“No talking. No talking.” The crazy merry-go-round of exercise.
At nine they went into the shop, a long bare workroom where the mail bags were stitched. Arthur was given more mail bags. Warder Beeby, the shop inspector, gave Arthur the mail bags, and observing his rawness, as he handed out the canvas he bent over and explained:
“See here, stupid, you rope them like this.” He pushed the big needle through two folds of the thick canvas, indicating, good-naturedly, the manner in which the stitches should be made. And he added, with not unfriendly irony: “If you rope a nice lot of mail bags you get cocoa at night. See, stupid? A nice hot bowl of oko!”
The kindness in Warder Beeby’s voice put a new heart into Arthur. He began to rope the mail bags. About a hundred men were roping mail bags. The man next to Arthur was old and grey-whiskered and he roped skilfully and quickly, making sure of his cocoa. Every time he threw down a mail bag he scratched himself under his armpit and threw a furtive look at Arthur. But he did not talk. If he talked he would lose his cocoa.
At twelve o’clock the bell rang again. They stopped work in the shop and filed back to the cells for dinner. The key sounded in Arthur’s cell. Dinner was skilly and bread and rancid margarine. After dinner Warder Collins slid back the peep-hole. His eye, seen through the peep-hole, seemed sinister and large. He said:
“You don’t come here to do nothing. Get on with these mail bags.”
Arthur got on with the mail bags. His hands were sore from pushing the heavy needle through the canvas and a blister had risen on his thumb. He worked in a reflex manner. He did not know what he was doing or why he was doing it; already his actions had become automatic, on and on, roping the mail bags. Once again the key sounded. Warder Collins came in with the supper, watery porridge and a chunk of bread. When he entered the cell he looked at the mail bags, then he looked at Arthur and his short upper lip drew back from his teeth. There was no doubt about it, for some reason Warder Collins had a down on Arthur. But he was in no hurry, he had a great many months in which to work and from long experience he knew how much more pleasure he got out of it by taking time. He merely said, reflectively:
“Haven’t you done no more nor that? We can’t have no scrim-shankin’ here.”
“I’m not used to it,” Arthur answered. Unconsciously he made his tone propitiating as if he realised the importance of being on the right side of Warder Collins. He raised his eyes, tired with close work, and it seemed as if Warder Collins had become enlarged. His head especially, his broad deformed head was fantastically enlarged and menacing. Arthur had to shade his eyes to look at Warder Collins.
“You better bloody well hurry up and get used to it.” Though he spoke ever so gently, Warder Collins brought his deformed head a little nearer. “Don’t think you’ve dodged out of the army to have a cushy job here. Get on with the bags till you hear the bell.”
Arthur got on with the bags until he heard the bell. He heard the bell at eight o’clock. The clanging of the bell filled the deep well of the prison with a great volume of sound, and Arthur knew that he had all night before him in which to be alone.
He sat on the edge of his board staring at the broad black arrows stamped on his khaki trousers and he started to trace the pattern of the arrows with his forefinger. Why did he have the arrows stamped upon him? He was covered with arrows; his entire body, enwrapped in a daze, in a blind stupor, was pierced by flights and flights of broad black arrows. He had a queer sense of having ceased to exist, a sense of spiritual annihilation. These arrows had killed him.
At nine o’clock the lights went out and after sitting stupidly for a minute in the darkness he fell back, dressed as he was, upon the board as though he had been stunned. He slept.
But he did not sleep long. Soon after midnight he was awakened by the howling which had disturbed him on the night before. But this time the howling went on and on, as if forgotten. It was wild and altogether lost. Arthur sprang up from the bed in the darkness. His sleep had recreated him. He was alive again, horribly and painfully alive, and he could not stand the howling nor the darkness nor the solitude. He lifted up his voice and shouted.
“Stop it, stop it, for God’s sake stop it,” and he began to pound the door of his cell with his closed fists. He shouted and pounded in a frenzy and in a minute he heard others shouting and pounding too. From the dark catacombs of the gallery rose a great sound of shouting and pounding. But no one took any notice and the great sound of shouting and pounding fell away gradually into the darkness and the silence.
Arthur stood for a moment with his cheek pressed against the cold shut grating of the door, his chest heaving, his arms outstretched. Then he tore himself away and began to pace the floor of his cell. There was no space in which to move yet he had to keep moving, it was impossible for him to be still. His hands remained clenched and he seemed to have no power to unclench his body. From time to time he flung himself upon the board but it was no use, the torment of his nerves would not let him alone. Only the pacing relieved him. He had to go on pacing.
He was still pacing when the key sounded. The sound of the key opened another day. He jumped at the sound, then he stood in the centre of his cell facing Warder Collins. He panted:
“I couldn’t sleep for that howling. I couldn’t sleep for it.”
“What a shame,” sneered Warder Collins.
“I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t sleep. What is that howling?”
“No talking!”
“What is that howling? What is it?”
“No talking I tell you. It’s a bloke gone mad if you want to know, he’s under observation for mental. Shut up. No talking!” And Warder Collins went out.
Arthur pressed his brow into his hands, striving with all his force to control himself. His head drooped, his legs seemed incapable of supporting his body. He felt mortally ill. He could not eat the skilly which Warder Collins had left for him in the usual earthenware bowl. The smell of the skilly sickened him to death. He sat down on the board bed. He could not eat the skilly.
Suddenly the key sounded. Warder Collins came in and looked at Arthur and drew back his lip. He said:
“Why don’t you eat your breakfast?”
Arthur looked at him dully.
“I can’t.”
“Stand up when I address you.”
Arthur stood up.
“Eat your breakfast!”
“I can’t.”
Collins’s lip came back, very thin and blue.
“Not good enough for you, eh? Not fancy enough for Cuthbert? Eat your breakfast, Cuthbert.”
Arthur repeated dully:
“I can’t.”
Warder Collins stroked his chin softly. It was beginning to get good.
“Do you know what’ll happen to you?” he said. “You’ll be fed forcible if you don’t look out. You’ll have a tube forced down your gullet and your soup run into your stomach, see. I’ve done it before and I’ll do it again.”
“I’m sorry,” Arthur said with his eyes on the ground. “If I eat it I know I’ll be sick.”
“Pick up the bowl,” Collins ordered.
Arthur stooped and picked up the bowl. Warder Collins watched him do it. From the start Collins had taken a violent dislike to Arthur as being well-bred, educated and a gentleman. There was the other reason too. Collins explained the other reason slowly:
“I been lookin’ at you, Cuthbert. I don’t like Cuthberts. I sort of picked on you the minnet you came in. I got a son in the trenches, see. That explains a lot, see. It explains why you be goin’ to eat that breakfast. Eat your breakfast, Cuthbert.”
Arthur began to eat the skilly. He swallowed half of the watery mess, then in a laboured voice he said: