ed. There was a crashing of
curtains and curtain-poles and a squawking and squalling of attendants as
my hands closed on Chong Mong-ju's throat. The litter overturned, and I
scarce knew whether I was heads or heels, but my clutch never relaxed.

In the confusion of cushions and quilts and curtains, at first few of the
attendants' blows found me. But soon the horsemen were in, and their
heavy whip-butts began to fall on my head, while a multitude of hands
clawed and tore at me. I was dizzy, but not unconscious, and very
blissful with my old fingers buried in that lean and scraggly old neck I
had sought for so long. The blows continued to rain on my head, and I
had whirling thoughts in which I likened myself to a bulldog with jaws
fast-locked. Chong Mong-ju could not escape me, and I know he was well
dead ere darkness, like that of an anaesthetic, descended upon me there
on the cliffs of Fusan by the Yellow Sea.

CHAPTER XVI

Warden Atherton, when he thinks of me, must feel anything but pride. I
have taught him what spirit is, humbled him with my own spirit that rose
invulnerable, triumphant, above all his tortures. I sit here in Folsom,
in Murderers' Row, awaiting my execution; Warden Atherton still holds his
political job and is king over San Quentin and all the damned within its
walls; and yet, in his heart of hearts, he knows that I am greater than
he.

In vain Warden Atherton tried to break my spirit. And there were times,
beyond any shadow of doubt, when he would have been glad had I died in
the jacket. So the long inquisition went on. As he had told me, and as
he told me repeatedly, it was dynamite or curtains.

Captain Jamie was a veteran in dungeon horrors, yet the time came when he
broke down under the strain I put on him and on the rest of my torturers.
So desperate did he become that he dared words with the Warden and washed
his hands of the affair. From that day until the end of my torturing he
never set foot in solitary.

Yes, and the time came when Warden Atherton grew afraid, although he
still persisted in trying to wring from me the hiding-place of the non-
existent dynamite. Toward the last he was badly shaken by Jake
Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer was fearless and outspoken. He had passed
unbroken through all their prison hells, and out of superior will could
beard them to their teeth. Morrell rapped me a full account of the
incident. I was unconscious in the jacket at the time.