It was in Burma, a sodden morning of the rains. A sickly light, like yellow tinfoil, was slanting
over the high walls into the jail yard. We were waiting outside the condemned cells, a row of
sheds fronted with double bars, like small animal cages. Each cell measured about ten feet by
ten and was quite bare within except for a plank bed and a pot of drinking water. In some of
them brown silent men were squatting at the inner bars, with their blankets draped round
them. These were the condemned men, due to be hanged within the next week or two.