone at night, with naturalsorrow rising in him for the sixty-three who had been that day putto death, and for tomorrow’s victims then awaiting their doom inCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsA Tale of Two Citiesthe prisons, and still of tomorrow’s and tomorrow’s, the chain ofassociation that brought the words home, like a rusty old ship’sanchor from the deep, might have been easily found. He did notseek it, but repeated them and went on.With a solemn interest in the lighted windows where the peoplewere going to rest, forgetful through a few calm hours of thehorrors surrounding them; in the towers of the churches, whereno prayers were said, for the popular revulsion had even travelledthat length of self-destruction from years of priestly impostors,plunderers, and profligates; in the distant burial-places reserved,as they wrote upon the gates, for Eternal Sleep; in the aboundinggaols; and in the streets along which the sixties rolled to a deathwhich had become so common and material, that no sorrowfulstory of a haunting Spirit ever arose among the people out of allthe working of the Guillotine; with a solemn interest in the wholelife and death of the city settling down to its short nightly pause infury; Sydney Carton crossed the Seine again for the lighter streets.Few coaches were abroad, for riders in coaches were liable tobe suspected, and gentility hid his head in red nightcaps, and puton heavy shoes, and trudged. But. the theatres were all well filled,and the people poured cheerfully out as he passed, and wentchatting home. At one of the theatre doors, there was a little girlwith a mother, looking for a way across the street through themud. He carried the child over, and before the timid arm wasloosed from his neck asked her for a kiss.“I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord: he thatbelieveth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: andwhosoever liveth and believeth in me, shall never die.”Now, that the streets were quiet and the night wore on, theCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsA Tale of Two Citieswords were in the echoes of his feet, and were in the air. Perfectlycalm and steady, he sometimes repeated them to himself as hewalked; but, he heard them always.The night wore out, and, as he stood upon the bridge listeningto the water as it splashed the river-walls of the Island of Paris,where the picturesque confusion of houses and cathedral shonebright in the light of the moon, the day came coldly, looking like adead face out of the sky. Then, the night, with the moon and thestars, turned pale and died, and for a little while it seemed as ifCreation were delivered over to Death’s dominion.But the glorious sun, rising, seemed to strike those words, thatburden of the night, straight and warm to his heart in its longbright rays. And looking along them, with reverently shaded eyes,a bridge of light appeared to span the air between him and thesun, while the river sparkled under it.The strong tide, so swift, so deep, and certain, was like acongenial friend, in the morning stillness. He walked by thestream, far from the houses, and in the light and warmth of thesun fell asleep on the bank. When he awoke and was afoot again,he lingered there yet a little longer, watching an eddy that turnedand turned purposeless, until the stream absorbed it, and carriedit on to the sea.—“Like me!”A trading-boat, with a sail of the softened colour of a dead leaf,then glided into his view, floated by him, and died away. As itssilent track in the water disappeared, the prayer that had brokenup out of his heart for a merciful consideration of all his poorblindness and errors, ended in the words, “I am the resurrectionand the life.”Mr. Lorry was already out when he got back, and it was easy toCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsA Tale of Two Citiessurmise where the good old man was gone. Sydney Carton dranknothing but a little coffee, ate some bread, and, having washed andchanged to refresh himself, went out to the place of trial.The court was all astir and a-buzz, when the black sheep—whom many fell away from in dread—pressed him into an obscurecorner among the crowd. Mr. Lorry was there, and DoctorManette was there. She was there, sitting beside her father.When her husband was brought in, she turned a look upon him,so sustaining, so encouraging, so full of admiring love, and pityingtenderness, yet so courageous for his sake, that it called thehealthy blood into his face, brightened his glance, and animatedhis heart. If there had been any eyes to notice the influence of herlook, on Sydney Carton, it would have been seen to be the sameinfluence exactly.Before that unjust Tribunal, there was little or no order ofprocedure, ensuring to any accused person any reasonablehearing. There could have been no such Revolution, if all laws,forms, and ceremonies, had not first been so monstrously abused,that the suicidal vengeance of the Revolution was to scatter themall to the winds.Every eye was turned to the jury. The same determined patriotsand good republicans as yesterday and the day before, andtomorrow and the day after. Eager and prominent among them,one man with a craving face, and his fingers perpetually hoveringabout his lips, whose appearance gave great satisfaction to thespectators. A life-thirsting, cannibal-looking, bloody-mindedjuryman, the Jacques Three of Saint Antoine. The whole jury, as ajury of dogs empanelled to try the deer.Every eye then turned to the five judges and the publicCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsA Tale of Two Citiesprosecutor. No favourable leaning in that quarter today. A fell,uncompromising, murderous business-meaning there. Every eyethen sought some other eye in the crowd, and gleamed at itapprovingly; and heads nodded at one another before bendingforward with a strained attention.Charles Evremonde, called Darnay. Released yesterday.Reaccused and retaken yesterday. Indictment delivered to himlast night. Suspected and Denounced enemy of the Republic,Aristocrat, one of a family of tyrants, one of a race proscribed, forthat they had used their abolished privileges to the infamousoppression of the people. Charles Evremonde, called Darnay, inright of such proscription, absolutely Dead in Law.To this effect, in as few or fewer words, the Public Prosecutor.The President asked, was the Accused openly denounced orsecretly?“Openly, President.”“By whom?”“Three voices. Ernest Defarge, wine vendor of Saint Antoine.”“Good.”“Therese Defarge, his wife.”“Good.”“Alexandre Manette, physician.”A great uproar took place in the court, and in the midst of it,Doctor Manette was seen, pale and trembling, standing where hehad been seated.“President, I indignantly protest to you that this is a forgeryand a fraud. You know the accused to be the husband of mydaughter. My daughter, and those dear to her, are far dearer to methan my life. Who and where is the false conspirator who says thatCharles Dickens ElecBook ClassicsA Tale of Two CitiesI denounce the husband of my child?”“Citizen Manette, be tranquil. To fail in submission of theauthority of the Tribunal would be to put yourself out of Law. Asto what is dearer to you than life. nothing can be so dear to a good