, he was so anxious to
impress this laudable impartiality on the members of the little
prison-world, which was the only world he knew, that he overshot the
mark, refusing Axel small conveniences that he would have unhesitatingly
granted a suppliant called Schmidt, Schultz, or Meyer.

It was now quite dark, except for the faint light from the lamps in the
street below. Weary to death, Axel flung himself down on the little bed.
He had brought a few necessaries, hastily thrown into a bag by his
servant, necessaries that had first been carefully handled and inspected
with every symptom of distrust by the Junior Public Prosecutor Meyer;
but he did not unpack them. Judging from the shortness of the bed, he
concluded that criminals must be a stunted race. Sleeping was not made
easy by this bed, and he lay awake staring at the shadows cast by the
iron bars outside his window on to the ceiling. These shadows affected
him oddly. He shut his eyes, but still he saw them; he turned his head
to the wall and tried not to think of them, but still he saw them. They
expressed the whole misery of his situation.

He had dozed off, worn out, when a bright light on his face woke him. He
started up in bed, confused, hardly remembering where he was. A feeling
very nearly resembling horror came over him. A bull's-eye lantern was
being held close to his face. He could see nothing but the bright light.
The man holding it did not speak, and presently backed out again,
bolting the door behind him. Axel lay down, reflecting that such
surprises, added to anxiety and bad food, must wear out a suspected
culprit's nerves with extraordinary rapidity and thoroughness. There
could not, he thought, be much left of a man in the way of brains and
calmness by the time he was taken before the judge to clear himself. The
incident completely banished all tendency to sleep. He remained wide
awake after that, tormented by anxious thoughts.

Towards dawn, for which he thanked God when it came, the silence of the
prison was broken by screams. He started up again and listened, his
blood frozen by the sound of them. They were terrible to hear, echoing
through that place. Again a feeling of sheer horror came over him. How
long would he be able to endure these things? The screams grew more and
more appalling. He sprang up and went to the door, and listened there.
He thought he heard steps outside, and knocked. "What is that
screaming?" he cried out. But no one answered