The Inmate of the Dungeon | Page 5

pointing to the

chairman and moving slightly to lend emphasis to his narrative, was the
only thing that modified the rigid immobility of his figure. Without a
single change in the pitch or modulation of his voice, never hurrying,
but speaking with the slow and dreary monotony with which he had
begun, he nevertheless--partly by reason of these evidences of his
incredible self-control--made a formidable picture as he proceeded:
"When I told him that, sir, he said he'd take me to the ladder and see if
he couldn't make me change my mind.... Yes, sir; he said he'd take me
to the ladder." (Here there was a long pause.) "And I a human being,
with flesh on my bones and the heart of a man in my body. The other
warden hadn't tried to break my spirit on the ladder. He did break it,
though; he broke it clear to the bottom of the man inside of me; but he
did it with a human word, and not with the dungeon and the ladder. I
didn't believe the warden when he said he would take me to the ladder.
I couldn't imagine myself alive and put through at the ladder, and I
couldn't imagine any human being who could find the heart to put me
through. If I had believed him I would have strangled him then and
there, and got my body full of lead while doing it. No, sir; I could not
believe it.
"And then he told me to come on. I went with him and the guards. He
brought me to the ladder. I had never seen it before. It was a heavy
wooden ladder, leaned against the wall, and the bottom was bolted to
the floor and the top to the wall. A whip was on the floor." (Again there
was a pause.) "The warden told me to strip, sir, and I stripped.... And
still I didn't believe he would whip me. I thought he just wanted to
scare me.
"Then he told me to face up to the ladder. I did so, and reached my
arms up to the straps. They strapped my arms to the ladder, and
stretched so hard that they pulled me up clear of the floor. Then they
strapped my legs to the ladder. The warden then picked up the whip. He
said to me, 'I'll give you one more chance: will you go to work
to-morrow?' I said, 'No; I won't go to work till I get my dues.' 'Very
well,' said he, 'you'll get your dues now.' And then he stepped back and
raised the whip. I turned my head and looked at him, and I could see it

in his eyes that he meant to strike.... And when I saw that, sir, I felt that
something inside of me was about to burst.'"
The convict paused to gather up his strength for the crisis of his story,
yet not in the least particular did he change his position, the slight
movement of his pointing finger, the steady gleam of his eye, or the
slow monotony of his speech. I had never witnessed any scene so
dramatic as this, and yet all was absolutely simple and unintentional. I
had been thrilled by the greatest actors, as with matchless skill they
gave rein to their genius in tragic situations; but how inconceivably
tawdry and cheap such pictures seemed in comparison with this! The
claptrap of the music, the lights, the posing, the wry faces, the gasps,
lunges, staggerings, rolling eyes--how flimsy and colorless, how
mocking and grotesque, they all appeared beside this simple, uncouth,
but genuine expression of immeasurable agony!
The stenographer held his pencil poised above the paper, and wrote no
more.
"And then the whip came down across my back. The something inside
of me twisted hard and then broke wide open, and went pouring all
through me like melted iron. It was a hard fight to keep my head clear,
but I did it. And then I said to the warden this: 'You've struck me with a
whip in cold blood. You' ve tied me up hand and foot, to whip me like a
dog. Well, whip me, then, till you fill your belly with it. You are a
coward. You are lower, and meaner, and cowardlier than the lowest and
meanest dog that ever yelped when his master kicked him. You were
born a coward. Cowards will lie and steal, and you are the same as a
thief and liar. No hound would own you for a friend. Whip me hard and
long, you coward. Whip me, I say. See how good a coward feels when
he ties up a man and whips him like a dog. Whip me till the last breath
quits my body: if