'During the year or so that I was in the fortress of Petro-Paolovski I never encouraged the slightest hopes of escape, for in the first place I, for a long time, suffered from a bad gunshot wound, and, secondly, because it is known only too well among us that escape from Petro-Paolovski is impossible. When, for some unknown reason, the Government sent me to Tieff, my health was improved, and so were my chances of getting away, and from the moment I entered the prison doors I never lost an opportunity of making and maturing a plan of escape. Escaping from a Russian prison is not quite such a desperate business for one of us as it would be for one of you, for you would be like a blind man in a strange house; but those of us who are judged to be the most likely subjects for arrest make it a rule to have the plan of every prison and fortress at our finger-tips.'
'What a marvellous organisation yours is,' said the stone-mason, more as an excuse for escaping a moment from the martyrdom of the unaccustomed cigarette than by way of saying anything original.
'Yes, the war is fairly well organised on both sides,' Petrovitch replied; 'but at present they have the big battalions.'
'But your plans,' struck in Vernon, impatient of the interruption.
'Yes. Well, my knowledge of Tieff told me that there was one way, and one way only, of leaving it, and that was by the way I had come in—by the front gate, and to get to the front gate one had to cross the courtyard, and between my cell and the courtyard lay obstacles too many to be calculated and dangers too great to be faced.'
'And you at once began to calculate them and to face them,' cried Vernon admiringly.
'Rather to elude them,' Petrovitch went on, ignoring the boy's compliment. 'As I could not meet them in detail I thought it better to surmount them in "the lump," as I think I have heard you call it in England. Now the thing that had given me most hope when I heard I was coming to Tieff was that I happened to know that the resident doctor of the prison was, not exactly one of us, but one who sympathised with us secretly—there are many such, who are unwilling to take an active part in the struggle, but who, short of that, help us in many ways—for instance, with money, and especially by hiding those of us who happen to be "wanted." We call them the Ukrivatelli—the concealers.'
'I hope there's lots of them sort, sir,' said Toomey, surreptitiously abandoning his cigarette in favour of the more familiar but slightly stronger smelling 'cutty.' 'But don't they get theirselves into trouble?'
'Yes, if they are found out,' answered Petrovitch; 'but they seldom are. They are a very large class, and are often men whose official rank or social position places them beyond suspicion. My wound still needed attention, and I soon managed to convey to the doctor a suggestion that daily exercise in a prison courtyard was a first-rate specific for gunshot wounds. He seemed to think so too, and before the end of the week I was told that I should have to walk every day for an hour in the only place where a walk of a dozen consecutive yards was possible—in the courtyard.'
'It was no use getting into the courtyard unless I had some prospect of getting out of it, and straight into some perfectly safe refuge. This was a matter that took some weeks to arrange, and during that time I never turned my eyes to the gate. The doctor, though he was willing to help me, was not willing to risk his own safety by carrying too many letters, and a whole code of signals had to be arranged. Luck seldom favours the right side; but I think I was certainly lucky, for just when I began to take my daily exercise the right wing of the prison had to be repaired, and consequently the gates of the courtyard were open all day for the carts of building materials, etc., which had to come in and out. This must have seemed tolerably safe to the authorities, as I was the only prisoner who "took exercise," and there were two sentries to whom was allotted the pleasing duty of watching me. They had a pretty easy time of it for these three weeks, for I used to crawl up and down the yard in a feeble and dejected sort of way, as though I had hardly the strength to put one foot before the other. I always leaned on a stick, and did my best to appear to be at my last gasp. I was well-nigh tired of waiting, so often my escape seemed almost close at hand, and then something happened, and all our plans had to be made over again. Innumerable ideas were suggested, but abandoned for one reason or another. At last it was definitely settled that at a certain signal I was to make for the gate and rush out—that a carriage was to be waiting just outside, and that one or two of our friends were to be there promiscuously, to give false information in judicious doses, as it might be called for. The gate was almost exactly in the middle of the courtyard, and the beat of sentry No. 1 was from the gate to the end of the yard and back, and that of sentry No. 2 from the other end of the yard to the gate and back—thus the face of one of them was always towards the gate. At length the day came when I might expect the signal—this was to be nothing more dramatic and startling than the smallest piece of paper that could well be seen—stuck on the shaft of one of the builder's carts. Cart after cart went by, my hour was nearly up, and I began to feel pretty sure that either the signal was not to be given that morning, or else that it had been given and I had missed seeing it. This last alternative was becoming a maddening certainty, when yet another cart came crawling in, and on the shaft, luckily on the side to which my walk had now brought me, was lightly stuck a little piece of white paper. Once more luck was my friend, for the sentry on the same side of the gate as myself was marching from the gate, and between me and the one walking towards the gate was the cart. Had any one not in the secret been watching me from one of the prison windows at that moment he would certainly have thought that I was the subject of a miraculous cure, for in what seemed to me about half-a-dozen bounds I was at the side of the cart, out of the gate, and in one of two carriages which were passing at the time.'