Liberian Literary Magazine
January Issue 0115
besides, nothing could be more dreary than drinking
good wine and seeing no one. And
tobacco spoilt the air of his room. In the first year
the books he sent for were principally of a light
character; novels with a complicated love plot,
sensational and fantastic stories, and so on.
In the second year the piano was silent in the
lodge, and the prisoner asked only for the classics.
In the fifth year music was audible again, and the
prisoner asked for wine. Those who watched him
through the window said that all that year he spent
doing nothing but eating and drinking and lying on
his bed, frequently yawning and angrily talking to
himself. He did not read books. Sometimes at night
he would sit down to write; he would spend hours
writing, and in the morning tear up all that he had
written. More than once he could be heard crying.
In the second half of the sixth year the prisoner
began zealously studying languages, philosophy,
and history. He threw himself eagerly into these
studies -- so much so that the banker had enough to
do to get him the books he ordered. In the course of
four years some six hundred volumes were procured
at his request. It was during this period that the
banker received the following letter from his prisoner:
"My dear Jailer, I write you these lines in six
languages. Show them to people who know the
languages. Let them read them. If they find not one
mistake I implore you to fire a shot in the garden.
That shot will show me that my efforts have not
been thrown away. The geniuses of all ages and of
all lands speak different languages, but the same
flame burns in them all. Oh, if you only knew what
unearthly happiness my soul feels now from being
able to understand them!" The prisoner's desire was
fulfilled. The banker ordered two shots to be fired in
the garden.
Then after the tenth year, the prisoner sat
immovably at the table and read nothing but the
Gospel. It seemed strange to the banker that a man
who in four years had mastered six hundred learned
volumes should waste nearly a year over one thin
book easy of comprehension. Theology and
histories of religion followed the Gospels.
In the last two years of his confinement the
prisoner read an immense quantity of books quite
indiscriminately. At one time he was busy with the
natural sciences, then he would ask for Byron or
Shakespeare. There were notes in which he
demanded at the same time books on chemistry,
and a manual of medicine, and a novel, and
some treatise on philosophy or theology.
His
reading suggested a man swimming in the sea
among the wreckage of his ship, and trying to save
his life by greedily clutching first at one spar and
then at another.
The old banker remembered all this, and thought:
"To-morrow at twelve o'clock he will regain his
freedom. By our agreement I ought to pay him two
millions. If I do pay him, it is all over with me: I
shall be utterly ruined."
Fifteen years before, his millions had been beyond
his reckoning; now he was afraid to ask himself
which were greater, his debts or his assets.
Desperate gambling on the Stock Exchange, wild
speculation and the excitability which he could not
get over even in advancing years, had by degrees led
to the decline of his fortune and the proud, fearless,
self-confident millionaire had become a banker of
middling rank, trembling at every rise and fall in his
investments. "Cursed bet!" muttered the old man,
clutching his head in despair "Why didn't the man
die? He is only forty now. He will take my last
penny from me, he will marry, will enjoy life, will
gamble on the Exchange; while I shall look at him
with envy like a beggar, and hear from him every
day the same sentence: 'I am indebted to you for the
happiness of my life, let me help you!' No, it is too
much! The one means of being saved from
bankruptcy and disgrace is the death of that man!"
It struck three o'clock, the banker listened;
everyone was asleep in the house and nothing could
be heard outside but the rustling of the chilled trees.
Trying to make no noise, he took from a fireproof
safe the key of the door which had not been opened
for fifteen years, put on his overcoat, and went out
of the house.
It was dark and cold in the garden. Rain was
falling. A damp cutting wind was racing about the
garden, howling and giving the trees no rest. The
banker strained his eyes, but could see neither the
earth nor the white statues, nor the lodge, nor the
trees. Going to the spot where the lodge stood, he
twice called the watchman. No answer followed.
Evidently the watchman had sought shelter from
the weather, and was now asleep somewhere either
in the kitchen or in the greenhouse.
"If I had the pluck to carry out my intention,"
thought the old man, "Suspicion would fall first
upon the watchman."
He felt in the darkness for the steps and the door,
and went into the entry of the lodge. Then he groped
his way into a little passage and lighted a match.
There was not a soul there. There was a bedstead
with no bedding on it, and in the corner there was a
dark cast-iron stove. The seals on the door leading
to the prisoner's rooms were intact.
When the match went out the old man, trembling
with emotion, peeped through the little window. A
candle was burning dimly in the prisoner's room. He
was sitting at the table. Nothing could be seen but
his back, the hair on his head, and his hands. Open
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