THE INMATE OF THE DUNGEON By W. C. Morrow Copyright, 1894, by J. B. Lippincott & Co After, the Board of State Prison Directors, sitting in session at theprison, had heard and disposed of the complaints and petitions of anumber of convicts, the warden announced that all who wished to appearhad been heard. Thereupon a certain uneasy and apprehensive expression, which all along had sat upon the faces of the directors, became visiblydeeper. The chairman--nervous, energetic, abrupt, incisive man--glancedat a slip of paper in his hand, and said to the warden: "Send a guard for convict No-14, 208. " The warden started and become slightly pale. Somewhat confused, hehaltingly replied, "Why, he has expressed no desire to appear beforeyou. " "Nevertheless, you will send for him at once, " responded the chairman. The warden bowed stiffly and directed a guard to produce the convict. Then, turning to the chairman, he said: "I am ignorant of your purpose in summoning this man, but of course Ihave no objection. I desire, however, to make a statement concerning himbefore he appears. " "When we shall have called for a statement from you, " boldly respondedthe chairman, "you may make one. " The warden sank back into his seat. He was a tall, fine-looking man, well-bred and intelligent, and had a kindly face. Though ordinarilycool, courageous, and self-possessed, he was unable to conceal a strongemotion which looked much like fear. A heavy silence fell upon the room, disturbed only by the official stenographer, who was sharpening hispencils. A stray beam of light from the westering sun slipped into theroom between the edge of the window-shade and the sash, and fell acrossthe chair reserved for the convict. The uneasy eyes of the wardenfinally fell upon this beam, and there his glance rested. The chairman, without addressing any one particularly, remarked: "There are ways of learning what occurs in a prison without theassistance of either the wardens or the convicts. " Just then the guard appeared with the convict, who shambled in painfullyand laboriously, as with a string he held up from the floor the heavyiron ball which was chained to his ankles. He was about forty-five yearsold. Undoubtedly he once had been a man of uncommon physical strength, for a powerful skeleton showed underneath the sallow skin which coveredhis emaciated frame. His sallowness was peculiar and ghastly-It waspartly that of disease, and partly of something worse; and it was thissomething that accounted also for his shrunken muscles and manifestfeebleness. There had been no time to prepare him for presentation to the Board. Asa consequence, his unstockinged toes showed through his gaping shoes;the dingy suit of prison stripes which covered his gaunt frame wasfrayed and tattered; his hair had not been recently cut to the prisonfashion, and, being rebellious, stood out upon his head like bristles;and his beard, which, like his hair, was heavily dashed with gray, hadnot been shaved for weeks. These incidents of his appearance combinedwith a very peculiar expression of his face to make an extraordinarypicture. It is difficult to describe this almost unearthly expression. With a certain suppressed ferocity it combined an inflexibility ofpurpose that sat like an iron mask upon him. His eyes were hungry andeager; they were the living part of him, and they shone luminousfrom beneath shaggy brows. His forehead was massive, his head of fineproportions, his jaw square and strong, and his thin, high nose showedtraces of an ancestry that must have made a mark in some corner of theworld at some time in history. He was prematurely old; this was seenin his gray hair and in the uncommonly deep wrinkles which lined hisforehead and the corners of his eyes and of his mouth. Upon stumbling weakly into the room, faint with the labor of walking andof carrying the iron ball, he looked around eagerly, like a beardriven to his haunches by the hounds. His glance passed so rapidly andunintelligently from one face to another that he could not have hadtime to form a conception of the persons present, until his swift eyesencountered the face of the warden, Instantly they flashed; he cranedhis neck forward; his lips opened and became blue; the wrinkles deepenedabout his mouth and eyes; his form grew rigid, and his breathingstopped. This sinister and terrible attitude--all the more so becausehe was wholly unconscious of it--was disturbed only when the chairmansharply commanded, "Take that seat. " The convict started as though he had been struck, and turned his eyesupon the chairman. He drew a deep inspiration, which wheezed and rattledas it passed into his chest. An expression of excruciating pain sweptover his face. He dropped the ball, which struck the floor with a loudsound, and his long bony fingers tore at the striped shirt over hisbreast. A groan escaped him, and he would have sunk to the floor had notthe guard caught him and held him upright. In a moment it was over, andthen, collapsing with exhaustion, he sank into the chair. There he sat, conscious and intelligent, but slouching, disorganized, and indifferent. The chairman turned sharply to the guard. "Why did you manacle this man, " he demanded, "when he is evidently soweak, and when none of the others were manacled?" "Why, sir, " stammered the guard, "surely you know who this man is: he isthe most dangerous and desperate--" "We know all about that. Remove his manacles. " The guard obeyed. The chairman turned to the convict, and in a kindlymanner said, "Do you know who we are?" The convict got himself together a little and looked steadily at thechairman. "No, " he replied after a pause. His manner was direct, and hisvoice was deep, though hoarse. "We are the State Prison Directors. We have heard of your case, and wewant you to tell us the whole truth about it. " The convict's mind worked slowly, and it was some time before he couldcomprehend the explanation and request. When he had accomplished thattask he said, very slowly, "I suppose you want me to make a complaint, sir. " "Yes--if you have any to make. " The convict was getting himself in hand. He straightened, and gazedat the chairman with a peculiar intensity. Then firmly and clearly heanswered, "I've no complaint to make. " The two men sat looking at each other in silence, and as they looked abridge of human sympathy was slowly reared between them. The chairmanrose, passed around an intervening table, went up to the convict, andlaid a hand on his gaunt shoulder. There was a tenderness in his voicethat few men had ever heard there. "I know, " said he, "that you are a patient and uncomplaining man, or weshould have heard from you long ago. In asking you to make a statementI am merely asking for your help to right a wrong, if a wrong hasbeen done. Leave your own wishes entirely out of consideration, if youprefer. Assume, if you will, that it is not our intention or desireeither to give you relief or to make your case harder for you. Thereare fifteen hundred human beings in this prison, and they are under theabsolute control of one man. If a serious wrong is practiced upon one, it may be upon others. I ask you in the name of common humanity, andas one man of another, to put us in the way of working justice in thisprison. If you have the instincts of a man within you, you will complywith my request. Speak out, therefore, like a man, and have no fear ofanything. " The convict was touched and stung. He looked up steadily into thechairman's face, and firmly said, "There is nothing in this world thatI fear. " Then he hung his head, and presently he raised it and added, "Iwill tell you all about it. " At that moment he shifted his position so as to bring the beam of lightperpendicularly across his face and chest, and it seemed to split himin twain. He saw it, and feasted his gaze upon it as it lay upon hisbreast. After a time he thus proceeded, speaking very slowly, and in astrangely monotonous voice: "I was sent up for twenty years for killing a man. I hadn't been acriminal: I killed him without thinking, for he had robbed me andwronged me. I came here thirteen years ago. I had trouble at first--itgalled me to be a convict; but I got over that, because the warden thatwas here then understood me and was kind to me, and he made me oneof the best men in the prison. I don't say this to make you think I'mcomplaining about the present warden, or that he didn't treat me kindly:I can take care of myself with him. I am not making any complaint. I askno man's favor, and I fear no man's power. " "That is all right. Proceed. " "After the warden had made a good man out of me I worked faithfully, sir; I did everything they told me to do; I worked willingly and like aslave. It did me good to work, and I worked hard. I never violated anyof the rules after I was broken in. And then the law was passed givingcredits to the men for good conduct. My term was twenty years, but I didso well that my credits piled up, and after I had been here ten years Icould begin to see my way out. There were only about three years left. And, sir, I worked faithfully to make those years good. I knew that if Idid anything against the rules I should lose my credits and have to staynearly ten years longer. I knew all about that, sir: I never forgot it. I wanted to be a free man again, and I planned to go away somewhere andmake the fight all over--to be a man in the world once more. " "We know all about your record in the prison. Proceed. " "Well, it was this way. You know they were doing some heavy work in thequarries and on the grades, and they wanted the strongest men in theprison. There weren't very many: there never are very many strong men inprison. And I was one of 'em that they put on the heavy work, and Idid it faithfully. They used to pay the men for extra work--not pay 'emmoney, but the value of the money in candles, tobacco, extra clothes, and things like that. I loved to work, and I loved to work extra, and sodid some of the other men. On Saturdays the men who had done extra workwould fall in and go up to the captain of the guard and he would give toeach man what was coming to him. He had it all down in a book, and whena man would come up and call for what was due him the captain would giveit to him, whatever he wanted that the rules allowed. "One Saturday I fell in with the others. A good many were ahead of me inthe line, and when they got what they wanted they fell into a new line, waiting to be marched to the cells. When my turn in the line came I wentup to the captain and said I would take mine in tobacco. He looked atme pretty sharply, and said, 'How did you get back in that line?' I toldhim I belonged there--that I had come to get my extra. He looked at hisbook, and he said, 'You've had your extra: you got tobacco. ' And he toldme to fall into the new line, I told him I hadn't received any tobacco;I said I hadn't got my extra, and hadn't been up before. He said, 'Don'tspoil your record by trying to steal a little tobacco. Fall in. '. . . Ithurt me, sir. I hadn't been up; I hadn't got my extra; and I wasn't athief, and I never had been a thief, and no living man had a right tocall me a thief. I said to him, straight, 'I won't fall in till I get myextra, and I'm not a thief, and no man can call me one, and no man canrob me of my just dues. ' He turned pale, and said, 'Fall in, there. ' Isaid, 'I won't fall in till I get my dues. ' "With that he raised his hand as a signal, and the two guards behind himcovered me with their rifles, and the guard on the west wall, and oneon the north wall, and one on the portico in front of the arsenal, allcovered me with rifles. The captain turned to a trusty and told him tocall the warden. The warden came out, and the captain told him Iwas trying to run double on my extra, and said I was impudent andinsubordinate and refused to fall in. The warden said, 'Drop that andfall in. ' I told him I wouldn't fall in. I said I hadn't run double, that I hadn't got my extra, and that I would stay there till I diedbefore I would be robbed of it. He asked the captain if there wasn'tsome mistake, and the captain looked at his book and said there was nomistake; he said he remembered me when I came up and got the tobacco andhe saw me fall into the new line, but he didn't see me get back in theold line. The warden didn't ask the other men if they saw me get mytobacco and slip back into the old line. He just ordered me to fall in. I told him I would die before I would do that. I said I wanted my justdues and no more, and I asked him to call on the other men in line toprove that I hadn't been up. "He said, That's enough of this. ' He sent all the other men to thecells, and left me standing there. Then he told two guards to take meto the cells. They came and took hold of me, and I threw them off as ifthey were babies. Then more guards came up, and one of them hit me overthe head with a club, and I fell. And then, sir"--here the convict'svoice fell to a whisper--"and then he told them to take me to thedungeon. " The sharp, steady glitter of the convict's eyes failed, and he hung hishead and looked despairingly at the floor. "Go on, " said the chairman. "They took me to the dungeon, sir. Did you ever see the dungeon?" "Perhaps; but you may tell us about it. " The cold, steady gleam returned to the convict's eyes, as he fixed themagain upon the chairman. "There are several little rooms in the dungeon. The one they put mein was about five feet by eight. It has steel walls and ceiling, and agranite floor. The only light that comes in passes through a slit inthe door. The slit is an inch wide and five inches long. It doesn't givemuch light because the door is thick. It's about four inches thick, and is made of oak and sheet steel bolted through. The slit runs thisway"--making a horizontal motion in the air--"and it is four inchesabove my eyes when I stand on tiptoe. And I can't look out at thefactory wall forty feet away unless I hook my fingers in the slit andpull myself up. " He stopped and regarded his hands, the peculiar appearance of which weall had observed. The ends of the fingers were uncommonly thick; theywere red and swollen, and the knuckles were curiously marked with deepwhite scars. "Well, sir, there wasn't anything at all in the dungeon, but they gaveme a blanket, and they put me on bread and water. That's all they evergive you in the dimgeon. They bring the bread and water once a day, andthat is at night, because if they come in the daytime it lets in thelight. "The next night after they put me in--it was Sunday night--the wardencame with the guard and asked me if I was all right. I said I was. He said, 'Will you behave yourself and go to work to-morow?' I said, 'No, sir; I won't go to work till I get what is due me. ' He shrugged hisshoulders, and said, 'Very well: maybe you'll change your mind after youhave been in here a week. ' "They kept me there a week. The next Sunday night the warden came andsaid, 'Are you ready to go to work to-morrow, ' and I said, 'No; I willnot go to work till I get what is due me. ' He called me hard names. Isaid it was a man's duty to demand his rights, and that a man who wouldstand to be treated like a dog was no man at all. " The chairman interrupted. "Did you not reflect, " he asked, "that theseofficers would not have stooped to rob you?--that it was through somemistake they withheld your tobacco, and that in any event you had achoice of two things to lose--one a plug of tobacco, and the other sevenyears of freedom?" "But they angered me and hurt me, sir, by calling me a thief, and theythrew me in the dungeon like a beast. . . . I was standing for my rights, and my rights were my manhood; and that is something a man can carrysound to the grave, whether he's bond or free, weak or powerful, rich orpoor. " "Well, after you refused to go to work what did the warden do?" The convict, although tremendous excitement must have surged and boiledwithin him, slowly, deliberately, and weakly came to his feet. He placedhis right foot on the chair, and rested his right elbow on the raisedknee. The index finger of his right hand, pointing to the chairman andmoving slightly to lend emphasis to his narrative, was the only thingthat modified the rigid immobility of his figure. Without a singlechange in the pitch or modulation of his voice, never hurrying, butspeaking with the slow and dreary monotony with which he had begun, he nevertheless--partly by reason of these evidences of his incredibleself-control--made a formidable picture as he proceeded: "When I told him that, sir, he said he'd take me to the ladder and seeif he couldn't make me change my mind. . . . Yes, sir; he said he'd takeme to the ladder. " (Here there was a long pause. ) "And I a human being, with flesh on my bones and the heart of a man in my body. The otherwarden hadn't tried to break my spirit on the ladder. He did break it, though; he broke it clear to the bottom of the man inside of me; buthe did it with a human word, and not with the dungeon and the ladder. Ididn't believe the warden when he said he would take me to the ladder. I couldn't imagine myself alive and put through at the ladder, and Icouldn't imagine any human being who could find the heart to put methrough. If I had believed him I would have strangled him then andthere, and got my body full of lead while doing it. No, sir; I could notbelieve it. "And then he told me to come on. I went with him and the guards. Hebrought me to the ladder. I had never seen it before. It was a heavywooden ladder, leaned against the wall, and the bottom was bolted to thefloor and the top to the wall. A whip was on the floor. " (Again therewas a pause. ) "The warden told me to strip, sir, and I stripped. . . . Andstill I didn't believe he would whip me. I thought he just wanted toscare me. "Then he told me to face up to the ladder. I did so, and reached my armsup to the straps. They strapped my arms to the ladder, and stretched sohard that they pulled me up clear of the floor. Then they strapped mylegs to the ladder. The warden then picked up the whip. He said to me, 'I'll give you one more chance: will you go to work to-morrow?' I said, 'No; I won't go to work till I get my dues. ' 'Very well, ' said he, 'you'll get your dues now. ' And then he stepped back and raised thewhip. I turned my head and looked at him, and I could see it in hiseyes that he meant to strike. . . . And when I saw that, sir, I felt thatsomething inside of me was about to burst. '" The convict paused to gather up his strength for the crisis of hisstory, yet not in the least particular did he change his position, theslight movement of his pointing finger, the steady gleam of his eye, or the slow monotony of his speech. I had never witnessed any scene sodramatic as this, and yet all was absolutely simple and unintentional. I had been thrilled by the greatest actors, as with matchless skill theygave rein to their genius in tragic situations; but how inconceivablytawdry and cheap such pictures seemed in comparison with this! Theclaptrap of the music, the lights, the posing, the wry faces, the gasps, lunges, staggerings, rolling eyes--how flimsy and colorless, how mockingand grotesque, they all appeared beside this simple, uncouth, butgenuine expression of immeasurable agony! The stenographer held his pencil poised above the paper, and wrote nomore. "And then the whip came down across my back. The something inside of metwisted hard and then broke wide open, and went pouring all through melike melted iron. It was a hard fight to keep my head clear, but I didit. And then I said to the warden this: 'You've struck me with a whipin cold blood. You' ve tied me up hand and foot, to whip me like a dog. Well, whip me, then, till you fill your belly with it. You are a coward. You are lower, and meaner, and cowardlier than the lowest and meanestdog that ever yelped when his master kicked him. You were born a coward. Cowards will lie and steal, and you are the same as a thief and liar. No hound would own you for a friend. Whip me hard and long, you coward. Whip me, I say. See how good a coward feels when he ties up a man andwhips him like a dog. Whip me till the last breath quits my body: if youleave me alive I will kill you for this. ' "His face got white. He asked me if I meant that, and I said, 'Yes;before God, I do. ' Then he took the whip in both hands and came downwith all his might. " "That was nearly two years ago, " said the chairman. "You would not killhim now, would you?" "Yes. I will kill him if I get a chance; and I feel it in me that thechance will come. " "Well, proceed. " "He kept on whipping me. He whipped me with all the strength of bothhands. I could feel the broken skin curl upon my back, and when my headgot too heavy to hold it straight it hung down, and I saw the bloodon my legs and dripping off my toes into a pool of it on the floor. Something was straining and twisting inside of me again. My back didn'thurt much; it was the thing twisting inside of me that hurt. I countedthe lashes, and when I counted to twenty-eight the twisting got so hardthat it choked me and blinded me;. . . And when I woke up I was in thedungeon again, and the doctor had my back all plastered up, and he waskneeling beside me, feeling my pulse. " The prisoner had finished. He looked around vaguely, as though he wantedto go. "And you have been in the dungeon ever since?" "Yes, sir; but I don't mind that. " "How long?" "Twenty-three months. " "On bread and water?" "Yes; but that was all I wanted. " "Have you reflected that so long as you harbor a determination to killthe warden you may be kept in the dungeon? You can't live much longerthere, and if you die there you will never find the chance you want. Ifyou say you will not kill the warden he may return you to the cells. " "But that would be a lie, sir; I will get a chance to kill him if Igo to the cells. I would rather die in the dungeon than be a liar andsneak. If you send me to the cells I will kill him. But I will kill himwithout that. I will kill him, sir. . . . And he knows it. " Without concealment, but open, deliberate, and implacable, thus in thewrecked frame of a man, so close that we could have touched it, stoodMurder--not boastful, but relentless as death. "Apart from weakness, is your health good?" asked the chairman. "Oh, it's good enough, " wearily answered the convict. "Sometimes thetwisting comes on, but when I wake up after it I'm all right. " The prison surgeon, under the chairman's direction, put his ear to theconvict's chest, and then went over and whispered to the chairman. "I thought so, " said that gentleman. "Now, take this man to thehospital. Put him to bed where the sun will shine on him, and give himthe most nourishing food. " The convict, giving no heed to this, shambled out with a guard and thesurgeon. ***** The warden sat alone in the prison office with No. 14, 208. That he atlast should have been brought face to face, and alone, with the man whomhe had determined to kill, perplexed the convict. He was not manacled;the door was locked, and the key lay on the table between the two men. Three weeks in the hospital had proved beneficial, but a deathly pallorwas still in his face. "The action of the directors three weeks ago, " said the warden, "make myresignation necessary. I have awaited the appointment of my successor, who is now in charge. I leave the prison to-day. In the meantime, I havesomething to tell you that will interest you. A few days ago a manwho was discharged from the prison last year read what the papers havepublished recently about your case, and he has written to me confessingthat it was he who got your tobacco from the captain of the guard. Hisname is Salter, and he looks very much like you. He had got his ownextra, and when he came up again and called for yours the captain, thinking it was you, gave it to him. There was no intention on thecaptain's part to rob you. " The convict gasped and leaned forward eagerly. "Until the receipt of this letter, " resumed the warden, "I had opposedthe movement which had been started for your pardon; but when thisletter came I recommended your pardon, and it has been granted. Besides, you have a serious heart trouble. So you are now discharged from theprison. " The convict stared, and leaned back speechless. His eyes shone witha strange, glassy expression, and his white teeth glistened ominouslybetween his parted lips. Yet a certain painful softness tempered theiron in his face. "The stage will leave for the station in four hours, " continued thewarden. "You have made certain threats against my life. " The wardenpaused; then, in a voice that slightly wavered from emotion, hecontinued: "I shall not permit your intentions in that regard--for Icare nothing about them--to prevent me from discharging a duty which, as from one man to another, I owe you. I have treated you with a crueltythe enormity of which I now comprehend. I thought I was right. Myfatal mistake was in not understanding your nature. I misconstruedyour conduct from the beginning, and in doing so I have laid upon myconscience a burden which will imbitter the remaining years of my life. I would do anything in my power, if it were not too late, to atone forthe wrong I have done you. If before I sent you to the dungeon, Icould have understood the wrong and foreseen its consequences, I wouldcheerfully have taken my own life rather than raise a hand against you. The lives of us both have been wrecked; but your suffering is in thepast--mine is present, and will cease only with my life. For my life isa curse, and I prefer not to keep it. " With that the warden, very pale, but with a clear purpose in his face, took a loaded revolver from a drawer and laid it before the convict. "Now is your chance, " he said, quietly: "no one can hinder you. " The convict gasped and shrank away from the weapon as from a viper. "Not yet--not yet, " he whispered, in agony. The two men sat and regarded each other without the movement of amuscle. "Are you afraid to do it?" asked the warden. A momentary light flashed in the convict's eyes. "No!" he gasped; "you know I am not. But I can't--not yet--not yet. " The convict, whose ghastly pallor, glassy eyes, and gleaming teeth satlike a mask of death upon his face, staggered to his feet. "You have done it at last! you have broken my spirit. A human word hasdone what the dungeon and the whip could not do. . . . It twists inside ofme now. . . . I could be your slave for that human word. " Tears streamedfrom his eyes. "I can't help crying. I'm only a baby, after all--and Ithought I was a man. " He reeled, and the warden caught him and seated him in the chair. Hetook the convict's hand in his and felt a firm, true pressure there. Theconvict's eyes rolled vacantly. A spasm of pain caused him to raise hisfree hand to his chest; his thin, gnarled fingers--made shapeless bylong use in the slit of the dungeon door--clutched automatically athis shirt. A faint, hard smile wrinkled his wan face, displaying thegleaming teeth more freely. "That human word, " he whispered--"if you had spoken it long ago, if--butit's all--it's all right--now. I'll go--I'll go to work--to-morrow. " There was a slightly firmer pressure of the hand that held the warden's;then it relaxed. The fingers which clutched the shirt slipped away, andthe hand dropped to his side. The weary head sank back and rested onthe chair; the strange, hard smile still sat upon the marble face, anda dead man's glassy eyes and gleaming teeth were upturned toward theceiling.