When God Laughs, Jack London [most read books in the world of all time .txt] 📗

the world over. But, unlike his brethren in other lands, Yi Chin Ho was in jail. Not that he had inadvertently diverted to himself public moneys, but that he had inadvertently diverted too much. Excess is to be deplored in all things, even in grafting, and Yi Chin Ho’s excess had brought him to most deplorable straits.

Ten thousand strings of cash he owed the Government, and he lay in prison under sentence of death. There was one advantage to the situation⁠—he had plenty of time in which to think. And he thought well. Then called he the jailer to him.

“Most worthy man, you see before you one most wretched,” he began. “Yet all will be well with me if you will but let me go free for one short hour this night. And all will be well with you, for I shall see to your advancement through the years, and you shall come at length to the directorship of all the prisons of Cho-sen.”

“How now?” demanded the jailer. “What foolishness is this? One short hour, and you but waiting for your head to be chopped off! And I, with an aged and much-to-be-respected mother, not to say anything of a wife and several children of tender years! Out upon you for the scoundrel that you are!”

“From the Sacred City to the ends of all the Eight Coasts there is no place for me to hide,” Yi Chin Ho made reply. “I am a man of wisdom, but of what worth my wisdom here in prison? Were I free, well I know I could seek out and obtain the money wherewith to repay the Government. I know of a nose that will save me from all my difficulties.”

“A nose!” cried the jailer.

“A nose,” said Yi Chin Ho. “A remarkable nose, if I may say so, a most remarkable nose.”

The jailer threw up his hands despairingly. “Ah, what a wag you are, what a wag,” he laughed. “To think that that very admirable wit of yours must go the way of the chopping-block!”

And so saying, he turned and went away. But in the end, being a man soft of head and heart, when the night was well along he permitted Yi Chin Ho to go.

Straight he went to the Governor, catching him alone and arousing him from his sleep.

“Yi Chin Ho, or I’m no Governor!” cried the Governor. “What do you here who should be in prison waiting on the chopping-block?”

“I pray Your Excellency to listen to me,” said Yi Chin Ho, squatting on his hams by the bedside and lighting his pipe from the firebox. “A dead man is without value. It is true, I am as a dead man, without value to the Government, to Your Excellency, or to myself. But if, so to say, Your Excellency were to give me my freedom⁠—”

“Impossible!” cried the Governor. “Beside, you are condemned to death.”

“Your Excellency well knows that if I can repay the ten thousand strings of cash, the Government will pardon me,” Yi Chin Ho went on. “So, as I say, if Your Excellency were to give me my freedom for a few days, being a man of understanding, I should then repay the Government and be in position to be of service to Your Excellency. I should be in position to be of very great service to Your Excellency.”

“Have you a plan whereby you hope to obtain this money?” asked the Governor.

“I have,” said Yi Chin Ho.

“Then come with it to me tomorrow night; I would now sleep,” said the Governor, taking up his snore where it had been interrupted.

On the following night, having again obtained leave of absence from the jailer, Yi Chin Ho presented himself at the Governor’s bedside.

“Is it you, Yi Chin Ho?” asked the Governor. “And have you the plan?”

“It is I, Your Excellency,” answered Yi Chin Ho, “and the plan is here.”

“Speak,” commanded the Governor.

“The plan is here,” repeated Yi Chin Ho, “here in my hand.”

The Governor sat up and opened his eyes. Yi Chin Ho proffered in his hand a sheet of paper. The Governor held it to the light.

“Nothing but a nose,” said he.

“A bit pinched, so, and so, Your Excellency,” said Yi Chin Ho.

“Yes, a bit pinched here and there, as you say,” said the Governor.

“Withal it is an exceeding corpulent nose, thus, and so, all in one place, at the end,” proceeded Yi Chin Ho. “Your Excellency would seek far and wide and many a day for that nose and find it not!”

“An unusual nose,” admitted the Governor.

“There is a wart upon it,” said Yi Chin Ho.

“A most unusual nose,” said the Governor. “Never have I seen the like. But what do you with this nose, Yi Chin Ho?”

“I seek it whereby to repay the money to the Government,” said Yi Chin Ho. “I seek it to be of service to Your Excellency, and I seek it to save my own worthless head. Further, I seek Your Excellency’s seal upon this picture of the nose.”

And the Governor laughed and affixed the seal of State, and Yi Chin Ho departed. For a month and a day he travelled the King’s Road which leads to the shore of the Eastern Sea; and there, one night, at the gate of the largest mansion of a wealthy city he knocked loudly for admittance.

“None other than the master of the house will I see,” said he fiercely to the frightened servants. “I travel upon the King’s business.”

Straightway was he led to an inner room, where the master of the house was roused from his sleep and brought blinking before him.

“You are Pak Chung Chang, head man of this city,” said Yi Chin Ho in tones that were all-accusing. “I am upon the King’s business.”

Pak Chung Chang trembled. Well he knew the King’s business was ever a terrible business. His knees smote together, and he near fell to the floor.

“The hour is late,” he quavered. “Were it not well to⁠—”

“The King’s business never waits!” thundered Yi Chin