### Clue: What Madame Defarge does fools king in the beginning (5)
### Answer: KNITS 
 ### Explanation: Definition: What Madame Defarge does 
 NITS(fools/idiots) **placed after**(… in the beginning) K(abbrev. for "king", in chess notation).
Defn: … in Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities.