"Ah, bah!" said Nicholas, in his turn; "we laugh at Charlot and his shop; it is like the prison or the galleys,—we laugh at them, too; and so, that we may be all friends together, let's be jolly as long as we can."
"The thing that would do us," said the shrill-voiced prisoner, "would be to put us in solitary cells day and night. They do say they mean to do so at last."
"In solitary cells!" exclaimed the Skeleton, with repressed rage; "don't talk of it! Solitary cell—alone! Hold your tongue! I would rather have my arms and legs cut off! Alone within four walls! Quite alone—without having our pals to laugh with! Oh, that will never be! I like the galleys a hundred times better than the central prison, because at the galleys, instead of being shut up, one is out-of-doors, sees the world, people going and coming, and has his jokes and fun. Well, I'd rather be done for at once than be put in a solitary cell, if only for a year. Yes, for at this moment I am sure to be guillotined—ain't I? Well, if they said to me, 'Would you rather have a year of solitary confinement?' I should hold out my neck. A year all alone! Why, is it possible? What do they suppose a man thinks of when he is alone?"
"Suppose you were carried there by main force?"
"Well, I wouldn't stay; I would make such use of my hands and feet that I should escape," replied the Skeleton.
"But if you couldn't,—if you were unable to escape?"
"Then I'd kill the first person who came near me, in order to have my head chopped off."
"But if, instead of sentencing such as us to death, they condemned us to be in solitary confinement for life?"
The Skeleton appeared struck at this remark, and, after a moment's silence, replied:
"Why, then, I'll tell you what I should do,—I should dash out my brains against the walls. I would starve rather than be in a solitary cell. What, all alone! all my life alone with myself,—and no chance of escape! I tell you it is impossible. Well, you know, there's no man more reckless than I am—I'd kill a man for a dollar, and for nothing if my honour was concerned; they believe I have only killed two persons, but if the dead could tell tales there are five tongues could say what I have done."