A Tale of Two Cities-CHAPTER 4 CALM IN STORM

CALM IN STORM,Doctor Manette did not return until the morning of the fourth day of his absence. So much of what had happened in that dreadful time as could be kept from the knowledge of Lucie was so well concealed ¹ from her, that not until long afterwards, when France and she were far apart, did she know that eleven hundred defenceless prisoners of both sexes and all ages had been killed by the populace; that four days and nights had been darkened by this deed of horror; and that the air around her had been tainted ² by the slain ³. She only knew that there had been an attack upon the prisons, that all political prisoners had been in danger, and that some had been dragged out by the crowd and murdered.,To Mr. Lorry, the Doctor communicated under an injunction of secrecy ⁴ on which he had no need to dwell, that the crowd had taken him through a scene of carnage to the prison La Force. That, in the prison he had found a self-appointed Tribunal sitting, before which the prisoners were brought singly, and by which they were rapidly ordered to be put forth ⁶ to be massacred, or to be released, or (in a few cases) to be sent back to their cells. That, presented by his conductors to this Tribunal, he had announced himself by name and profession as having been for eighteen years a secret and unaccused prisoner in the Bastille; that, one of the body so sitting in judgment ⁷ had risen and identified him, and that this man was Defarge. That, hereupon he had ascertained ⁸, through the registers on the table, that his son-in-law was among the living prisoners, and had pleaded hard to the Tribunal—of whom some members were asleep and some awake, some dirty with murder and some clean, some sober and some not—for his life and liberty. That, in the first frantic ⁹ greetings lavished ¹⁰ on himself as a notable sufferer under the over-thrown system, it had been accorded to him to have Charles Darnay brought before the lawless Court, and examined. That, he seemed on the point of being at once released, when the tide in his favour met with some unexplained check (not intelligible ¹¹ to the Doctor), which led to a few words of secret conference. That, the man sitting as President had then informed Doctor Manette that the prisoner must remain in custody ¹², but should, for his sake, be held inviolate ¹³ in safe custody. That, immediately, on a signal, the prisoner was removed to the interior of the prison again; but, that he, the Doctor, had then so strongly pleaded for permission to remain and assure himself that his son-in-law was, through no malice ¹⁴ or mischance, delivered to the concourse whose murderous yells outside the gate had often drowned the proceedings ¹⁵, that he had obtained the permission, and had remained in that Hall of Blood until the danger was over.,The sights he had seen there, with brief snatches of food and sleep by intervals ¹⁶, shall remain untold ¹⁸. The mad joy over the prisoners who were saved, had astounded ¹⁹ him scarcely less than the mad ferocity against those who were cut to pieces. One prisoner there was, he said, who had been discharged into the street free, but at whom a mistaken savage ²⁰ had thrust a pike as he passed out. Being besought ²¹ to go to him and dress the wound, the Doctor had passed out at the same gate, and found him in the arms of a company of Samaritans, who were seated on the bodies of their victims. With an inconsistency as monstrous ²² as anything in this awful nightmare, they had helped the healer, and tended the wounded man with the gentlest solicitude ²³—had made a litter for him and escorted him carefully from the spot—had then caught up their weapons and plunged ²⁴ anew into a butchery so dreadful, that the Doctor had covered his eyes with his hands, and swooned away in the midst of it.,As Mr. Lorry received these confidences, and as he watched the face of his friend now sixty-two years of age, a misgiving ²⁵ arose within him that such dreadful experiences would revive the old danger. But, he had never seen his friend in his present aspect: he had never at all known him in his present character. For the first time the Doctor felt, now, that his suffering was strength and power. For the first time he felt that in that sharp fire, he had slowly forged the iron which could break the prison door of his daughter’s husband, and deliver him. “It all tended to a good end, my friend; it was not mere ²⁶ waste and ruin. As my beloved child was helpful in restoring me to myself, I will be helpful now in restoring the dearest part of herself to her; by the aid of Heaven I will do it!” Thus, Doctor Manette. And when Jarvis Lorry saw the kindled ²⁷ eyes, the resolute ²⁸ face, the calm strong look and bearing of the man whose life always seemed to him to have been stopped, like a clock, for so many years, and then set going again with an energy which had lain dormant ²⁹ during the cessation of its usefulness, he believed.,Greater things than the Doctor had at that time to contend with, would have yielded before his persevering ³⁰ purpose. While he kept himself in his place, as a physician, whose business was with all degrees of mankind, bond and free, rich and poor, bad and good, he used his personal influence so wisely, that he was soon the inspecting physician of three prisons, and among them of La Force. He could now assure Lucie that her husband was no longer confined alone, but was mixed with the general body of prisoners; he saw her husband weekly, and brought sweet messages to her, straight from his lips; sometimes her husband himself sent a letter to her (though never by the Doctor’s hand), but she was not permitted to write to him: for, among the many wild suspicions of plots in the prisons, the wildest of all pointed ⁵ at emigrants ³¹ who were known to have made friends or permanent connections abroad.,But, though the Doctor tried hard, and never ceased trying, to get Charles Darnay set at liberty, or at least to get him brought to trial, the public current of the time set too strong and fast for him. The new era began; the king was tried, doomed ⁴⁰ and beheaded; the Republic of Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, or Death, declared for victory or death against the world in arms; the black flag waved night and day from the great towers of Notre Dame ⁴¹; three hundred thousand men, summoned to rise against the tyrants ⁴² of the earth, rose from all the varying soils of France, as if the dragon’s teeth had been sown broadcast, and had yielded fruit equally on hill and plain, on rock, in gravel ⁴³, and alluvial ⁴⁴ mud, under the bright sky of the South and under the clouds of the North, in fell and forest, in the vineyards and the olive-grounds and among the cropped grass and the stubble of the corn, along the fruitful banks of the broad rivers, and in the sand of the seashore. What private solicitude could rear itself against the deluge ⁴⁵ of the Year One of Liberty—the deluge rising from below, not falling from above, and with the windows of Heaven shut, not opened!,There was no pause, no pity, no peace, no interval ¹⁷ of relenting rest, no measurement of time. Though days and nights circled as regularly as when time was young, and the evening and morning were the first day, other count of time there was none. Hold of it was lost in the raging fever of a nation, as it is in the fever of one patient. Now, breaking the unnatural ⁴⁶ silence of a whole city, the executioner showed the people the head of the king—and now, it seemed almost in the same breath, the head of his fair wife which had had eight weary months of imprisoned ⁴⁷ widowhood and misery ⁴⁸, to turn it grey.,And yet, observing the strange law of contradiction which obtains in all such cases, the time was long, while it flamed by so fast. A revolutionary tribunal in the capital, and forty or fifty thousand revolutionary committees all over the land; a law of the Suspected, which struck away all security for liberty or life, and delivered over any good and innocent person to any bad and guilty one; prisons gorged ⁴⁹ with people who had committed no offence, and could obtain no hearing; these things became the established order and nature of appointed things, and seemed to be ancient usage before they were many weeks old. Above all, one hideous ⁵⁰ figure grew as familiar as if it had been before the general gaze from the foundations of the world—the figure of the sharp female called La Guillotine.,It was the popular theme for jests; it was the best cure for headache, it infallibly prevented the hair from turning grey, it imparted a peculiar ⁵¹ delicacy ⁵² to the complexion ⁵³, it was the National Razor which shaved close: who kissed La Guillotine, looked through the window and sneezed into the sack. It was the sign of the regeneration of the human race. It superseded ⁵⁴ the Cross. Models of it were worn on breasts from which the Cross was discarded, and it was bowed down to and believed in where the Cross was denied.,It sheared ⁵⁵ off heads so many, that it, and the ground it most polluted, were a rotten red. It was taken to pieces, like a toy-puzzle for a young Devil, and was put together again when the occasion wanted it. It hushed the eloquent ⁵⁶, struck down the powerful, abolished the beautiful and good. Twenty-two friends of high public mark, twenty-one living and one dead, it had lopped the heads off, in one morning, in as many minutes. The name of the strong man of Old Scripture ⁵⁷ had descended ⁵⁸ to the chief functionary ⁵⁹ who worked it; but, so armed, he was stronger than his namesake, and blinder, and tore away the gates of God’s own Temple every day.,I think he had a gun concealed about his person. 我认为他当时身上藏有一支枪。,The administration was tainted with scandal. 丑闻使得政府声名狼藉 。