Page:The Jail, Experiences in 1916.pdf/89

 hands, postcards and letters written to soldiers from home likewise; who knows how much domestic trouble these peeple caused by their work. And now they are here. The whole business came out in a typically Austrian manner. A certain prostitute was murdered in Vienna. As usual, no trace of the murderer. Among her possessions the police discovered a number of letters from a regimental medical officer with his name and address. So they went to him and instituted a search. But even so they found nothing which would have led to the discovery of the murderer, but on the other hand they came upon the censorists trick. The regimental medical officer was mixed up with it."

The room was quiet with the quietness following a meal in the afternoon. A few were still chewing slices of bread, others were stretched out on the straw mattresses, were smoking and staring with a sullen glance into vacuity.

Papa Declich had also stretched himself out. Budi was snoring in the sound sleep of youth. Hedrich was lying downm cap on head and with a cigar which had slipped into the corner of his mouth.

"Dušek, let's have a nap."

"Let's have a nap."

 

Tuesday, one—Wednesday—two, Thursday—three—what, only three days? And I feel as if I had been here three weeks, no, three months and even longer. My freedom is already far, far behind me; I recalled it and my heart began to ache, I began to think of the future, and gloomy thoughts arose in my mind. I have loved nothing so much in the world as this freedom of mine; I could not