The cell was one of the top ones; it was in close proximity to the roof. This he had also ascertained—if he could once get on the roof, he felt the rest would be an easy matter.
The chances are that he would not have succeeded in any case, but he was bent on his project, and was in a state of nervous excitement until it was carried out.
“I’ll do them yet,” he murmured. “If I gain the roof I shall be able to give them the slip, and there will be one prisoner less in Wakefield gaol—that’s all. Ha, ha!” he laughed, at the prospect of doing his janitors.
For the greater part of the night he was at work, but the progress he made was so slow, in consequence of the clumsy instrument with which he worked, that daylight came before he had made a hole sufficiently large for him to pass through.
“The warders will be round presently,” he ejaculated; “and if I am not clean off before they make their appearance I am lost.”
He set to work with renewed vigour; the perspiration fell in thick beads from his forehead and temples. An exclamation of delight escaped him: the aperture was sufficiently large for his purpose.
He crept through the hole, and then seemed to breathe more freely. He laid hold of the top rail of the ladder, which he was in the act of drawing up after him, when the cell door was opened, and an official exclaimed in a voice of alarm—
“Halloa there—what’s this? Come down!”
Peace made no reply. The moments were now precious to him. The officer advanced and endeavoured to seize the ladder. Peace gave him a blow with it in the chest, and knocked him down.
The man uttered an exclamation of rage and pain. But Peace did not wait for further parley: he drew up the ladder and ran along the roof in the greatest state of excitement.