"No."
"Or an account of your life?"
"No, not that either. My life has not been good enough. Misfortune should be forgotten rather than recorded. No, I think I can write something else," stated Konrad.
"You shall have writing materials," said the judge. "And is there anything else? A more comfortable bed?"
"No, thank you. It's right enough as it is. If a hard bed was the only thing——"
"And is everything kept properly neat and clean?" interrupted the judge.
"If you're always waiting and thinking, 'Now, now, they're coming!' I tell you, sir, you don't sleep well," replied Konrad.
"Don't keep worrying yourself with ideas, Ferleitner," said the judge warningly to the man, who had again worked himself up into a state of excitement. "Not one of us knows what the next hour may bring, and yet we live on calmly. Use the time," he continued playfully, "in avenging your condemnation by some great literary work. In olden times great minds often did it."
"I can't write a great work," answered Konrad. "And I've nothing to avenge. I deserve death. But it's this waiting for it. The torments of hell cannot be worse."
"We've nothing to do with hell. We've merely to think of the purgatory in which we are placed. Let heaven, as they say, follow. Haven't you any business to arrange? Nothing to settle for anyone?" asked the judge.