"I suppose you still have the silent system?"
The official nodded.
"Absolutely?"
"Absolutely."
"How awful it must be!" said Alicia, with a nervous laugh.
The official shrugged his shoulders, and the other two males murmured reassuring axioms about discipline.
They emerged from the stairway into a colossal and resounding iron hall. Round the emptiness of this interior ran galleries of perforated iron protected from the abyss by iron balustrades. The group stood on the second of the galleries from the stony floor, and there were two galleries above them. Far away, opposite, a glint of sunshine had feloniously slipped in, transpiercing the gloom, and it lighted a series of doors. There was a row of these doors along every gallery. Each had a peep-hole, a key-hole and a number. The longer Hilda regarded, the more nightmarishly numerous seemed the doors. The place was like a huge rabbit-hutch designed for the claustration of countless rabbits. Across the whole width and length of the hall, and at the level of the lowest gallery, was stretched a great net.
"To provide against suicides?" suggested one of the men.
"Yes," said the official.
"A good idea."