CHAPTER IX
PERSECUTION
I
Suffering and ever-present danger are quick teachers. In the three months of penitentiary life I have learned many things. I doubt whether the vague terrors pictured by my inexperience were more dreadful than the actuality of prison existence.
In one respect, especially, the reality is a source of bitterness and constant irritation. Notwithstanding all its terrors, perhaps because of them, I had always thought of prison as a place where, in a measure, nature comes into its own: social distinctions are abolished, artificial barriers destroyed; no need of hiding one's thoughts and emotions; one could be his real self, shedding all hypocrisy and artifice at the prison gates. But how different is this life! It is full of deceit, sham, and pharisaism—an aggravated counterpart of the outside world. The flatterer, the backbiter, the spy,—these find here a rich soil. The ill-will of a guard portends disaster, to be averted only by truckling and flattery, and servility fawns for the reward of an easier job. The dissembling soul in stripes whines his conversion into the pleased ears of the Christian ladies, taking care he be not surprised without tract or Bible,—and presently simulated piety secures a pardon, for the angels rejoice at the sinner's return to the fold. It sickens me to witness these scenes.
The officers make the alternative quickly apparent to the new inmate: to protest against injustice is unavailing and dangerous. Yesterday I witnessed in the shop a characteristic incident—a fight between Johnny Davis and Jack Bradford, both recent arrivals and mere boys. Johnny, a manly-looking fellow, works on a knitting machine, a few feet from my table. Opposite him is Jack, whose previous experience in a reformatory has "put him wise," as he expresses it. My three months' stay has taught me the art of conversing by an almost imperceptible motion of the lips. In this manner I learned from Johnny that Bradford is stealing his product, causing him repeated punishment for shortage in the task. Hoping to terminate the thefts, Johnny complained to the overseer, though without accusing Jack. But the guard ignored the complaint, and continued to report the youth. Finally Johnny was sent to the dungeon. Yesterday morning he returned to work. The change in the rosy-cheeked boy was startling: pale and hollow-eyed, he walked with a weak, halting step. As he took his place at the machine, I heard him say to the officer:
"Mr. Cosson, please put me somewhere else."
"Why so?" the guard asked.
"I can't make the task here. I'll make it on another machine, please, Mr. Cosson."