wledged, with his troubled hand

at his chin, and his troubled eyes on Carton.

“In short,” said Sydney, “this is a desperate time, when

desperate games are played for desperate stakes. Let the Doctor

play the winning game; I will play the losing one. No man’s life

here is worth purchase. Any one carried home by the people

today, may be condemned tomorrow. Now, the stake I have

resolved to play for, in case of the worst, is a friend in the

Conciergerie. And the friend I purpose to myself to win, is Mr.

Barsad.”

“You need have good cards, sir,” said the spy.

“I’ll run them over. I’ll see what I hold,Mr. Lorry, you know

Charles Dickens ElecBook Classics

what a brute I am; I wish you’d give me a little brandy.”

It was put before him, and he drank off a glassfuldrank off

another glassfulpushed the bottle thoughtfully away.

“Mr. Barsad,” he went on, in the tone of one who really was

looking over a hand at cards: “Sheep of the prisons, emissary of

Republican committees, now turnkey, now prisoner, always spy

and secret informer, so much the more valuable here for being

English that an Englishman is less open to suspicion of

subornation in those characters than a Frenchman, represents

himself to his employers under a false name. That’s a very good

card. Mr. Barsad, now in the employ of the republican French

government, w