A TALE OF TWO CITIES - 2 - 19 books and stories free download online pdf in English

A TALE OF TWO CITIES - 2 - 19

A TALE OF TWO CITIES

A STORY OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION

By Charles Dickens

The Golden Thread

(19)

An Opinion

Worn out by anxious watching, Mr. Lorry fell asleep at his post. On the

tenth morning of his suspense, he was startled by the shining of the sun

into the room where a heavy slumber had overtaken him when it was dark

night.

He rubbed his eyes and roused himself; but he doubted, when he had

done so, whether he was not still asleep. For, going to the door of the

Doctor's room and looking in, he perceived that the shoemaker's bench

and tools were put aside again, and that the Doctor himself sat reading

at the window. He was in his usual morning dress, and his face (which

Mr. Lorry could distinctly see), though still very pale, was calmly

studious and attentive.

Even when he had satisfied himself that he was awake, Mr. Lorry felt

giddily uncertain for some few moments whether the late shoemaking might

not be a disturbed dream of his own; for, did not his eyes show him his

friend before him in his accustomed clothing and aspect, and employed

as usual; and was there any sign within their range, that the change of

which he had so strong an impression had actually happened?

It was but the inquiry of his first confusion and astonishment, the

answer being obvious. If the impression were not produced by a real

corresponding and sufficient cause, how came he, Jarvis Lorry, there?

How came he to have fallen asleep, in his clothes, on the sofa in Doctor

Manette's consulting-room, and to be debating these points outside the

Doctor's bedroom door in the early morning?

Within a few minutes, Miss Pross stood whispering at his side. If he

had had any particle of doubt left, her talk would of necessity have

resolved it; but he was by that time clear-headed, and had none.

He advised that they should let the time go by until the regular

breakfast-hour, and should then meet the Doctor as if nothing unusual

had occurred. If he appeared to be in his customary state of mind, Mr.

Lorry would then cautiously proceed to seek direction and guidance from

the opinion he had been, in his anxiety, so anxious to obtain.

Miss Pross, submitting herself to his judgment, the scheme was worked

out with care. Having abundance of time for his usual methodical

toilette, Mr. Lorry presented himself at the breakfast-hour in his usual

white linen, and with his usual neat leg. The Doctor was summoned in the

usual way, and came to breakfast.

So far as it was possible to comprehend him without overstepping those

delicate and gradual approaches which Mr. Lorry felt to be the only safe

advance, he at first supposed that his daughter's marriage had taken

place yesterday. An incidental allusion, purposely thrown out, to

the day of the week, and the day of the month, set him thinking and

counting, and evidently made him uneasy. In all other respects, however,

he was so composedly himself, that Mr. Lorry determined to have the aid

he sought. And that aid was his own.

Therefore, when the breakfast was done and cleared away, and he and the

Doctor were left together, Mr. Lorry said, feelingly:

“My dear Manette, I am anxious to have your opinion, in confidence, on a

very curious case in which I am deeply interested; that is to say, it is

very curious to me; perhaps, to your better information it may be less

so.”

Glancing at his hands, which were discoloured by his late work, the

Doctor looked troubled, and listened attentively. He had already glanced

at his hands more than once.

“Doctor Manette,” said Mr. Lorry, touching him affectionately on the

arm, “the case is the case of a particularly dear friend of mine. Pray

give your mind to it, and advise me well for his sake--and above all,

for his daughter's--his daughter's, my dear Manette.”

“If I understand,” said the Doctor, in a subdued tone, “some mental

shock--?”

“Yes!”

“Be explicit,” said the Doctor. “Spare no detail.”

Mr. Lorry saw that they understood one another, and proceeded.

“My dear Manette, it is the case of an old and a prolonged shock,

of great acuteness and severity to the affections, the feelings,

the--the--as you express it--the mind. The mind. It is the case of a

shock under which the sufferer was borne down, one cannot say for how

long, because I believe he cannot calculate the time himself, and there

are no other means of getting at it. It is the case of a shock from

which the sufferer recovered, by a process that he cannot trace

himself--as I once heard him publicly relate in a striking manner. It is

the case of a shock from which he has recovered, so completely, as to

be a highly intelligent man, capable of close application of mind, and

great exertion of body, and of constantly making fresh additions to his

stock of knowledge, which was already very large. But, unfortunately,

there has been,” he paused and took a deep breath--“a slight relapse.”

The Doctor, in a low voice, asked, “Of how long duration?”

“Nine days and nights.”

“How did it show itself? I infer,” glancing at his hands again, “in the

resumption of some old pursuit connected with the shock?”

“That is the fact.”

“Now, did you ever see him,” asked the Doctor, distinctly and

collectedly, though in the same low voice, “engaged in that pursuit

originally?”

“Once.”

“And when the relapse fell on him, was he in most respects--or in all

respects--as he was then?”

“I think in all respects.”

“You spoke of his daughter. Does his daughter know of the relapse?”

“No. It has been kept from her, and I hope will always be kept from her.

It is known only to myself, and to one other who may be trusted.”

The Doctor grasped his hand, and murmured, “That was very kind. That was

very thoughtful!” Mr. Lorry grasped his hand in return, and neither of

the two spoke for a little while.

“Now, my dear Manette,” said Mr. Lorry, at length, in his most

considerate and most affectionate way, “I am a mere man of business,

and unfit to cope with such intricate and difficult matters. I do not

possess the kind of information necessary; I do not possess the kind of

intelligence; I want guiding. There is no man in this world on whom

I could so rely for right guidance, as on you. Tell me, how does this

relapse come about? Is there danger of another? Could a repetition of it

be prevented? How should a repetition of it be treated? How does it come

about at all? What can I do for my friend? No man ever can have been

more desirous in his heart to serve a friend, than I am to serve mine,

if I knew how.

“But I don't know how to originate, in such a case. If your sagacity,

knowledge, and experience, could put me on the right track, I might be

able to do so much; unenlightened and undirected, I can do so little.

Pray discuss it with me; pray enable me to see it a little more clearly,

and teach me how to be a little more useful.”

Doctor Manette sat meditating after these earnest words were spoken, and

Mr. Lorry did not press him.

“I think it probable,” said the Doctor, breaking silence with an effort,

“that the relapse you have described, my dear friend, was not quite

unforeseen by its subject.”

“Was it dreaded by him?” Mr. Lorry ventured to ask.

“Very much.” He said it with an involuntary shudder.

“You have no idea how such an apprehension weighs on the sufferer's

mind, and how difficult--how almost impossible--it is, for him to force

himself to utter a word upon the topic that oppresses him.”

“Would he,” asked Mr. Lorry, “be sensibly relieved if he could prevail

upon himself to impart that secret brooding to any one, when it is on

him?”

“I think so. But it is, as I have told you, next to impossible. I even

believe it--in some cases--to be quite impossible.”

“Now,” said Mr. Lorry, gently laying his hand on the Doctor's arm again,

after a short silence on both sides, “to what would you refer this

attack?”

“I believe,” returned Doctor Manette, “that there had been a strong and

extraordinary revival of the train of thought and remembrance that

was the first cause of the malady. Some intense associations of a most

distressing nature were vividly recalled, I think. It is probable that

there had long been a dread lurking in his mind, that those associations

would be recalled--say, under certain circumstances--say, on a

particular occasion. He tried to prepare himself in vain; perhaps the

effort to prepare himself made him less able to bear it.”

“Would he remember what took place in the relapse?” asked Mr. Lorry,

with natural hesitation.

The Doctor looked desolately round the room, shook his head, and

answered, in a low voice, “Not at all.”

“Now, as to the future,” hinted Mr. Lorry.

“As to the future,” said the Doctor, recovering firmness, “I should have

great hope. As it pleased Heaven in its mercy to restore him so soon, I

should have great hope. He, yielding under the pressure of a complicated

something, long dreaded and long vaguely foreseen and contended against,

and recovering after the cloud had burst and passed, I should hope that

the worst was over.”

“Well, well! That's good comfort. I am thankful!” said Mr. Lorry.

“I am thankful!” repeated the Doctor, bending his head with reverence.

“There are two other points,” said Mr. Lorry, “on which I am anxious to

be instructed. I may go on?”

“You cannot do your friend a better service.” The Doctor gave him his

hand.

“To the first, then. He is of a studious habit, and unusually energetic;

he applies himself with great ardour to the acquisition of professional

knowledge, to the conducting of experiments, to many things. Now, does

he do too much?”

“I think not. It may be the character of his mind, to be always in

singular need of occupation. That may be, in part, natural to it; in

part, the result of affliction. The less it was occupied with healthy

things, the more it would be in danger of turning in the unhealthy

direction. He may have observed himself, and made the discovery.”

“You are sure that he is not under too great a strain?”

“I think I am quite sure of it.”

“My dear Manette, if he were overworked now--”

“My dear Lorry, I doubt if that could easily be. There has been a

violent stress in one direction, and it needs a counterweight.”

“Excuse me, as a persistent man of business. Assuming for a moment,

that he _was_ overworked; it would show itself in some renewal of this

disorder?”

“I do not think so. I do not think,” said Doctor Manette with the

firmness of self-conviction, “that anything but the one train of

association would renew it. I think that, henceforth, nothing but some

extraordinary jarring of that chord could renew it. After what has

happened, and after his recovery, I find it difficult to imagine any

such violent sounding of that string again. I trust, and I almost

believe, that the circumstances likely to renew it are exhausted.”

He spoke with the diffidence of a man who knew how slight a thing

would overset the delicate organisation of the mind, and yet with the

confidence of a man who had slowly won his assurance out of personal

endurance and distress. It was not for his friend to abate that

confidence. He professed himself more relieved and encouraged than he

really was, and approached his second and last point. He felt it to

be the most difficult of all; but, remembering his old Sunday morning

conversation with Miss Pross, and remembering what he had seen in the

last nine days, he knew that he must face it.

“The occupation resumed under the influence of this passing affliction

so happily recovered from,” said Mr. Lorry, clearing his throat, “we

will call--Blacksmith's work, Blacksmith's work. We will say, to put a

case and for the sake of illustration, that he had been used, in his bad

time, to work at a little forge. We will say that he was unexpectedly

found at his forge again. Is it not a pity that he should keep it by

him?”

The Doctor shaded his forehead with his hand, and beat his foot

nervously on the ground.

“He has always kept it by him,” said Mr. Lorry, with an anxious look at

his friend. “Now, would it not be better that he should let it go?”

Still, the Doctor, with shaded forehead, beat his foot nervously on the

ground.

“You do not find it easy to advise me?” said Mr. Lorry. “I quite

understand it to be a nice question. And yet I think--” And there he

shook his head, and stopped.

“You see,” said Doctor Manette, turning to him after an uneasy pause,

“it is very hard to explain, consistently, the innermost workings

of this poor man's mind. He once yearned so frightfully for that

occupation, and it was so welcome when it came; no doubt it relieved

his pain so much, by substituting the perplexity of the fingers for

the perplexity of the brain, and by substituting, as he became more

practised, the ingenuity of the hands, for the ingenuity of the mental

torture; that he has never been able to bear the thought of putting it

quite out of his reach. Even now, when I believe he is more hopeful of

himself than he has ever been, and even speaks of himself with a kind

of confidence, the idea that he might need that old employment, and not

find it, gives him a sudden sense of terror, like that which one may

fancy strikes to the heart of a lost child.”

He looked like his illustration, as he raised his eyes to Mr. Lorry's

face.

“But may not--mind! I ask for information, as a plodding man of business

who only deals with such material objects as guineas, shillings, and

bank-notes--may not the retention of the thing involve the retention of

the idea? If the thing were gone, my dear Manette, might not the fear go

with it? In short, is it not a concession to the misgiving, to keep the

forge?”

There was another silence.

“You see, too,” said the Doctor, tremulously, “it is such an old

companion.”

“I would not keep it,” said Mr. Lorry, shaking his head; for he gained

in firmness as he saw the Doctor disquieted. “I would recommend him to

sacrifice it. I only want your authority. I am sure it does no good.

Come! Give me your authority, like a dear good man. For his daughter's

sake, my dear Manette!”

Very strange to see what a struggle there was within him!

“In her name, then, let it be done; I sanction it. But, I would not take

it away while he was present. Let it be removed when he is not there;

let him miss his old companion after an absence.”

Mr. Lorry readily engaged for that, and the conference was ended. They

passed the day in the country, and the Doctor was quite restored. On the

three following days he remained perfectly well, and on the fourteenth

day he went away to join Lucie and her husband. The precaution that

had been taken to account for his silence, Mr. Lorry had previously

explained to him, and he had written to Lucie in accordance with it, and

she had no suspicions.

On the night of the day on which he left the house, Mr. Lorry went into

his room with a chopper, saw, chisel, and hammer, attended by Miss Pross

carrying a light. There, with closed doors, and in a mysterious and

guilty manner, Mr. Lorry hacked the shoemaker's bench to pieces, while

Miss Pross held the candle as if she were assisting at a murder--for

which, indeed, in her grimness, she was no unsuitable figure. The

burning of the body (previously reduced to pieces convenient for the

purpose) was commenced without delay in the kitchen fire; and the tools,

shoes, and leather, were buried in the garden. So wicked do destruction

and secrecy appear to honest minds, that Mr. Lorry and Miss Pross,

while engaged in the commission of their deed and in the removal of its

traces, almost felt, and almost looked, like accomplices in a horrible

crime.

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