Full Text Archive

Full Text Archive
https://www.fulltextarchive.com
When Cowperwood entered, dressed in his very good clothing--a
dark gray-blue twill suit of pure wool, a light, well-made gray overcoat, a black derby hat of the
latest shape, his shoes new and of good leather, his tie of the best silk, heavy and
conservatively colored, his hair and mustache showing the attention of an intelligent barber, and
his hands well manicured--the receiving overseer saw at once that he was in the presence of
some one of superior intelligence and force, such a man as the fortune of his trade rarely
brought into his net.
Cowperwood stood in the middle of the room without apparently looking at any one or anything,
though he saw all. "Convict number 3633," Kendall called to a clerk, handing him at the same
time a yellow slip of paper on which was written Cowperwood's full name and his record
number, counting from the beginning of the penitentiary itself.
The underling, a convict, took it and entered it in a book, reserving the slip at the same time for
the penitentiary "runner" or "trusty," who would eventually take Cowperwood to the "manners"
gallery.
"You will have to take off your clothes and take a bath," said Kendall to Cowperwood, eyeing
him curiously. "I don't suppose you need one, but it's the rule."
"Thank you," replied Cowperwood, pleased that his personality was counting for something
even here. "Whatever the rules are, I want to obey."
When he started to take off his coat, however, Kendall put up his hand delayingly and tapped a
bell. There now issued from an adjoining room an assistant, a prison servitor, a weird-looking
specimen of the genus "trusty." He was a small, dark, lopsided individual, one leg being slightly
shorter, and therefore one shoulder lower, than the other. He was hollow-chested, squint-eyed,
and rather shambling, but spry enough withal. He was dressed in a thin, poorly made, baggy
suit of striped jeans, the prison stripes of the place, showing a soft roll-collar shirt underneath,
and wearing a large, wide-striped cap, peculiarly offensive in its size and shape to Cowperwood.
He could not help thinking how uncanny the man's squint eyes looked under its straight
outstanding visor. The trusty had a silly, sycophantic manner of raising one hand in salute. He
was a professional "second-story man," "up" for ten years, but by dint of good behavior he had
attained to the honor of working about this office without the degrading hood customary for
prisoners to wear over the cap. For this he was properly grateful. He now considered his
superior with nervous dog-like eyes, and looked at Cowperwood with a certain cunning
appreciation of his lot and a show of initial mistrust.
One prisoner is as good as another to the average convict; as a matter of fact, it is their only
consolation in their degradation that all who come here are no better than they. The world may
have misused them; but they misuse their confreres in their thoughts. The "holier than thou"
attitude, intentional or otherwise, is quite the last and most deadly offense within prison walls.
This particular "trusty" could no more understand Cowperwood than could a fly the motions of a
fly-wheel; but with the cocky superiority of the underling of the world he did not hesitate to think
that he could. A crook was a crook to him--Cowperwood no less than the shabbiest pickpocket.
His one feeling was that he would like to demean him, to pull him down to his own level.
269 / 312

---