In the vaulted room outside there are two windows, one at either end, north and south. But so little light comes through these windows that except at midday on a bright, sunny day, if you wish to see the inside of the cells after the doors are opened you must use the electric light. There are two of these and each is fastened to a long cord, so that it can be carried to the farthest of the eight cells. At the south end of the room is a toilet seat, and a sink with running water where the supply for the prisoners is drawn. Up to the time of Superintendent Riley's and Warden Rattigan's coming into office, the supply of water for each prisoner was limited to ONE GILL FOR TWENTY-FOUR HOURS!
The sink was not used for the prisoners to wash, for the simple reason that the prisoners in the jail were _not allowed to wash_.
Other peculiarities of the jail system will be made clear in the next chapter.
As Captain Martin and I traverse the long stone passage leading from his office to the death chamber, I listen intently to catch any sound from the jail, for I am wondering whether or not I shall have any companions in misery; but nothing can be heard. Even when the Captain unlocks and opens the door on the right at the end of the passage and I step into the dungeon, there is no indication of any other inhabitants. Except for our own movements the silence is complete, although there is a peculiar reverberation of the vaulted roof which reëchoes every sound we make. I am aware of a sort of uncanny feeling about the place, as though there were some sort of living creature--man, ape, or devil--in every cell, with his face close to the bars, peering through and holding his breath.
The Captain, going to a locker which is at his left, backing against the iron wall of the first cell, opens it and takes out a shirt, trousers, coat, cap, and a pair of felt shoes.
"Take off your clothes and put these on," he says briefly.
I take the clothes as he hands them to me and place them upon a bench at my right, where I also sit and proceed to make the required change. If these are the clothes which have been carefully washed and cleaned for me, I should like to examine--at a safe distance--the ordinary ones. They must be filthy beyond words. And I suppose no one but a prisoner ever wonders or cares about the condition of the last man who wore them.