by G. A. Henty
“No; they may not be rich, but you say they are always nomads. Well, people who are nomads must always have some sort of animals to carry their tents, and a certain amount, anyhow, of cattle, horses, or sheep. No, I don’t at all believe in cutting throats without a motive.”
“But let us understand a little more about your intentions, Godfrey. Do you mean to climb over that fence and then to stroll away to the south with your hands in your pockets and your hat on one side of your head, and to ask the first man you come upon to direct you to the shortest road to Pekin?”
Godfrey laughed. “No, not quite that, Alexis. These clothes did very well in St. Petersburg, and though they are all the worse for the journey here I daresay they would pass well enough in the streets of Irkutsk. The first thing to do will be to get some clothes, for as far as I could see coming along the natives all dress a good deal like the Russians. I suppose in winter they wrap up more in furs, or they may wear their furs differently, but any sort of peasant dress would do, as it would not excite attention, while this tweed suit would be singular even in the streets here.”
“That fur-lined great-coat would be all right, Godfrey.”
“Yes. I bought that at St. Petersburg. I don’t know that it would go very well with a peasant’s dress, and it is certainly not suitable for the time of year, though I shall take it with me if I can. If I could roll it up and carry it as a knapsack it would be first rate for sleeping in, besides it might do as something to exchange when one gets to places where money is of little use. If I can get hold of a pistol anyhow I shall be glad. A pistol will always produce civility if one meets only one or two men. The other things I should want are a box of matches for making fires, a good knife, or better still, a small axe, for chopping wood, and a bottle or skin for holding water.”
“You will be seized and sent back in a week, Godfrey.”
“Very well, then, there will be no harm done. I regard this as a sort of preliminary investigation. I shall ascertain the difficulties of travel in Siberia, and shall learn lessons for next time. I believe myself the true way is to strike one of the great rivers, to build or steal a boat, to go down in it to the Arctic Sea, and then to coast along until one gets to Norway; but that is a big affair, and besides it is a great deal too late in the year for it. When I attempt that I shall make off as early in the spring as possible.”
“Remember you may be flogged when you are caught, Godfrey.”
“Well, I shouldn’t like to be flogged, but as you say the convicts don’t think much of it, I suppose I could bear it. They used to flog in our army and navy till quite lately.”
“It is a dishonour,” Alexis exclaimed passionately.
Godfrey shrugged his shoulders.
“The dishonour lies in the crime and not in the punishment,” he said. “At our great public schools in England fellows are flogged. Well, there is no disgrace in it if it’s only for breaking the rules or anything of that sort, but it would be a horrible dishonour if it were for thieving. All that sort of thing is absurd. I believe flogging is the best punishment there is. It is a lot better to give a man a couple of dozen and send him about his business, than it is to keep him for a year in prison at the public expense, and to have to maintain his wife and children also at the public expense while he is there. Besides, I thought you said the other day that they did not flog political prisoners.”
“Well, they don’t, at least not at any of the large prisons; but in some of the small establishments, with perhaps a brutal drunken captain or major as governor, no doubt it may be done sometimes.”
“Well, I will take my chance of it.”
“And when do you think of starting?” Alexis asked after a pause.
“Directly. I have only to decide how I am to get out after the door is locked, and to make a rope of some sort to climb the fence with. The blankets tied together will do for that. As to the getting out there is no difficulty. One only has to throw a blanket over that cross beam, get up on that, and get off one of the lining boards, displace a few tiles, crawl through.”
“I have half a mind to go with you, Godfrey.”
“Have you, Alexis? I should be awfully glad, but at the same time I would not say a word to persuade you to do it. You know I make light of it, but I know very well that there will be some danger and a tremendous lot of hardship to be gone through.”
“I don’t think I am afraid of that, Godfrey,” Alexis said seriously. “It is not that I have been thinking of ever since you began to talk to me of getting away. I consider it is a hundred to one against success; but, as you say, if we fail and get brought back no great harm is done. If we get killed or die of hunger and thirst, again no harm is done, for certainly life is not a thing to cling to when one is a prisoner in Siberia; but it is not that. You see I am differently situated to you. If you do succeed in getting away you go home, and you are all right; if I succeed in getting away what is to become of me? I speak Russian and German, but there would be no return for me to Russia unless some day when a new Czar ascends the throne, or on some such occasion, when a general amnesty is granted; but even that would hardly extend to political prisoners. What am I to do? So far as I can see I might starve, and after all one might almost as well remain here as starve in Pekin or in some Chinese port. Granted that I could work my way back to Europe on board ship, what should I do if I landed at Marseilles or Liverpool? I could not go through the streets shouting in German ‘I am a doctor, who wants to be cured?’”
“No, Alexis,” Godfrey agreed, “you could not well do that; but I will tell you what you could do. Of course at the first place I get to, where there is a telegraph to England, I will send a message to my father to cable to some firm there to let me have what money I require. Very well. Then, of course, you would go home with me to England, and there is one thing I could promise you, and that is a post in my father’s office. You know we trade with Russia, and though our correspondence is generally carried on in German, I am quite sure that my father would, after you had been my companion on such a journey as that we propose, make a berth for you in the office to undertake correspondence in Russian and German, and that he would pay a salary quite sufficient for you to live in comfort; or if you would rather, I am sure that he would find you means for going out and settling, say in the United States, in the part where German is the general language.”
“Then in that case, Godfrey,” the Russian said, shaking his hand warmly, “I am your man. I think I should have gone with you anyhow; but what you have said quite decides me. Now, then, what is our first proceeding?”
Godfrey laughed.
“I should say to take an inventory of our belongings, Alexis, or rather of your belongings, for mine are very briefly described. Two hundred roubles in notes, a watch, a pocket-knife, the suit of clothes I stand up in, half a dozen pairs of socks, and three flannel shirts I bought on the way, one great-coat lined with fur; I think that is about all. It is a very small share. Yours are much more numerous.”
“More numerous, but not much more useful,” Alexis said. “They let me bring one large portmanteau of clothes, but as I can’t carry that away on my shoulders it is of very little use. All I can take in that way is a suit of clothes and a spare flannel shirt or two, and some socks. I have got two cases of surgical instruments. I will take a few of the most useful and some other things, a pair of forceps for instance. We may come across a Tartar with a raging tooth, and make him our friend for ever by extracting it, and I will put a bandage or two and some plaster in my pocket. They are things one ought always to carry, for one is always liable to get a hurt or a sprain. As to money, I have a hundred and twenty roubles; they are all in silver. I changed my paper at Tobolsk, thinking that silver would be more handy here. Unfortunately they took away my pistol, but a couple of amputating knives will make good weapons. I have got a leather waistcoat, which I will cut up and make from it a couple of sheaths. Of course I have got fur cloaks, one of them a very handsome one. I will take
that and another. There ought to be no difficulty whatever in getting some one to give us two peasants’ dresses in exchange for that coat, for all these people know something of the value of furs.”
“Yes, and if you can get a gun and some ammunition thrown into the bargain, Alexis, it will be most useful, for we may have to depend upon what we shoot sometimes.”
“Yes, that would be a great addition, Godfrey. Well, we will set about making the sheaths at once. I have got a store of needles and stout thread.”
“They will be useful to take with us,” Godfrey said, “not only for mending our clothes, if we want it, but for exchange. Women have to sew all over the world, and even the most savage people can appreciate the advantage of a good needle.”
“That is so, Godfrey. I have got a packet of capital surgical needles, and some silk. I will put them in with the others; they won’t take up much room. Well, shall we start to-morrow night?”
“I think we had better wait for two or three days,” Godfrey said. “We must save up some of our food.”
“Yes, we shall want some bread,” Alexis agreed. “We can’t well get that in through the warders, it would look suspicious, but I will get in some meat through them. We have got some of the last lot left, so we can do with very little bread.”
For the next two days they found plenty to occupy them, while their stock of bread was accumulating. One of the Russian’s coats was cut up and made into two bags like haversacks, with a band to pass over the shoulder, for carrying their belongings. Straps were make of the cloth for fastening the great-coats knapsack fashion. They agreed that however long they might have to wait they must choose a stormy night for their flight, as otherwise they could hardly break through the roof and scale the fence without being heard by the sentries who kept watch night and day. They were eager to be off, for it was already the end of July, and the winter would be severe in the country over which they had to travel. On the fourth day a heavy rain set in, and in the evening it began to blow hard.
“Now is our time,” Godfrey said; “nothing could have been better.”
They had already loosened two of the lining boards of the roof, and as soon as they had been locked up for the night they removed these altogether. They packed their haversacks with the articles they had agreed to take, with six pounds of bread each and some meat, rolled four blankets up and knotted them tightly together, strapped up the three fur-lined cloaks, and placed the knives in their belts. Then without much difficulty they prised up one of the thick planks with which the hut was roofed. Godfrey got through the opening, and Alexis passed out to him the haversacks and coats, and then joined him, and they slid down the roof and dropped to the ground.
The paling was but twenty yards behind the huts. As soon as they reached it Godfrey climbed upon his companion’s shoulders, threw the loop of a doubled rope over one of the palisades and climbed on to the top. Then with the rope he pulled up the coats and haversacks and dropped them outside. Alexis pulled himself up by the rope; this was then dropped on the outside and he slid down by it. Godfrey shifted the rope on to the point of one of the palings, so that it could be easily shaken off from below, and then slipped down it. The rope shaken off and two of the blankets opened, the haversacks hung over their shoulders, and the great-coats strapped on, each put one of the twisted blankets over his shoulder, scarf fashion, wrapped the other round as a cloak, and then set out on their way. Fortunately the prison lay on the south side of the town and at a distance of half a mile from it; and as their course to the extremity of Lake Baikal lay almost due south, they were able to strike right across the country.
The wind was from the north, and they had therefore only to keep their backs to it to follow the right direction. It was half-past ten when they started, for the nights were short, and had it not been that the sky was covered with clouds and the air thick with rain, it would not have been dark enough for them to make the attempt until an hour later. By three o’clock it was light again, but they knew there was little chance of their escape being discovered until the warders came to unlock the hut at six in the morning, as the planks they had removed from the roof were at the back of the hut, and therefore invisible to the sentries.
“No doubt they will send a few mounted Cossacks out to search for us, as we are political prisoners,” Alexis said; “but we may calculate it will be seven o’clock before they set out, and as this is the very last direction they will imagine we have taken we need not trouble ourselves about them; besides, we shall soon be getting into wooded country. I believe it is all wood round the lower end of the lake, and we shall be quite out of the way of traffic, for everything going east from Irkutsk is taken across the lake by steamer.”
After twelve hours’ walking, with only one halt of half an hour for refreshment, they reached the edge of the forest, and after again making a hearty meal of their bread and cold meat, and taking each a sip from a bottle containing cold tea, they lay down and slept until late in the afternoon.
“Well, we have accomplished so much satisfactorily,” Alexis said. “Now we have to keep on to Kaltuk, at the extreme south-western point of the lake. It is a very small place, I believe, and that is where we must get what we want. We shall be there by the evening. We shall be just right, as it wouldn’t do for us to go in until it is pretty nearly dark. A place of that sort is sure to have a store where they sell clothes and other things, and trade with the people round.”
They struck the lake a mile or two from its extremity, and following it until they could see the roofs of the houses lay down for an hour until it should be dark enough to enter.
“We had better put on our fur coats,” Alexis said. “The people all wear long coats of some fashion or other, and in the dusk we shall pass well enough.”
It was a village containing some fifty or sixty houses, for the most part the tent-like structures of the Buriats. They met no one in the street, and kept on until they saw a light in a window of a house larger than any others, and looking in saw that it was the place for which they were in search. Opening the door they went in and closed it behind them. A man came out from the room behind the shop. He stopped for a moment at seeing two strangers, then advanced with a suspicious look on his face.
“Do you want a bargain?” Alexis asked him abruptly.
“I have little money to buy with,” he said sullenly.
“That matters little, for we will take it out in goods.”
The man hesitated. Alexis drew out the long keen amputating knife. “Look here,” he said. “We are not to be fooled with. You may guess what we are or not; it is nothing to us and nothing to you. We want some of your goods, and are ready to give you good exchange for them; we are not robbers. Here is this coat; look at it; it is almost unworn. I have used it only one winter. You can see it is lined with real sable, and it cost me three hundred roubles. At any rate, it is worth a hundred to you, even if you take out the lining, sell the skins separately, and burn the coat. Examine it for yourself.”
The shopkeeper did so. “They are good skins,” he said, and Alexis could see that he quite appreciated their value.
“Now,” Alexis said, “I want two peasant dresses complete, coat, trousers, high boots, and caps. What do you charge for them?”
“Twenty roubles each suit.”
“Very well. Pick two suits the right size for us, and lay them down on the counter. Now we want two pounds of brick-tea and two pounds of tobacco. We want two skins that will each hold a gallon or a gallon and a half of water, and a tin pot that will hold a quart, and two tin drinking mugs. We want a gun and ammunition; it need not be a new one. I see you have got half a dozen standing over there in the corner. What do you charge your customers for those? I see they are all old single barrels and flint-locks.”
“I charge fifteen roubles a piece.”
“Well we will take two of them, and we want two pounds of powder and six pounds of shot, and a couple of dozen bullets. Now add that up and see how much it com
es to.”
“Ninety-two roubles,” the man said.
“Well, I tell you what. I will give you this cloak and twelve paper roubles for them. I don’t suppose the goods cost you fifty at the outside, and you will get at least a hundred for the skins alone.”
“I will take it,” the man said. “I take it because I cannot help it.”
“You take it because you are making an excellent bargain,” Alexis said fiercely. “Now, mind, if you give the alarm when we have gone it will be worse for you. They won’t catch us; but you will see your house on fire over your head before the week is past.”
Godfrey placed a ten-rouble note and two one-rouble notes on the table; they gathered up their goods and made them into a bundle, carefully loaded their guns, and put the powder and shot into their haversacks. Then Alexis lifted the bundle, and shouldering the guns they left the shop.
“Will he give the alarm, do you think?” Godfrey asked.
“Not he. He is thoroughly well satisfied. I daresay he will get a hundred and fifty roubles for the coat; besides, he knows that escaped convicts are desperate men, and that we should be likely to execute my threat. Besides, I don’t suppose he would venture to stir out. For aught he knows we may be waiting just outside the shop to see what he does, and he will fear that he might get that hungry-looking knife into him if he came out to raise the alarm.”
All was quiet, and they were soon beyond the limits of the village, and struck out for the country.
They held on for two or three miles, filled their water-skins at a little stream running towards the lake, and then entering a wood pushed on for some little distance, lighted a fire, and made themselves some tea.
“We are fairly off now, Godfrey. We have become what they call wanderers, and should be safe enough among the Russian peasants, most of whom have been convicts in their time, in the villages north, for they are always willing enough to help men who have taken to the woods. Well, except in the villages, of which there are few enough about here, we are not likely to come upon them. From here to the frontier are Buriats, and indeed beyond the frontier. However as we have both got guns, we need not be afraid of any small party. Of course some of them have guns too; but I don’t suppose they will be fools enough to risk throwing their lives away for nothing. At any rate there is one comfort. There is nothing to show that we are political prisoners now. We might be honest peasants if it were not for these confounded heads of hair.”
