Hank looked around for Jim, but was told that he was upstairs locked in his cell. The guard explained that the death-watch had been set on him and that for some time no one had left him day or night. He was to be hanged in the morning before sunrise. He himself had gone around that day and handed written invitations to the judges to be present. Some of them had asked him whether they could get in a few friends who wanted to go and see the hanging. The guard said they had over a thousand applications for tickets; that it was one of the most popular hangings they’d ever had in the jail. He supposed this was because Jackson had killed his wife and the newspapers had said so much about it. He could not help feeling sorry for Jackson. Of course, he supposed he was awfully wicked or he wouldn’t have killed his wife, but since he had come to know Jackson he had found him a perfect gentleman and very kind and obliging, and he acted like a good fellow. It really seemed kind of tough to hang a man. He had seen a good many men hung and was getting kind of tired of it. He believed he would go out in the country fishing somewhere tomorrow instead of staying to see it done. They never needed so many guards on that day because all the prisoners were kept locked up in their cells. As Hank went along, the guard chatted to him in the most friendly way. He pointed over to the courtyard where there were some long black beams and boards, and said that was where they were going to hang Jackson, that the carpenters would put up the scaffold in the night. The murderers’ row where Jim was kept was around on the side where he couldn’t see the carpenters put up the scaffold. It used to be right in front but it had been changed. The guard said he didn’t see much difference, because the men could hear it and they knew just what it was, and anyhow they never could sleep the last night unless they took something. He told Hank that after they got through he would take him down to the office and show him a piece of the rope that they used to hang the Anarchists, and the one they used on Pendergast, who killed Carter Harrison, and the one they had for the car-barn murderers. It was the very best rope they could get; some people wouldn’t know it from clothes-line but it was a good deal finer and more expensive. The guard said it was strange how these men acted before they were hanged.