Should the Conciergerie remain the Conciergerie?

With a smiling eyeglass and a good-natured belly, the head guard of the Conciergerie has operated the lock of the "detention" with professional precision. And his finger rises, demonstrative:

Here, it is the solitary regime... to the extent, naturally, that our means allow us. We do not settle in as we please in a prison that is made of pieces. Besides, you will see.

It is not so simple as that, even at midday, to see something in the Conciergerie. The head guard, fortunately, turns out to be nyctalope. And, immediately, by way of welcome, the smell of "prison" falls upon you, an inimitable odor, a skillfully measured mixture of tobacco smoke and dubious linen, boiled beans and cresyl, which leaves far behind the atmosphere of a guard post, an hour before the changeover.

When I was at the Conciergerie, a guard from Fresnes told me simply, I had ended up not noticing it anymore. But now, when I go back there, I admit that…

As soon as the door closes, the stench clings to you and never lets go. It follows you to the parlor, narrow and dark as a confessional, into the kitchen where piles of soldiers' mess tins collapse onto a tile flooded with mud, all along the dreary corridors brightened on each side by the impeccable alignment of the bolts.
And then, all of a sudden, it starts to exaggerate the guard on duty has just pushed open a wicket. Voices, which had been purring discreetly, have fallen silent. And, behind a screen of smoke, three heads come forward, three chins with thick beards and three pairs of wide-open eyes: the tenants who are surprised.

There's room for one in there, regulation space with light and air cubic capacity. We put three. It's the usual.
At the moment, said the guard, we have a hundred and fifty prisoners. There are only a hundred and forty cells, not all of which are habitable. We manage as best we can.
Are these suspects?
Accused and appellants. We only have a few convicts, for chores.

At the end of the corridor, we can make out, in the dark, a clean-shaven man in white fatigues, who is carrying a broom, with the weary and vaguely humiliated look of an old man who would be brought, by some paradox, to do the work of the blues...
The head guard shrugs his shoulders.

Nothing to do here. We can sweep, wash, scrub; the dust still sticks. I've never seen the walls repainted; so, we can scrape.
The guests here, themselves, do nothing. Crouching on their bunks, a privilege of the first to arrive, or lying on the ground on vague straw mattresses, they smoke the three packets of tobacco that the Administration grants them each week. Twice a day, their soup is brought to them. Some of them turn half-heartedly the disjointed pages of the two volumes lent by the library. Others persist, as long as the day lasts, in blackening interminable sheets, because the quills and inkwells are taken away from them at half past four. In the meantime, there is the walk. The rules, in fact, require that the prisoner be allowed to turn around for one hour in a sort of cage on which a dull day falls as if with regret.
"The courtyards," says the head guard. "Besides, the walk only lasts half an hour. Here, you know, we can't apply the rules."

And there's the big word out. It is understood, once and for all, that at the Conciergerie it is impossible to apply the rules. So we are no longer surprised by anything. The prisoners can be crammed three to a single cell: it is the Conciergerie. If the telegrams reach them a day late, it is the Conciergerie. Are the blankets they are given decorated with vermin? Does one of them, suffering from a malaria attack, go half an hour without receiving care? Is the weekly shower only scheduled once a month for the lucky ones? Everything is in order: it is the Conciergerie.

The rules? Not only will they be searched for in vain on the walls of the cells, but the head warden does not suspect the existence of a single copy in the house…

And then, even if they were posted, it probably would not change much.
- There is nothing to be done, concluded the head warden. The Conciergerie will remain the Conciergerie…

Tradition is a very nice thing. But it is doubtful that those temporary tenants of this historic building in front of whom justice will open wide tomorrow the door of the Quai de l'Horloge will powerfully appreciate the attractions of this one!

ANDRE GUERIN.