The next morning he appeared outside of the bars holding a large box and the chains for the step up blocks in his hands, then unlocked the cell door and came inside.
“That was your first night of seven convict. I hope you thought about why you are being disciplined like this?”
He stepped out of my sight and I trembled like a falling leaf, fearing that he was going to whip me again, but a moment later, he spread some ointment on my still sore, burning buttocks. I’d fallen forward again and hung there, unresisting, in front of him until a few moments later he pulled me back to a standing position and placed the wooden blocks under my feet. I stood gratefully on them, keeping very still while he unlocked the side chains then at last released the one at the top of my head cage. Once freed, I stepped slowly and tiredly onto the tiles, staggering from exhaustion, but he held me up and guided me to the toilet. I sat on it with a heavy clank of my harness hitting the steel seat, then, without a sympathetic word, he screwed the long rubber hose onto the front of the gag plate covering my lower face. The bottles of water and bread mash were fitted into brackets on the wall, then he spoke.
“Your food and water are here convict and so you may eat and drink