nine o'clock
So each lad , when they sweat him , just tells the truth , the whole truth , so help him God . '' And there , in that dark hole of man 's inhumanity , from dungeon cell to dungeon cell , their mouths against the gratings , the two-score lifers solemnly pledged themselves before God to tell the truth . Little good did their truth-telling do them . At nine o'clock the guards , paid bravoes of the smug citizens who constitute the state , full of meat and sleep , were upon us . Not only had we had no breakfast , but we had had no water . And beaten men are prone to feverishness . I wonder , my reader , if you can glimpse or guess the faintest connotation of a man beaten -- `` beat up , '' we prisoners call it .