FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59  
60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   >>   >|  
arm; "do you remember nothing of this man? Look at him. Look at me. Is there no old banker, no old business, no old servant, no old time, rising in your mind, Monsieur Manette?" As the captive of many years sat looking fixedly, by turns, at Mr. Lorry and at Defarge, some long obliterated marks of an actively intent intelligence in the middle of the forehead, gradually forced themselves through the black mist that had fallen on him. They were overclouded again, they were fainter, they were gone; but they had been there. And so exactly was the expression repeated on the fair young face of her who had crept along the wall to a point where she could see him, and where she now stood looking at him, with hands which at first had been only raised in frightened compassion, if not even to keep him off and shut out the sight of him, but which were now extending towards him, trembling with eagerness to lay the spectral face upon her warm young breast, and love it back to life and hope--so exactly was the expression repeated (though in stronger characters) on her fair young face, that it looked as though it had passed like a moving light, from him to her. Darkness had fallen on him in its place. He looked at the two, less and less attentively, and his eyes in gloomy abstraction sought the ground and looked about him in the old way. Finally, with a deep long sigh, he took the shoe up, and resumed his work. "Have you recognised him, monsieur?" asked Defarge in a whisper. "Yes; for a moment. At first I thought it quite hopeless, but I have unquestionably seen, for a single moment, the face that I once knew so well. Hush! Let us draw further back. Hush!" She had moved from the wall of the garret, very near to the bench on which he sat. There was something awful in his unconsciousness of the figure that could have put out its hand and touched him as he stooped over his labour. Not a word was spoken, not a sound was made. She stood, like a spirit, beside him, and he bent over his work. It happened, at length, that he had occasion to change the instrument in his hand, for his shoemaker's knife. It lay on that side of him which was not the side on which she stood. He had taken it up, and was stooping to work again, when his eyes caught the skirt of her dress. He raised them, and saw her face. The two spectators started forward, but she stayed them with a motion of her hand. She had no fear of his striking at her with the kni
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59  
60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
looked
 

repeated

 

expression

 

raised

 

moment

 

Defarge

 

fallen

 
whisper
 

hopeless

 
unquestionably

thought

 

stooping

 

caught

 

striking

 

motion

 
stayed
 

forward

 
recognised
 

monsieur

 

spectators


resumed

 
started
 

spoken

 

spirit

 

labour

 

figure

 

touched

 
Finally
 

stooped

 

shoemaker


unconsciousness
 

happened

 
garret
 

length

 

occasion

 

instrument

 

change

 

single

 

obliterated

 

actively


intent

 

intelligence

 

forced

 
middle
 
forehead
 

gradually

 
fixedly
 

banker

 

remember

 

business