In Chap­ter 192 of “All the Col­ors of the Dark,” the set­ting opens with a descrip­tion of a prison envi­ron­ment where twen­ty cells exist, of which eigh­teen are occu­pied. The nar­ra­tive paints a bleak pic­ture with rust­ed sil­ver bars and dim nat­ur­al light stream­ing through high win­dows, result­ing in a stark atmos­phere. Black­jack, a char­ac­ter with­in the chap­ter, unlocks the last gate, allow­ing Patch to enter with a can­vas bag full of books. The men­tion of a library ser­vice from the past high­lights the bud­get cuts that have affect­ed prison life, empha­siz­ing a sense of loss and neglect.

Patch notices that the inside of the cells is some­what col­or­ful com­pared to his own, adorned with posters, cac­ti, and the qui­et tunes of a radio, which adds a sense of nor­mal­cy amidst the con­fine­ment. The first inmate Patch encoun­ters is Ricky Nel­son, who, at the age of six­ty, asks for cig­a­rettes and shows no inter­est in read­ing mate­ri­als. Howie Gouch­er, anoth­er inmate, remains unre­spon­sive to Patch’s pres­ence. As Patch dis­trib­utes books from his col­lec­tion, he reflects on the sig­nif­i­cant wait for inmates—averaging fif­teen years, with a grim pre­dic­tion that a quar­ter of them will die before exe­cu­tion. He specif­i­cal­ly acknowl­edges the dis­mal con­di­tions: dis­ease, mal­nu­tri­tion, sleep­less­ness due to fre­quent counts, and the unfor­tu­nate real­i­ty that four per­cent of inmates may be inno­cent.

Patch’s expe­ri­ence in prison has been large­ly edu­ca­tion­al, as he spent con­sid­er­able time in the library, which has giv­en him insight into the grim real­i­ties of incar­cer­a­tion. As he reach­es the last cell, he paus­es to delve into his mem­o­ries, draw­ing from a pro­found con­nec­tion to the past. The atmos­phere thick­ens as the radio plays, instill­ing a sense of nos­tal­gia. The final inmate he encoun­ters is por­trayed as thin, metic­u­lous about his appear­ance, and absorbed in his thoughts. When they final­ly make eye con­tact, Patch strug­gles to speak, weighed down by the enor­mi­ty of the situation—the man has endured nine­teen years of impris­on­ment with lit­tle more than despair for com­pa­ny. Final­ly, Mar­ty Tooms acknowl­edges Patch with a sim­ple greet­ing, “Hel­lo, Joseph,” mark­ing a poignant moment in the chap­ter that encap­su­lates unex­pect­ed recon­nec­tions amidst the harsh­ness of prison life.