At long intervals a new prisoner came through the door, and eventually the number had grown to thirteen. The arrival of a new companion always wakened us up for a little, and then the spell of the place fell on us again. The atmosphere was too devastating to think in, to read in; we passed the time on our backs, pacing up and down in twos or singly, now and then wearily playing cards and sleeping. And everybody who was not asleep smoked until the air was like a fog.
Lunch time came. A couple of us went away under escort and returned with two tin dishes laden with food. There was food and to spare, and good food too; but strange are the ways of Dublin Castle, and there was nothing to eat it off or with. Among thirteen people there were three or four plates, a couple of knives, a couple of forks and a spoon. We had to eat in turn. I saw that my turn never came. If you keep a bird in a cage you should see that the cage is clean. These people, who were of inferior social position, two were railway porters, may not have been squeamish; but the conditions were unnecessary, and gave the Sinn Fein party a genuine handle for their propaganda. There was a gallon of tea for us, and not one cup, and an apologetic sergeant could only produce five jam jars of different sizes. Yet countless prisoners have lain in Dublin Castle.
We asked for coal, we got coal, and the place was never chilly. “Eat as much as you want,” the sergeant said, “but don’t get more than you can eat or there’ll be trouble about it.” The contrast was extreme between the accommodation provided and the readiness of our guards to make us comfortable. I found no man who was not accommodating. One had only to knock on the door and the guard opened it to grant any little request he could, such as purchasing cigarettes or a pack of cards. When night came along one soldier gave up his blankets to us because we had not enough to go round.
The man like a Spaniard had seen the inside of many prisons.
“A man is better off when it’s their minds they have made up what they’re going to do with him,” he said. “Sure, once a man’s sentenced conditions are better. It’s these places where they grab chaps and keep them for interrogation that are worst.”
At night, when we rolled up in our blankets, we covered the whole floor. I was to get an intimate glance into Catholic life. As each man finished taking off his boots and such clothes as he thought fit, he knelt upon his blankets in the most natural way in the world and said his prayers. Nobody seemed to think there was anything strange in this behaviour; but it was surprising to a stranger, and proved how intimate a part of a Catholic’s life his religion is. The fire was made up last thing to last through the night.
For three days thirteen of us stayed in an atmosphere which was foul in the beginning and staling all the time.
The third day we were told to get ready for exercise, and were taken under escort to a back yard of the Castle where we wandered wearily up and down, while female servants looked down on us disdainfully from upper stories. In the middle of our wanderings somebody arrived with a chair, and a sprightly young man, waving a diminutive camera on very long legs, so that it looked like some breed of spider, invited us to take the chair in turn and be photographed. At the same time another gentleman with a waxed moustache and a very penetrating eye jotted down his personal reflections upon our looks. This was for the Castle archives. Tears came into the eyes of poor old O’Grady when he had to suffer the indignity of the chair; but I disguised myself behind a three days’ growth of beard and remained unashamed. After the photography we were headed back to our cell, to staleness, to boredom and to dreary contemplation.
The end of my adventure came as suddenly as the beginning. We were exercising next day. A sergeant of Military Police tapped me on the shoulder and said, “This way.” I started at his side and we crossed the Upper Castle Yard, and then the Lower Castle Yard, and finally we came to the main gate. He gave a flourish of his hand and said, “There you are. You are free.”
Not to be outdone, I also waved my hand. “I’m to walk out there?”