Page 232 - down-and-out-in-paris-and-london

on the road. She was, no doubt, a respectable widow wom-
an, become a tramp through some grotesque accident.
The spike opened at six. This was Saturday, and we were
to be confined over the week-end, which is the usual prac-
tice; why, I do not know, unless it is from a vague feeling that
Sunday merits something disagreeable. When we registered
I gave my trade as ‘journalist’. It was truer than ‘painter’,
for I had sometimes earned money from newspaper arti-
cles, but it was a silly thing to say, being bound to lead to
questions. As soon as we were inside the spike and had been
lined up for the search, the Tramp Major called my name.
He was a stiff, soldierly man of forty, not looking the bully
he had been represented, but with an old soldier’s gruffness.
He said sharply:
‘Which of you is Blank?’ (I forget what name I had giv-
en.)
‘Me, sir.’
‘So you are a journalist?’
‘Yes, sir,’ I said, quaking. A few questions would betray
the fact that I had been lying, which might mean prison. But
the Tramp Major only looked me up and down and said:
‘Then you are a gentleman?’
‘I suppose so.’
He gave me another long look. ‘Well, that’s bloody bad
luck, guv’nor,’ he said; ‘bloody bad luck that is.’ And there-
after he treated me with unfair favouritism, and even with
a kind of deference. He did not search me, and in the bath-
room he actually gave me a clean towel to myself—an
unheard-of luxury. So powerful is the word ‘gentleman’ in

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