A Tale of Two Cities
“I did so, raising the boy’s head against my knee. But, invested for the
moment with extraordinary power, he raised himself completely: obliging
me to rise too, or I could not have still supported him.
“‘Marquis,’ said the boy, turned to him with his eyes opened wide, and
his right hand raised, ‘in the days when all these things are to be
answered for, I summon you and yours, to the last of your bad race, to
answer for them. I mark this cross of blood upon you, as a sign that
I do it. In the days when all these things are to be answered for,
I summon your brother, the worst of the bad race, to answer for them
separately. I mark this cross of blood upon him, as a sign that I do
it.’
“Twice, he put his hand to the wound in his breast, and with his
forefinger drew a cross in the air. He stood for an instant with the
finger yet raised, and as it dropped, he dropped with it, and I laid him
down dead.
*****
“When I returned to the bedside of the young woman, I found her raving
in precisely the same order of continuity. I knew that this might last
for many hours, and that it would probably end in the silence of the
grave.
“I repeated the medicines I had given her, and I sat at the side of
the bed until the night was far advanced. She never abated the piercing
quality of her shrieks, never stumbled in the distinctness or the order
of her words. They were always ‘My husband, my father, and my brother!
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven,
twelve. Hush!’
“This lasted twenty-six hours from the time when I first saw her. I had
come and gone twice, and was again sitting by her, when she began to
falter. I did what little could be done to assist that opportunity, and
by-and-bye she sank into a lethargy, and lay like the dead.
“It was as if the wind and rain had lulled at last, after a long and
fearful storm. I released her arms, and called the woman to assist me to
compose her figure and the dress she had torn. It was then that I knew
her condition to be that of one in whom the first expectations of being
a mother have arisen; and it was then that I lost the little hope I had
had of her.
“‘Is she dead?’ asked the Marquis, whom I will still describe as the
elder brother, coming booted into the room from his horse.
“‘Not dead,’ said I; ‘but like to die.’
“‘What strength there is in these common bodies!’ he said, looking down
at her with some curiosity.
“‘There is prodigious strength,’ I answered him, ‘in sorrow and
despair.’
“He first laughed at my words, and then frowned at them. He moved a
chair with his foot near to mine, ordered the woman away, and said in a
subdued voice,
“‘Doctor, finding my brother in this difficulty with these hinds, I
recommended that your aid should be invited. Your reputation is high,
and, as a young man with your fortune to make, you are probably mindful
of your interest. The things that you see here, are things to be seen,
and not spoken of.’
“I listened to the patient’s breathing, and avoided answering.
“‘Do you honour me with your attention, Doctor?’
“‘Monsieur,’ said I, ‘in my profession, the communications of patients
are always received in confidence.’ I was guarded in my answer, for I
was troubled in my mind with what I had heard and seen.
“Her breathing was so difficult to trace, that I carefully tried the
pulse and the heart. There was life, and no more. Looking round as I
resumed my seat, I found both the brothers intent upon me.
*****
“I write with so much difficulty, the cold is so severe, I am so
fearful of being detected and consigned to an underground cell and total
darkness, that I must abridge this narrative. There is no confusion or
failure in my memory; it can recall, and could detail, every word that
was ever spoken between me and those brothers.
“She lingered for a week. Towards the last, I could understand some few
syllables that she said to me, by placing my ear close to her lips. She
asked me where she was, and I told her; who I was, and I told her. It
was in vain that I asked her for her family name. She faintly shook her
head upon the pillow, and kept her secret, as the boy had done.
“I had no opportunity of asking her any question, until I had told the
brothers she was sinking fast, and could not live another day. Until
then, though no one was ever presented to her consciousness save the
woman and myself, one or other of them had always jealously sat behind
the curtain at the head of the bed when I was there. But when it came to
that, they seemed careless what communication I might hold with her; as
if--the thought passed through my mind--I were dying too.
“I always observed that their pride bitterly resented the younger
brother’s (as I call him) having crossed swords with a peasant, and that
peasant a boy. The only consideration that appeared to affect the mind
of either of them was the consideration that this was highly degrading
to the family, and was ridiculous. As often as I caught the younger
brother’s eyes, their expression reminded me that he disliked me deeply,
for knowing what I knew from the boy. He was smoother and more polite to
me than the elder; but I saw this. I also saw that I was an incumbrance
in the mind of the elder, too.
“My patient died, two hours before midnight--at a time, by my watch,
answering almost to the minute when I had first seen her. I was alone
with her, when her forlorn young head drooped gently on one side, and
all her earthly wrongs and sorrows ended.
“The brothers were waiting in a room down-stairs, impatient to ride
away. I had heard them, alone at the bedside, striking their boots with
their riding-whips, and loitering up and down.
“‘At last she is dead?’ said the elder, when I went in.
“‘She is dead,’ said I.
“‘I congratulate you, my brother,’ were his words as he turned round.
“He had before offered me money, which I had postponed taking. He now
gave me a rouleau of gold. I took it from his hand, but laid it on
the table. I had considered the question, and had resolved to accept
nothing.
“‘Pray excuse me,’ said I. ‘Under the circumstances, no.’
“They exchanged looks, but bent their heads to me as I bent mine to
them, and we parted without another word on either side.
*****
“I am weary, weary, weary--worn down by misery. I cannot read what I
have written with this gaunt hand.
“Early in the morning, the rouleau of gold was left at my door in a
little box, with my name on the outside. From the first, I had anxiously
considered what I ought to do. I decided, that day, to write privately
to the Minister, stating the nature of the two cases to which I had been
summoned, and the place to which I had gone: in effect, stating all the
circumstances. I knew what Court influence was, and what the immunities
of the Nobles were, and I expected that the matter would never be
heard of; but, I wished to relieve my own mind. I had kept the matter a
profound secret, even from my wife; and this, too, I resolved to state
in my letter. I had no apprehension whatever of my real danger; but
I was conscious that there might be danger for others, if others were
compromised by possessing the knowledge that I possessed.
“I was much engaged that day, and could not complete my letter that
night. I rose long before my usual time next morning to finish it.
It was the last day of the year. The letter was lying before me just
completed, when I was told that a lady waited, who wished to see me.
*****
“I am growing more and more unequal to the task I have set myself. It is
so cold, so dark, my senses are so benumbed, and the gloom upon me is so
dreadful.
“The lady was young, engaging, and handsome, but not marked for long
life. She was in great agitation. She presented herself to me as the
wife of the Marquis St. Evrémonde. I connected the title by which the
boy had addressed the elder brother, with the initial letter embroidered
on the scarf, and had no difficulty in arriving at the conclusion that I
had seen that nobleman very lately.
“My memory is still accurate, but I cannot write the words of our
conversation. I suspect that I am watched more closely than I was, and I
know not at what times I may be watched. She had in part suspected, and
in part discovered, the main facts of the cruel story, of her husband’s
share in it, and my being resorted to. She did not know that the girl
was dead. Her hope had been, she said in great distress, to show her,
in secret, a woman’s sympathy. Her hope had been to avert the wrath of
Heaven from a House that had long been hateful to the suffering many.
“She had reasons for believing that there was a young sister living, and
her greatest desire was, to help that sister. I could tell her nothing
but that there was such a sister; beyond that, I knew nothing. Her
inducement to come to me, relying on my confidence, had been the hope
that I could tell her the name and place of abode. Whereas, to this
wretched hour I am ignorant of both.
*****
“These scraps of paper fail me. One was taken from me, with a warning,
yesterday. I must finish my record to-day.
“She was a good, compassionate lady, and not happy in her marriage. How
could she be! The brother distrusted and disliked her, and his influence
was all opposed to her; she stood in dread of him, and in dread of her
husband too. When I handed her down to the door, there was a child, a
pretty boy from two to three years old, in her carriage.
“‘For his sake, Doctor,’ she said, pointing to him in tears, ‘I would do
all I can to make what poor amends I can. He will never prosper in his
inheritance otherwise. I have a presentiment that if no other innocent
atonement is made for this, it will one day be required of him. What
I have left to call my own--it is little beyond the worth of a few
jewels--I will make it the first charge of his life to bestow, with the
compassion and lamenting of his dead mother, on this injured family, if
the sister can be discovered.’
“She kissed the boy, and said, caressing him, ‘It is for thine own dear
sake. Thou wilt be faithful, little Charles?’ The child answered her
bravely, ‘Yes!’ I kissed her hand, and she took him in her arms, and
went away caressing him. I never saw her more.
“As she had mentioned her husband’s name in the faith that I knew it,
I added no mention of it to my letter. I sealed my letter, and, not
trusting it out of my own hands, delivered it myself that day.
“That night, the last night of the year, towards nine o’clock, a man in
a black dress rang at my gate, demanded to see me, and softly followed
my servant, Ernest Defarge, a youth, up-stairs. When my servant came
into the room where I sat with my wife--O my wife, beloved of my heart!
My fair young English wife!--we saw the man, who was supposed to be at
the gate, standing silent behind him.
“An urgent case in the Rue St. Honore, he said. It would not detain me,
he had a coach in waiting.
“It brought me here, it brought me to my grave. When I was clear of the
house, a black muffler was drawn tightly over my mouth from behind, and
my arms were pinioned. The two brothers crossed the road from a dark
corner, and identified me with a single gesture. The Marquis took from
his pocket the letter I had written, showed it me, burnt it in the light
of a lantern that was held, and extinguished the ashes with his foot.
Not a word was spoken. I was brought here, I was brought to my living
grave.
“If it had pleased _God_ to put it in the hard heart of either of the
brothers, in all these frightful years, to grant me any tidings of
my dearest wife--so much as to let me know by a word whether alive or
dead--I might have thought that He had not quite abandoned them. But,