A Tale of Two Cities

Mr. Lorry is sitting in Tellson’s Paris branch, which is located in a wing of a lavish mansion that once belonged to Monseigneur. The house has since been confiscated (and partially occupied) by the French Republic, and Lorry is troubled as he looks out the window into the courtyard, where a “grindstone” (269) has been erected. Just as he is feeling grateful that no one he knows is in Paris at the moment, Lucie and Doctor Manette enter the room.

In great distress, Lucie explains that her husband has been imprisoned. Manette is calmer, telling Lorry that his status as a former prisoner of the Bastille gives him “a power that has brought [them] through the barrier, and gained [them] news of Charles” (271). Ultimately, he expects this same power will free Darnay.

As Lorry listens, he attempts to prevent either Manette or his daughter from looking out the window. Once Lucie is in bed, however, Lorry allows Manette to see the courtyard, where rebels are sharpening weapons to murder prisoners: “The eye could not detect one creature in the group, free from the smear of blood. Shouldering one another to get next at the sharpening-stone, were men stripped to the waist, with the stain all over their limbs and bodies” (272). Seeing this, Manette goes out into the crowd and announces who he is in the hopes of stopping the massacre; the people greet him enthusiastically and begin to call for Darnay’s release.

Meanwhile, Lorry tells Lucie what has happened, and learns that her daughter and Miss Pross have also come to Paris. The night passes slowly, with Lucie growing increasingly frightened by the noise from the grindstone (which Lorry tells her is being used by soldiers). When morning comes, the “grindstone stood alone there in the calm morning air, with a red upon it that the sun had never given, and would never take away” (274).

Just as Lorry begins to worry about the consequences housing a prisoner’s family might have for Tellson’s, Lucie tells him that her father plans on renting rooms for the duration of their stay. Lorry therefore tracks down safe lodgings and helps the family move in, leaving Jerry behind as a guard.

That night, Lorry is visited by a man whom he eventually recognizes as Defarge. Defarge explains that Doctor Manette has sent him, along with a note from Darnay. Lorry therefore asks Defarge to come with him to deliver the message to Lucie. As they step out into the courtyard, however, Lorry finds that two women—Madame Defarge and the Vengeance—are waiting. Defarge says that his wife is coming to see Lucie and the child so that she can recognize and protect them in the future.

The group arrives to find Lucie in tears. She is somewhat consoled by her husband’s message, which assures her of Manette’s influence, and gratefully kisses Monsieur and Madame Defarge’s hands. Lorry explains why Madame Defarge has come and urges Lucie to have her daughter brought out. The Defarges then prepare to leave, but Lucie, alarmed by Madame Defarge’s coldness throughout the conversation, begs her to be kind to her husband for her sake and for her daughter’s sake. Madame Defarge, however, refuses to give her any assurance, rejecting her appeal “as a wife and mother” (278): “All our lives, we have seen our sister-women suffer, in themselves and in their children poverty, nakedness, hunger thirst, sickness, misery, oppression and neglect of all kinds” (279).

The Defarges leave, and Lorry attempts to cheer Lucie up by reminding her of the good news about her husband. Lucie, however, remarks that “that dreadful woman seems to have thrown a shadow on [her] and on all [her] hopes” (279).

Doctor Manette is busy for the first three days after arriving in France. When he finally has a chance to recount what he has seen to Lorry, they decide to keep much of what is going on in France a secret from Lucie: while at La Force, Manette saw prisoners being brought before a makeshift tribunal and condemned to death (all told, the narrator estimates, 1,100 prisoners were killed during this period—now known as the September Massacres). Manette also witnessed firsthand the frenzied behavior of the crowds; he saw, for instance, people rush to the aid of a pardoned prisoner who had accidentally been hurt, only to “[plunge] anew into a butchery so dreadful, that the Doctor […] covered his eyes with his hands” (281).

Nevertheless, Manette has been able to use his influence to achieve a great deal of good. Although he was unable to secure Darnay’s pardon—an “unexplained check” (280) prevented this just as the tribunal seemed most sympathetic to Manette’s arguments—Darnay was released from solitary confinement and allowed to send letters to his wife. Furthermore, Manette managed to get himself appointed as an “inspecting physician” (282) at three prisons, giving him further access to Darnay. As Manette talks, Lorry notices that he seems to have a renewed sense of purpose:

Now that […] he knew himself to be invested through that old trial with forces to which [Lucie and Lorry] both looked for Charles’s ultimate safety and deliverance, he became so far exalted by the change, that he took the lead and direction, and required them as the weak, to trust to him as the strong (282).

Manette’s efforts to free Darnay continue to meet with failure as the Revolution progresses and escalates. By the time Darnay has spent a year and three months in prison, the Reign of Terror is well underway: Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette have been executed, new courts have been established, definitions of counterrevolutionary activity have been expanded, and the Revolution’s more moderate leaders have been purged from the government and killed. As all of this becomes “the established order and nature of appointed things” (283), Manette continues to go about his business in the city, sure that he will eventually be successful. 

Throughout the period of Darnay’s imprisonment, Lucie strives to maintain an atmosphere of normalcy, tutoring her daughter and keeping the house prepared for her husband, despite never being sure “but that the Guillotine would strike off [his] head next day” (285). When her father tells her, not long after their arrival, that Darnay might sometimes be able to see her from a prison window, she faithfully waits below for two hours every day.

During one of these visits, a man sawing wood notices and greets Lucie (and, on a later visit, her daughter). The wood-sawyer, who also happens to be the mender of roads, hints that he knows Lucie is there to see someone in prison, but repeatedly insists that it’s “not [his] business” before returning to his saw, which he refers to cheerfully as his “Little Guillotine” (287). Lucie finds the man’s attention unnerving but tries to make friends with him over the course of her visits.

In December of 1793, Lucie is again waiting outside the prison on “a day of some wild rejoicing, and a festival” (288). As she stands there, a crowd of people, including the wood-sawyer and the Vengeance, pass by singing and dancing the revolutionary “Carmagnole.” Manette emerges from the prison just as the crowd passes and reassures his frightened daughter that she doesn’t need to depend on the “mercies” (289) of the crowd: Darnay will be tried the following day, and Manette feels sure he will be “restored” (290) to Lucie. He tells Lucie he needs to go speak to Lorry in preparation for the trial.

When Manette arrives at Tellson’s, someone else is there with Lorry, eager to hear news of Darnay’s trial. It later emerges that this person is Sydney Carton.