Suddenly Sims rose from his chair. "Now, then," he said with a rather wan smile, "take me to the poor fellow." Dr. Marriott opened the door and made a sign to the waiting warder. Together the three men went to the end of the passage. Another door was unlocked and they found themselves in a low stone hall, with a roof of heavily barred ground glass. There was a door on each side of the place. "That's the execution room," said Dr. Marriott in a whisper, pointing to one of the doors. "The other's the condemned cell. It's only about ten steps from one to the other. The convict, of course, never knows that. But from the time he leaves his cell to the moment of death is rarely more than forty-five seconds." The voice of the prison doctor, though very low in key, was not subdued by any note of awe. The machinery of Death had no terrors for him. He spoke in a matter-of-fact way, with an unconscious note of the showman. The curator of a museum might have shown his treasures thus to an intelligent observer. For a second of time--so strange are the operations of the memory cells--another and far distant scene grew vivid in the mind of Morton Sims. Once more he was paying his first visit to Rome, and had been driven from his hotel upon the Pincio to the nine o'clock Mass at St. Peter's. A suave guide had accompanied him, and among the curious crowd that thronged the rails, had told in a complacent whisper of this or that Monsignore who said or served the Mass. Dr. Marriott went to the door opposite to the one he had pointed out as the death-chamber. He moved aside a hanging disc of metal on a level with his eyes, and peered through a glass-covered spy-hole into the condemned cell. After a scrutiny of some seconds, he slid the disc into its place and rapped softly upon the door. Almost immediately it was opened a foot or so, silently, as the door of a sick-room is opened by one who watches within. There was a whispered confabulation, and a warder came out. "This gentleman," said the Medical Officer, "as you have already been informed by the Governor, is to have an interview with the convict absolutely alone. You, and the man with you, are to sit just outside the cell and to keep it under continual observation through the glass. If you think it necessary you are to enter the cell at once. And at the least gesture of this gentleman you will do so too. But otherwise, Dr. Morton Sims is to be left alone with the prisoner for an hour. You quite understand?" "Perfectly, sir." "You anticipate no trouble?--how is he?" "Quiet as a lamb, sir. There's no fear of any trouble with him. He's cheerful and he's been talking a lot about himself--about his violin playing mostly, and a week he had in Paris. His hands are twitching a bit, but less than usual with them." "Very well. Jones will remain here and will fetch me at once if I am wanted. Now take Dr. Morton Sims in."