From The Enormous Room the
procession wended a gentle way to the women's quarters (scrubbed and
swept in anticipation of their arrival) and so departed; conscious--no
doubt--that in the Directeur France had found a rare specimen of
whole-hearted and efficient generosity.
Upon being sentenced to _cabinot_, whether for writing an intercepted
letter, fighting, threatening a _planton_, or committing some minor
offense for the _n_th time, a man took one blanket from his bed, carried
it downstairs to the _cachot_, and disappeared therein for a night or
many days and nights as the case might be. Before entering he was
thoroughly searched and temporarily deprived of the contents of his
pockets, whatever they might include. It was made certain that he had no
cigarettes nor tobacco in any other form upon his person, and no matches.
The door was locked behind him and double and triple locked--to judge by
the sound--by a _planton_, usually the Black Holster, who on such
occasions produced a ring of enormous keys suggestive of a burlesque
jailer. Within the stone walls of his dungeon (into which a beam of light
no bigger than a ten-cent piece, and in some cases no light at all,
penetrated) the culprit could shout and scream his or her heart out if he
or she liked, without serious annoyance to His Majesty King Satan.
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