She had but a vague notion of that receptacle for vice, dishonesty, and misfortune. She had no clear perception of the difference between the debtor’s and the criminal’s place of incarceration. To her it was one huge black building, frowning and grim in its aspect without; all cells, chains, and torture within.
To some such a place she believed her father to have been borne. She shrank not to share his captivity She had a sense that the air would be foul, stifling, pestiferous, and the cell wanting the light of day. She pictured four black, mildewed walls, a straw bed, always damp with slime and dank with humid earth, a small wretched table, a pitcher of water, and a lump of dark, noisome bread. She had heard of such places. There might be some alleviation where the crime was only inability to pay, but a prison was still a prison, and hopeful as she might be that his condition was not so bad, yet she could see it in no other light.
To Mrs. Harper she revealed her wishes, but that good lady not only had a difficulty in believing in its practicability, but even in its propriety.
Mr. Harper was consulted, and he hastened to set Flora right.
“Do not suppose,” he said, “Miss Wilton, that I have overlooked the situation of your father—common humanity would have forbidden that. I made it my duty to send to him, as early as the gates of the establishment where he is detained were open, on the morning after the fire, to let him know that the sad disaster had happened, but that his child was safe in my charge. I further caused him to be informed that as soon as you were able to leave your chamber, you would go to him, and explain all that I was unable to communicate.”
“Oh, sir! let me go to him at once,” cried Flora eagerly.
“If you feel strong enough, certainly,” replied Mr. Harper.
“Oh, sir! I am quite strong enough, quite—indeed I am. I so long to see him; I have so much, so very much to say to him.”
“Be it so; Hal shall accompany you to protect you. You cannot go alone.”
“No?”