Page:The Jail, Experiences in 1916.pdf/155



What the superintendent's idea was of an "Intelligenz-Zimmer,—heaven alone knew. I watched the daily ebb and flow in our number 60, and could not help smiling. Or did he really want to give me an opportunity of becoming familiar with as many and varied human destinies as possible? He was a German from Mödling in Lover Austria, a well-to-do man. The war had taken him from his fields and vineyards, and turned him into a keeper of criminals and convicts. He assuredly was bored there and found his services irksome. He was an intelligent man; I used to speak a few words with him now and then. The ideas he expressed were not couched in common language, and one could not help surmising that he had read, observed and reflected. He was anxious to become acquainted with some of my work; he had heard that this or that had been translated, and asked whether I had it. I referred him to the time when I should leave that place as a free man, he waved his hand, as much as to say: Ah, I shall have to wait. Then he was very much interested as to how I should write my recollections of my sojourn there, what I should relate in them, who would be mentioned. I assured him that he would see himself too, and that the jail would be so thoroughly depicted and described that it would form a souvenir of the war for him also.

People entered the cell, not a day passed but one or two new faces appeared. In truth, the superintendent was turning number 60 into an observation-centre for me. They came, told their stories, and they were either put onone side and not troubled about any further, or they were watched until they again departed. They did not stay with us long; after two days, Sponner or Schmied would come and take them away into another room or to another floor.