"A Tale of Two Cities"
by Charles Dickens

  Previous Page   Next Page   Speaker Off
 

     "Pray," said Mr. Lorry, in a soothing tone, bringing his left hand from the back of the chair to lay it on the supplicatory fingers that clasped him in so violent a tremble: "pray control your agitation--a matter of business. As I was saying--"

     Her look so discomposed him that he stopped, wandered, and began anew:

 

     "As I was saying; if Monsieur Manette had not died; if he had suddenly and silently disappeared; if he had been spirited away; if it had not been difficult to guess to what dreadful place, though no art could trace him; if he had an enemy in some compatriot who could exercise a privilege that I in my own time have known the boldest people afraid to speak of in a whisper, across the water there; for instance, the privilege of filling up blank forms for the consignment of any one to the oblivion of a prison for any length of time; if his wife had implored the king, the queen, the court, the clergy, for any tidings of him, and all quite in vain;--then the history of your father would have been the history of this unfortunate gentleman, the Doctor of Beauvais."

 
Text provided by Project Gutenberg.
Audio by LiteralSystems, performed by Jane Aker and supported by Gordon W. Draper.
Flash mp3 player by Jeroen Wijering. (cc) some rights reserved.
Web page presentation by LoudLit.org.