Gurn was walking quickly and alone round the exercise yard, when a breathless voice sounded in his ear.
“ ’Gad, Gurn, you know how to march! I was going to join you for a bit, but I could not keep up with you.”
Gurn turned and saw old Siegenthal, the warder in charge of his division, in whose custody he was particularly placed.
“My word!” the old fellow panted, “anybody could tell you had been in the infantry. Well, so have I; though that wasn’t yesterday, nor yet the day before; but we never marched as fast as you do. We made a fine march once though—at Saint-Privat.”
Out of pity for the decent old fellow Gurn slackened his pace. He had heard the story of the battle of Saint-Privat a dozen times already, but he was quite willing to let Siegenthal tell it again. The warder, however, wandered to another point.
“By the way, I heard you were promoted sergeant out in the Transvaal: is that so?” and as Gurn nodded assent, he went on: “I never rose above the rank of corporal, but at any rate I have always led an honest life.” A sudden compassion for his prisoner seized the old man, and he laid a kindly hand on Gurn’s shoulder. “Is it really possible that an old soldier like you, who seem to be such a steady, serious, kind of man, can have committed such a crime?”
Gurn dropped his eyes and did not reply.
“I suppose there was a woman at the bottom of it?” Siegenthal said tentatively. “You acted on impulse, in a fit of jealousy, eh?”
“No,” Gurn answered with sudden bluntness, “I may as well own up that I did it in anger, because I wanted money—for the sake of robbery.”
“I’m sorry,” said the old warder simply. “You must have been desperately hard up.”
“No I wasn’t.”
Siegenthal stared at his prisoner. The man must be utterly callous to talk like that, he thought. Then a clock struck and the warder gave a curt order.
“Time, Gurn! We must go back,” and he conducted the unresisting prisoner up the three flights of stairs that led to the division in which his cell was. “By the way,” he remarked as they went, “I forgot to tell you that you and I have got to part.”
“Oh?” said Gurn. “Am I to be transferred to another prison?”
“No, it’s I who am going. Just fancy, I have been appointed head warder at Poissy; I go on leave tonight, and take up my new post in a week.” Both halted before the door of cell number 127. “In with you,” said Siegenthal, and when Gurn had obeyed he turned to go. Then he wheeled round again quickly, and put out his hand hurriedly, as if half afraid of being seen. “Put it there, Gurn,” he said; “no doubt you are a murderer and, as you have confessed yourself, a thief; but I can’t forget that if you had kept straight, you were the sergeant and I should have had to obey you. I’m sorry for you!” Gurn was touched and murmured a word of thanks. “That’s all right, that’s all right,” Siegenthal muttered, not attempting to hide his emotion; “let us hope that everything will turn out well,” and he left Gurn alone in the cell to his meditations.
Twice, Gurn reflected, relying on the sympathy which he knew he had evoked in the old warder’s heart despite the number of criminals who had passed through his hands, he had been on the point of broaching a serious and delicate matter to him; but he had not actually spoken, being deterred by some undefinable scruple, as well as half suspecting that his application would be made in vain. And now he was glad he had been so cautious, for even if the warder had been amenable, his approaching removal to another prison would have prevented the idea from coming to fruition.
A singsong voice echoed in the corridor.
“Number 127, you are wanted in the barristers’ room. Get ready,” and the next minute the door of the cell was thrown open, and a cheery-looking warder, with a strong Gascon accent, appeared. Gurn had noticed him before: he was the second warder in this division, a man named Nibet, and no doubt he would be promoted to Siegenthal’s place when the chief warder left. Nibet looked curiously at Gurn, a certain sympathy in his quick brown eyes. “Ready, Gurn?”
Gurn growled an answer and pulled on his coat again. His counsel was Maître Barberoux, one of the foremost criminal barristers of the day; Gurn had thought it prudent to retain him for his defence, more especially as it would cost him nothing personally. But he had no particular desire to talk to him now; he had already told him everything he intended to tell him, and he had no intention of allowing the case to be boomed as a sensation; quite the reverse indeed: in his opinion, the flatter the case fell, the better it would be for his interests, though no doubt Maître Barberoux would not be of the same way of thinking.
But he said nothing, and merely walked in front of Nibet along the corridor towards the barristers’ room, the way to which he was already familiar with. On the way they passed some masons who were at work in the prison, and these men stopped to watch him pass, but contrary to Gurn’s apprehensions they did
