17. One Night
Never did the sun go down more beautifully on the quiet corner in Soho than it did one very special evening when the Doctor and his daughter sat under the big tree together. Never did the moon come up with a nicer smile over London than it did on that same night when it looked down on their faces through the leaves of the big tree in the yard behind their rooms.
Lucie was to be married the next day. She had saved this evening for her father, and they sat alone under the tree.
"Are you happy, father?"
"Yes, very happy, my child."
They had been there for a long time, but they had said little. When there was enough light to work or read, she had not worked and she had not read to him as she did most nights. This night was too special for either work or reading.
"I too am very happy tonight, father. I am deeply happy in the love that heaven has blessed me with -- both my love for Charles and his love for me. But if my life were not to still be used for you, and if our being married were to take me even the length of a few streets away from you, I would be sadder now than I could tell you. Even as it is..."
Even as it was, she could not control her voice enough to finish what she had started.
In the sad light of the moon, she hugged him by the neck, and put her face on his chest. The light of the moon -- like the light of the sun, and the light of life -- is always sad as it comes and as it goes.
"Father, my love, can you tell me this one last time, that you are very very sure that no new love of mine and no new service that I must do will ever come between us? For myself I am sure, but I want to know that you are too. In your heart, do you have this confidence?
Her father answered with such confidence and trust that he could never have been doing it falsely, "Quite sure, my love! And more than that," he added, as he kissed her softly, "my future is even better because of you marrying Charles, than what it could have been... no, than it has ever been, without it."
"If I could hope for that, father..."
"Believe it, my love, for it is true. Think about how clear this truth is. As young and loving as you are, you could not know how much I have worried about you wasting your life."
She reached her hand toward his lips, but he took it away and repeated the word.
"Yes, wasted, my child... pulled away from the life that others of your age would live, all because you wanted to care for me. Your love for me could not see how much I have worried about that. But just ask yourself, how could my happiness be perfect when I knew that you were missing out on an important part of life?"
"If I had never seen Charles, father, I would have been quite happy with you."
He smiled at how she had said, by accident, that without Charles, her happiness now would not be full, and he answered:
"But, my child, you did see him. And if it had not been Charles, it would have been someone else. Or if it had not been another, I would have been the reason for you not seeing, and then the dark part of my life would have moved from me to you."
Apart from when they were in the court, this was the first time that he had ever talked to her about the pain of his past. It was a strange feeling for her to hear this, and she remembered the words for a long time after that.
"See!" said the Doctor from Beauvais, with his hand reaching up toward the moon. "I have looked at her through the prison window when her light only gave me sadness. I have looked at her when it was such torture to think of her light touching all that I had lost, that I would hit my head against the prison walls, trying to kill myself. I have watched her at times when I had no feeling and almost no life, and the best I could think of was how many horizontal lines I could draw across her, and how many vertical lines I could cross them with.” He added in a voice like he was back there now, "It was twenty each way, I remember. And the last one was difficult to squeeze in."
The strange feeling she had about hearing him talk of his past grew stronger as he talked on. But there was nothing to make her afraid in the way he was doing it now. He was only using it to say how happy he was now that it was over.
"I have looked at her a thousand times, thinking about the child who was not yet born when I was taken away. Had it been born alive? Or did it die from what its poor mother went through? Was it a son who would one day fight for his father? (There was a time when all I wanted was to hurt those who had hurt me.) Was it a son who would never know his father's story, who might even grow to believe that his father had chosen to leave him. Or would it be a daughter, who would one day grow into a woman?"
She moved closer, and kissed his cheek and his hand.
"I had pictured my daughter, to myself, as knowing nothing about me, and never thinking of me. I thought ahead, through the years of her life, as she grew into a woman, until she one day married a man who would know nothing of me. It would be like I had never lived, and their children would be without any thought of me."
"My father! Even to hear that you thought about such a daughter who never was real makes me feel like I am that child."
"You, Lucie? It is because of all you have done to bring me back that I even think such thoughts under the moon here tonight. Now, what was I just saying?"
"That this daughter knew nothing of you, and she thought nothing of you."
"Yes. But on other nights when the moon was out and I was feeling more of a sad peace, as any emotion growing out of pain can do, I had thoughts of her coming to me in the prison, and leading me into the liberty that was on the other side of the walls. I would see her often in the light of the moon, just as I see you now, but I could never hold her in my arms. She stood in the space between the door and the little window. But do you understand that this person was not the child that I was just talking about?"
"You mean that person was not... was not the one you thought about?"
"No. What I saw was something else. It stood before my confused look, but it never moved. The child that was in my mind was the more real one. I had no way of knowing what she would look like, apart from knowing that she would look like her mother. That other shape looked like her mother too, as you do right now, but it wasn't the same. Do you follow me, Lucie? I don't think you could. I think you would need to have lived as a prisoner alone for many years to understand a thing like this."
The peace he had in talking about the past at this time made Lucie's blood run cold.
"At those times when I was at peace, I would think of her coming to lead me to the home where she lived with her husband. It was full of things to make her remember her lost father. My picture was in her room, and I was in her prayers. Her life was busy, happy, and of help to many. But my sad history was part of it all."
"I was that child, father! I am not half as good, but in my love, that was me."
"And she showed me her children" said the Doctor from Beauvais. "They had heard of me, and they had been taught to think sadly of me. When going by a prison, they would stay far away from its angry walls, look up at its bars, and speak in whispers. In my thoughts she was never able to keep me free. She would lead me back to the prison after showing me such things. But I would find peace in crying when it was over. I would fall on my knees and bless her."
"I hope that I am that child, Father. But will you bless me with as much emotion tomorrow?"
"Lucie, I have remembered those old thoughts in the way I have tonight as a way of loving you better than words can tell, and of thanking God for my great happiness. My thoughts, when they were the wildest, never gave me such happiness as I have now here with you."
He hugged her, giving her to God, and humbly thanking God for giving her to him. Not long after that, they went into the house.
No one had been asked to come to the wedding, apart from Mr. Lorry. There was not even another young woman to help Lucie on the day... only sad old Miss Pross. The wedding had made no change in where she lived, because they had been able to rent the rooms above, where they had always believed someone lived whom they never saw. And they wanted nothing more.
Doctor Manette was very happy as they sat down for something to eat with Miss Pross. He was sad that Charles was not there and half wanted to argue with the foolish belief that the man must not be there on the night before the wedding. He had a special drink for Charles instead.
It came time for Lucie to go to bed, and so they all separated. But in the middle of the night, Lucie came quietly down the steps to look into her father's room. She was still not fully over her fears for him.
But everything was in its place, and all was quiet. His white hair was like a picture of peace on the smooth pillow, and his hands were folded together on top of the blanket. She left her candle in a corner, moved over to him without making a sound, and kissed him softly on the lips. Then she leaned over and looked lovingly at him.
His time in prison had been like rivers cutting many lines in his face. But his strength was such that it had covered many of them, and the change was there even when he was asleep. A more wonderful face, in its quiet, strong, and often secret fight with an invisible enemy, was not to be found in any other sleeping person that night.
She shyly put her hand on his chest and said a prayer, asking God to help her stay as true to him as her love hoped for and as his pained past needed. Then she pulled back her hand and kissed his lips again before leaving the room. As the sun came up, the shadows of the leaves on the big tree in the yard moved across his face as quietly as her lips had moved in praying for him.