Several weeks passed without incident. The prisoners were strongly guarded and were placed in a building originally built for a jail and surrounded by a very high wall. Harold often discussed with some of his fellow-captives the possibility of escape. The windows were all strongly barred, and even should the prisoners break through these they would only find themselves in the courtyard. There would then be a wall thirty feet high to surmount, and at the corners of this wall the Americans had built sentry-boxes, in each of which two men were stationed night and day. Escape, therefore, seemed next to impossible.
The sentries guarding the prison and at the gates were furnished by an American regiment stationed at Richmond. The wardens in the prison were, for the most part, negroes. The prisoners were confined at night in separate cells; in the daytime they were allowed, in parties of fifty, to walk for two hours in the courtyard. There were several large rooms in which they sat and took their meals, two sentries with loaded muskets being stationed in each room. Thus, although monotonous, there was little to complain of; their food, if coarse, was plentiful, and the prisoners passed the time in talk, playing cards, and in such games as their ingenuity could invent.
One day when two of the negro wardens entered with, the dinners of the room to which Harold belonged, the latter was astounded at recognizing in one of them his faithful companion Jake. It was with difficulty that he suppressed an exclamation of gladness and surprise. Jake paid no attention to him, but placed the great tin dish heaped up with yams, which he was carrying, upon the table, and, with an unmoved face, left the room. A fortnight passed without a word being exchanged between them. Several times each day Harold saw the negro, but the guards were always present, and although, when he had his back to the latter, Jake sometimes indulged in a momentary grin or a portentous wink, no further communication passed between them.
One night at the end of that time Harold, when on the point of going to sleep, thought he heard a noise as of his door gently opening. It was perfectly dark, and, after listening for a moment he laid his head down again, thinking that he had been mistaken, when he heard close to the bed the words in a low voice:
"Am you asleep, Massa Harold?"
"No, Jake," he exclaimed directly. "Ah, my good fellow! how have you got here?"
"Dat were a bery easy affair," Jake said. "Me tell you all about it."
"Have you shut the door again, Jake? There is a sentry coming along the passage every five minutes."
"Me shut him, massa, but dere aint no fastening on dis side, so Jake will sit down wid him back against him."
Harold got up and partly dressed himself and then sat down by the side of his follower.