Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1912-07-31
The Gates Of Silence y
By Meta SmmfnS, Author of "Hughed Ub"

sell 70 RImington as later. he SAT in the
cen TO which he had been taken-no
longer that grim anteroom to Deaths aud
renee chamber, but temporary cell
where he would remain until he was
GRATED out to begin the new life into
winch he had been born-the life of a con-
Wet condemned to penal servitude for
me. The reprieve which had been grant
ed TO him-waS it blessing or a curse?
In those first moments in the govern
or presence when he had realized that
ne was not to die his thoughts had rushed
out to embrace life with joy and thanks
giving that had bee nso poignant in it's
emotion as to cause that womanish faint
which had surprised and Inundated him
But now-facing the future-racing seven
thousand odd days and nights which
stretched between him and even the hope
of liberty-it was very different.
Twenty Years.
Twenty years! In twenty years IT, by
the most exemplary behavior he succeeded
in never losing his remission marks. and
by an effort of self control, that even to
contemplate at that moment was tor
ture. he could succeed in making himself
an absolutely passive instrument in the
hands OF those who from henceforth would
have the ordering of his life, he would be
free man. free man! The words
echoed in Rimington's brain with a bitter
irony. An elderly man. broken by prison
life, demoralized perhaps, heaven knew.
by prison association. A man who had
cheated the gallows by f1uke, who had
fallen out of his place in the world for
twenty years. What mockery! A free
mana free man!
And Betty7
No. no; he must not think Of her. He
could not-he would go mad. He must
shut out all though of her forever from
his heart-dig a grave for his love and
bury II deep deep-stamp down the cold,
wet clay on 1t with ruthless feet. Betty
was lost to him now forever. 1t was not
decent that dead man as he was should
associate himself in thought with living
woman Before II had been different;
going out to death he had the right to
look forward to reunion beyond the stars.
Now, IN the twenty years that stretched
between them, much could happen It
was not conceivable that any woman
could wait twenty years for a-felon. He
would pray every day that she would learn
TO see the folly of such waiting. In TWEEN
ty years she might become the wife OF an
other man, the mother of his children
All, Betty-Betty! In twenty years! The
mockery OF It!
He sprang to his feet laughing mad
laughter-laughter that rang through the
cell, waking no echo, attracting no atten-
ton They were used TO the laughter, to
the tears-that are allied to madness
there in those four walls that are fronted
by the grim Gates OF Silence.
Yet il at first he had found that it was
easier to face death with unfaltering
courage than this new life which stretched
out before him in an illimitable vista of
monotony. Jack Huntington began as the
time passed to realize that life was sweet
in the possessing even this life of
servitude was impregnated with the per-
fume of hope.
The chaplain had visited him again,
and the doctor also--a less human per
son than the chaplain, perhaps. but a
good sort all the same-who spoke CHEEKY
words that Rimington did not forget.
You're beginning as a prisoner in ear
nest. Well, let me give you an unofficial
tip. Give your will rest cure while
you're in prison. Good conduct in prison
and out Of it are different things; men
tality is the most useless of sciences to
1ifer -
Beginning as a prisoner In earnest!
The words had an ugly ring. There had
been little enough OF make believe in
what he had endured hitherto, Remington
thought But he was to realize very
acutely the gulf which exists between
the lenlency Of the treatment melted out
to the man under sentence of death and
the regulation of penal servitude mon.
Hitherto he had known nothing by per
sonal experience of the degradation of
prison death, Of the prison crop, OF the
physical examinetion-al ell those insignif-
cant items which eat into the soul Of the
gently nurtured man in prison, each. as
It were, a out from the knife that whit
ties down his personality and reduces him
to a human automaton without so much
as a name.
Leaving the Prison.
He left the prison that was to have
been his place of execution and his grave
on the afternoon following his reprieve
He had no idea of his destination, though
from vague Impressions in his own mind
and from the conversation overheard in
the prison van, he believed he was being
drafted to NORWOOD Scrubs
To Be Continued in Next Issue.