Leslie Hartley - The Complete Short Stories of L.P. Hartley

Here they left him; but presently a warder came in with a small bundle of clothes which he recognized as his. ‘This is all you’ll want,’ he said, ‘we’ve got the rest. I’ll show you where the place is,’ and unlocking the door he indicated where Rudy could relieve himself. ‘But you’ll have to knock on the door—there’s always me or one of us in the passage. Lights out at ten o’clock. Breakfast at six. These handcuffs are a bit tight, I’ll give you some second-grade ones, and you can stretch your arms a bit. No fooling about, mind. Good-night.’

The new handcuffs did indeed give Rudy more freedom of movement. Instead of being clamped together, with only an interval of a few inches between, hardly enough, not enough, to enable him to satisfy the most rudimentary needs of Nature, his hands now stretched to his hips; he could feel parts of his body that before had been beyond their scope; he could have picked things up from the dirty stone floor, had there been anything worth picking up. He could even embrace himself, or part of himself, had he felt so inclined. This freedom! But compared with the earlier restriction it seemed like liberty. Now he could sleep again; he had always been a good sleeper, but with his hands tied so tight in front of or (according to the gaoler’s whim) behind him, he had been unable to sleep, and his breakfast of bread and water, or whatever insubstantial substance took its place, found him more tired than he had been at ten o’clock lights out.

But now, folding and unfolding his arms so as to give him as little discomfort, not to say pain, as might be, he awoke, not refreshed, but with the blessed sense of having slept.

Gradually he adjusted himself, as best he could, to his new life. Small reliefs, that in the old days he would have taken for granted or not noticed—the cleansing of his cell from certain noxious insects—seemed like a gift from Heaven. And what a blessing it was to go out into the light of common day and join the other prisoners in their half-hour’s exercise inside the high-walled courtyard. Here they were allowed to speak to each other, those who had the necessary gift of speech, for they were of many nations and languages. Some had known each other recently, some from long ago; but the majority, of whom Rudy was one, were too low-spirited to want to talk much. What was there to talk about, between those flat, encircling walls, outside which life went on, with its incentives and excitements, whereas inside all was static and uneventful, without hope, promise, or future? Only death; and for death he sometimes longed. He couldn’t understand why he hadn’t been executed before; ‘they’ had plenty against him, a whole dossier, and from time to time they made him stand up in his cell while they questioned him. Sometimes he was too weak to stand up, and asked permission to sit down on his straw bed. He answered, or parried the questions as well as he could, and as well as his tired mind would let him. He had to keep a constant watch on his tongue, for he didn’t want to involve other people more than he could help—it was an occupational obligation to keep his mouth, as far as might be, shut.

He wasn’t subjected to any physical or bodily torture, in these interrogations, except a very hard strong light from an electrical instrument they brought with them, shining on his eyes. It dazzled and distressed him, and drove almost every thought from his head; to keep his head, or what remained of it, was his chief concern.

They are trying to wear me down, he thought, they are trying to wear me down, and perhaps one day they will, and perhaps I shall tell them everything—what is true as well as untrue—for he knew only too well, that for some psychological reason, physical or even emotional pressure will induce a man to tell the truth, instead of the lies to which spies are accustomed and which they have already carefully prepared.

They are waiting for me to break down, he thought, they are waiting for me to break down, and he who had always been proud of his strength, felt this as an almost personal affront to his image of himself.

Meanwhile his fears for his health were being too well justified. Needless to say, there was no looking glass in his cell—why should a prisoner want to look at himself? much better not. They had taken away his razor, as no doubt they do, and always have done, in many prisons, and for obvious reasons: but they had left him his little pocket mirror, in which, in better days, he used to study his face to see if it looked like what he wanted it to look like at the moment.

And now, what a picture did it present! He had usually been clean-shaven; he had sometimes, when the occasion seemed to demand it, been bearded; but beards need a good deal of attention and in the absence of scissors, his face, as he saw it reflected, was almost unrecognisable, and also shaming, for he had always been proud of his looks which had taken him a long way on his uneven road to temporary prosperity.

And now another thing, another physical thing, connected with the conditions in which he lived. The chain of his handcuffs had been considerably lengthened, so that he could now scratch himself (an almost necessary activity) in places where before he could not; but owing to his hands and wrists being of extra size, they chafed him, bringing to those parts sores and inflammation which took away what little physical comfort he had left. His gaoler, who was by no means unsympathetic, for a gaoler, reported this to the prison doctor, and the doctor, seeing Rudy’s swollen and suppurating hands, recommended handcuffs at least an inch wider, to help circulation and enable the blood to flow. This was a great relief to Rudy, whose robust constitution responded to any mitigation allowed it, and by degrees, the swelling died down, leaving behind them hollows where the flesh and muscles used to be.

Being technically stateless, though he had (or had had, before his belongings were confiscated), more than one passport he could not appeal to any country for aid, and even if he could have, the country he appealed to would certainly not have recognized him. Now that spying was an almost organized occupation, he had hoped that he might be exchanged for some opposite number (he could think of several); but it hadn’t happened—for how could he get in touch with some country to whom he had been of service? It didn’t seem likely to happen. In fact he had no one in authority to appeal to; and meanwhile he grew thinner, and less and less, physically and mentally, his old self.

For it was his misfortune that the country which had caught up with him and detected him was a poor country, and overrun by refugees; they had no food to spare for themselves or for the refugees, political sympathisers, who swarmed over them; and those who came last on the list, for physical sustenance, were political prisoners, of whom, for one reason and another, they had a surfeit.

Rudy’s diet was hardly enough to keep body and soul together; looking at himself, when he was allowed to have a bath, as sometimes the prisoners were, he hardly recognized the fine figure of a man he used to know.

Occasionally, but only occasionally, and under the strictest supervision, the prisoners were allowed to receive visitors. Such visitors, of course, had to be carefully ‘screened’, and more often than not, they were turned away at the gateway of the prison. So what was Rudy’s surprise, when his gaoler told him, almost as if it was a command not a concession, that a lady wanted to see him. ‘She says she is your daughter. I don’t know if you know about her. But sometimes we let in relations.’

‘Just a moment, please,’ said Rudy, who was lying on his bed, half naked, owing to the intense heat. ‘Just a moment.’ He tried to collect his thoughts, if any, but the sound of running water in the lavatory at the end of the passage gave him, as it gives many men, an uncontrollable desire to pee. ‘Take me down there, will you?’ he said, waving towards the sound, for without the gaoler’s permission, and presence, he couldn’t relieve the needs of Nature.