Citizen Manette, be silent! Call Citizen Defarge."

Rapidly Defarge told his story. He had been among the leaders in the
taking of the Bastille. When the citadel had fallen, he had gone to the
cell One Hundred and Five, North Tower, and had searched it. In a hole
in the chimney he had found a paper in the handwriting of Dr. Manette.

"Let it be read," said the president.

In this paper Dr. Manette had written the history of his imprisonment.
In the year 1757 he had been taken secretly by two nobles to visit two
poor people who were on the point of death. One was a woman whom one of
the nobles had forcibly carried off from her husband; the other, her
brother, whom the seducer had mortally wounded. The doctor had come too
late; both the woman and her brother died. The doctor refused a fee,
and, to relieve his mind, wrote privately to the government stating the
circumstances of the crime. One night he was called out of his home on a
false pretext, and taken to the Bastille.

The nobles were the Marquis de St. Evremonde and his brother; and the
Marquis was the father of Charles Darnay. A terrible sound arose in the
court when the reading was done. The voting of the jury was unanimous,
and at every vote there was a roar. Death in twenty-four hours!

That night Carton again came to Mr. Lorry. Between the two men, as they
spoke, a figure on a chair rocked itself to and fro, moaning. It was Dr.
Manette.

"He and Lucie and her child must leave Paris to-morrow," said Carton.
"They are in danger of being denounced. It is a capital crime to mourn
for, or sympathise with, a victim of the guillotine. Be ready to start
at two o'clock to-morrow afternoon. See them into their seats; take your
own seat. The moment I come to you, take me in, and drive away.

"It shall be done."

Carton turned to the couch where Lucie lay unconscious, prostrated with
utter grief.

He bent down, touched her face with his lips, and murmured some words.
Little Lucie told them afterwards that she heard him say, "A life you
love."

_VI.--The Guillotine_

In the black prison of the Conciergerie, the doomed of the day awaited
their fate. Fifty-two persons were to roll that afternoon on the
life-tide of the city to the boundless, everlasting sea.

The hours went on as Darnay walked to and fro in his cell, and the
clocks struck the numbers he would never hear again. The final hour, he
knew, was three, and he expected to be summoned at two. The clo