And then, although it seemed the effort must crack my face, I summoned all the will of me and smiled.
They held water to my lips, and I drank greedily. It must be remembered that all this while I lay helpless on my back, my arms pinioned along with my body inside the jacket. When they offered me food—dry prison bread—I shook my head. I closed my eyes in advertisement that I was tired of their presence. The pain of my partial resuscitation was unbearable. I could feel my body coming to life. Down the cords of my neck and into my patch of chest over the heart darting pains were making their way. And in my brain the memory was strong that Philippa waited me in the big hall, and I was desirous to escape away back to the half a day and half a night I had just lived in old France.
So it was, even as they stood about me, that I strove to eliminate the live portion of my body from my consciousness. I was in haste to depart, but Warden Atherton’s voice held me back.
“Is there anything you want to complain about?” he asked.
Now I had but one fear, namely, that they would unlace me; so that it must be understood that my reply was not uttered in braggadocio but was meant to forestall any possible unlacing.
“You might make the jacket a little tighter,” I whispered. “It’s too loose for comfort. I get lost in it. Hutchins is stupid. He is also a fool. He doesn’t know the first thing about lacing the jacket. Warden, you ought to put him in charge of the loom-room. He is a more profound master of inefficiency than the present incumbent, who is merely stupid without being a fool as well. Now get out, all of you, unless you can think of worse to do to me. In which case, by all means remain. I invite you heartily to remain, if you think in your feeble imaginings that you have devised fresh torture for me.”
“He’s a wooz, a true-blue, dyed-in-the-wool wooz,” Doctor Jackson chanted, with the medico’s delight in a novelty.
“Standing, you are a wonder,” the Warden said. “You’ve got an iron will, but I’ll break it as sure as God made little apples.”
“And you’ve the heart of a rabbit,” I retorted. “One-tenth the jacketing I have received in San Quentin would have squeezed your rabbit heart out of your long ears.”
Oh, it was a touch, that, for the Warden did have unusual ears. They would have interested Lombroso, I am sure.