Still, as
I say, in the case of these gentlemen who you refer to--to wit, the doomed
men as I have acted as death watch for--it do interfere with their game.
There's no denying that."
* * * * *
Now the rain chattered darkly on the grated windows of the Dearborn Street
bastile and Deputy Cochran tilted back in his chair and thought pensively
and in silence of life and death and high, low, jack and the game.
"They pick me out for the death watch on account I have a way with doomed
men," he remarked at last, his voice modestly self-conscious. "Some of the
deputies is inclined to get a bit sad, you know. Or to let their nerves go
away with them. But me, I feel as the best thing to do in the crisis to
which I refer is to make the best of it.
"So when I sit in on the death watch I faces myself with the truth. I says
to myself right away: 'Bill, this young feller here is to be hanged by the
neck until dead, in a few hours. Which being the case, there's no use
wasting any more time or thought on the matter.' So after this
self-communication, I usually says to the young feller under observation
by the death watch, 'Cheerio, m'lad. Is there anything in particular as
you'd like to discuss.
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