Chapter 45

I was enveloped. I felt a sudden paralyzing pressure in my spine—a muscular arm levered me into the car . . . and I realized that I had been garroted in Piccadilly, amid hundreds of passers-by and in sight of my hotel! § 4 I shot up from green depths in which I had been submerged for an immeasurable time. I had dived into a deep lake, I thought, and had become entangled in clinging weeds which sprang from its bed. I could not free my limbs; I knew that I was drowning—that never again should I see the sun and the bl…