Martin Eden Chapter XXXIII

In which Martin Eden, pressed by hunger and poverty, ventures to the Transcontinental office to claim the five dollars owed him for his story, only to be met with polite admiration but no immediate payment, prompting a desperate and forceful retrieval of his due from the reluctant editors. Afterwards, emboldened and still unpaid for another piece, he confronts the rough and tumble staff of The Hornet, where a spirited altercation ends in mutual respect and a contest of fists rather than funds.