Brown of Moukden: A Story of the Russo-Japanese War

by Herbert Strang

In the street Jack stopped a young Chinese boy and sent him to a purveyor's shop for a small supply of portable food. The messenger returned with some dried fish and stale cakes of potato-rice, all he could procure. With this tied behind his saddle Jack set off. It was an anxious moment when he passed a brown-coated Cossack policeman, and a little farther on he gave a jump when a squadron of Cossacks swung round the corner of the street. But they rode on without giving him more than a casual glance. Not daring to hasten, he slowly made his way through the city and out into the country. It was still only eleven o'clock; he had nine or ten hours of daylight before him, and though the pony was somewhat soft for want of exercise, it was no doubt good for thirty miles at a pinch.

Vladivostok stands at the end of a narrow peninsula, with the Amur Bay running for several miles into the land on the west, and the Ussuri Bay on the east. To gain the Manchurian frontier Jack would have to ride northwards, cross the railway at the head of the Amur Bay or beyond, and then turn to the south-west. It was obviously unsafe for him to ride parallel with the railway line, for his escape, if discovered, would no doubt be telegraphed ahead, and the road would be watched, especially in the neighbourhood of the stations. His best course, therefore, would be to strike up eastwards towards the head of the Ussuri Bay, away from his ultimate destination, and trust to luck to find a hill-path leading back that would enable him to cross the line somewhere between the head of the Amur Bay and the garrison town of Nikolskoye. His way led through the plantation where he had made his toilet early that morning, then to the right towards the hills.

Though Vladivostok itself has sprung up with marvellous rapidity, the country is as yet sparsely peopled. At one time the town was closely surrounded by magnificent woods; but the axe of the lumberman has been busy, and the same work of deforesting that has robbed the town of picturesqueness is now being pursued inland. One of the few people Jack met along the unfrequented road he had chosen was a Russian colonist riding behind a cart laden with pine logs and driven by a coolie. Jack threw him a friendly "Good morning!" as he passed, and received a feeling "Very hot, barin" in return. It was indeed hot; the almost naked Korean labourers in the fields were streaming with sweat; and Jack was glad to halt at a little brook to refresh himself and his beast.

After riding for some three hours, and covering, as he guessed, about eighteen miles, almost entirely uphill, he saw the sea below him on the right, and the far coast-line running to all appearance due south. This must be Ussuri Bay. He had evidently come far enough east; it was time to change his course to the north-west. Swinging round, he had not ridden far before he came to a small farm, the house surrounded, like all Chinese isolated country buildings, with a mud wall. His pony required food, and though he felt some misgivings he thought this too good an opportunity to be neglected. He rode up. The owner, he found, was a Korean; Jack did not speak Korean; but by the help of Chinese and pidgin Russian he succeeded in making the man understand what he wanted. He then asked how far it was to Nikolskoye, and learning that it was thirty versts, roughly twenty miles, he decided to give his pony a good rest and start again about six o'clock, so that darkness would have fallen by the time he came to the neighbourhood of the railway. Having seen that the animal was rubbed down and provided with a good feed of hay, he joined the farmer in a game of wei-ch'i, a difficult variant of chess, and with this and a slow laborious conversation, in the course of which his host expounded his hazy ideas of the war, he managed to get through the hot afternoon.

Soon after six he set off again. The way was mainly downhill now, and easier riding. About nine o'clock he saw in the gloaming a little settlement ahead, and beyond it the hexagonal water-tower and timbered store-house of the typical Siberian railway-station, but on a small scale. The path he was following led direct to the hamlet, and the sight of several small knots of people at that hour of the evening showed that a train would shortly be passing; the peasants have not yet lost their curiosity about the iron horse. He thought it well to avoid observation by leaving the track—road it could not be called—and striking across a bean-field. Making a wide sweep he came to the railway some three versts north of the station. He rode very cautiously as he approached the line, tied his pony to a tree, and scouted ahead to make sure that the line rifle guard, whose hut might be expected a few versts beyond, was not in sight. Suddenly he heard the distant rumble of a train—the night train for Harbin. In a moment he saw that the passage of the train would give him an opportunity of crossing the line unobserved. He went back to his pony, led it as near as he dared to the embankment, and waited.

The engine came snorting along at a fair pace, the fire throwing a glow upon the darkling sky. The train clattered by. Immediately after the last carriage had passed, Jack mounted the embankment, dragging his pony, crossed the single line, and descended on the other side.

With a lighter heart he got into the saddle again, and rode his excellent little steed across the fields in the hope of ere long striking a road. Pursuit would be difficult in the darkness; the greatest danger was to be expected with daylight, and it was very necessary that he should put as many miles as possible between himself and the railway before dawn. His course must be mainly south-west; the nearest town of any size was Hun-chun, some sixty miles in that direction; but having a vague idea that the Russians had erected a fort there, he had already made up his mind to avoid that town itself. Four or five hundred miles and countless perils lay between him and Moukden; but with the hopefulness of youth he rode confidently on. Danger and difficulty were only incentives to caution; if he anticipated them, it was merely that, being prepared, he might be the more ready to grapple with and overcome them. Ever present in his mind was the belief that his father's fate hung upon the success of his enterprise.

Coming by and by to a rough track between the fields, he followed it until past midnight. Then, feeling that his pony could do no more, and being unable in the darkness to guide himself by the little compass he wore on his watch-chain, he left the track, rode into a plantation to the right, off-saddled, and, hitching the bridle to a tree, threw himself on the ground and fell asleep.

During the short hours of darkness his slumbers were disturbed by dreams. Sowinski, Orloff, Monsieur Brin, the Chinese horse-dealer—all figured in a strange phantasmagoria. Monsieur Brin had lost his pass, and was shedding tears because he could not tear the red brassard from his arm, when Jack awoke with a start. Looking at his watch he found it was five o'clock. He must be up and away. He ate the last of his food; the pony had already made a meal of the shoots of creeping plants; then, with the instinct born of his fugitive condition, Jack approached the edge of the plantation to spy out the country. Before him, not many yards away, was a narrow river; behind—he gave a great start, for little more than half a mile distant he saw a troop of Russian horsemen trotting smartly along the road towards him. They might be going, of course, to Possiet Bay, or Novo Kiewsk, or the Korean frontier. But he noticed at a second glance that the leading man was bending low in his saddle, as though following a trail. He distinguished their uniform now; they were Buriats, Mongols by race and Buddhists by religion, hard riders, excellent scouts, the most reckless and daring of the Russian cavalry. Without a moment's hesitation he went back to his pony, snatched from the ground the saddle that had formed his pillow, threw it over the animal's back, and, tightening the girths with hands that shook in spite of himself, he plunged with the pony into the thickest part of the plantation.

At seven o'clock that morning, in a neatly-thatched, white-washed brick cottage, surrounded by a luxuriant and well-kept garden, in the hill-country above the Chuan, a little group sat at breakfast. The room was plain but spotlessly clean. The wooden floors shone; the white plastered walls were covered with coloured lithographs representing the seven stations of the Cross; the little windows were hung with curtains of Chinese muslin. A narrow shelf of books occupied one corner, a stove another; and the table in the centre was spread with a snow-white cloth, dishes of fruit, and home-made bread.