Carton stood next day in an obscure corner among the crowd when Charles Evrémonde, called Darnay, appeared again before the judges.
"Who denounces the accused?" asked the president.
"Ernest Defarge, wine-vendor."
"Good."
"Alexandre Manette, physician."
"President," cried the doctor, pale and trembling, "I indignantly protest to you."
"Citizen Manette, be silent! Call Citizen Defarge."
Rapidly Defarge told his story. He had been among the leaders in the taking of the Bastille. When the citadel had fallen, he had gone to the cell One Hundred and Five, North Tower, and had searched it. In a hole in the chimney he had found a paper in the handwriting of Dr. Manette.
"Let it be read," said the president.
In this paper Dr. Manette had written the history of his imprisonment. In the year 1757 he had been taken secretly by two nobles to visit two poor people who were on the point of death. One was a woman whom one of the nobles had forcibly carried off from her husband; the other, her brother, whom the seducer had mortally wounded. The doctor had come too late; both the woman and her brother died. The doctor refused a fee, and, to relieve his mind, wrote privately to the government stating the circumstances of the crime. One night he was called out of his home on a false pretext, and taken to the Bastille.