Condemned as a Nihilist: A Story of Escape from Siberia

by G. A. Henty

"Well, it is somewhere above three weeks," Godfrey went on; "so that by the time we get to the mouth of the Petchora, it will be the last week in July. That will give us a couple of months; but I fancy we can't count much on the weather in September. Still, if the canoes go from Archangel to Petchora and back, we ought to be able to do it from Petchora, for the distance from there to Archangel is a good deal less than from the mouth of the Yenesei to the Petchora. There is one thing, if the weather gets very bad on the way, or we get laid up by bad weather for a long time on the way to Petchora, we can go up the river, I hear, to a place called Ust Zlyma, and from there go overland to Archangel. It is about two hundred or two hundred and fifty miles across, and we could walk that in ten days. I am quite sure that we should not be suspected of being anything but what we look; and at Archangel there is sure to be a British consul, and he would put us up to the best plan of getting out of the country. However, there will be plenty of time to see about that as we get on."

The wind fell on the morning of the fourth day, but it would be some hours before the sea would have gone down sufficiently for them to make a start. Godfrey again went out shooting, this time accompanied by Luka.

Godfrey was as fortunate as he had been before, shooting three capercailzie and nineteen grouse; while Luka brought down with his arrows four capercailzie, which he found sitting on stunted trees. On their way back to the boat they collected a great quantity of eggs, and came upon a rabbit warren.

"Do not shoot," Luka said, as Godfrey cocked his gun, "it will frighten them all into their holes. If you will go on with the dog, I will lie down here and will bring you as many rabbits as I can carry."

Two hours later he came down to the tent with two dozen rabbits he had shot. After cooking two of them, and giving one to Jack as his share, they packed up all their belongings and again took to the canoe. They used their paddles until round the cape, and then heading westward hoisted their sail, for what wind there was was still from the north, and the help it afforded was sufficient greatly to reduce the labour of paddling. They kept steadily on, one or other taking occasional snatches of sleep. But with this exception, and that of the time spent by Luka in cooking, they continued to paddle until, forty hours after starting, they reached Cape Golovina, passing between it and Beloc Island. They did not make the halt they had intended under shelter of the cape, for the weather was fine, and Godfrey wanted to take advantage of the north wind as long as it lasted. Once round the cape they headed nearly due south, and the wind freshening a little, drove them along merrily, and they were able to cease paddling, and to take a fair proportion of sleep alternately.

Luka was now getting more accustomed to the management of the sail, and no longer feared an occasional jibe, and night and day—if it could be called night when the sun never set—they continued their voyage along the coast of the Yamal Peninsula. At the end of the fourth day the wind freshened so much that the large sail was taken down and the leg-of-mutton sail substituted for it; but as the wind continued to rise, and the sea to get up fast, Godfrey began to look out for some spot into which to run for shelter. The coast was very indented and broken, and in two hours they passed the mouth of a deep bay into which the boat was at once directed, and was presently moored under the shelter of its northern bank.

"She is a splendid sea-boat," Godfrey said. "If it wasn't for the boat in tow I should not mind what weather I was out in her."

Their stay was of short duration, for in a few hours the wind sank again. "I don't think it is done yet," Godfrey said when they were beyond the shelter of the bay. "I fancy it will blow up again presently; still we may as well push on. I think it is rather more from the east than it was."

For the next twenty-four hours, however, there was no very marked change in the force of the wind, but it had now veered round to the north-east.