numerous medley of men and women, not to
mention beasts and vehicles of various sorts, was
waiting to issue forth; but, the previous
identification was so strict that they filtered through
the barrier very slowly. Some of these people
knew their turn for examination to be so far off,
that they lay down on the ground to sleep or
smoke, while others talked together, or loitered
about. The red cap and tricolor cockade were
universal, both among men and women.

When he had sat in his saddle some half-hour,
taking note of these things, Darnay found
himself confronted by the same man in authority,
who directed the guard to open the barrier.
Then he delivered to the escort, drunk and sober,
a receipt for the escorted, and requested him to
dismount. He did so, and the two patriots, leading
his tired horse, turned and rode away without
entering the city.

He accompanied his conductor into a guard-
room, smelling of common wine and tobacco,
where certain soldiers and patriots, asleep and
awake, drunk and sober, and in various neutral
states between sleeping and waking, drunkenness
and sobriety, were standing and lying about.
The light in the guard-house, half derived from
the waning oil-lamps of the night, and half from
the overcast day, was in a correspondingly
uncertain condition. Some registers were lying
open on a desk, and an officer of a coarse, dark
aspect, presided over these.

"Citizen Defarge," said he to Darnay's
conductor, as he took a slip of paper to write on.
"Is this the emigrant Evrémonde?"

"This is the man."

"Your age, Evrémonde?"

"Thirty-seven."

"Married, Evrémonde?"

"Yes."

"Where married?"

"In England."

"Without doubt. Where is your wife,
Evrémonde?"

"In England."

"Without doubt. You are consigned,
Evrémonde, to the Prison of La Force."

"Just Heaven!" exclaimed Darnay. "Under
what law, and for what offence?"

The officer looked up from his slip of paper
for a moment.

"We have new laws, Evrémonde, and new
offences, since you were here." He said it with
a hard smile, and went on writing.

"I entreat you to observe that I have come
here voluntarily, in response to that written
appeal of a fellow-citizen which lies before you
I have come here, to clear him and to clear
myself. I demand no more than the opportunity
to do so without delay. Is not that my
right?"

"Emigrants have no rights, Evrémonde," was
the stolid reply. The officer wrote until he had
finished, read over to himself what he had
written, sanded it, and handed it to Citizen
Defarge, with the words "In secret."

Citizen Defarge motioned with the paper to
the prisoner that he must accompany him. The
prisoner obeyed, and a guard of two armed
patriots attended them.

"It is you," said Defarge, in a low voice, as
they went down the guard-house steps and
turned into Paris, "who married the daughter of
Doctor Manette, once a prisoner in the Bastille
that is no more."

"Yes," replied Darnay, looking at him with
surprise.

"My name is Defarge, and I keep a wine-
shop in the Quarter Saint Antoine. Possibly
you have heard of me."

"My wife came to your house to reclaim her
father? Yes!"

The word "wife" seemed to serve as a gloomy
reminder to Citizen Defarge, to say with sudden
impatience, "In the name of that sharp female
newly born and called La Guillotine, why did
you come to France?"

"You heard me say why, a minute ago. Do
you not believe it is the truth?"

"A bad truth for you," said Defarge, speaking
with knitted brows, and looking straight before
him.

"Indeed, I am lost here. All here is so
unprecedented, so changed, so sudden and unfair,
that I am absolutely lost. Will you render me
a little help?"

"None." Citizen Defarge spoke, always looking
straight before him.

"Will you answer me a single question?"

"Perhaps. According to its nature. You
can say what it is."

"In this prison that I am going to so unjustly,
shall I have some free communication
with the world outside?"

"You will see."

"I am not to be buried there, prejudged, and
without any means of presenting my case?"

"You will see. But, what then? Other
people have been similarly buried in worse
prisons, before now."

"But never by me, Citizen Defarge."

Citizen Defarge glanced darkly at him for
answer, and walked on in a steady and set
silence. The deeper he sank into this silence,
the fainter hope there was—or so Damay
thought—of his softening in any slight degree.
He, therefore, made haste to say:

"It is of the utmost importance to me (you
know, Citizen, even better than I, of how much
importance), that I should be able to communicate
to Mr. Lorry of Tellson's Bank, an English
gentleman who is now in Paris, the simple fact,
without comment, that I have been thrown into
the prison of La Force. Will you cause that to
be done for me?"

"I will do," Defarge doggedly rejoined,
"nothing for you. My duty is to my country and the
People. I am the sworn servant of both,
against you. I will do nothing for you."

Charles Darnay felt it hopeless to entreat him
further, and his pride was touched besides. As
they walked on in silence, he could not but see
how used the people were to the spectacle of
prisoners passing along the streets. The very
children scarcely noticed him. A few passers