is it, my boy?”
“Chaplain, I should like something to read.”
“Read? Why, we have a splendid library, m’ boy; very fine library. I will send you a catalogue, and you can draw one book every week.”
“I missed library day on this range. I’ll have to wait another week. But I’d like to have something in the meantime, Chaplain.”
“You are not working, m’ boy?”
“No.”
“You have not refused to work, have you?”
“No, I have not been offered any work yet.”
“Oh well, you will be assigned soon. Be patient, m’ boy.”
“But can’t I have something to read now?”
“Isn’t there a Bible in your cell?”
“A Bible? I don’t believe in it, Chaplain.”
“My boy, it will do you no harm to read it. It may do you good. Read it, m’ boy.”
For a moment I hesitate. A desperate idea crosses my mind.
“All right, Chaplain, I’ll read the Bible, but I don’t care for the modern English version. Perhaps you have one with Greek or Latin annotations?”
“Why, why, m’ boy, do you understand Latin or Greek?”
“Yes, I have studied the classics.”
The Chaplain seems impressed. He steps close to the door, leaning against it in the attitude of a man prepared for a long conversation. We talk about the classics, the sources of my knowledge, Russian schools, social conditions. An interesting and intelligent man, this prison Chaplain, an extensive traveler whose visit to Russia had impressed him with the great possibilities of that country. Finally he motions to a guard:
“Let A 7 come with me.”
With a suspicious glance at me, the officer unlocks the door. “Shall I come along, Chaplain?” he asks.
“No, no. It is all right. Come, m’ boy.”
Past the tier of vacant cells, we ascend the stairway to the upper rotunda, on the left side of which is the Chaplain’s office. Excited and alert, I absorb every detail of the surroundings. I strive to appear indifferent, while furtively following every movement of the Chaplain, as he selects the rotunda key from the large bunch in his hand, and opens the door. Passionate longing for liberty is consuming me. A plan of escape is maturing in my mind. The Chaplain carries all the keys—he lives in the Warden’s house, connected with the prison—he is so fragile—I could easily overpower him—there is no one in the rotunda—I’d stifle his cries—take the keys—
“Have a seat, my boy. Sit down. Here are some books. Look them over. I have a duplicate of my personal Bible, with annotations. It is somewhere here.”
With feverish eyes I watch him lay the keys on the desk. A quick motion, and they would be mine. That large and heavy one, it must belong to the gate. It is so big,—one blow would kill him. Ah, there is a safe! The Chaplain is taking some books from it. His back is turned to me. A thrust—and I’d lock him in.… Stealthily, imperceptibly, I draw nearer to the desk, my eyes fastened on the keys. Now I bend over them, pretending to be absorbed in a book, the while my hand glides forward, slowly, cautiously. Quickly I lean over; the open book in my hands entirely hides the keys. My hand touches them. Desperately I clutch the large, heavy bunch, my arm slowly rises—
“My boy, I cannot find that Bible just now, but I’ll give you some other book. Sit down, my boy. I am so sorry about you. I am an officer of the State, but I think you were dealt with unjustly. Your sentence is quite excessive. I can well understand the state of mind that actuated you, a young enthusiast, in these exciting times. It was in connection with Homestead, is it not so, m’ boy?”
I fall back into the chair, shaken, unmanned. That deep note of sympathy, the sincerity of the trembling voice—no, no, I cannot touch him.…
III
At last, mail from New York! Letters from the Girl and Fedya. With a feeling of mixed anxiety and resentment, I gaze at the familiar handwriting. Why didn’t they write before? The edge of expectancy has been dulled by the long suspense. The Girl and the Twin, my closest, most intimate friends of yesterday,—but the yesterday seems so distant in the past, its very reality submerged in the tide of soul-racking events.
There is a note of disappointment, almost of bitterness, in the Girl’s letter. The failure of my act will lessen the moral effect, and diminish its propagandistic value. The situation is aggravated by Most. Owing to his disparaging attitude, the Germans remain indifferent. To a considerable extent, even the Jewish revolutionary element has been influenced by him. The Twin, in veiled and abstruse Russian, hints at the attempted completion of my work, planned, yet impossible of realization.95
I smile scornfully at the “completion” that failed even of an attempt. The damningly false viewpoint of the Girl exasperates me, and I angrily resent the disapproving surprise I sense in both letters at my continued existence.
I read the lines repeatedly. Every word drips bitterness into my soul. Have I grown morbid, or do they actually presume to reproach me with my failure to suicide? By what right? Impatiently I smother the accusing whisper of my conscience, “By the right of revolutionary ethics.” The will to live leaps into being peremptorily, more compelling and imperative at the implied challenge.
No, I will struggle and fight! Friend or enemy, they shall learn that I am not so easily done for. I will live, to escape, to conquer!
93 The Chaplain of Western Penitentiary was John Lynn Milligan (1837–1909) who worked at the prison from 1869 to 1909. He was instrumental in the movement for prison reform in Pennsylvania and is credited with helping prisoners intellectually as well as spiritually. Milligan had created a large library at Riverside; one that Berkman and others fed on avidly.
94 Edward Wright (“Big Sandy”) had become the warden at the Western Penitentiary and stayed there until 1901 when he retired. In 1909 he penned A Brief History of the Western Penitentiary. In the eyes of Berkman and other prisoners, he was an officious, power-conscious, and rather cruel man who was also guilty of blatant favoritism in his dealings with the inmates.
95 After Berkman’s failed attempt on Frick, Modest Stein traveled to Pittsburgh in order to kill Frick by dynamiting his house. News of his presence appears to have been leaked and he fled to Detroit where Robert Reitzel, editor of Der arme Teufel, provided Stein with accommodation. In a letter to Goldman on September 20, 1929, held in the Emma Goldman Papers at ISSH, Stein reported that he believed the leak was Roman Lewis, who had been the first editor of Freie Arbeiter Stimme.
Chapter III: Spectral Silence
The silence grows more oppressive, the solitude unbearable. My natural buoyancy is weighted down by a nameless dread. With dismay I realize the failing elasticity of my step, the gradual loss of mental vivacity. I feel worn in body and soul.
The
