《A Tale of Two Cities》 Book2 CHAPTER
XV Knitting
by Charles Dickens
THERE had been earlier
drinking than usual in the wine shop of Monsieur Defarge. As early as six o'clock in the
morning, sallow faces peeping through its barred windows had descried other faces within,
bending over measures of wine. Monsieur Defarge sold a very thin wine at the best of
times, but it would seem to have been an unusually thin wine that he sold at this time. A
sour wine, moreover, or a souring, for its influence on the mood of those who drank it was
to make them gloomy. No vivacious Bacchanalian flame leaped out of the pressed grape of
monsieur Defarge: but, a smouldering fire that burnt in the
dark, lay hidden in the dregs of it.
This had been the third morning in succession, on which there had been early drinking at
the wine-shop of Monsieur Defarge. It had begun on Monday, and here was Wednesday come.
There had been more of early brooding than drinking; for, many men had listened and
whispered and slunk about there from the time of the opening of the door, who could not
ave laid a Piece of money on the counter to save their souls. These were to the full as
interested in the place, however, as if they could have commanded whole barrels of wine;
and they glided from seat to seat, and from corner to corner, swallowing talk in lieu of
drink, with greedy looks.
Notwithstanding an unusual flow of company, the master of the wine-shop was not visible.
He was not missed; for, nobody who crossed the threshold looked for him, nobody asked for
him, nobody wondered to see only Madame Defarge in her seat, presiding over the
distribution of wine, with a bowl of battered small coins before her, as much defaced and
beaten out of their original impress as the small coinage of humanity from whose ragged
pockets they had come.
A suspended interest and a prevalent absence of mind, were perhaps observed by the spies
who looked in at the wine-shop, as they looked in at every place, high and low, from the
king's palace to the criminal's gaol. Games at cards languished, players at dominoes
musingly built towers with them, drinkers drew figures on the tables with spilt drops of
wine, Madame Defarge herself picked out the pattern on her sleeve with her toothpick, and
saw and heard something inaudible and invisible a long way off.
Thus, Saint Antoine in this vinous feature of his, until midday. It was high noontide,
when two dusty men passed through his streets and under his swinging lamps: of whom, one
was Monsieur Defarge: the other a mender of roads in a blue cap. All adust and athirst,
the two entered the wine-shop. Their arrival had lighted a kind of fire in the breast of
Saint Antoine, fast spreading as they came along, which stirred and flickered in flames of
faces at most doors and windows. Yet, no one had followed them, and no man spoke when they
entered the wine-shop, though the eyes of every man there were turned upon them.
`Good-day, gentlemen!' said Monsieur Defarge.
It may have been a signal for loosening the general tongue. It elicited an answering
chorus of `Good-day!'
`It is bad weather, gentlemen,' said Defarge, shaking his head. Upon which, every man
looked at his neighbour, and then all cast down their eyes and sat silent. Except one man,
who got up and went out.
`My wife,' said Defarge aloud, addressing Madame Defarge: `I have travelled certain
leagues with this good mender of roads, called Jacques. I met him--by accident--a day an
half's journey Out of Paris. He is a good child, this mender of roads, called Jacques.
Give him to drink, my wife!'
A second man got up and went out. Madame Defarge set wine before the mender of roads
called Jacques, who doffed his blue cap to the company, and drank. In the breast of his
blouse he carried some coarse dark bread; he ate of this between whiles, and sat munching
and drinking near Madame Defarge's counter. A third man got up and went out.
Defarge refreshed himself with a draught of wine--but, he took less than was given to the
stranger, as being himself a man to whom it was no rarity--and stood waiting until the
countryman had made his breakfast. He looked at no one present, and no one now looked at
him; not even Madame Defarge, who had taken up her knitting, and was at work.
`Have you finished your repast, friend?' he asked, in due season.
`Yes, thank you.'
`Come, then! You shall see the apartment that I told you you could occupy. It will suit
you to a marvel.'
Out of the wine-shop into the street, out of the street into a courtyard, out of the
courtyard up a steep staircase, out of the staircase into a garret--formerly the garret
where a white-haired man sat on a low bench, stooping forward and very busy, making shoes.
No white-haired man was there now; but, the three men were there who had gone out of the
wine-shop singly. And between them and the white-haired man afar off, was the one small
link, that they had once looked in at him through the chinks in the wail.
Defarge closed the door carefully, and spoke in a subdued voice:
`Jacques One, Jacques Two, Jacques Three! This is the witness encountered by appointment,
by me, Jacques Four.
He will tell you all. Speak, Jacques Five!
The mender of roads, blue cap in hand, wiped his swarthy forehead with it, and said,
`Where shall I commence, monsieur?'
`Commence,' was Monsieur Defarge's not unreasonable reply, `at the commencement.'
`I saw him then, messieurs,' began the mender of roads, a year ago this running summer,
underneath the carriage of the Marquis, hanging by the chain. Behold the manner of it. I
leaving my work on the road, the sun going to bed, the carriage of the Marquis slowly
ascending the hill, he hanging by the chain--like this.'
Again the mender of roads went through the whole performance; in which he ought to have
been perfect by that time, seeing that it had been the infallible resource and
indispensable entertainment of his village during a whole year.
Jacques One struck in, and asked if he had ever seen the man before?
`Never,' answered the mender of roads, recovering his perpendicular.
Jacques Three demanded how he afterwards recognised him then?
`By his tall figure,' said the mender of roads, softly, and with his finger at his nose.
`When Monsieur the Marquis demands that evening,, ``Say, what is he like?'' I make
response, ``Tall as a spectre.'''
`You should have said, short as a dwarf,' returned Jacques Two.
`But what did I know? The deed was not then accomplished, neither did he confide in me.
Observe! Under those circumstances even, I do not offer my testimony. Monsieur the Marquis
indicates me with his finger, standing near our little fountain, and says, ``To me! Bring
that rascal!'' My faith, messieurs, I offer nothing.'
`He is right there, Jacques,' murmured Defarge, to him who had interrupted. `Go on!'
`Good!' said the mender of roads, with an air of mystery. `The tall man is lost, and he is
sought--how many months? Nine, ten, eleven?'
`No matter, the number,' said Defarge. `He is well hidden, but at last he is unluckily
found. Go on!'
`I am again at work upon the hillside, and the sun is again about to go to bed. I am
collecting my tools to descend to my cottage down in the village below, where it is
already dark, when I raise my eyes, and see coming over the hill six soldiers. In the
midst
of them is a tall man with his arms bound--tied to his sides--like this!'
With the aid of his indispensable cap, he represented a man with his elbows bound fast at
his hips, with cords that were knotted behind him.
`I stand aside, messieurs, by my heap of stones, to see the soldiers and their prisoner
pass (for it is a solitary road, that, where any spectacle is well worth looking at), and
at first, as they approach, I see no more than that they are six soldiers with a tall man
bound, and that they are almost black to my sight--except on the side of the sun going to
bed where they have a red edge, messieurs. Also, I see that their long shadows are on the
hollow ridge on the opposite side of the road, and are on the hill above it, and are like
the shadows of giants. Also, I see that they are covered with dust, and that the dust
moves with them as they come, tramp, tramp! But when they advance quite near to me, I
recognise the tall man, and he recognises me. Ah, but he would be well content to
precipitate himself over the hillside once again, as on the evening when he and I first
encountered, close to the same spot!'
He described it as if he were there, and it was evident that he saw it vividly; perhaps he
had not seen much in his life.
`I do not show the soldiers that I recognise the tall man; he does not show the soldiers
that he recognises me; we do it, and we know it, with our eyes. ``Come on!'' says the
chief of that company, pointing to the village, ``bring him fast to his tomb!'' and they
bring him faster. I follow. His arms are swelled because of being bound so tight, his
wooden shoes are large and clumsy, and he is lame. Because he is lame, and consequently
slow, they drive him with their guns--like this!'
He imitated the action of a man's being impelled forward by the butt-ends of muskets.
`As they descend the hill like madmen running a race, he falls. They laugh and pick him up
again. His face is bleeding and covered with dust, but he cannot touch it; thereupon they
laugh again. They bring him into the village; all the village runs to look; they take him
past the mill, and up to the prison; all the village sees the prison gate open in the
darkness of the night, and swallow him--like this!'
He opened his mouth as wide as he could, and shut it with a sounding snap of his teeth.
Observant of his unwillingness to mar the effect by opening it again, Defarge said, `Go
on, Jacques.'
`All the village,' pursued the mender of roads, on tiptoe and in a low voice, `withdraws;
all the village whispers by the fountain; all the village sleeps; all the village dreams
of that unhappy one, within the locks and bars of the prison on the crag, and never to
come out of it, except to perish. In the morning, with my tools upon my shoulder, eating
my morsel of black bread as I go, I make a circuit by the prison, on my way to my work.
There I see him, high up, behind the bars of a lofty iron cage, bloody and dusty as last
night, looking through. He has no hand free, to wave to me; I dare not call to him; he
regards me like a dead man.'
Defarge and the three glanced darkly at one another. The looks of all of them were dark,
repressed, and revengeful, as they listened to the countryman's story; the manner of all
of them, while it was secret, was authoritative too. They had the air of a rough tribunal;
Jacques One and Two sitting on the old pallet-bed, each with his chin resting on his hand,
and his eyes intent on the road-mender; Jacques Three, equally intent, on one knee behind
them, with his agitated hand always gliding over the network of fine nerves about his
mouth and nose; Defarge standing between them and the narrator, whom he had stationed in
the light of the window, by turns looking from him to them, and from them to him.
`Go on, Jacques,' said Defarge.
`He remains up there in his iron cage some days. The village looks at him by stealth, for
it is afraid. But it always looks up, from a distance, at the prison on the crag; and in
the evening, when the work of the day is achieved and it assembles to gossip at the
fountain, all faces are turned towards the prison. Formerly, they were turned towards the
posting-house; now, they are turned towards the prison. They whisper at the fountain, that
although condemned to death he will not be executed; they say that petitions have been
presented in Paris, showing that he was enraged and made mad by the death of his child;
they say that a petition has been presented to the King himself. What do I know? It is
possible. Perhaps yes, perhaps no.'
`Listen then, Jacques,' Number One of that name sternly interposed. `Know that a petition
was presented to the King and Queen. All here, yourself excepted, saw the King take it, in
his carriage in the street, sitting beside the Queen. It is Defarge whom you see here,
who, at the hazard of his life, darted out before the horses, with the petition in his
hand.'
`And once again listen, Jacques!' said the kneeling Number Three: his fingers ever
wandering over and over those fine nerves, with a strikingly greedy air, as if he hungered
for some thing--that was neither food nor drink; `the guard, horse and foot, surrounded
the petitioner, and struck him blows. You hear?'
`I hear, messieurs.'
`Go on then,' said Defarge.
`Again; on the other hand, they whisper at the fountain,' resumed the countryman, `that he
is brought down into our country to be executed on the spot, and that he will very
certainly be executed. They even whisper that because he has slain Monseigneur,
and because Monseigneur was the father of his tenants--serfs--what you will--he will be
executed as a parricide. One old man says at the fountain, that his right hand, armed with
the knife, will be burnt off before his face; that, into wounds which will be made in his
arms, his breast, and his legs, there will be poured boiling oil, melted lead, hot resin,
wax, and sulphur; finally, that he will be torn limb from limb by four strong horses. That
old man says, all this was actually done to a prisoner who made an attempt on the life of
the late King, Louis Fifteen. But how do I know if he lies?
I am not a scholar.'
`Listen once again then, Jacques!' said the man with the restless hand and the craving
air. `The name of that prisoner was Damiens, and it was all done in open day, in the open
streets of this city of Paris; and nothing was more noticed in the vast concourse that saw
it done, than the crowd of ladies of quality and fashion, who were full of eager attention
to the last--to the last, Jacques, prolonged until nightfall, when he had lost two legs
and an arm, and still breathed! And it was done--why, how old are you?'
`Thirty-five,' said the mender of roads, who looked sixty.
`It was done when you were more than ten years old; you might have seen it.'
`Enough!' said Defarge, with grim impatience. `Long live the Devil! Go on.'
`Well! Some whisper this, some whisper that; they sped of nothing else; even the fountain
appears to fall to that tune. At length, on Sunday night when all the village is asleep,
come soldiers, winding down from the prison, and their guns ring on the stones of the
little street. Workmen dig, workmen hammer, soldiers laugh and sing; in the morning, by
the fountain, there is raised a gallows forty feet high, poisoning the water.'
The mender of roads looked through rather than at the low ceiling, and pointed as if he
saw the gallows somewhere in the sky.
`All work is stopped, all assemble there, nobody leads the cows out, the cows are there
with the rest. At midday, the roll of drums. Soldiers have marched into the prison in the
night, and he is in the midst of many soldiers. He is bound as before, and in his mouth
there is a gag--tied so, with a tight string, making him look almost as if he laughed.' He
suggested it, by creasing his face with his two thumbs, from the corners of his mouth to
his ears. `On the top of the gallows is fixed the knife, blade upwards, with its point in
the air. He is hanged there forty feet high--and is left hanging, poisoning the water.
They looked at one another, as he used his blue cap to wipe his face, on which the
perspiration had started afresh while he recalled the spectacle.
`It is frightful, messieurs. How can the women and the children draw water! Who can gossip
of an evening, under that shadow! Under it, have I said? When I left the village, Monday
evening as the sun was going to bed, and looked back from the hill, the shadow struck
across the church, across the mill, across the prison--seemed to strike across the earth,
messieurs, to where the sky rests upon it!'
The hungry man gnawed one of his fingers as he looked at the other three, and his finger
quivered with the craving that was on him.
`That's all, messieurs. I left at sunset (as I had been warned to do), and I walked on,
that night and half next day, until I met (as I was warned I should) this comrade. With
him, I came on, now riding and now walking, through the rest of yesterday and through last
night. And here you see me!'
After a gloomy silence, the first Jacques said, `Good! You have acted and recounted
faithfully. Will you wait for us a little, outside the door?'
`Very willingly,' said the mender of roads. Whom Defarge escorted to the top of the
stairs, and, leaving seated there, returned.
The three had risen, and their heads were together when he came back to the garret.
`How say you, Jacques?' demanded Number One. `To be registered?'
`To be registered, as doomed to destruction,' returned Defarge.
`Magnificent!' croaked the man with the craving.
`The chateau and all the race?' inquired the first.
`The chateau and all the race,' returned Defarge. `Extermination.'
The hungry man repeated, in a rapturous croak, `Magnificent!' and began gnawing another
finger.
`Are you sure,' asked Jacques Two, of Defarge, `that no embarrassment can arise from our
manner of keeping the register? Without doubt it is safe, for no one beyond ourselves can
decipher it; but shall we always be able to decipher it or, I ought to say, will she?'
`Jacques,' returned Defarge, drawing himself up, `if madame my wife undertook to keep the
register in her memory alone, she would not lose a word of it--not a syllable of it.
Knitted, in her own stitches and her own symbols, it will always be as plain to
her as the sun. Confide in Madame Defarge. It would be easier for the weakest poltroon
that lives, to erase himself from existence, than to erase one letter of his name or
crimes from the knitted register of Madame Defarge.'
There was a murmur of confidence and approval, and then the man who hungered, asked: `Is
this rustic to be sent back soon? I hope so. He is very simple; is he not a little
dangerous?'
`He knows nothing,' said Defarge; `at least nothing more than would easily elevate himself
to gallows of the same height. I charge myself with him; let him remain with me; I will
take care of him, and set him on his road. He wishes to see the fine world--the King, the
Queen, and Court; let him see them on Sunday.
`What?' exclaimed the hungry man, staring. `Is it a good sign, that he wishes to see
Royalty and Nobility?'
`Jacques,' said Defarge; judiciously show a cat milk, if you wish her to thirst for it.
Judiciously show a dog his natural prey, if you wish him to bring it down one day.'
Nothing more was said, and the mender of roads, being found already dozing on the topmost
stair, was advised to lay himself down on the pallet-bed and take some rest. He needed no
persuasion, and was soon asleep.
Worse quarters than Defarge's wine-shop, could easily have been found in Paris for a
provincial slave of that degree. Saving for a mysterious dread of madame by which he was
constantly haunted, his life was very new and agreeable. But, madame sat all
day at her counter, so expressly unconscious of him, and so particularly determined not to
perceive that his being there had any connexion with anything below the surface, that he
shook in his wooden shoes whenever his eye lighted on her. For, he contended with himself
that it was impossible to foresee what that lady might pretend next; and he felt assured
that if she should take it into her brightly ornamented head to pretend that she had seen
him do a murder and afterwards Ray the victim, she would infallibly go through with it
until the play was played out.
Therefore, when Sunday came, the mender of roads was not enchanted (though he said he was)
to find that madame was to accompany monsieur and himself to Versailles. It was
additionally disconcerting to have madame knitting all the way there, in a public
conveyance; it was additionally disconcerting yet, to have madame in the crowd in the
afternoon, still with her knitting in her hands as the crowd waited to see the carriage of
the King and Queen.
`You work hard, madame,' said a man near her.
`Yes,' answered Madame Defarge; `I have a good deal to do.'
`What do you make, madame?'
`Many things.'
`For instance--'
`For instance,' returned Madame Defarge, composedly, `shrouds.'
The man moved a little further away, as soon as he could, and the mender of roads fanned
himself with his blue cap: feeling it mightily close and oppressive. If he needed a King
and Queen to restore him, he was fortunate in having his remedy at hand; for, soon the
large-faced King and the fair-faced Queen came in their golden coach, attended by the
shining Bull's Eye of their Court, a glittering multitude of laughing ladies and fine
lords; and in jewels and silks and powder and splendour and elegantly spurning figures and
handsomely disdainful faces of both sexes, the mender of roads bathed himself, so much to
his temporary intoxication, that he cried Long live the King, Long live the Queen, Long
live everybody and everything! as if he had never heard of ubiquitous Jacques in his time.
Then, there were gardens, courtyards, terraces, fountains, green banks, more King and
Queen, more Bull's Eye, more lords and ladies, more Long live they all! until he
absolutely wept with sentiment. During the whole of this scene, which lasted some three
hours, he had plenty of shouting and weeping and sentimental company, and I throughout
Defarge held him by the collar, as if to restrain him from flying at the objects of his
brief devotion and tearing them pieces.
`Bravo' said Defarge, clapping him on the back when it was Over, like a patron; `you are a
good boy!'
The mender of roads was now coming to himself, and was mistrustful of having made a
mistake in his late demonstrations; but no.
`You are the fellow we want,' said Defarge, in his ear; `you make these fools believe that
it will last for ever. Then, they are the more insolent, and it is the nearer ended.'
`Hey!' cried the mender of roads, reflectively; `that's true.' `These fools know nothing.
While they despise your breath, and would stop it for ever and ever, in you or in a
hundred like you rather than in one of their own horses or dogs, they only know what your
breath tells them. Let it deceive them, then, a little longer; it cannot deceive them too
much.'
Madame Defarge looked superciliously at the client, and nodded in confirmation.
`As to you,' said she, `you would shout and shed tears for anything, if it made a show and
a noise. Say! Would you not?'
`Truly, madame, I think so. For the moment.'
`If you were shown a great heap of dolls, and were set upon them to pluck them to pieces
and despoil them for your own advantage, you would pick out the richest and gayest. Say!
Would you not?'
`Truly yes, madame.'
`Yes. And if you were shown a flock of birds, unable to fly, and were set upon them to
strip them of their feathers for your own advantage, you would set upon the birds of the
finest feathers; would you not?'
`It is true, madame.'
`You have seen both dolls and birds today,' said Madame Defarge, with a wave of her hand
towards the place where they had last been apparent; `now, go home!' |
