请选择 进入手机版 | 继续访问电脑版

 找回密码
 注册入学

QQ登录

只需一步,快速开始

查看: 519|回复: 0

《A Tale of Two Cities》Book2 CHAPTER4

[复制链接]
 楼主| 发表于 2013-3-26 10:38:37 | 显示全部楼层 |阅读模式
《A Tale of Two Cities》 Book2 CHAPTER IV Congratulatory
    by Charles Dickens
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 liking 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. Larry, 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 re-people 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 inr 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 |?銮what you have
    to do with the matter. If you'llUod 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 hustled 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.'
   
    `1 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.
回复

使用道具 举报

您需要登录后才可以回帖 登录 | 注册入学

本版积分规则

联系我们|Archiver|小黑屋|手机版|滚动|柠檬大学 ( 京ICP备13050917号-2 )

GMT+8, 2024-3-29 14:31 , Processed in 0.040412 second(s), 15 queries .

Powered by Discuz! X3.5 Licensed

© 2001-2023 Discuz! Team.

快速回复 返回顶部 返回列表