Romanoff and Mrs. B—— were gone more than an hour, and when they returned, Romanoff assured me that the colonel had promised to release Captain B——, but Mrs. B—— was still worried. She was well aware of the custom of shooting people first and making explanations afterward. Many innocent persons suffered by this custom. When a mistake was made, the official responsible generally shrugged his shoulders and asked if there were not plenty more people in the world.
The reason for the arrest was reported to be that Captain B—— had given a room in our hotel to an officer of Semenoff, when the officer showed an order signed by the Ataman that quarters should be provided. There was but one room in the hotel available—a room which had been occupied by the colonel who had ordered Captain B—— arrested. This colonel had not lived in the room for weeks, but had moved to the hotel across the street, leaving in his room in our hotel a small grip.
It was charged that the order for quarters was an old one, and that since it had been signed the officer had had trouble with the Ataman. But Captain B—— did not know this, and accepted the order for quarters for what it appeared to be on its face—still in force.
But the principal crime committed by Captain B—— was said to be having allowed the officer out of the good graces of the Ataman, to sleep in a room while the colonel’s bag remained in a closet. It may have been that the bag had been opened, or it may have been that the bag contained documents which would have caused the colonel trouble with the Ataman. But it all appeared to me as a fine piece of subterfuge, if the facts were as given. But one rarely gets the facts in Siberia.
Romanoff and I remained with Mrs. B—— through the evening, waiting. When she was not crying dolefully and wringing her hands, she was playing for us on her piano, stopping at times to listen to footsteps in the hall to see if they could be those of her husband, coming back.
Romanoff’s room was right across the hall, and he stepped out for a minute, leaving the B—— door open. While he was absent, Mrs. B—— stopped playing suddenly and listened. Then she cried out in terror and ran into the hall. I had heard nothing startling, and wondered what had caused her perturbation. She ran in again presently, crying “Meescha! Meescha!,” or so it sounded to me, and pointed to the corner of her room, where a large sack stood. It was a sack of sugar, and as I approached it, I heard a rustling.
I looked in and saw two mice and then held the top of the sack shut so they could not escape into the room. Finally I dragged the sack out into the hall, close to the open door of the officers’ mess-room. It was full of dining officers, and some of them looked out in surprise at seeing me dragging a heavy sack through the hall. I opened the sack and let the mice escape. They ran into the dining-room, but as no one had noticed them it did not matter. So I dragged the sack back to Mrs. B——’s room.
About ten o’clock Captain B—— came striding down the hall. I supposed the colonel had held him prisoner a few hours so as not to be too ready to show any regard for my attitude. And being in Asia, the colonel had to “save his face.”
Captain B—— wrung my hand, and I pushed him gently through the door to his wife. I went back to my own room, wondering if I had prevented an execution.