The Square Emerald by Edgar Wallace — Read

PETER DAWLISH found it very difficult to concentrate his mind upon his work, and although his task was purely mechanical he stopped from time to time and allowed his thoughts to wander; and inevitably they wandered towards that grey building on the Thames Embankment, and a room somewhere in its dark interior where a girl was sitting. He could see her face very clearly. He sighed and took up his pen again, and cursed himself for the folly of dreams.

Far better for him, he thought, that, if he could not concentrate upon his work, he let his mind go roving westwards to the bleak moor and those ugly prison buildings that are set in a fold of it; to the carved sneer on the stone arch under which he had walked, heavy--footed, towards the golden--bearded warder who stood by the iron gates and counted the prisoners in and out; to the long, smelly "ward," and the vault--like cells with their gaily coloured blankets; to the stretch of bogland from which the convict workers returned soaked to the skin to their lukewarm dinners; to the barnlike laundry, the silent punishment cells, and the cracked asphalt where the prisoners walked in a ring on Sunday mornings. An ugly memory, but at least one of accomplishment, and substantially past. Much better than letting your fancies go straying towards the straight figure of a girl with violet eyes and red lips that curved everlastingly in laughter.