Heaven, and help us! Look out, look out, and see if we are

pursued.

The wind is rushing after us, and the clouds are flying after us,

and the moon is plunging after us, and the whole wild night is in

pursuit of us, but, so far, we are pursued by nothing else.

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Chapter XLIV

THE KNITTING DONE

n that same juncture of time when the Fifty-Two awaited their

fate, Madame Defarge held darkly ominous council with The

Vengeance and Jacques Three of the Revolutionary Jury. Not

in the wine-shop did Madame Defarge confer with these ministers,

but in the shed of the wood-sawyer, erst a mender of roads. The

sawyer himself did not participate in the conference, but abided at

a little distance, like an outer satellite who was not to speak until

required, or to offer an opinion until invited.

“But our Defarge,” said Jacques Three, “is undoubtedly a good

Republican? Eh?”

“There is no better,” the voluble Vengeance protested in her

shrill notes, “in France.”

“Peace, little Vengeance,” said Madame Defarge, laying her

hand with a slight frown on her lieutenant’s lips, “hear me speak.

My husband, fellow-citizen, is a good Republican and a bold man;

he has deserved well of the Republic, and possesses its confidence.

But my husband has his weaknesses, and he is so weak as to relent

towards this Doctor.”

“It is a great pity,” croaked Jacques Three, dubiously shaking

his head, with his cruel fingers at his hungry mouth; “it is not

quite like a good citizen; it is a thing to regret.”

“See you,” said madame, “I care nothing for this Doctor, I. He

may wear his head or lose it, for any interest I have in him; it is all

one to me. But, the Evremonde people are to be exterminated, and

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the wife and child must follow the husband and father.”

“She has a fine head for it,” croaked Jacques Three. “I have

seen blue eyes and golden hair there, and they looked charming

when Samson held them up.” Ogre that he was, he spoke like an

epicure.

Madame Defarge cast down her eyes, and reflected a little.

“The child also,” observed Jacques Three, with a meditative

enjoyment of his words, “has golden hair and blue eyes. And we

seldom have a child there. It is a pretty sight!”

“In a word,” said Madame Defarge, coming out of her short

abstraction, “I cannot trust my husband in this matter. Not only

do I feel, since last night, that I dare not confide to him the details

of my projects; but also I feel that if I delay, there is danger of his

giving warning, and then they might escape.”

“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.”