A Tale of Two Cities

With this on his mind, which was enough to carry into a dreary prison
courtyard, he arrived at the prison of La Force.

A man with a bloated face opened the strong wicket, to whom Defarge
presented "The Emigrant Evremonde."

"What the Devil!  How many more of them!" exclaimed the man with
the bloated face.

Defarge took his receipt without noticing the exclamation,
and withdrew, with his two fellow-patriots.

"What the Devil, I say again!" exclaimed the gaoler, left with his wife.
"How many more!"

The gaoler's wife, being provided with no answer to the question,
merely replied, "One must have patience, my dear!"  Three turnkeys who
entered responsive to a bell she rang, echoed the sentiment, and one
added, "For the love of Liberty;" which sounded in that place like an
inappropriate conclusion.

The prison of La Force was a gloomy prison, dark and filthy, and with
a horrible smell of foul sleep in it.  Extraordinary how soon the
noisome flavour of imprisoned sleep, becomes manifest in all such
places that are ill cared for!

"In secret, too," grumbled the gaoler, looking at the written paper.
"As if I was not already full to bursting!"

He stuck the paper on a file, in an ill-humour, and Charles Darnay
awaited his further pleasure for half an hour:  sometimes, pacing to
and fro in the strong arched room:  sometimes, resting on a stone seat:
in either case detained to be imprinted on the memory of the chief
and his subordinates.

"Come!" said the chief, at length taking up his keys, "come with me,
emigrant."

Through the dismal prison twilight, his new charge accompanied him by
corridor and staircase, many doors clanging and locking behind them,
until they came into a large, low, vaulted chamber, crowded with
prisoners of both sexes.  The women were seated at a long table,
reading and writing, knitting, sewing, and embroidering; the men were
for the most part standing behind their chairs, or lingering up and
down the room.

In the instinctive association of prisoners with shameful crime and
disgrace, the new-comer recoiled from this company.  But the crowning
unreality of his long unreal ride, was, their all at once rising to
receive him, with every refinement of manner known to the time, and
with all the engaging graces and courtesies of life.

So strangely clouded were these refinements by the prison manners and
gloom, so spectral did they become in the inappropriate squalor and
misery through which they were seen, that Charles Darnay seemed to
stand in a company of the dead.  Ghosts all!  The ghost of beauty,
the ghost of stateliness, the ghost of elegance, the ghost of pride,
the ghost of frivolity, the ghost of wit, the ghost of youth, the
ghost of age, all waiting their dismissal from the desolate shore,
all turning on him eyes that were changed by the death they had died
in coming there.

It struck him motionless.  The gaoler standing at his side, and the
other gaolers moving about, who would have been well enough as to
appearance in the ordinary exercise of their functions, looked so
extravagantly coarse contrasted with sorrowing mothers and blooming
daughters who were there--with the apparitions of the coquette,
the young beauty, and the mature woman delicately bred--that the
inversion of all experience and likelihood which the scene of shadows
presented, was heightened to its utmost.  Surely, ghosts all.
Surely, the long unreal ride some progress of disease that had
brought him to these gloomy shades!

"In the name of the assembled companions in misfortune," said a
gentleman of courtly appearance and address, coming forward,
"I have the honour of giving you welcome to La Force, and of
condoling with you on the calamity that has brought you among us.
May it soon terminate happily!  It would be an impertinence elsewhere,
but it is not so here, to ask your name and condition?"

Charles Darnay roused himself, and gave the required information,
in words as suitable as he could find.

"But I hope," said the gentleman, following the chief gaoler with his
eyes, who moved across the room, "that you are not in secret?"

"I do not understand the meaning of the term, but I have heard them
say so."

"Ah, what a pity!  We so much regret it!  But take courage; several
members of our society have been in secret, at first, and it has
lasted but a short time."  Then he added, raising his voice,
"I grieve to inform the society--in secret."

There was a murmur of commiseration as Charles Darnay crossed the
room to a grated door where the gaoler awaited him, and many
voices--among which, the soft and compassionate voices of women were
conspicuous--gave him good wishes and encouragement.  He turned at
the grated door, to render the thanks of his heart; it closed under
the gaoler's hand; and the apparitions vanished from his sight forever.