After running over the roof he got on to the prison wall, and he was making his way along there when a terrible misfortune befel him: the bricks were loose, and it was impossible for him to keep his balance or maintain his foothold. He fell. It was supposed that he had fallen outside.
There was by this time a hue and cry after him. Consternation sat on the visages of the warders, and the whole place was soon in an uproar.
The deputy-governor asked what was the matter. The warders said that a prisoner had escaped.
“How and by what means?” cried the deputy-governor.
Nobody appeared to know. Davis, the warder who had been pushed down by Peace, not chosing to stop and explain matters, hastened at once into the governor’s presence, and made him acquainted with the facts which had come under his knowledge. After this he ran round the outside of the prison in search of Peace, whom he did not succeed in finding.
Peace had really fallen inside the prison wall, not far from where some servants were looking out from the door of the governor’s house; but, notwithstanding their close proximity to him, they had not seen him either before or after his fall, the reason for this being that their attention was directed away from him.
The general impression was at this time that our hero had succeeded in making his escape, and the governor and deputy-governor were greatly incensed at what they termed the carelessness of the men in charge of the convicts.
The prison officials were in no enviable frame of mind; they expected to be called over the coals, and were ransacking their brains for excuses to offer.
Peace, finding that the governor’s servants had not observed him, determined upon a bold stroke. With the cunning of a hunted fox he slipped past the room in which they were at this time, entered the governors’ house, and ran upstairs.
No one for a moment supposed that he was loitering about the premises. Indeed, everyone was fairly puzzled, and could not in any way account for his sudden and mysterious disappearance.