Page:The Plutocrat (1927).pdf/20

 of animation; and the animation had increased hour by hour, until now, as his blurred eyes half opened from time to time to give him glimpses of whirling walls, ceiling, curtains, and mirrors, the happy pride he had felt upon his first sight of this cell of misery bore the aspect of lunacy.

But his most dreadful thought was that he had committed himself to twelve days of what he now endured. Twelve years would have seemed little longer, for already he was flaccid with the interminable passage of time, and no more than a quarter of the first day of the twelve, each composed of twenty-four unbearable hours, had gone by. Why had nobody warned him not to embark on a twelve-day voyage? Had he no friends possessed of even sight intelligence? He thought of them, driving home a beautiful, peaceful taxicabs from theatres, or loung, ing in health beside the wood fire in the solid restfulness of the club, and his envy of them was like hatred. "Eleven days!" he gasped, in a wretchedness that foresaw no mitigation forever. "Eleven days and three quarters!"

He had always thought himself a resourceful young man; but he understood that under the circumstances resourcefulness was a quality of little prac-