midnight
`` You 'll excuse my ranting a bit , sir . It 's natural after what I 've gone through . You 've never been in a prison , maybe . And you do n't know what it 's like to shake the bars of a cell at midnight and howl out of sheer madness to be off and away -- somewhere , anywhere ! '' He leaned forward and touched the minister on the knee . `` And that brings me back to my idea in coming to see you . I 'm a level-headed man , still -- quite cool and collected , as you see -- and I 've been thinking the situation over . ''