A big barrel of wine had been dropped and broken in the street. The accident had happened in getting it out of the wagon. It had landed with a bang, breaking the metal rings holding it together; and now the barrel was on the stones near the front door of the wine shop, like the shell of a big broken nut.
All who saw it dropped what they were doing and ran to drink what wine they could save. The rough stones in the road, made to cripple any who tried to walk over them, had places between them that were like little lakes, each catching some of the wine. And by each little lake was a group of people pushing to get to the wine. Some men were face down near the wine, getting what they could in their two hands. Some were giving some to women who leaned over their shoulders. Others would put a cup into the liquid, and a few women even put their head scarves into it before squeezing the wine into the mouths of their babies. A few made little walls of dirt to stop the wine from running away. And there were those who, following directions from people leaning out of high windows, ran here and there to where they believed the most wine could be found. Others were happy to pick up pieces of the broken barrel, drink what little was on them and then chew on them, to get the taste of the wine out of the wet timber.
Very little wine was lost, and not only was the wine itself picked up, but an equal measure of mud was picked up with it, making it look like a miracle-working street cleaner had been there.
There was a lot of laughing and many happy voices for as long as the job of cleaning up the wine lasted. The people were not rough with each other, but it was more like they were playing a game. Those who were able to win a good taste of the wine would shake hands, laugh, dance, and hug each other. When the wine was finished, people returned to what they were doing. The man who had left his saw in a piece of timber he was cutting for the fire, returned to his cutting. The woman who had been trying to warm herself and her hungry child by a container of hot coals, returned to the coals. Men without coats who had come into the winter light from the basements where they worked, returned to the basements. And a sadness returned to the street that was more a part of it than was light from the sun.
The wine had been red wine, and it had painted the ground red there in the Saint Antoine part of Paris. Red too were the hands and faces and cold feet of the people who had come. The hands of the man cutting timber left red marks on the branches that he was cutting now. The woman who had given wine to her baby now had a red mark on her head, where the head scarf had been returned. Those who had chewed on the timber pieces of the barrel had wide red marks on both sides of their mouths. And one tall man, rubbing his finger in the bitter seeds at the bottom of the barrel, used them to write BLOOD on a wall.
A time was coming when that red liquid would be poured out on the street too. And many of these same people would have blood on themselves like the red wine that marked their bodies now.
Now that the clouds were back over Saint Antoine, the darkness in that place was heavy. Cold, dirt, sickness, and hunger were the servants of the poor saint after whom the place was named. Antoine's servants were all strong, but hunger was the strongest. These people had been through many troubles, and they were not the kind of troubles that kept old people young. Everywhere you looked, you could see, instead, young people who had been turned into old people because of their troubles. The children had the faces and voices of adults, and adults had the deep lines of old age, all of it coming from that devil called hunger. You could see hunger in the broken clothes hanging on the lines outside the tall houses. Hunger was there in every little piece of firewood that the man was cutting. It looked down on them from the chimneys that had no smoke coming out, and it looked up at them from the street, where there was not the smallest piece of food thrown away. Hunger was there in the bread shop, where only a few very rough loaves of bread could be found, and in the butcher shop, where dead dogs were cooked and made into sausages. You could hear the dry bones of hunger in the chestnuts that were cooking in a turning cylinder, and in the little bowls of rough potato pieces, cooked in a few small drops of oil, that were to be sold for the smallest coin.
The place and its people were equal to the hunger that lived there. It was a narrow bending street with more narrow bending streets coming off of it. All of them were full of bad smells and of sick-looking people dressed in rags like so many scarecrows. But in these people there was also the hope that things could change. Sad and slow as they were, there were still eyes of fire, tight lips (from all that they were holding back) and serious faces. The lines on their faces were like the ropes that they knew could be used to hang them or could be used by them to hang their enemies.
The dangerous stones on the road, with room between them for mud and water, were not made for walking. Down the middle of the road was a channel for rain water, but in a storm, by the time the channel filled, water would already be working its way into many of the houses. Ropes across the road here and there each held one rough lantern, that the lantern-lighter would lower each night, put a light to, and lift back up on the rope. When one looked at all of these lights moving from side to side in the wind, it gave the feeling of being in a storm on a ship. And in real life a storm was building up there that could have serious effects.
The time would come when the thin scarecrows living in that part of Paris would have watched the lantern-lighter so long that they would have started to think of pulling bodies up on those ropes and putting fire to them. But the time was not yet. For now, the scarecrows would shake in the wind while the birds in their beautiful feathers would go on singing their beautiful songs without any interest in the warnings.
The wine shop was a corner shop, better than most, both in its size and in its looks. Its owner had stood outside in his yellow top and green pants, watching as the people raced for the wine.
"It's not my problem," he had said, lifting and dropping his shoulders to show how little interest he had in it all. "The people from the market dropped it, so they'll just have to bring me another."
Then he saw the tall joker writing his word on the wall. He called out to him from across the street, "Say there, what do you think you're doing?"
The man pointed to his joke, proud of what he had written, as is often the way with his kind. But the joke missed its mark and did not bring a laugh. That too is often the way with his kind.
"What now? Do you want to be locked away as crazy?” asked the wine shop owner as he crossed the road. He picked up mud in his hand on the way, and rubbed it over the word. "Why do you write here on the wall? Is there... listen to me... is there no other place where you can write words like this?"
In saying this, he dropped his clean hand (maybe by accident and maybe not) on the foolish man's heart. The joker pushed it away and jumped high in the air only to come down in a dancing movement, with one shoe pulled off and in his hand. He reached out to the wine shop owner with his shoe.
"Put it on. Put it on. You should call wine wine and leave it at that.” With that, he rubbed his dirty hand on the clothes (if you can call them that) that the joker was wearing, as if to say that he was the reason that the hand had become dirty in the first place. Then he returned across the road and into the wine shop.
This owner was a strong man of thirty, with a thick neck. One could understand him being angry, because it was very cold out and he did not have a coat on (but he carried one over his shoulder). Even the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up, leaving his brown arms with no covering to the elbows. He did not wear a hat either, to cover his short dark hair. He was a dark man all over, with good eyes and a good distance between them. On the whole he was friendly, but he was not the kind of person one would want to argue with, or to meet on a narrow road with water on each side.
Madam Defarge, his wife, was sitting in the shop behind the counter, when he came in. She was a heavy woman of about his age with an eye that looked at nothing and everything at the same time. She had a few heavy rings on her fingers, an interesting face, and a quiet spirit. She had an air of confidence about her that would make one think she was not often wrong in anything she did. Not liking the cold, Madam Defarge was covered in animal skins, with a big scarf turned around her head, but not enough to cover the big rings hanging from her ears. She had been knitting, but she had stopped to pick at her teeth with a match stick. She was so busy doing this, with her left hand holding up her right elbow, that she said nothing when her husband came in. She just made a very little cough and lifted her eyebrow by the smallest distance, as if to say that he needed to look around the shop and see if there were any new people who had come in while he was out.
He looked around to see if there was anyone new in the shop, and he saw an older man together with a young woman, both seated in a corner. There were also two people playing cards, two playing dominoes, and three people at the counter talking. As he walked over to the counter, he heard the older man in the corner say to the young woman, "There's our man."
"What the devil do I have to do with him?” Mr. Defarge asked himself. "I don't know him."
He did not show any interest in the new people, but started talking to the three men at the counter instead.
"How is it, Jack?” said one of the three to Mr. Defarge. "Did they drink all of the wine?"
"Every drop, Jack," answered Mr. Defarge.
At this point, Madam Defarge coughed another little cough, and lifted her eyebrows a little more than she did the first time.
"It is not often," said the second of the three to Mr. Defarge, "that many of these poor animals know the taste of wine, or of anything but black bread and death. Isn't that true, Jack?"
"That's true, Jack," Mr. Defarge returned.
At this, Madam Defarge, still quietly using her match stick to clean her teeth, gave another little cough, and lifted her eyebrows a little higher than she had just done.
The last of the three put down his cup, rubbed his lips together and had his say: "Ah, so much the worse for them! Now they will always have that bitter taste in their mouths. The poor cows do live a hard life, do they not, Jack?"
"You're so right, Jack," Mr. Defarge answered.
This is when Madam Defarge put down her match stick, holding her eyebrows up, and moved a little in her seat.
"Stay there!" whispered her husband. "Men... my wife!"
The three men took off their hats to Madam Defarge, and she answered back by bowing her head and giving them a little look. Then she looked quietly around the wine shop, picked up her needles with what looked like a happy spirit, and turned her whole mind to knitting.
"Good men," said her husband, "the room that you had been asking to see is on the fifth floor. The steps leading up to it start in the little closed yard to my left here, close to the shop window. But now, as I remember, one of you has been there already, and so he can show you all the way. You may go, my friends!"
They paid for their wine and left. Mr. Defarge's eyes were studying his wife at her knitting when the old man came from his corner and asked to have a word with him.
"I would be happy to do that," said Mr. Defarge as he walked quietly with him to the door.
Their talk was very short, but very clear. Almost at the first word Mr. Defarge showed serious interest in what he was hearing. In less than a minute, he showed agreement and stepped outside. The old man showed with his hand that he wanted the young woman to follow him, and she too went out the door. Madam Defarge was so busy knitting that she saw nothing.
Mr. Lorry and Miss Manette left the wine shop to join Mr. Defarge at the foot of the steps that he had just pointed out to the other men. The closed yard was dark and full of bad smells. It was the front yard for many floors of rooms holding many more people. At the foot of the steps, Mr. Defarge went down on one knee to the child of his old master, and put her hand to his lips. It was a humble action, but it marked a change in his spirit. Far from being happy and friendly, he became angry, in a dangerous and secret way.
"It's a long climb. It's a little difficult. Better to start slowly.” Mr. Defarge said this to Mr. Lorry like it was an important rule, as they started climbing the steps.
"Is he alone?” Mr. Lorry whispered.
"Alone? God help him, who should be with him?” said the other in the same low voice.
"Is he always alone, then?”
"Yes."
"Because he wants to be?"
"Because he needs to be. He is now as he was when I first saw him, after they found him and asked if I would take him. They made it clear that I would be in danger if I was not very careful."
"Had he changed much?"
"Changed?!" The owner of the wine shop stopped to hit the wall with his hand and say some very rough words. The answer was clear. Mr. Lorry's spirit grew heavier and heavier as the three of them climbed higher and higher.
Such steps today would be hard enough in the older and poorer parts of Paris; but it was much worse then, for any who were not used to being in such a place. Every room in that great nest of rooms that was one tall building, left their rubbish by these steps; that is, if they did not just throw it out of their windows to land in the yard. The three people were now climbing up through a dark tower filled with this awful smell. Giving in to his own worries, and to those of his young friend, whose worries were growing as they climbed, Mr. Jarvis Lorry stopped two times on the way to have a rest.
Each stop was beside an opening with bars, where light could come in. Because other buildings were so close beside them, it seemed that the openings were taking the best air out of that dark tower and bringing the worst air in. One could almost taste the life in the other awful buildings near this one, and the closest sign of healthy air and high hopes, even up here, were the two tall towers of Notre Dame far off in the distance.
At last they reached the top of the steps, where they rested for the third time. But there was one more narrow ladder up to the room in the roof that they were trying to reach. The shop owner, who had been leading them, and keeping to Mr. Lorry's side of the steps as if afraid the young woman would ask him a question, turned around here and, carefully feeling in the pockets of the coat he carried over his shoulder, took out a key
"The door is locked?” asked Mr. Lorry in surprise.
"Oh, yes," Mr. Defarge answered quite seriously.
"You think you need to keep the poor man away from others?"
Mr. Defarge leaned down to whisper into Mr. Lorry's ear. "I think that I need to be in control."
"Why?"
"Why? Because he has lived so long that way, that he would be afraid... go crazy... die... Who knows what would happen if his door was left open?"
"Is that possible?” Mr. Lorry said with surprise.
"Is it possible!" Defarge whispered bitterly. "Yes. And what a world we live in when it is, and when many other things like it are... not only possible, but done. Done, see you! Under that sky there every day. The devil is real and alive. Now let us go on."
These words had been said so softly that not one had reached the young woman's ears. But by now she was shaking under such emotion, and her face showed so much worry and fear, that Mr. Lorry believed he should speak a word or two to encourage her.
"Do not be afraid, Miss! Be brave! Business, remember? The worst will be over in a minute. It's just a question of opening the door, and the worst will be over. Then all the good, the love, and the happiness you bring to him will start to work. Let our good friend help you up the steps. Thank you, friend Defarge. Come now. Business, business!"
They went up slowly and softly. It was only a short distance and they were at the top. There, on turning the corner, they saw three men bending over, with their heads close together by the door. They were busy looking into the room through some small holes in the wall. On hearing the others, they stood and turned to face them, showing themselves to be the three men with the same name who had been drinking in the wine shop.
"I had forgotten them in the surprise of your visit," Mr. Defarge said. "Leave us, boys; we have business here."
The men squeezed by and climbed quietly down the ladder.
There being no other door on that floor, Mr. Lorry asked the owner in a whisper, and with some anger, "Do you make a show of Mr. Manette?"
"I show him in the way you have seen, to a few people whom I choose."
"Is it right to do that?"
"I think it is right."
"Who are the few people, and how do you choose them?"
"I choose them as real men, men with the same name as me... Jack. I choose men who I think will be better off for seeing. That is enough reason for me. You're English; you would not understand. Wait here for a minute."
With a hand out to hold them back, he leaned over to look through a hole in the wall himself. Soon he lifted his head and knocked two or three times on the door, for no other reason than to say that he was there. Then he pulled the key across the door three or four times for the same reason, before putting it in the lock and turning it as loudly as he could.
The door opened slowly into the room. Defarge looked in and said something. A weak voice answered something. Little more than a word could have been said by either.
Mr. Defarge looked back over his shoulder and made a movement to call them in. Mr. Lorry put his arm strongly around the daughter, to help her, because he had the feeling that she was about to faint.
"A... a... a business!" he said, with a tear on his cheek that was not of business. "Come in. Come in."
"I am not afraid of it," she answered, shaking.
"Of it? Of what?"
"I mean of him. Of my father."
Between Defarge calling them in and Miss Manette being so worried, Mr. Lorry did not know what to do. So he pulled the arm that was shaking on his shoulder, over his neck, and half lifted the girl into the room. He put her down just inside the door, where she stood holding onto him in fear.
Defarge pulled the key out of the lock, closed the door, and then locked the door again from the inside. He did it all with as much noise as he could make of it. Then he walked across the room to where the window was and turned around to face the others.
The room had been a place for firewood in the past, and the window was more of a door in the roof than a window, with a rope and timbers to be used for lifting things from the street below. There was no glass in it, and it opened in two halves. To keep out the cold, one half was locked at all times. The other was only open a very little. So little light was coming through that opening that it was difficult, on first coming into the room, to see anything. Only after living there for a long time would anyone be able to do any work that needed good eyes. Yet work of that kind was being done in that room even now; for, with his back toward the door and his face toward the window, where the wine shop owner stood looking at him, a white-haired man sat on a low bench, leaning forward and was very busily making shoes.