"Mr. Kelly; You have been in this hospital for years. The socks and suspenders which should go to the patients are divided impartially between you and the other attendants. Of the four razors, which lately arrived for patients, two are in your trunk, one you sent to your brother in Ireland, and the fourth you keep in the ward for show, in case the doctor should be coming around."
That night when I was going to bed I slipped the note into the Kings hand and whispered: "There's going to be a beat tonight." The King turned pale, and hurriedly ordered the men in the ward to bed, so that he could read the note. Before reading it he handed it to a doctor, to be sure to get the credit of stopping the beat as soon as possible. The doctor read it and gave the King the laugh. In the morning, when the doctor made his rounds, Mr. Kelly said to him: "We have one or two funny men in the ward who, instead of robbing decent people, could have made their fortunes at Tony Pastor's." The result was that the doctor put me down for three or four new delusions. Knowing the Celtic character thoroughly I used to crack many a joke on the King. I would say to another patient, as the King passed: "If it hadn't been for Kelly we should have escaped that time sure." That would make him wild. My gift of ridicule was more than once valuable to me in the mad-house.
But I must say that the King was pretty kind when a patient was ill. When I was so ill and weak that I didn't care whether I died or not, the old King used to give me extras,--milk, eggs and puddings. And in his heart the old man hated stool-pigeons, for by nature he was a dynamiter and believed in physical force and not mental treachery.
The last few months I served in the insane asylum was at Dannemora, where I was transferred from Matteawan. The conditions at the two asylums are much the same. While at Dannemora I continued my efforts to be sent back to stir to finish my sentence, and used to talk to the doctors about it as often as I had an opportunity. A few months before I was released I had an interview with a Commissioner--the first one in three years, although I had repeatedly demanded to talk to one.
"How is it," I said, "that I am not sent back to stir?"