I was put into a cell with Chump Charlie, Big Loony, and a tall, skinny, dried-up Mississippi red neck called Pappy Calhoun. It wasn’t as tough in the cells as it had been before because in some miraculous manner, during our stay in 2-6, we had changed from “agitators” into legitimate cripples. How this had come about, since we were the same convicts with the same afflictions and attitudes, I didn’t know. But it was so, like the world when God got through making it. There were also cripple companies on 1-2 and 1- and 2-1, part of whom were also from the dormitory. During the afternoons, when the weather permitted, we were taken out behind the wooden dormitory in the area facing down from the death house along the outside wall. It was a recreation period for all four cripple companies. We pitched horseshoes and played softball, visited with each other or just strolled about in the bright sunshine. Later we were given permission to use the old baseball diamond as our playground.
