An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser

contest of skill—or the arguments on every conceivable

topic from death and women to lack of it, as far at least as

the general low intelligence of the group permitted.

For the most part, as soon as breakfast was over—among

those who were not called upon to join the first group for

exercise, there were checkers or cards, two games that

were played—not with a single set of checkers or a deck of

cards between groups released from their cells, but by one

of the ever present keepers providing two challenging

prisoners (if it were checkers) with one checker-board but

no checkers. They were not needed. Thereafter the

opening move was called by one. “I move from G 2 to E

1”—each square being numbered—each side lettered. The

moves checked with a pencil.

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Thereafter the second party—having recorded this move on

his own board and having studied the effect of it on his own

general position, would call: “I move from E 7 to F 5.” If

more of those present decided to join in this—either on one

side or the other, additional boards and pencils were

passed to each signifying his desire. Then Shorty Bristol,

desiring to aid “Dutch” Swighort, three cells down, might

call: “I wouldn’t do that, Dutch. Wait a minute, there’s a

better move than that.” And so on with taunts, oaths,

laughter, arguments, according to the varying fortunes and

difficulties of the game. And so, too, with cards. These were

played with each man locked in his cell, yet quite as

successfully.

But Clyde did not care for cards—or for these jibing and

coarse hours of conversation. There was for him—and with

the exception of the speech of one—Nicholson—alone, too

much ribald and even brutal talk which he could not

appreciate. But he was drawn to Nicholson. He was

beginning to think after a time—a few days—that this lawyer

—his presence and companionship during the exercise hour

—whenever they chanced to be in the same set—could

help him to endure this. He was the most intelligent and

respectable man here. The others were all so different—

taciturn at times—and for the most part so sinister, crude or

remote.

But then and that not more than a week after his coming

here—and when, because of his interest in Nicholson, he

was beginning to feel slightly sustained at least—the

execution of Pasquale Cutrone, of Brooklyn, an Italian,

convicted of the slaying of his brother for attempting to

seduce his wife. He had one of the cells nearest the

transverse passage, so Clyde learned after arriving, and

had in part lost his mind from worrying. At any rate he was

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invariably left in his cell when the others—in groups of six—

were taken for exercise. But the horror of his emaciated

face, as Clyde passed and occasionally looked in—a face

divided into three grim panels by two gutters or prison lines

of misery that led from the eyes to the corners of the mouth.

Beginning with his, Clyde’s arrival, as he learned, Pasquale

had begun to pray night and day. For already, before that,

he had been notified of the approximate date of his death

which was to be within the week. And after that he was

given to crawling up and down his cell on his hands and

knees, kissing the floor, licking the feet of a brass Christ on

a cross that had been given him. Also he was repeatedly

visited by an Italian brother and sister fresh from Italy and

for whose benefit at certain hours, he was removed to the

old death house. But as all now whispered, Pasquale was

mentally beyond any help that might lie in brothers or

sisters.

All night long and all day long, when they were not present,

he did this crawling to and fro and praying, and those who

were awake and trying to read to pass the time, were

compelled to listen to his mumbled prayers, the click of the

beads of a rosary on which he was numbering numberless

Our Fathers and Hail Marys.

And though there were voices which occasionally said: “Oh,

for Christ’s sake—if he would only sleep a little”—still on,

on. And the tap of his forehead on the floor—in prayer, until

at last the fatal day preceding the one on which he was to

die, when Pasquale was taken from his cell here and

escorted to another in the old death house beyond and

where, before the following morning, as Clyde later learned,

last farewells, if any, were to be said. Also he was to be

allowed a few hours in which to prepare his soul for his

maker.

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But throughout that night what a strange condition was this

that settled upon all who were of this fatal room. Few ate

any supper as the departing trays showed. There was

silence—and after that mumbled prayers on the part of

some—not so greatly removed by time from Pasquale’s

fate, as they knew. One Italian, sentenced for the murder of

a bank watchman, became hysterical, screamed, dashed

the chair and table of his cell against the bars of his door,

tore the sheets of his bed to shreds and even sought to

strangle himself before eventually he was overpowered and

removed to a cell in a different part of the building to be

observed as to his sanity.

As for the others, throughout this excitement, one could

hear them walking and mumbling or calling to the guards to

do something. And as for Clyde, never having experienced

or imagined such a scene, he was literally shivering with

fear and horror. All through the last night of this man’s life

he lay on his pallet, chasing phantoms. So this was what

death was like here; men cried, prayed, they lost their minds

—yet the deadly process was in no way halted, for all their

terror. Instead, at ten o’clock and in order to quiet all those

who were left, a cold lunch was brought in and offered—but

with none eating save the Chinaman over the way.

And then at four the following morning—the keepers in

charge of the deadly work coming silently along the main

passage and drawing the heavy green curtains with which

the cells were equipped so that none might see the fatal

procession which was yet to return along the transverse

passage from the old death house to the execution room.

And yet with Clyde and all the others waking and sitting up

at the sound.

It was here, the execution! The hour of death was at hand.

This was the signal. In their separate cells, many of those

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1137

who through fear or contrition, or because of innate

religious convictions, had been recalled to some form of

shielding or comforting faith, were upon their knees praying.

Among the rest were others who merely walked or

muttered. And still others who screamed from time to time

in an incontrollable fever of terror.

As for Clyde he was numb and dumb. Almost thoughtless.

They were going to kill that man in that other room in there.

That chair—that chair that he had so greatly feared this

long while was in there—was so close now. Yet his time as

Jephson and his mother had told him was so long and

distant as yet—if ever—ever it was to be—if ever—ever——

But now other sounds. Certain walkings to and fro. A cell

door clanking somewhere. Then plainly the door leading

from the old death house into this room opening—for there

was a voice—several voices indistinct as yet. Then another

voice a little clearer as if some one praying. That tell-tale

shuffling of feet as a procession moved across and through

that passage. “Lord have mercy. Christ have mercy.”

“Mary, Mother of Grace, Mary, Mother of Mercy, St. Michael,

pray for me; my good Angel, pray for me.

“Holy Mary, pray for me; St. Joseph, pray for me. St.

Ambrose, pray for me; all ye saints and angels, pray for me.”

“St. Michael, pray for me; my good Angel, pray for me.”

It was the voice of the priest accompanying the doomed

man and reciting a litany. Yet he was no longer in his right

mind they said. And yet was not that his voice mumbling

too? It was. Clyde could tell. He had heard it too much

recently. And now that other door would be opened. He

would be looking through it—this condemned man—so

soon to be dead—at it—seeing it—that cap—those straps.

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Oh, he knew all about those by now though they should

never come to be put upon him, maybe.

“Good-by, Cutrone!” It was a hoarse, shaky voice from

some near-by cell—Clyde could not tell which. “Go to a

better world than this.” And then other voices: “Good-by,

Cutrone. God keep you—even though you can’t talk

English.”

The procession had passed. That door was shut. He was in