When about five miles from the shore, they saw a small steamer creeping slowly along. She came close to the boat, and an English voice hailed her and asked if anyone in the boat spoke English.
Treskin answered. The voice then inquired if the occupant of the boat would kindly take some letters on shore. The captain of the steamer did not want to go into the port.
Treskin gladly consented, and he was asked to order his boatmen to pull alongside the steamer, which proved to be a pleasure-yacht.
Without a shadow of suspicion in his mind, Treskin did so, and he was politely invited to step on board, a ladder being lowered for that purpose. He turned to Anna, and asked her if she would go. Of course she would. So she preceded him up the ladder.
As soon as he was on the deck the gangway was closed, and a man in uniform directed him to the little saloon, where some wine and biscuits stood on the table. The engines of the steamer were started, though that did not alarm him; but in a few minutes a stern, determined man entered the cabin. He wore the uniform of a lieutenant of the Russian Navy, and had a sword at his side.
‘Peter Treskin,’ he said in Russian, ‘you have been cleverly lured on board this boat, which is owned by a Russian gentleman, and flies the Russian flag, in order that you may be taken back to Russia to answer for your great crime.’
Treskin’s face turned to an ashen grayness, and, springing to his feet, he rushed to the door, but found his exit barred by armed men. In another instant he was seized, and heavily ironed. He knew then that his fate was sealed, and his heart turned to lead with an awful sense of despair.
Steaming as hard as she could steam, the yacht rounded Point de Galle, and when about fifteen miles due east of Ceylon she suddenly stopped. A Russian gunboat was lying in wait. To this gunboat the prisoner was transferred, but Anna remained on board the yacht.
The gunboat steamed away at once, and shaped her course for Manilla, where she coaled; and that done she proceeded under a full head of steam for the sea of Japan and Vladivostock.
The yacht went in the other direction, making for the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea, and after a pleasant and uneventful voyage she sailed by way of the Bosphorus to the Crimea. She made many calls on the way, and at every port she touched at she was supposed to be on a pleasure cruise, and Anna was looked upon as the owner’s wife.