prompt:
Chapter: III. A Disappointment

Mr. Attorney-General had to inform the jury, that the prisoner before
them, though young in years, was old in the treasonable practices which
claimed the forfeit of his life. That this correspondence with the
public enemy was not a correspondence of to-day, or of yesterday, or
even of last year, or of the year before. That, it was certain the
prisoner had, for longer than that, been in the habit of passing and
repassing between France and England, on secret business of which
he could give no honest account. That, if it were in the nature of
traitorous ways to thrive (which happily it never was), the real
wickedness and guilt of his business might have remained undiscovered.
That Providence, however, had put it into the heart of a person who
was beyond fear and beyond reproach, to ferret out the nature of the
prisoner's schemes, and, struck with horror, to disclose them to his
Majesty's Chief Secretary of State and most honourable Privy Council.
That, this patriot would be produced before them. That, his position and
attitude were, on the whole, sublime. That, he had been the prisoner's
friend, but, at once in an auspicious and an evil hour detecting his
infamy, had resolved to immolate the traitor he could no longer cherish
in his bosom, on the sacred altar of his country. That, if statues
were decreed in Britain, as in ancient Greece and Rome, to public
benefactors, this shining citizen would assuredly have had one. That, as
they were not so decreed, he probably would not have one. That, Virtue,
as had been observed by the poets (in many passages which he well
knew the jury would have, word for word, at the tips of their tongues;
whereat the jury's countenances displayed a guilty consciousness that
they knew nothing about the passages), was in a manner contagious; more
especially the bright virtue known as patriotism, or love of country.
That, the lofty example of this immaculate and unimpeachable witness
for the Crown, to refer to whom however unworthily was an honour, had
communicated itself to the prisoner's servant, and had engendered in him
a holy determination to examine his master's table-drawers and pockets,
and secrete his papers. That, he (Mr. Attorney-General) was prepared to
hear some disparagement attempted of this admirable servant; but that,
in a general way, he preferred him to his (Mr. Attorney-General's)
brothers and sisters, and honoured him more than his (Mr.
Attorney-General's) father and mother. That, he called with confidence
on the jury to come and do likewise. That, the evidence of these two
witnesses, coupled with the documents of their discovering that would be
produced, would show the prisoner to have been furnished with lists of
his Majesty's forces, and of their disposition and preparation, both by
sea and land, and would leave no doubt that he had habitually conveyed
such information to a hostile power. That, these lists could not be
proved to be in the prisoner's handwriting; but that it was all the
same; that, indeed, it was rather the better for the prosecution, as
showing the prisoner to be artful in his precautions. That, the proof
would go back five years, and would show the prisoner already engaged
in these pernicious missions, within a few weeks before the date of the
very first action fought between the British troops and the Americans.
That, for these reasons, the jury, being a loyal jury (as he knew they
were), and being a responsible jury (as _they_ knew they were), must
positively find the prisoner Guilty, and make an end of him, whether
they liked it or not. That, they never could lay their heads upon their
pillows; that, they never could tolerate the idea of their wives laying
their heads upon their pillows; that, they never could endure the notion
of their children laying their heads upon their pillows; in short, that
there never more could be, for them or theirs, any laying of heads upon
pillows at all, unless the prisoner's head was taken off. That head
Mr. Attorney-General concluded by demanding of them, in the name of
everything he could think of with a round turn in it, and on the faith
of his solemn asseveration that he already considered the prisoner as
good as dead and gone.

When the Attorney-General ceased, a buzz arose in the court as if
a cloud of great blue-flies were swarming about the prisoner, in
anticipation of what he was soon to become. When toned down again, the
unimpeachable patriot appeared in the witness-box.

Mr. Solicitor-General then, following his leader's lead, examined the
patriot: John Barsad, gentleman, by name. The story of his pure soul was
exactly what Mr. Attorney-General had described it to be--perhaps, if
it had a fault, a little too exactly. Having released his noble bosom
of its burden, he would have modestly withdrawn himself, but that the
wigged gentleman with the papers before him, sitting not far from Mr.
Lorry, begged to ask him a few questions. The wigged gentleman sitting
opposite, still looking at the ceiling of the court.

Had he ever been a spy himself? No, he scorned the base insinuation.
What did he live upon? His property. Where was his property? He didn't
precisely remember where it was. What was it? No business of anybody's.
Had he inherited it? Yes, he had. From whom? Distant relation. Very
distant? Rather. Ever been in prison? Certainly not. Never in a debtors'
prison? Didn't see what that had to do with it. Never in a debtors'
prison?--Come, once again. Never? Yes. How many times? Two or three
times. Not five or six? Perhaps. Of what profession? Gentleman. Ever
been kicked? Might have been. Frequently? No. Ever kicked downstairs?
Decidedly not; once received a kick on the top of a staircase, and fell
downstairs of his own accord. Kicked on that occasion for cheating at
dice? Something to that effect was said by the intoxicated liar who
committed the assault, but it was not true. Swear it was not true?
Positively. Ever live by cheating at play? Never. Ever live by play? Not
more than other gentlemen do. Ever borrow money of the prisoner? Yes.
Ever pay him? No. Was not this intimacy with the prisoner, in reality a
very slight one, forced upon the prisoner in coaches, inns, and packets?
No. Sure he saw the prisoner with these lists? Certain. Knew no more
about the lists? No. Had not procured them himself, for instance? No.
Expect to get anything by this evidence? No. Not in regular government
pay and employment, to lay traps? Oh dear no. Or to do anything? Oh dear
no. Swear that? Over and over again. No motives but motives of sheer
patriotism? None whatever.

The virtuous servant, Roger Cly, swore his way through the case at a
great rate. He had taken service with the prisoner, in good faith and
simplicity, four years ago. He had asked the prisoner, aboard the Calais
packet, if he wanted a handy fellow, and the prisoner had engaged him.
He had not asked the prisoner to take the handy fellow as an act of
charity--never thought of such a thing. He began to have suspicions of
the prisoner, and to keep an eye upon him, soon afterwards. In arranging
his clothes, while travelling, he had seen similar lists to these in the
prisoner's pockets, over and over again. He had taken these lists from
the drawer of the prisoner's desk. He had not put them there first. He
had seen the prisoner show these identical lists to French gentlemen
at Calais, and similar lists to French gentlemen, both at Calais and
Boulogne. He loved his country, and couldn't bear it, and had given
information. He had never been suspected of stealing a silver tea-pot;
he had been maligned respecting a mustard-pot, but it turned out to be
only a plated one. He had known the last witness seven or eight years;
that was merely a coincidence. He didn't call it a particularly curious
coincidence; most coincidences were curious. Neither did he call it a
curious coincidence that true patriotism was _his_ only motive too. He
was a true Briton, and hoped there were many like him.

The blue-flies buzzed again, and Mr. Attorney-General called Mr. Jarvis
Lorry.

"Mr. Jarvis Lorry, are you a clerk in Tellson's bank?"

"I am."

"On a certain Friday night in November one thousand seven hundred and
seventy-five, did business occasion you to travel between London and
Dover by the mail?"

"It did."

"Were there any other passengers in the mail?"

"Two."

"Did they alight on the road in the course of the night?"

"They did."

"Mr. Lorry, look upon the prisoner. Was he one of those two passengers?"

"I cannot undertake to say that he was."

"Does he resemble either of these two passengers?"

"Both were so wrapped up, and the night was so dark, and we were all so
reserved, that I cannot undertake to say even that."

"Mr. Lorry, look again upon the prisoner. Supposing him wrapped up as
those two passengers were, is there anything in his bulk and stature to
render it unlikely that he was one of them?"

"No."

"You will not swear, Mr. Lorry, that he was not one of them?"

"No."

"So at least you say he may have been one of them?"

"Yes. Except that I remember them both to have been--like
myself--timorous of highwaymen, and the prisoner has not a timorous
air."

"Did you ever see a counterfeit of timidity, Mr. Lorry?"

"I certainly have seen that."

"Mr. Lorry, look once more upon the prisoner. Have you seen him, to your
certain knowledge, before?"

"I have."

"When?"

"I was returning from France a few days afterwards, and, at Calais, the
prisoner came on board the packet-ship in which I returned, and made the
voyage with me."

"At what hour did he come on board?"

"At a little after midnight."

"In the dead of the night. Was he the only passenger who came on board
at that untimely hour?"

"He happened to be the only one."

"Never mind about 'happening,' Mr. Lorry. He was the only passenger who
came on board in the dead of the night?"

"He was."

"Were you travelling alone, Mr. Lorry, or with any companion?"

"With two companions. A gentleman and lady. They are here."

"They are here. Had you any conversation with the prisoner?"

"Hardly any. The weather was stormy, and the passage long and rough, and
I lay on a sofa, almost from shore to shore."

"Miss Manette!"

The young lady, to whom all eyes had been turned before, and were now
turned again, stood up where she had sat. Her father rose with her, and
kept her hand drawn through his arm.

"Miss Manette, look upon the prisoner."

To be confronted with such pity, and such earnest youth and beauty, was
far more trying to the accused than to be confronted with all the crowd.
Standing, as it were, apart with her on the edge of his grave, not all
the staring curiosity that looked on, could, for the moment, nerve him
to remain quite still. His hurried right hand parcelled out the herbs
before him into imaginary beds of flowers in a garden; and his efforts
to control and steady his breathing shook the lips from which the colour
rushed to his heart. The buzz of the great flies was loud again.

"Miss Manette, have you seen the prisoner before?"

"Yes, sir."

"Where?"

"On board of the packet-ship just now referred to, sir, and on the same
occasion."

"You are the young lady just now referred to?"

"O! most unhappily, I am!"

The plaintive tone of her compassion merged into the less musical voice
of the Judge, as he said something fiercely: "Answer the questions put
to you, and make no remark upon them."

"Miss Manette, had you any conversation with the prisoner on that
passage across the Channel?"

"Yes, sir."

"Recall it."

In the midst of a profound stillness, she faintly began: "When the
gentleman came on board--"

"Do you mean the prisoner?" inquired the Judge, knitting his brows.

"Yes, my Lord."

"Then say the prisoner."

"When the prisoner came on board, he noticed that my father," turning
her eyes lovingly to him as he stood beside her, "was much fatigued
and in a very weak state of health. My father was so reduced that I was
afraid to take him out of the air, and I had made a bed for him on the
deck near the cabin steps, and I sat on the deck at his side to take
care of him. There were no other passengers that night, but we four.
The prisoner was so good as to beg permission to advise me how I could
shelter my father from the wind and weather, better than I had done. I
had not known how to do it well, not understanding how the wind would
set when we were out of the harbour. He did it for me. He expressed
great gentleness and kindness for my father's state, and I am sure he
felt it. That was the manner of our beginning to speak together."

"Let me interrupt you for a moment. Had he come on board alone?"

"No."

"How many were with him?"

"Two French gentlemen."

"Had they conferred together?"

"They had conferred together until the last moment, when it was
necessary for the French gentlemen to be landed in their boat."

"Had any papers been handed about among them, similar to these lists?"

"Some papers had been handed about among them, but I don't know what
papers."

"Like these in shape and size?"

"Possibly, but indeed I don't know, although they stood whispering very
near to me: because they stood at the top of the cabin steps to have the
light of the lamp that was hanging there; it was a dull lamp, and they
spoke very low, and I did not hear what they said, and saw only that
they looked at papers."

"Now, to the prisoner's conversation, Miss Manette."

"The prisoner was as open in his confidence with me--which arose out
of my helpless situation--as he was kind, and good, and useful to my
father. I hope," bursting into tears, "I may not repay him by doing him
harm to-day."

Buzzing from the blue-flies.

"Miss Manette, if the prisoner does not perfectly understand that
you give the evidence which it is your duty to give--which you must
give--and which you cannot escape from giving--with great unwillingness,
he is the only person present in that condition. Please to go on."

"He told me that he was travelling on business of a delicate and
difficult nature, which might get people into trouble, and that he was
therefore travelling under an assumed name. He said that this business
had, within a few days, taken him to France, and might, at intervals,
take him backwards and forwards between France and England for a long
time to come."

"Did he say anything about America, Miss Manette? Be particular."

"He tried to explain to me how that quarrel had arisen, and he said
that, so far as he could judge, it was a wrong and foolish one on
England's part. He added, in a jesting way, that perhaps George
Washington might gain almost as great a name in history as George the
Third. But there was no harm in his way of saying this: it was said
laughingly, and to beguile the time."

Any strongly marked expression of face on the part of a chief actor in
a scene of great interest to whom many eyes are directed, will be
unconsciously imitated by the spectators. Her forehead was painfully
anxious and intent as she gave this evidence, and, in the pauses when
she stopped for the Judge to write it down, watched its effect upon
the counsel for and against. Among the lookers-on there was the same
expression in all quarters of the court; insomuch, that a great majority
of the foreheads there, might have been mirrors reflecting the witness,
when the Judge looked up from his notes to glare at that tremendous
heresy about George Washington.

Mr. Attorney-General now signified to my Lord, that he deemed it
necessary, as a matter of precaution and form, to call the young lady's
father, Doctor Manette. Who was called accordingly.

"Doctor Manette, look upon the prisoner. Have you ever seen him before?"

"Once. When he called at my lodgings in London. Some three years, or
three years and a half ago."

"Can you identify him as your fellow-passenger on board the packet, or
speak to his conversation with your daughter?"

"Sir, I can do neither."

"Is there any particular and special reason for your being unable to do
either?"

He answered, in a low voice, "There is."

"Has it been your misfortune to undergo a long imprisonment, without
trial, or even accusation, in your native country, Doctor Manette?"

He answered, in a tone that went to every heart, "A long imprisonment."

"Were you newly released on the occasion in question?"

"They tell me so."

"Have you no remembrance of the occasion?"

"None. My mind is a blank, from some time--I cannot even say what
time--when I employed myself, in my captivity, in making shoes, to the
time when I found myself living in London with my dear daughter
here. She had become familiar to me, when a gracious God restored
my faculties; but, I am quite unable even to say how she had become
familiar. I have no remembrance of the process."

Mr. Attorney-General sat down, and the father and daughter sat down
together.

A singular circumstance then arose in the case. The object in hand being
to show that the prisoner went down, with some fellow-plotter untracked,
in the Dover mail on that Friday night in November five years ago, and
got out of the mail in the night, as a blind, at a place where he did
not remain, but from which he travelled back some dozen miles or more,
to a garrison and dockyard, and there collected information; a witness
was called to identify him as having been at the precise time required,
in the coffee-room of an hotel in that garrison-and-dockyard town,
waiting for another person. The prisoner's counsel was cross-examining
this witness with no result, except that he had never seen the prisoner
on any other occasion, when the wigged gentleman who had all this time
been looking at the ceiling of the court, wrote a word or two on a
little piece of paper, screwed it up, and tossed it to him. Opening
this piece of paper in the next pause, the counsel looked with great
attention and curiosity at the prisoner.

"You say again you are quite sure that it was the prisoner?"

The witness was quite sure.

"Did you ever see anybody very like the prisoner?"

Not so like (the witness said) as that he could be mistaken.

"Look well upon that gentleman, my learned friend there," pointing
to him who had tossed the paper over, "and then look well upon the
prisoner. How say you? Are they very like each other?"

Allowing for my learned friend's appearance being careless and slovenly
if not debauched, they were sufficiently like each other to surprise,
not only the witness, but everybody present, when they were thus brought
into comparison. My Lord being prayed to bid my learned friend lay aside
his wig, and giving no very gracious consent, the likeness became
much more remarkable. My Lord inquired of Mr. Stryver (the prisoner's
counsel), whether they were next to try Mr. Carton (name of my learned
friend) for treason? But, Mr. Stryver replied to my Lord, no; but he
would ask the witness to tell him whether what happened once, might
happen twice; whether he would have been so confident if he had seen
this illustration of his rashness sooner, whether he would be so
confident, having seen it; and more. The upshot of which, was, to smash
this witness like a crockery vessel, and shiver his part of the case to
useless lumber.

Mr. Cruncher had by this time taken quite a lunch of rust off his
fingers in his following of the evidence. He had now to attend while Mr.
Stryver fitted the prisoner's case on the jury, like a compact suit
of clothes; showing them how the patriot, Barsad, was a hired spy and
traitor, an unblushing trafficker in blood, and one of the greatest
scoundrels upon earth since accursed Judas--which he certainly did look
rather like. How the virtuous servant, Cly, was his friend and partner,
and was worthy to be; how the watchful eyes of those forgers and false
swearers had rested on the prisoner as a victim, because some family
affairs in France, he being of French extraction, did require his making
those passages across the Channel--though what those affairs were, a
consideration for others who were near and dear to him, forbade him,
even for his life, to disclose. How the evidence that had been warped
and wrested from the young lady, whose anguish in giving it they
had witnessed, came to nothing, involving the mere little innocent
gallantries and politenesses likely to pass between any young gentleman
and young lady so thrown together;--with the exception of that
reference to George Washington, which was altogether too extravagant and
impossible to be regarded in any other light than as a monstrous joke.
How it would be a weakness in the government to break down in this
attempt to practise for popularity on the lowest national antipathies
and fears, and therefore Mr. Attorney-General had made the most of it;
how, nevertheless, it rested upon nothing, save that vile and infamous
character of evidence too often disfiguring such cases, and of which the
State Trials of this country were full. But, there my Lord interposed
(with as grave a face as if it had not been true), saying that he could
not sit upon that Bench and suffer those allusions.

Mr. Stryver then called his few witnesses, and Mr. Cruncher had next to
attend while Mr. Attorney-General turned the whole suit of clothes Mr.
Stryver had fitted on the jury, inside out; showing how Barsad and
Cly were even a hundred times better than he had thought them, and the
prisoner a hundred times worse. Lastly, came my Lord himself, turning
the suit of clothes, now inside out, now outside in, but on the whole
decidedly trimming and shaping them into grave-clothes for the prisoner.

And now, the jury turned to consider, and the great flies swarmed again.

Mr. Carton, who had so long sat looking at the ceiling of the court,
changed neither his place nor his attitude, even in this excitement.
While his teamed friend, Mr. Stryver, massing his papers before him,
whispered with those who sat near, and from time to time glanced
anxiously at the jury; while all the spectators moved more or less, and
grouped themselves anew; while even my Lord himself arose from his seat,
and slowly paced up and down his platform, not unattended by a suspicion
in the minds of the audience that his state was feverish; this one man
sat leaning back, with his torn gown half off him, his untidy wig put
on just as it had happened to light on his head after its removal, his
hands in his pockets, and his eyes on the ceiling as they had been all
day. Something especially reckless in his demeanour, not only gave him
a disreputable look, but so diminished the strong resemblance he
undoubtedly bore to the prisoner (which his momentary earnestness,
when they were compared together, had strengthened), that many of the
lookers-on, taking note of him now, said to one another they would
hardly have thought the two were so alike. Mr. Cruncher made the
observation to his next neighbour, and added, "I'd hold half a guinea
that _he_ don't get no law-work to do. Don't look like the sort of one
to get any, do he?"

Yet, this Mr. Carton took in more of the details of the scene than he
appeared to take in; for now, when Miss Manette's head dropped upon
her father's breast, he was the first to see it, and to say audibly:
"Officer! look to that young lady. Help the gentleman to take her out.
Don't you see she will fall!"

There was much commiseration for her as she was removed, and much
sympathy with her father. It had evidently been a great distress to
him, to have the days of his imprisonment recalled. He had shown
strong internal agitation when he was questioned, and that pondering or
brooding look which made him old, had been upon him, like a heavy cloud,
ever since. As he passed out, the jury, who had turned back and paused a
moment, spoke, through their foreman.

They were not agreed, and wished to retire. My Lord (perhaps with George
Washington on his mind) showed some surprise that they were not agreed,
but signified his pleasure that they should retire under watch and ward,
and retired himself. The trial had lasted all day, and the lamps in
the court were now being lighted. It began to be rumoured that the
jury would be out a long while. The spectators dropped off to get
refreshment, and the prisoner withdrew to the back of the dock, and sat
down.

Mr. Lorry, who had gone out when the young lady and her father went out,
now reappeared, and beckoned to Jerry: who, in the slackened interest,
could easily get near him.

"Jerry, if you wish to take something to eat, you can. But, keep in the
way. You will be sure to hear when the jury come in. Don't be a moment
behind them, for I want you to take the verdict back to the bank. You
are the quickest messenger I know, and will get to Temple Bar long
before I can."

Jerry had just enough forehead to knuckle, and he knuckled it in
acknowledgment of this communication and a shilling. Mr. Carton came up
at the moment, and touched Mr. Lorry on the arm.

"How is the young lady?"

"She is greatly distressed; but her father is comforting her, and she
feels the better for being out of court."

"I'll tell the prisoner so. It won't do for a respectable bank gentleman
like you, to be seen speaking to him publicly, you know."

Mr. Lorry reddened as if he were conscious of having debated the point
in his mind, and Mr. Carton made his way to the outside of the bar.
The way out of court lay in that direction, and Jerry followed him, all
eyes, ears, and spikes.

"Mr. Darnay!"

The prisoner came forward directly.

"You will naturally be anxious to hear of the witness, Miss Manette. She
will do very well. You have seen the worst of her agitation."

"I am deeply sorry to have been the cause of it. Could you tell her so
for me, with my fervent acknowledgments?"

"Yes, I could. I will, if you ask it."

Mr. Carton's manner was so careless as to be almost insolent. He stood,
half turned from the prisoner, lounging with his elbow against the bar.

"I do ask it. Accept my cordial thanks."

"What," said Carton, still only half turned towards him, "do you expect,
Mr. Darnay?"

"The worst."

"It's the wisest thing to expect, and the likeliest. But I think their
withdrawing is in your favour."

Loitering on the way out of court not being allowed, Jerry heard no
more: but left them--so like each other in feature, so unlike each other
in manner--standing side by side, both reflected in the glass above
them.

An hour and a half limped heavily away in the thief-and-rascal crowded
passages below, even though assisted off with mutton pies and ale.
The hoarse messenger, uncomfortably seated on a form after taking that
refection, had dropped into a doze, when a loud murmur and a rapid tide
of people setting up the stairs that led to the court, carried him along
with them.

"Jerry! Jerry!" Mr. Lorry was already calling at the door when he got
there.

"Here, sir! It's a fight to get back again. Here I am, sir!"

Mr. Lorry handed him a paper through the throng. "Quick! Have you got
it?"

"Yes, sir."

Hastily written on the paper was the word "ACQUITTED."

"If you had sent the message, 'Recalled to Life,' again," muttered
Jerry, as he turned, "I should have known what you meant, this time."

He had no opportunity of saying, or so much as thinking, anything else,
until he was clear of the Old Bailey; for, the crowd came pouring out
with a vehemence that nearly took him off his legs, and a loud buzz
swept into the street as if the baffled blue-flies were dispersing in
search of other carrion.

IV. Congratulatory

From the dimly-lighted passages of the court, the last sediment of the
human stew that had been boiling there all day, was straining off, when
Doctor Manette, Lucie Manette, his daughter, Mr. Lorry, the solicitor
for the defence, and its counsel, Mr. Stryver, stood gathered round Mr.
Charles Darnay--just released--congratulating him on his escape from
death.

It would have been difficult by a far brighter light, to recognise
in Doctor Manette, intellectual of face and upright of bearing, the
shoemaker of the garret in Paris. Yet, no one could have looked at him
twice, without looking again: even though the opportunity of observation
had not extended to the mournful cadence of his low grave voice, and
to the abstraction that overclouded him fitfully, without any apparent
reason. While one external cause, and that a reference to his long
lingering agony, would always--as on the trial--evoke this condition
from the depths of his soul, it was also in its nature to arise of
itself, and to draw a gloom over him, as incomprehensible to those
unacquainted with his story as if they had seen the shadow of the actual
Bastille thrown upon him by a summer sun, when the substance was three
hundred miles away.

Only his daughter had the power of charming this black brooding from
his mind. She was the golden thread that united him to a Past beyond his
misery, and to a Present beyond his misery: and the sound of her voice,
the light of her face, the touch of her hand, had a strong beneficial
influence with him almost always. Not absolutely always, for she could
recall some occasions on which her power had failed; but they were few
and slight, and she believed them over.

Mr. Darnay had kissed her hand fervently and gratefully, and had turned
to Mr. Stryver, whom he warmly thanked. Mr. Stryver, a man of little
more than thirty, but looking twenty years older than he was, stout,
loud, red, bluff, and free from any drawback of delicacy, had a pushing
way of shouldering himself (morally and physically) into companies and
conversations, that argued well for his shouldering his way up in life.

He still had his wig and gown on, and he said, squaring himself at his
late client to that degree that he squeezed the innocent Mr. Lorry clean
out of the group: "I am glad to have brought you off with honour, Mr.
Darnay. It was an infamous prosecution, grossly infamous; but not the
less likely to succeed on that account."

"You have laid me under an obligation to you for life--in two senses,"
said his late client, taking his hand.

"I have done my best for you, Mr. Darnay; and my best is as good as
another man's, I believe."

It clearly being incumbent on some one to say, "Much better," Mr. Lorry
said it; perhaps not quite disinterestedly, but with the interested
object of squeezing himself back again.

"You think so?" said Mr. Stryver. "Well! you have been present all day,
and you ought to know. You are a man of business, too."

"And as such," quoth Mr. Lorry, whom the counsel learned in the law had
now shouldered back into the group, just as he had previously shouldered
him out of it--"as such I will appeal to Doctor Manette, to break up
this conference and order us all to our homes. Miss Lucie looks ill, Mr.
Darnay has had a terrible day, we are worn out."

"Speak for yourself, Mr. Lorry," said Stryver; "I have a night's work to
do yet. Speak for yourself."

"I speak for myself," answered Mr. Lorry, "and for Mr. Darnay, and for
Miss Lucie, and--Miss Lucie, do you not think I may speak for us all?"
He asked her the question pointedly, and with a glance at her father.

His face had become frozen, as it were, in a very curious look at
Darnay: an intent look, deepening into a frown of dislike and distrust,
not even unmixed with fear. With this strange expression on him his
thoughts had wandered away.

"My father," said Lucie, softly laying her hand on his.

He slowly shook the shadow off, and turned to her.

"Shall we go home, my father?"

With a long breath, he answered "Yes."

The friends of the acquitted prisoner had dispersed, under the
impression--which he himself had originated--that he would not be
released that night. The lights were nearly all extinguished in the
passages, the iron gates were being closed with a jar and a rattle,
and the dismal place was deserted until to-morrow morning's interest of
gallows, pillory, whipping-post, and branding-iron, should repeople it.
Walking between her father and Mr. Darnay, Lucie Manette passed into
the open air. A hackney-coach was called, and the father and daughter
departed in it.

Mr. Stryver had left them in the passages, to shoulder his way back
to the robing-room. Another person, who had not joined the group, or
interchanged a word with any one of them, but who had been leaning
against the wall where its shadow was darkest, had silently strolled
out after the rest, and had looked on until the coach drove away. He now
stepped up to where Mr. Lorry and Mr. Darnay stood upon the pavement.

"So, Mr. Lorry! Men of business may speak to Mr. Darnay now?"

Nobody had made any acknowledgment of Mr. Carton's part in the day's
proceedings; nobody had known of it. He was unrobed, and was none the
better for it in appearance.

"If you knew what a conflict goes on in the business mind, when the
business mind is divided between good-natured impulse and business
appearances, you would be amused, Mr. Darnay."

Mr. Lorry reddened, and said, warmly, "You have mentioned that before,
sir. We men of business, who serve a House, are not our own masters. We
have to think of the House more than ourselves."

"_I_ know, _I_ know," rejoined Mr. Carton, carelessly. "Don't be
nettled, Mr. Lorry. You are as good as another, I have no doubt: better,
I dare say."

"And indeed, sir," pursued Mr. Lorry, not minding him, "I really don't
know what you have to do with the matter. If you'll excuse me, as very
much your elder, for saying so, I really don't know that it is your
business."

"Business! Bless you, _I_ have no business," said Mr. Carton.

"It is a pity you have not, sir."

"I think so, too."

"If you had," pursued Mr. Lorry, "perhaps you would attend to it."

"Lord love you, no!--I shouldn't," said Mr. Carton.

"Well, sir!" cried Mr. Lorry, thoroughly heated by his indifference,
"business is a very good thing, and a very respectable thing. And, sir,
if business imposes its restraints and its silences and impediments, Mr.
Darnay as a young gentleman of generosity knows how to make allowance
for that circumstance. Mr. Darnay, good night, God bless you, sir!
I hope you have been this day preserved for a prosperous and happy
life.--Chair there!"

Perhaps a little angry with himself, as well as with the barrister, Mr.
Lorry bustled into the chair, and was carried off to Tellson's. Carton,
who smelt of port wine, and did not appear to be quite sober, laughed
then, and turned to Darnay:

"This is a strange chance that throws you and me together. This must
be a strange night to you, standing alone here with your counterpart on
these street stones?"

"I hardly seem yet," returned Charles Darnay, "to belong to this world
again."

"I don't wonder at it; it's not so long since you were pretty far
advanced on your way to another. You speak faintly."

"I begin to think I _am_ faint."

"Then why the devil don't you dine? I dined, myself, while those
numskulls were deliberating which world you should belong to--this, or
some other. Let me show you the nearest tavern to dine well at."

Drawing his arm through his own, he took him down Ludgate-hill to
Fleet-street, and so, up a covered way, into a tavern. Here, they were
shown into a little room, where Charles Darnay was soon recruiting
his strength with a good plain dinner and good wine: while Carton sat
opposite to him at the same table, with his separate bottle of port
before him, and his fully half-insolent manner upon him.

"Do you feel, yet, that you belong to this terrestrial scheme again, Mr.
Darnay?"

"I am frightfully confused regarding time and place; but I am so far
mended as to feel that."

"It must be an immense satisfaction!"

He said it bitterly, and filled up his glass again: which was a large
one.

"As to me, the greatest desire I have, is to forget that I belong to it.
It has no good in it for me--except wine like this--nor I for it. So we
are not much alike in that particular. Indeed, I begin to think we are
not much alike in any particular, you and I."

Confused by the emotion of the day, and feeling his being there with
this Double of coarse deportment, to be like a dream, Charles Darnay was
at a loss how to answer; finally, answered not at all.

"Now your dinner is done," Carton presently said, "why don't you call a
health, Mr. Darnay; why don't you give your toast?"

"What health? What toast?"

"Why, it's on the tip of your tongue. It ought to be, it must be, I'll
swear it's there."

"Miss Manette, then!"

"Miss Manette, then!"

Looking his companion full in the face while he drank the toast, Carton
flung his glass over his shoulder against the wall, where it shivered to
pieces; then, rang the bell, and ordered in another.

"That's a fair young lady to hand to a coach in the dark, Mr. Darnay!"
he said, filling his new goblet.

A slight frown and a laconic "Yes," were the answer.

"That's a fair young lady to be pitied by and wept for by! How does it
feel? Is it worth being tried for one's life, to be the object of such
sympathy and compassion, Mr. Darnay?"

Again Darnay answered not a word.

"She was mightily pleased to have your message, when I gave it her. Not
that she showed she was pleased, but I suppose she was."

The allusion served as a timely reminder to Darnay that this
disagreeable companion had, of his own free will, assisted him in the
strait of the day. He turned the dialogue to that point, and thanked him
for it.

"I neither want any thanks, nor merit any," was the careless rejoinder.
"It was nothing to do, in the first place; and I don't know why I did
it, in the second. Mr. Darnay, let me ask you a question."

"Willingly, and a small return for your good offices."

"Do you think I particularly like you?"

"Really, Mr. Carton," returned the other, oddly disconcerted, "I have
not asked myself the question."

"But ask yourself the question now."

"You have acted as if you do; but I don't think you do."

"_I_ don't think I do," said Carton. "I begin to have a very good
opinion of your understanding."

"Nevertheless," pursued Darnay, rising to ring the bell, "there is
nothing in that, I hope, to prevent my calling the reckoning, and our
parting without ill-blood on either side."

Carton rejoining, "Nothing in life!" Darnay rang. "Do you call the whole
reckoning?" said Carton. On his answering in the affirmative, "Then
bring me another pint of this same wine, drawer, and come and wake me at
ten."

The bill being paid, Charles Darnay rose and wished him good night.
Without returning the wish, Carton rose too, with something of a threat
of defiance in his manner, and said, "A last word, Mr. Darnay: you think
I am drunk?"

"I think you have been drinking, Mr. Carton."

"Think? You know I have been drinking."

"Since I must say so, I know it."

"Then you shall likewise know why. I am a disappointed drudge, sir. I
care for no man on earth, and no man on earth cares for me."

"Much to be regretted. You might have used your talents better."

"May be so, Mr. Darnay; may be not. Don't let your sober face elate you,
however; you don't know what it may come to. Good night!"

When he was left alone, this strange being took up a candle, went to a
glass that hung against the wall, and surveyed himself minutely in it.

"Do you particularly like the man?" he muttered, at his own image; "why
should you particularly like a man who resembles you? There is nothing
in you to like; you know that. Ah, confound you! What a change you have
made in yourself! A good reason for taking to a man, that he shows you
what you have fallen away from, and what you might have been! Change
places with him, and would you have been looked at by those blue eyes as
he was, and commiserated by that agitated face as he was? Come on, and
have it out in plain words! You hate the fellow."

He resorted to his pint of wine for consolation, drank it all in a few
minutes, and fell asleep on his arms, with his hair straggling over the
table, and a long winding-sheet in the candle dripping down upon him.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: The trial begins with the Attorney General reading a statement concerning the charges of Treason against Darnay. Darnay's lawyer is a Mr. Stryver and he tries to discredit the prosecution's main witnesses, John Barsad and Roger Cly. It is clear that Judge and Jury have already assumed that Darnay is guilty. He is accused of giving information about British troops in the American War of Independence to the French who were the American's allies. Barsad turned Darnay in together with Roger Cly who was Darnay's hired servant. Both seem unreliable, but their testimony is believed. Darnay was one of the passengers in the carriage to Dover in Chapter 1 and also returned back to England on the same ship as Dr. Manette and Lucie. Lucie testifies in tears that the prisoner aided her and her sick father and that he had jokingly made a remark that George Washington will some day be as famous as George III. This brought shouts of anger from the crowd. Dr. Manette is unable to remember details of the trip, as he was ill. The trial is so biased that the Judge will not even allow the defense to make a speech. However, Stryver dramatically calls attention to the resemblance his assistant, Sidney Carton, has to Darnay. This causes great confusion for the witnesses. He states that Darnay is an innocent victim whose confidential family affairs caused him to travel between Paris and London. The jury returns a verdict of Innocent. Dr. Manette, Lucie, Mr. Lorry and Mr. Stryver celebrate with Darnay on his acquittal. It is clear that Carton had the idea to confuse the witnesses over the identification of Darnay, and Darnay wants to thank Carton for his timely intervention. Carton shrugs off the thanks, informing Darnay that he does not particularly like him and he leaves the company to go on another drinking binge. Carton reflects on his physical resemblance to Darnay thinking that he represents all that he could have been.


prompt:
Chapter: V. The Jackal

Those were drinking days, and most men drank hard. So very great is
the improvement Time has brought about in such habits, that a moderate
statement of the quantity of wine and punch which one man would swallow
in the course of a night, without any detriment to his reputation as a
perfect gentleman, would seem, in these days, a ridiculous exaggeration.
The learned profession of the law was certainly not behind any other
learned profession in its Bacchanalian propensities; neither was Mr.
Stryver, already fast shouldering his way to a large and lucrative
practice, behind his compeers in this particular, any more than in the
drier parts of the legal race.

A favourite at the Old Bailey, and eke at the Sessions, Mr. Stryver had
begun cautiously to hew away the lower staves of the ladder on which
he mounted. Sessions and Old Bailey had now to summon their favourite,
specially, to their longing arms; and shouldering itself towards the
visage of the Lord Chief Justice in the Court of King's Bench, the
florid countenance of Mr. Stryver might be daily seen, bursting out of
the bed of wigs, like a great sunflower pushing its way at the sun from
among a rank garden-full of flaring companions.

It had once been noted at the Bar, that while Mr. Stryver was a glib
man, and an unscrupulous, and a ready, and a bold, he had not that
faculty of extracting the essence from a heap of statements, which is
among the most striking and necessary of the advocate's accomplishments.
But, a remarkable improvement came upon him as to this. The more
business he got, the greater his power seemed to grow of getting at its
pith and marrow; and however late at night he sat carousing with Sydney
Carton, he always had his points at his fingers' ends in the morning.

Sydney Carton, idlest and most unpromising of men, was Stryver's great
ally. What the two drank together, between Hilary Term and Michaelmas,
might have floated a king's ship. Stryver never had a case in hand,
anywhere, but Carton was there, with his hands in his pockets, staring
at the ceiling of the court; they went the same Circuit, and even there
they prolonged their usual orgies late into the night, and Carton was
rumoured to be seen at broad day, going home stealthily and unsteadily
to his lodgings, like a dissipated cat. At last, it began to get about,
among such as were interested in the matter, that although Sydney Carton
would never be a lion, he was an amazingly good jackal, and that he
rendered suit and service to Stryver in that humble capacity.

"Ten o'clock, sir," said the man at the tavern, whom he had charged to
wake him--"ten o'clock, sir."

"_What's_ the matter?"

"Ten o'clock, sir."

"What do you mean? Ten o'clock at night?"

"Yes, sir. Your honour told me to call you."

"Oh! I remember. Very well, very well."

After a few dull efforts to get to sleep again, which the man
dexterously combated by stirring the fire continuously for five minutes,
he got up, tossed his hat on, and walked out. He turned into the Temple,
and, having revived himself by twice pacing the pavements of King's
Bench-walk and Paper-buildings, turned into the Stryver chambers.

The Stryver clerk, who never assisted at these conferences, had gone
home, and the Stryver principal opened the door. He had his slippers on,
and a loose bed-gown, and his throat was bare for his greater ease. He
had that rather wild, strained, seared marking about the eyes, which
may be observed in all free livers of his class, from the portrait of
Jeffries downward, and which can be traced, under various disguises of
Art, through the portraits of every Drinking Age.

"You are a little late, Memory," said Stryver.

"About the usual time; it may be a quarter of an hour later."

They went into a dingy room lined with books and littered with papers,
where there was a blazing fire. A kettle steamed upon the hob, and in
the midst of the wreck of papers a table shone, with plenty of wine upon
it, and brandy, and rum, and sugar, and lemons.

"You have had your bottle, I perceive, Sydney."

"Two to-night, I think. I have been dining with the day's client; or
seeing him dine--it's all one!"

"That was a rare point, Sydney, that you brought to bear upon the
identification. How did you come by it? When did it strike you?"

"I thought he was rather a handsome fellow, and I thought I should have
been much the same sort of fellow, if I had had any luck."

Mr. Stryver laughed till he shook his precocious paunch.

"You and your luck, Sydney! Get to work, get to work."

Sullenly enough, the jackal loosened his dress, went into an adjoining
room, and came back with a large jug of cold water, a basin, and a towel
or two. Steeping the towels in the water, and partially wringing them
out, he folded them on his head in a manner hideous to behold, sat down
at the table, and said, "Now I am ready!"

"Not much boiling down to be done to-night, Memory," said Mr. Stryver,
gaily, as he looked among his papers.

"How much?"

"Only two sets of them."

"Give me the worst first."

"There they are, Sydney. Fire away!"

The lion then composed himself on his back on a sofa on one side of the
drinking-table, while the jackal sat at his own paper-bestrewn table
proper, on the other side of it, with the bottles and glasses ready to
his hand. Both resorted to the drinking-table without stint, but each in
a different way; the lion for the most part reclining with his hands in
his waistband, looking at the fire, or occasionally flirting with some
lighter document; the jackal, with knitted brows and intent face,
so deep in his task, that his eyes did not even follow the hand he
stretched out for his glass--which often groped about, for a minute or
more, before it found the glass for his lips. Two or three times, the
matter in hand became so knotty, that the jackal found it imperative on
him to get up, and steep his towels anew. From these pilgrimages to the
jug and basin, he returned with such eccentricities of damp headgear as
no words can describe; which were made the more ludicrous by his anxious
gravity.

At length the jackal had got together a compact repast for the lion, and
proceeded to offer it to him. The lion took it with care and caution,
made his selections from it, and his remarks upon it, and the jackal
assisted both. When the repast was fully discussed, the lion put his
hands in his waistband again, and lay down to meditate. The jackal then
invigorated himself with a bumper for his throttle, and a fresh application
to his head, and applied himself to the collection of a second meal;
this was administered to the lion in the same manner, and was not
disposed of until the clocks struck three in the morning.

"And now we have done, Sydney, fill a bumper of punch," said Mr.
Stryver.

The jackal removed the towels from his head, which had been steaming
again, shook himself, yawned, shivered, and complied.

"You were very sound, Sydney, in the matter of those crown witnesses
to-day. Every question told."

"I always am sound; am I not?"

"I don't gainsay it. What has roughened your temper? Put some punch to
it and smooth it again."

With a deprecatory grunt, the jackal again complied.

"The old Sydney Carton of old Shrewsbury School," said Stryver, nodding
his head over him as he reviewed him in the present and the past, "the
old seesaw Sydney. Up one minute and down the next; now in spirits and
now in despondency!"

"Ah!" returned the other, sighing: "yes! The same Sydney, with the same
luck. Even then, I did exercises for other boys, and seldom did my own."

"And why not?"

"God knows. It was my way, I suppose."

He sat, with his hands in his pockets and his legs stretched out before
him, looking at the fire.

"Carton," said his friend, squaring himself at him with a bullying air,
as if the fire-grate had been the furnace in which sustained endeavour
was forged, and the one delicate thing to be done for the old Sydney
Carton of old Shrewsbury School was to shoulder him into it, "your way
is, and always was, a lame way. You summon no energy and purpose. Look
at me."

"Oh, botheration!" returned Sydney, with a lighter and more
good-humoured laugh, "don't _you_ be moral!"

"How have I done what I have done?" said Stryver; "how do I do what I
do?"

"Partly through paying me to help you, I suppose. But it's not worth
your while to apostrophise me, or the air, about it; what you want to
do, you do. You were always in the front rank, and I was always behind."

"I had to get into the front rank; I was not born there, was I?"

"I was not present at the ceremony; but my opinion is you were," said
Carton. At this, he laughed again, and they both laughed.

"Before Shrewsbury, and at Shrewsbury, and ever since Shrewsbury,"
pursued Carton, "you have fallen into your rank, and I have fallen into
mine. Even when we were fellow-students in the Student-Quarter of Paris,
picking up French, and French law, and other French crumbs that we
didn't get much good of, you were always somewhere, and I was always
nowhere."

"And whose fault was that?"

"Upon my soul, I am not sure that it was not yours. You were always
driving and riving and shouldering and passing, to that restless degree
that I had no chance for my life but in rust and repose. It's a gloomy
thing, however, to talk about one's own past, with the day breaking.
Turn me in some other direction before I go."

"Well then! Pledge me to the pretty witness," said Stryver, holding up
his glass. "Are you turned in a pleasant direction?"

Apparently not, for he became gloomy again.

"Pretty witness," he muttered, looking down into his glass. "I have had
enough of witnesses to-day and to-night; who's your pretty witness?"

"The picturesque doctor's daughter, Miss Manette."

"_She_ pretty?"

"Is she not?"

"No."

"Why, man alive, she was the admiration of the whole Court!"

"Rot the admiration of the whole Court! Who made the Old Bailey a judge
of beauty? She was a golden-haired doll!"

"Do you know, Sydney," said Mr. Stryver, looking at him with sharp eyes,
and slowly drawing a hand across his florid face: "do you know, I rather
thought, at the time, that you sympathised with the golden-haired doll,
and were quick to see what happened to the golden-haired doll?"

"Quick to see what happened! If a girl, doll or no doll, swoons within a
yard or two of a man's nose, he can see it without a perspective-glass.
I pledge you, but I deny the beauty. And now I'll have no more drink;
I'll get to bed."

When his host followed him out on the staircase with a candle, to light
him down the stairs, the day was coldly looking in through its grimy
windows. When he got out of the house, the air was cold and sad, the
dull sky overcast, the river dark and dim, the whole scene like a
lifeless desert. And wreaths of dust were spinning round and round
before the morning blast, as if the desert-sand had risen far away, and
the first spray of it in its advance had begun to overwhelm the city.

Waste forces within him, and a desert all around, this man stood still
on his way across a silent terrace, and saw for a moment, lying in the
wilderness before him, a mirage of honourable ambition, self-denial, and
perseverance. In the fair city of this vision, there were airy galleries
from which the loves and graces looked upon him, gardens in which the
fruits of life hung ripening, waters of Hope that sparkled in his sight.
A moment, and it was gone. Climbing to a high chamber in a well of
houses, he threw himself down in his clothes on a neglected bed, and its
pillow was wet with wasted tears.

Sadly, sadly, the sun rose; it rose upon no sadder sight than the man of
good abilities and good emotions, incapable of their directed exercise,
incapable of his own help and his own happiness, sensible of the blight
on him, and resigning himself to let it eat him away.

VI. Hundreds of People

The quiet lodgings of Doctor Manette were in a quiet street-corner not
far from Soho-square. On the afternoon of a certain fine Sunday when the
waves of four months had rolled over the trial for treason, and carried
it, as to the public interest and memory, far out to sea, Mr. Jarvis
Lorry walked along the sunny streets from Clerkenwell where he lived,
on his way to dine with the Doctor. After several relapses into
business-absorption, Mr. Lorry had become the Doctor's friend, and the
quiet street-corner was the sunny part of his life.

On this certain fine Sunday, Mr. Lorry walked towards Soho, early in
the afternoon, for three reasons of habit. Firstly, because, on fine
Sundays, he often walked out, before dinner, with the Doctor and Lucie;
secondly, because, on unfavourable Sundays, he was accustomed to be with
them as the family friend, talking, reading, looking out of window, and
generally getting through the day; thirdly, because he happened to have
his own little shrewd doubts to solve, and knew how the ways of the
Doctor's household pointed to that time as a likely time for solving
them.

A quainter corner than the corner where the Doctor lived, was not to be
found in London. There was no way through it, and the front windows of
the Doctor's lodgings commanded a pleasant little vista of street that
had a congenial air of retirement on it. There were few buildings then,
north of the Oxford-road, and forest-trees flourished, and wild flowers
grew, and the hawthorn blossomed, in the now vanished fields. As a
consequence, country airs circulated in Soho with vigorous freedom,
instead of languishing into the parish like stray paupers without a
settlement; and there was many a good south wall, not far off, on which
the peaches ripened in their season.

The summer light struck into the corner brilliantly in the earlier part
of the day; but, when the streets grew hot, the corner was in shadow,
though not in shadow so remote but that you could see beyond it into a
glare of brightness. It was a cool spot, staid but cheerful, a wonderful
place for echoes, and a very harbour from the raging streets.

There ought to have been a tranquil bark in such an anchorage, and
there was. The Doctor occupied two floors of a large stiff house, where
several callings purported to be pursued by day, but whereof little was
audible any day, and which was shunned by all of them at night. In
a building at the back, attainable by a courtyard where a plane-tree
rustled its green leaves, church-organs claimed to be made, and silver
to be chased, and likewise gold to be beaten by some mysterious giant
who had a golden arm starting out of the wall of the front hall--as if
he had beaten himself precious, and menaced a similar conversion of all
visitors. Very little of these trades, or of a lonely lodger rumoured
to live up-stairs, or of a dim coach-trimming maker asserted to have
a counting-house below, was ever heard or seen. Occasionally, a stray
workman putting his coat on, traversed the hall, or a stranger peered
about there, or a distant clink was heard across the courtyard, or a
thump from the golden giant. These, however, were only the exceptions
required to prove the rule that the sparrows in the plane-tree behind
the house, and the echoes in the corner before it, had their own way
from Sunday morning unto Saturday night.

Doctor Manette received such patients here as his old reputation, and
its revival in the floating whispers of his story, brought him.
His scientific knowledge, and his vigilance and skill in conducting
ingenious experiments, brought him otherwise into moderate request, and
he earned as much as he wanted.

These things were within Mr. Jarvis Lorry's knowledge, thoughts, and
notice, when he rang the door-bell of the tranquil house in the corner,
on the fine Sunday afternoon.

"Doctor Manette at home?"

Expected home.

"Miss Lucie at home?"

Expected home.

"Miss Pross at home?"

Possibly at home, but of a certainty impossible for handmaid to
anticipate intentions of Miss Pross, as to admission or denial of the
fact.

"As I am at home myself," said Mr. Lorry, "I'll go upstairs."

Although the Doctor's daughter had known nothing of the country of her
birth, she appeared to have innately derived from it that ability to
make much of little means, which is one of its most useful and most
agreeable characteristics. Simple as the furniture was, it was set off
by so many little adornments, of no value but for their taste and fancy,
that its effect was delightful. The disposition of everything in the
rooms, from the largest object to the least; the arrangement of colours,
the elegant variety and contrast obtained by thrift in trifles, by
delicate hands, clear eyes, and good sense; were at once so pleasant in
themselves, and so expressive of their originator, that, as Mr. Lorry
stood looking about him, the very chairs and tables seemed to ask him,
with something of that peculiar expression which he knew so well by this
time, whether he approved?

There were three rooms on a floor, and, the doors by which they
communicated being put open that the air might pass freely through them
all, Mr. Lorry, smilingly observant of that fanciful resemblance which
he detected all around him, walked from one to another. The first was
the best room, and in it were Lucie's birds, and flowers, and books,
and desk, and work-table, and box of water-colours; the second was
the Doctor's consulting-room, used also as the dining-room; the third,
changingly speckled by the rustle of the plane-tree in the yard, was the
Doctor's bedroom, and there, in a corner, stood the disused shoemaker's
bench and tray of tools, much as it had stood on the fifth floor of the
dismal house by the wine-shop, in the suburb of Saint Antoine in Paris.

"I wonder," said Mr. Lorry, pausing in his looking about, "that he keeps
that reminder of his sufferings about him!"

"And why wonder at that?" was the abrupt inquiry that made him start.

It proceeded from Miss Pross, the wild red woman, strong of hand, whose
acquaintance he had first made at the Royal George Hotel at Dover, and
had since improved.

"I should have thought--" Mr. Lorry began.

"Pooh! You'd have thought!" said Miss Pross; and Mr. Lorry left off.

"How do you do?" inquired that lady then--sharply, and yet as if to
express that she bore him no malice.

"I am pretty well, I thank you," answered Mr. Lorry, with meekness; "how
are you?"

"Nothing to boast of," said Miss Pross.

"Indeed?"

"Ah! indeed!" said Miss Pross. "I am very much put out about my
Ladybird."

"Indeed?"

"For gracious sake say something else besides 'indeed,' or you'll
fidget me to death," said Miss Pross: whose character (dissociated from
stature) was shortness.

"Really, then?" said Mr. Lorry, as an amendment.

"Really, is bad enough," returned Miss Pross, "but better. Yes, I am
very much put out."

"May I ask the cause?"

"I don't want dozens of people who are not at all worthy of Ladybird, to
come here looking after her," said Miss Pross.

"_Do_ dozens come for that purpose?"

"Hundreds," said Miss Pross.

It was characteristic of this lady (as of some other people before her
time and since) that whenever her original proposition was questioned,
she exaggerated it.

"Dear me!" said Mr. Lorry, as the safest remark he could think of.

"I have lived with the darling--or the darling has lived with me, and
paid me for it; which she certainly should never have done, you may take
your affidavit, if I could have afforded to keep either myself or her
for nothing--since she was ten years old. And it's really very hard,"
said Miss Pross.

Not seeing with precision what was very hard, Mr. Lorry shook his head;
using that important part of himself as a sort of fairy cloak that would
fit anything.

"All sorts of people who are not in the least degree worthy of the pet,
are always turning up," said Miss Pross. "When you began it--"

"_I_ began it, Miss Pross?"

"Didn't you? Who brought her father to life?"

"Oh! If _that_ was beginning it--" said Mr. Lorry.

"It wasn't ending it, I suppose? I say, when you began it, it was hard
enough; not that I have any fault to find with Doctor Manette, except
that he is not worthy of such a daughter, which is no imputation on
him, for it was not to be expected that anybody should be, under any
circumstances. But it really is doubly and trebly hard to have crowds
and multitudes of people turning up after him (I could have forgiven
him), to take Ladybird's affections away from me."

Mr. Lorry knew Miss Pross to be very jealous, but he also knew her by
this time to be, beneath the service of her eccentricity, one of those
unselfish creatures--found only among women--who will, for pure love and
admiration, bind themselves willing slaves, to youth when they have lost
it, to beauty that they never had, to accomplishments that they were
never fortunate enough to gain, to bright hopes that never shone upon
their own sombre lives. He knew enough of the world to know that there
is nothing in it better than the faithful service of the heart; so
rendered and so free from any mercenary taint, he had such an exalted
respect for it, that in the retributive arrangements made by his own
mind--we all make such arrangements, more or less--he stationed Miss
Pross much nearer to the lower Angels than many ladies immeasurably
better got up both by Nature and Art, who had balances at Tellson's.

"There never was, nor will be, but one man worthy of Ladybird," said
Miss Pross; "and that was my brother Solomon, if he hadn't made a
mistake in life."

Here again: Mr. Lorry's inquiries into Miss Pross's personal history had
established the fact that her brother Solomon was a heartless scoundrel
who had stripped her of everything she possessed, as a stake to
speculate with, and had abandoned her in her poverty for evermore, with
no touch of compunction. Miss Pross's fidelity of belief in Solomon
(deducting a mere trifle for this slight mistake) was quite a serious
matter with Mr. Lorry, and had its weight in his good opinion of her.

"As we happen to be alone for the moment, and are both people of
business," he said, when they had got back to the drawing-room and had
sat down there in friendly relations, "let me ask you--does the Doctor,
in talking with Lucie, never refer to the shoemaking time, yet?"

"Never."

"And yet keeps that bench and those tools beside him?"

"Ah!" returned Miss Pross, shaking her head. "But I don't say he don't
refer to it within himself."

"Do you believe that he thinks of it much?"

"I do," said Miss Pross.

"Do you imagine--" Mr. Lorry had begun, when Miss Pross took him up
short with:

"Never imagine anything. Have no imagination at all."

"I stand corrected; do you suppose--you go so far as to suppose,
sometimes?"

"Now and then," said Miss Pross.

"Do you suppose," Mr. Lorry went on, with a laughing twinkle in his
bright eye, as it looked kindly at her, "that Doctor Manette has any
theory of his own, preserved through all those years, relative to
the cause of his being so oppressed; perhaps, even to the name of his
oppressor?"

"I don't suppose anything about it but what Ladybird tells me."

"And that is--?"

"That she thinks he has."

"Now don't be angry at my asking all these questions; because I am a
mere dull man of business, and you are a woman of business."

"Dull?" Miss Pross inquired, with placidity.

Rather wishing his modest adjective away, Mr. Lorry replied, "No, no,
no. Surely not. To return to business:--Is it not remarkable that Doctor
Manette, unquestionably innocent of any crime as we are all well assured
he is, should never touch upon that question? I will not say with me,
though he had business relations with me many years ago, and we are now
intimate; I will say with the fair daughter to whom he is so devotedly
attached, and who is so devotedly attached to him? Believe me, Miss
Pross, I don't approach the topic with you, out of curiosity, but out of
zealous interest."

"Well! To the best of my understanding, and bad's the best, you'll tell
me," said Miss Pross, softened by the tone of the apology, "he is afraid
of the whole subject."

"Afraid?"

"It's plain enough, I should think, why he may be. It's a dreadful
remembrance. Besides that, his loss of himself grew out of it. Not
knowing how he lost himself, or how he recovered himself, he may never
feel certain of not losing himself again. That alone wouldn't make the
subject pleasant, I should think."

It was a profounder remark than Mr. Lorry had looked for. "True," said
he, "and fearful to reflect upon. Yet, a doubt lurks in my mind, Miss
Pross, whether it is good for Doctor Manette to have that suppression
always shut up within him. Indeed, it is this doubt and the uneasiness
it sometimes causes me that has led me to our present confidence."

"Can't be helped," said Miss Pross, shaking her head. "Touch that
string, and he instantly changes for the worse. Better leave it alone.
In short, must leave it alone, like or no like. Sometimes, he gets up in
the dead of the night, and will be heard, by us overhead there, walking
up and down, walking up and down, in his room. Ladybird has learnt to
know then that his mind is walking up and down, walking up and down, in
his old prison. She hurries to him, and they go on together, walking up
and down, walking up and down, until he is composed. But he never says
a word of the true reason of his restlessness, to her, and she finds it
best not to hint at it to him. In silence they go walking up and down
together, walking up and down together, till her love and company have
brought him to himself."

Notwithstanding Miss Pross's denial of her own imagination, there was a
perception of the pain of being monotonously haunted by one sad idea,
in her repetition of the phrase, walking up and down, which testified to
her possessing such a thing.

The corner has been mentioned as a wonderful corner for echoes; it
had begun to echo so resoundingly to the tread of coming feet, that it
seemed as though the very mention of that weary pacing to and fro had
set it going.

"Here they are!" said Miss Pross, rising to break up the conference;
"and now we shall have hundreds of people pretty soon!"

It was such a curious corner in its acoustical properties, such a
peculiar Ear of a place, that as Mr. Lorry stood at the open window,
looking for the father and daughter whose steps he heard, he fancied
they would never approach. Not only would the echoes die away, as though
the steps had gone; but, echoes of other steps that never came would be
heard in their stead, and would die away for good when they seemed close
at hand. However, father and daughter did at last appear, and Miss Pross
was ready at the street door to receive them.

Miss Pross was a pleasant sight, albeit wild, and red, and grim, taking
off her darling's bonnet when she came up-stairs, and touching it up
with the ends of her handkerchief, and blowing the dust off it, and
folding her mantle ready for laying by, and smoothing her rich hair with
as much pride as she could possibly have taken in her own hair if she
had been the vainest and handsomest of women. Her darling was a pleasant
sight too, embracing her and thanking her, and protesting against
her taking so much trouble for her--which last she only dared to do
playfully, or Miss Pross, sorely hurt, would have retired to her own
chamber and cried. The Doctor was a pleasant sight too, looking on at
them, and telling Miss Pross how she spoilt Lucie, in accents and with
eyes that had as much spoiling in them as Miss Pross had, and would
have had more if it were possible. Mr. Lorry was a pleasant sight too,
beaming at all this in his little wig, and thanking his bachelor
stars for having lighted him in his declining years to a Home. But, no
Hundreds of people came to see the sights, and Mr. Lorry looked in vain
for the fulfilment of Miss Pross's prediction.

Dinner-time, and still no Hundreds of people. In the arrangements of
the little household, Miss Pross took charge of the lower regions, and
always acquitted herself marvellously. Her dinners, of a very modest
quality, were so well cooked and so well served, and so neat in their
contrivances, half English and half French, that nothing could be
better. Miss Pross's friendship being of the thoroughly practical
kind, she had ravaged Soho and the adjacent provinces, in search of
impoverished French, who, tempted by shillings and half-crowns, would
impart culinary mysteries to her. From these decayed sons and daughters
of Gaul, she had acquired such wonderful arts, that the woman and girl
who formed the staff of domestics regarded her as quite a Sorceress,
or Cinderella's Godmother: who would send out for a fowl, a rabbit,
a vegetable or two from the garden, and change them into anything she
pleased.

On Sundays, Miss Pross dined at the Doctor's table, but on other days
persisted in taking her meals at unknown periods, either in the lower
regions, or in her own room on the second floor--a blue chamber, to
which no one but her Ladybird ever gained admittance. On this occasion,
Miss Pross, responding to Ladybird's pleasant face and pleasant efforts
to please her, unbent exceedingly; so the dinner was very pleasant, too.

It was an oppressive day, and, after dinner, Lucie proposed that the
wine should be carried out under the plane-tree, and they should sit
there in the air. As everything turned upon her, and revolved about her,
they went out under the plane-tree, and she carried the wine down for
the special benefit of Mr. Lorry. She had installed herself, some
time before, as Mr. Lorry's cup-bearer; and while they sat under the
plane-tree, talking, she kept his glass replenished. Mysterious backs
and ends of houses peeped at them as they talked, and the plane-tree
whispered to them in its own way above their heads.

Still, the Hundreds of people did not present themselves. Mr. Darnay
presented himself while they were sitting under the plane-tree, but he
was only One.

Doctor Manette received him kindly, and so did Lucie. But, Miss Pross
suddenly became afflicted with a twitching in the head and body, and
retired into the house. She was not unfrequently the victim of this
disorder, and she called it, in familiar conversation, "a fit of the
jerks."

The Doctor was in his best condition, and looked specially young. The
resemblance between him and Lucie was very strong at such times, and as
they sat side by side, she leaning on his shoulder, and he resting
his arm on the back of her chair, it was very agreeable to trace the
likeness.

He had been talking all day, on many subjects, and with unusual
vivacity. "Pray, Doctor Manette," said Mr. Darnay, as they sat under the
plane-tree--and he said it in the natural pursuit of the topic in hand,
which happened to be the old buildings of London--"have you seen much of
the Tower?"

"Lucie and I have been there; but only casually. We have seen enough of
it, to know that it teems with interest; little more."

"_I_ have been there, as you remember," said Darnay, with a smile,
though reddening a little angrily, "in another character, and not in a
character that gives facilities for seeing much of it. They told me a
curious thing when I was there."

"What was that?" Lucie asked.

"In making some alterations, the workmen came upon an old dungeon, which
had been, for many years, built up and forgotten. Every stone of
its inner wall was covered by inscriptions which had been carved by
prisoners--dates, names, complaints, and prayers. Upon a corner stone
in an angle of the wall, one prisoner, who seemed to have gone to
execution, had cut as his last work, three letters. They were done with
some very poor instrument, and hurriedly, with an unsteady hand.
At first, they were read as D. I. C.; but, on being more carefully
examined, the last letter was found to be G. There was no record or
legend of any prisoner with those initials, and many fruitless guesses
were made what the name could have been. At length, it was suggested
that the letters were not initials, but the complete word, DIG. The
floor was examined very carefully under the inscription, and, in the
earth beneath a stone, or tile, or some fragment of paving, were found
the ashes of a paper, mingled with the ashes of a small leathern case
or bag. What the unknown prisoner had written will never be read, but he
had written something, and hidden it away to keep it from the gaoler."

"My father," exclaimed Lucie, "you are ill!"

He had suddenly started up, with his hand to his head. His manner and
his look quite terrified them all.

"No, my dear, not ill. There are large drops of rain falling, and they
made me start. We had better go in."

He recovered himself almost instantly. Rain was really falling in large
drops, and he showed the back of his hand with rain-drops on it. But, he
said not a single word in reference to the discovery that had been told
of, and, as they went into the house, the business eye of Mr. Lorry
either detected, or fancied it detected, on his face, as it turned
towards Charles Darnay, the same singular look that had been upon it
when it turned towards him in the passages of the Court House.

He recovered himself so quickly, however, that Mr. Lorry had doubts of
his business eye. The arm of the golden giant in the hall was not more
steady than he was, when he stopped under it to remark to them that he
was not yet proof against slight surprises (if he ever would be), and
that the rain had startled him.

Tea-time, and Miss Pross making tea, with another fit of the jerks upon
her, and yet no Hundreds of people. Mr. Carton had lounged in, but he
made only Two.

The night was so very sultry, that although they sat with doors and
windows open, they were overpowered by heat. When the tea-table was
done with, they all moved to one of the windows, and looked out into the
heavy twilight. Lucie sat by her father; Darnay sat beside her; Carton
leaned against a window. The curtains were long and white, and some of
the thunder-gusts that whirled into the corner, caught them up to the
ceiling, and waved them like spectral wings.

"The rain-drops are still falling, large, heavy, and few," said Doctor
Manette. "It comes slowly."

"It comes surely," said Carton.

They spoke low, as people watching and waiting mostly do; as people in a
dark room, watching and waiting for Lightning, always do.

There was a great hurry in the streets of people speeding away to
get shelter before the storm broke; the wonderful corner for echoes
resounded with the echoes of footsteps coming and going, yet not a
footstep was there.

"A multitude of people, and yet a solitude!" said Darnay, when they had
listened for a while.

"Is it not impressive, Mr. Darnay?" asked Lucie. "Sometimes, I have
sat here of an evening, until I have fancied--but even the shade of
a foolish fancy makes me shudder to-night, when all is so black and
solemn--"

"Let us shudder too. We may know what it is."

"It will seem nothing to you. Such whims are only impressive as we
originate them, I think; they are not to be communicated. I have
sometimes sat alone here of an evening, listening, until I have made
the echoes out to be the echoes of all the footsteps that are coming
by-and-bye into our lives."

"There is a great crowd coming one day into our lives, if that be so,"
Sydney Carton struck in, in his moody way.

The footsteps were incessant, and the hurry of them became more and more
rapid. The corner echoed and re-echoed with the tread of feet; some,
as it seemed, under the windows; some, as it seemed, in the room; some
coming, some going, some breaking off, some stopping altogether; all in
the distant streets, and not one within sight.

"Are all these footsteps destined to come to all of us, Miss Manette, or
are we to divide them among us?"

"I don't know, Mr. Darnay; I told you it was a foolish fancy, but you
asked for it. When I have yielded myself to it, I have been alone, and
then I have imagined them the footsteps of the people who are to come
into my life, and my father's."

"I take them into mine!" said Carton. "_I_ ask no questions and make no
stipulations. There is a great crowd bearing down upon us, Miss Manette,
and I see them--by the Lightning." He added the last words, after there
had been a vivid flash which had shown him lounging in the window.

"And I hear them!" he added again, after a peal of thunder. "Here they
come, fast, fierce, and furious!"

It was the rush and roar of rain that he typified, and it stopped him,
for no voice could be heard in it. A memorable storm of thunder and
lightning broke with that sweep of water, and there was not a moment's
interval in crash, and fire, and rain, until after the moon rose at
midnight.

The great bell of Saint Paul's was striking one in the cleared air, when
Mr. Lorry, escorted by Jerry, high-booted and bearing a lantern, set
forth on his return-passage to Clerkenwell. There were solitary patches
of road on the way between Soho and Clerkenwell, and Mr. Lorry, mindful
of foot-pads, always retained Jerry for this service: though it was
usually performed a good two hours earlier.

"What a night it has been! Almost a night, Jerry," said Mr. Lorry, "to
bring the dead out of their graves."

"I never see the night myself, master--nor yet I don't expect to--what
would do that," answered Jerry.

"Good night, Mr. Carton," said the man of business. "Good night, Mr.
Darnay. Shall we ever see such a night again, together!"

Perhaps. Perhaps, see the great crowd of people with its rush and roar,
bearing down upon them, too.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: Carton awakes in a tavern and walks to Stryver's Chambers to do some work. Carton and Stryver both attended school together in Paris, but they have had different fortunes since then, Stryver moving to the top of his profession while Carton remains in his shadow. They discuss Lucie Manette who Stryver admires, but whom Carton dismisses as a golden-haired doll. With dawn breaking Carton heads home wondering how much richer his life might have been if he had practiced self-denial and perseverance. When he arrives home at this empty room he breaks down in tears. Four months have passed since the trial and Lorry, Darnay and Carton become regular visitors to the Manettes where Miss Pross is still Lucie's companion, having previously been her nursemaid. Miss Pross is concerned at the number of suitors Lucie has received, none of which are worthy of her. In fact it is only Lorry, Darnay and Carton. Darnay tells a story of how a prisoner in the Tower of London had written on the walls of his cell, the word &#8216Dig'. Apparently year's later workmen had found papers in a leather case. This immediately brings an alarming reaction from Dr. Manette. Clearly Darnay has struck a nerve. The position of the Manette's house is such that they can hear the sounds of footsteps that are quite far off, and on this particular still evening, with the rain falling, these footsteps seem louder than usual. Lucie shares a fancy that 'the echoes of all the footsteps are coming by-and-by into our lives'. Carton comments that the footsteps symbolize a great crowd that will one day come for our lives.