At last we were in the cell, which was of course as dark as the nether regions, having taken quite an affectionate farewell of our escort.
PART III
CHAPTER XIX
FOOTING THE BILL
The lieutenant at the station, by his orders to us and the soldiers, had given us the cue for our behavior. Obviously, we must try to impress the warder with our standing as “military prisoners,” in order to be as comfortable as circumstances permitted.
We proceeded to do this with great ingenuousness. Long arguments and counter-arguments secured us the use of an oil lamp until eight o’clock at night. We went in force to obtain a second blanket, the warder leading the procession.
Our cell was very small, and very dirty. What little space there ought to have been was taken up by stacks of old bicycle tires, which had been confiscated six months before by the Government to relieve the rubber famine in the army.
During the three days we spent in Haltern prison we had no exercise at all. When the weather changed on the second day, and became mild again, just about the time when we should have been close to the frontier if everything had gone well, we sulked with fate more than ever.
The reported arrival of our escort on the evening of the third day excited the warder to such an extent that he wanted us to get up at half-past five the next morning in order to catch a train about eight o’clock. We demurred, of course, and got our way, as usual. Ever since our arrest we had devoted a good deal of time to weighing the probability of being sent to a certain penal prison in Berlin.