ATALE OF TWO CITIES

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXX, 13 June 1936, Page 2

ATALE OF TWO CITIES

Adapted bty LEBBEUS MITCHEUR

Synopsis Charles Darnay, - young Frenchman who has renounced his inheritance, married Lucie, the daughter of Dr. Manette whom Darney’s uncle, the Marquis of Evremonde, had wrongfully imprisoned in the Bastille for 18 years, receives a letter from his old tutor, Gabelle, who has fallen into the hands of the revolutionary Parisian mob, imploring him to come and testify in his favour —to save his life, barney obeys the summons, leaving a letter for his father-in-law. Dr. Manette tells Lucie they must follow Darnay to France — he who had suffered at the hands of an Evremonde must journey from London to France to save an Evremonde. THE MASSACRE AT LA FORCE PRISON CHAPTER VIII As Charles Darnay passed through village after village en route from Calais to Paris, he was halted at barriers which had been constructed across the main street. His coach was stopped and he was asked fox his papers. They were found m order. „ “Darnay? Yes, pass—Evremonde, said one of the guards at a barrier in a. village approaching the Parisian environs. Darnay glanced nervously at ine guard at his pronouncement of that name hated in France. The guard was grinning hideously at his iellow. The gate of the barrier was closed, and instinctively Darnay looked back with a feeling that prison doors had swung to behind him. The nearer he came to Paris, the heavier upon him weighed that sinister sensation. At Barrier No. 4 in the Rue Antoine, Darnay got out of the carriage and waited before the little shed in which a man. bent over the desk, was reading the passport he had presented. The man was Defarge. He lifted his head and made a sign to the soldiers who stood about, some holding torches “Take Evremonde to La Force prison,” he ordered. “Prison? Under what law?’ demanded Darnay. “For what offence?” “We have new laws, Evremonde, and new offences —since you were here.” “Will you permit me to communicate with Mr Lorry of Tellson’s Bank who is now in Paris—” Defarge interrupted roughly: “I will do nothing for you. Take him away.” A quarter of an hour later, the great door of La Force clanged to behind Charles Darnay. He was swallowed up in the forbidding blackness of that redoubtable building—a prisoner of the Revolutionary party. While Darnay was accustoming himself as best he could to the darkness and discomfort of his cell, the wheezing of a grindstone made a continuous buzzing before the door of Tellson’s Parisian Bank. In the mob gathered in front of the bank were Madame Defarge, La Vengeance and the wood-cutter who was last seen toying with a miniature guillotine. “To-night this pampering of the aristos in the prisons will end,” proclaimed Madame Defarge. “We feed them —but did they feed us? We give them trials. Did they give us trials?” “La Force first!” cried La Vengeance, waving her arm and laughing wildly. A swelling of hoarse shouts of approval met her words and many of the mob lifted their weapons and began moving off. Jarvis Lorry stood at a window of his room in Tellson’s Bank, watching the scene below —the dispersal of the enraged mob, the speed with which the knife-sharp-ener plied his trade at the grindstone; the line of men and women still waiting to have a keener cutting edge put on their instruments of death. He clasped his hands behind him as he watched the grisly spectacle, murmuring: “Thank God that no one near and dear to me is in this dreadful town to-night!” The murmur had scarcely died away from his lips when there came a knocking at the door behind him. He strode to it and threw it open to find Dr. Manette, Lucie, and Miss Pross, the latter with Little Lucie asleep in her arms, standing before him. At sight of Mr Lorry, Lucie extended imploring arms toward him with that look of unrest and concentration which exerted such power upon him. “Lucie! Dr. Manette!” he cried. “What has happened?” “Oh, my dear friend, my husband . . .” Lucie began, and could not go

on. “Charles is here in Paris,” explained Dr Manette. “He’s been arrested!” Lucie cried in desperate excitement.

“Now, now, let’s be calm. . . .” began Lorry when Miss Pross interrupted: “Now tell me where I can put this infant where she won’t be frightened by that howling mob.” “Take her right into that bedroom,” said Mr Lorry with a gesture to a door at the side. As Miss Pross carried the child away, Lucie stepped to a window overlooking the street. There came a great outcry from the mob. "I hear them crying, ‘On to La Force!’ ” she said. “They mean to kill the prisoners! They mean to kill Charles! What shall we do?” “Lucie, my child, if ever you were brave you will compose yourself now,” entreated her father. “You must stay here quietly while I go to see if I can save Charles.” Mr Lorry interposed: “But, Dr. Manette, you can’t go out in that mob!” “You forget that I have been a Bastille prisoner,” responded Dr. Manette with a peculiar smile. “That gives me power here. Lucie, stay with Pross and Mr Lorry and hope that I can bring you back some good news.”

“I will pray'■that you do,” said Lucie, and in her eyes glowed a steadfast courage as she watched her father leave the room. Then she went to the window from which Mr Lorry had watched the mob; saw the slight, stooping form of her white-haired father make his way among the weirdly lighted scene in the street below, pushing his way among the bloodthirty riff-raff of Paris waiting impatiently their turn to have knife,, sword or sickle sharpened to a keen cutting edge before joining the advance guard of sans-culotted men and liberty-becapped women already en route to storm La Force prison and bring the taste of death to the lips of the cursed aristocrats.

Lucie was barely able to distinguish her father’s words above the din of the mob. “Help here! Dr. Manette. ... A prisoner in the Bastille. . . . Yes, Citizens for eighteen years! Your help, Citizens! Justice for me —for my family!” His words appeared to have caught attentive ears, for members of the insensate crowd swarmed towards nim, threatened to engulf him. Above the roar of confused cries, tramping of feet, grinding of knives, voices now and then made themselves distinguishable: “The Citizen Doctor!”, “Come with us!” “On to Le Force!” “Justice for the Citizen Doctor!”. “Hail Dr. Manette —hero of the Revolution!”, “The Bastille prisoner—Dr. Manette!” Lucie saw half a dozen of the ruf-fianly-appearing sans-culotte make a rush for her father, lift him up to their shoulders and sweep away with him through the opened gate of the street barrier. “Merciful Creator,” prayed Lucie silently, “have pity on your servant Charles. He came here to save a life—save his.” Miss Pross finally coaxed her away from the window into the bedroom where little Lucie was fast asleep.- By the side of the child’s bed, Lucie fell to her knees and continued a wordless prayer for the safety of the man she loved. It was so that Pross left her, went into the outer chamber and joined Mr Lorry who was again standing at the window overlooking the street. Daylight was streaming through the window when the distant shouting of the triumphant mob returning from La Force assailed * their ears. “They’re coming back!” said Pross, a ghastly awe in her voice. “We shouldn’t have let the Doctor go.” muttered Mr Lorry. “My poor ladybird. . . . Oh, look! . . . They are covered with bloodwomen, too!” The advance-guard of the victorious mob entered through the gate in the street barrier. Carried high above their heads, on the ends of long pikes, were the heads of a number of their victims, still dripping with blood. The clamour and the shouting grew louder. White and sick at the sight, Pross withdrew from the window. Mr Lorry remained there, trying to distinguish the figure of Dr. Manette in that blood-surfeited,, mass of the dregs of humanity. ' At the sound of an outer door opening and shutting, Lucie came out of the bodroom. “Father?” she said, and looked about. And then the door of the room opened, Dr. Manette, haggard and disheveled, entered. “Father! Father!” She ran to him, her hands extended. “He is safe,” said the Doctor, “Thank God! Oh, thank God! .... You saw him?” “I saw the head of the prison—told him who I was. He put Charles high in the Tower where he was safe from the mob. For the moment he is safe, but we must get him to trial quickly. If I testify before the Tribunal, I know I can win .his release. By the aid of Heaven I will do it!” (To be continued)