“Yes, unhappily.”
“I shall be there, but only as one of the crowd. My Spy will find a place for me. Take my arm, sir.”
Mr. Lorry did so, and they went downstairs and out in the streets. A few minutes brought them to Mr. Lorry’s destination. Carton left him there; but lingered at a little distance, and turned back to the gate again when it was shut, and touched it. He had heard of her going to the prison every day. “She came out here,” he said, looking about him, “turned this way, must have trod on these stones often. Let me follow in her steps.”
It was ten o’clock at night when he stood before the prison of La Force, where she had stood hundreds of times. A little wood-sawyer, having closed his shop, was smoking his pipe at his shop-door.
“Good night, citizen,” said Sydney Carton, pausing in going by; for, the man eyed him inquisitively.
“Good night, citizen.”
“How goes the Republic?”
“You mean the Guillotine. Not ill. Sixty-three today. We shall mount to a hundred soon. Samson and his men complain sometimes, of being exhausted. Ha, ha, ha! He is so droll, that Samson. Such a Barber!”
“Do you often go to see him—”
“Shave? Always. Every day. What a barber! You have seen him at work?”
“Never.”
“Go and see him when he has a good batch. Figure this to yourself, citizen; he shaved the sixty-three today, in less than two pipes! Less than two pipes. Word of honour!”