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PinkMonkey.com Digital Library - A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens


83

Not seeing with precision what was very hard, Mr. Lorry shook his
head; using that important part of himself as a sort of fairy cloak
that would fit anything.

“All sorts of people who are not in the least degree worthy of the
pet, are always turning up,” said Miss Pross. “When you began it--
” “I began it, Miss Pross?” “Didn’t you? Who brought her father to
life?”

“Oh! If that was beginning it--” said Mr. Lorry.
“It wasn’t ending it, I suppose? I say, when you began it, it was
hard enough; not that I have any fault to find with Doctor Manette,
except that he is not worthy of such a daughter, which is no
imputation on him, for it was not to be expected that anybody
should be, under any circumstances. But it really is doubly and
trebly hard to have crowds and multitudes of people turning up
after him (I could have forgiven him), to take Ladybird’s affections
away from me.” Mr. Lorry knew Miss Pross to be very jealous, but
he also knew her by this time to be, beneath the service of her
eccentricity, one of those unselfish creatures-found only among
women-who will, for pure love and admiration, bind themselves
willing slaves, to youth when they have lost it, to beauty that they
never had, to accomplishments that they were never fortunate
enough to gain, to bright hopes that never shone upon their own
sombre lives. He knew enough of the world to know that there is
nothing in it better than the faithful service of the heart; so
rendered and so free from any mercenary taint, he had such an
exalted respect for it, that in the retributive arrangements made by
his own mind-we all make such arrangements, more or less-he
stationed Miss Pross much nearer to the lower Angels than many
ladies immeasurably better got up both by Nature and Art, who
had balances at Tellson’s.

“There never was, nor will be, but one man worthy of Ladybird,”
said Miss Pross; “and that was my brother Solomon, if he hadn’t
made a mistake in life.”

Here again: Mr. Lorry’s inquiries into Miss Pross’s personal history
had established the fact that her brother Solomon was a heartless
scoundrel who had stripped her of everything she possessed, as a
stake to speculate with, and had abandoned her in her poverty for
evermore, with no touch of compunction. Miss Pross’s fidelity of
belief in Solomon (deducting a mere trifle for this slight mistake)
was quite a serious matter with Mr. Lorry, and had its weight in
his good opinion of her.

“As we happen to be alone for the moment, and are both people of
business,” he said, when they had got back to the drawing-room
and had sat down there in friendly relations, “Let me ask you-
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