“That must never be,” croaked Jacques Three; “no one must escape. We have not half enough as it is. We ought to have six score a day.”
“In a word,” Madame Defarge went on, “my husband has not my reason for pursuing this family to annihilation, and I have not his reason for regarding this Doctor with any sensibility. I must act for myself, therefore. Come hither, little citizen.”
The wood-sawyer, who held her in the respect, and himself in the submission, of mortal fear, advanced with his hand to his red cap.
“Touching those signals, little citizen,” said Madame Defarge, sternly, “that she made to the prisoners; you are ready to bear witness to them this very day?”
“Ay, ay, why not!” cried the sawyer. “Every day, in all weathers, from two to four, always signalling, sometimes with the little one, sometimes without. I know what I know. I have seen with my eyes.”
He made all manner of gestures while he spoke, as if in incidental imitation of some few of the great diversity of signals that he had never seen.
“Clearly plots,” said Jacques Three. “Transparently!”
“There is no doubt of the jury?” inquired Madame Defarge, letting her eyes turn to him with a gloomy smile.
“Rely upon the patriotic jury, dear citizeness. I answer for my fellow-jurymen.”
“Now, let me see,” said Madame Defarge, pondering again. “Yet once more! Can I spare this Doctor to my husband? I have no feeling either way. Can I spare him?”
“He would count as one head,” observed Jacques Three, in a low voice. “We really have not heads enough; it would be a pity, I think.”
“He was signalling with her when I saw her,” argued Madame Defarge; “I cannot speak of one without the other; and I must not be silent, and trust the case wholly to him, this little citizen here. For, I am not a bad witness.”
The Vengeance and Jacques Three vied with each other in their fervent protestations that she was the most admirable and marvellous of witnesses. The little citizen, not to be outdone, declared her to be a celestial witness.
“He must take his chance,” said Madame Defarge. “No, I cannot spare him! You are engaged at three o’clock; you are going to see the batch of to-day executed.—You?”
The question was addressed to the wood-sawyer, who hurriedly replied in the affirmative: seizing the occasion to add that he was the most ardent of Republicans, and that he would be in effect the most desolate of Republicans, if anything prevented him from enjoying the pleasure of smoking his afternoon pipe in the contemplation of the droll national barber. He was so very demonstrative herein, that he might have been suspected (perhaps was, by the dark eyes that looked contemptuously at him out of Madame Defarge’s head) of having his small individual fears for his own personal safety, every hour in the day.
“I,” said madame, “am equally engaged at the same place. After it is over—say at eight to-night—come you to me, in Saint Antoine, and we will give information against these people at my Section.”
The wood-sawyer said he would be proud and flattered to attend the citizeness. The citizeness looking at him, he became embarrassed, evaded her glance as a small dog would have done, retreated among his wood, and hid his confusion over the handle of the saw.
Madame Defarge beckoned the juryman and The Vengeance a little nearer to the door, and there expounded her further views of them thus:
“She will now be at home, awaiting the moment of his death. She will be mourning and grieving. She will be in a state of mind to impeach the justice of the Republic. She will be full of sympathy with its enemies. I will go to her.”
“What an admirable woman; what an adorable woman!” exclaimed Jacques Three, rapturously. “Ah, my cherished!” cried The Vengeance; and embraced her.
“Take you my knitting,” said Madame Defarge, placing it in her lieutenant’s hands, “and have it ready for me in my usual seat. Keep me my usual chair. Go you there, straight, for there will probably be a greater concourse than usual, to-day.”