Doubles

Atwood reads the Old Bailey trial the way a cryptographer reads a letter: convinced Dickens hid things in it. She's right. There is a joke buried in the name Barsad that he could never have printed, and a mirror hung over a prisoner's head doing far more than lighting his face. The trial saves Charles Darnay's life by a resemblance, and Atwood shows why that resemblance is not a courtroom trick. It's the engine of the entire book, planted here so the ending can fire.