hand on his account; and then re-crossed the road and entered the
wine-shop.
This wine-shop keeper was a bull-necked, martial-looking man
of thirty, and he should have been of a hot temperament, for,
although it was a bitter day, he wore no coat, but carried one slung
over his shoulder. His shirt-sleeves were rolled up, too, and his
brown arms were bare to the elbows. Neither did he wear
anything more on his head than his own crisply-curling short dark
hair. He was a dark man altogether, with good eyes and a good
bold breadth between them. Good-humoured looking on the
whole, but implacable-looking, too; evidently a man of a strong
resolution and a set purpose; a man not desirable to be met,
rushing down a narrow pass with a gulf on either side, for nothing
would turn the man.
Madame Defarge, his wife, sat in the shop behind the counter
as he came in. Madame Defarge was a stout woman of about his
Charles Dickens ElecBook Classics
own age, with a watchful eye that seldom seemed to look at
anything, a large hand heavily ringed, a steady face, strong
features, and great composure of manner. There was a character
about Madame Defarge from which one might have predicted that
she did not often make mistakes against herself in any of the
reckonings over which she presided. Madame Defarge being
sensitive to cold, was wrapped in fur, and had a quantity of bright
shawl twined about her head, though not to the concealment of
her large ear-rings. Her knitting was before her, but she had laid it
down to pick her teeth with a toothpick. Thus engaged, with her
right elbow supported by her left ha