After weary weeks the work was done; the bars cut so nearly through I was afraid they would fall out every time the cell door was slammed shut. I hid the worn saws, and waited patiently till our jailer got drunk and gave us our searching. On those nights he never made a second appearance. Satisfied, he always went direct to bed and we could hear his alcoholic snores in another part of the building. The Indian trusties went to sleep and I rolled our blankets into dummies that looked passable. At twelve o’clock the freight train pulled in and went on a side track to get a fresh engine and allow the passenger train to go by at one o’clock. I broke the bars out and hid them under the blankets. The China boy’s knees were shaking as he crawled out and dropped to the ground. I followed him, not any too calm and cool myself. He had no hat, otherwise he was dressed as I was—duck pants and a thin shirt.
There was no time to try to steal clothing, food, or money. As we hurried toward the freight yards where the train stood I had but one comforting thought—we wouldn’t be missed till seven in the morning.
The Chinaman was helpless. At the side track I ran frantically about in search of something to spring a car door with. At last I found a pile of scrap iron and dug a fishplate out of it. The train was an all-through freight, billed to Vancouver, the terminus. I soon discovered a battered box car that suited, and sprang a side door away from its bearings. Then I showed the Chinaman the end door and tried to explain to him, mostly by signs, that he should get in the side door while I pulled it out, and then unfasten the end door from the inside to admit me after I put the side door back in place. He refused to budge. At last I made him pull the door out while I got into the car. When I got the end door open I had to get out, go down, and get him and put him in. Then I sprang the side door back in position, went to the end door, crawled in, and fastened it on the inside the way I found it.
We didn’t have a pocketknife, not a dime, not a match; but we were safe, and I wouldn’t have exchanged the security of that box car for a soft berth in the sleeper on the departing passenger train. We were barely settled inside when there was a bumping and jolting of cars and our train slowly got under way. We were in a car loaded with barrels of lime. They stood on end and it was painful to stretch out on them. The ride was a nightmare. Hungry, thirsty, cold, racked with fear and suspense, we got into Vancouver after twenty-four hours.
Clothes were the first problem, any kind of rags to cover our jail uniforms. I got out of the car with the half-dead China boy at once, and went directly back to the caboose on the train we rode. The conductor and brakeman were already gone. The caboose was deserted. The boy hid between box cars while I went to the top of the caboose, through the cupola, and down inside. In a locker were greasy coats and pants, and a cap for the Chink. The clothes were too big for him and the cap too small. He knew Vancouver and wanted to take me to his “cousins” in Chinatown, but I was afraid we couldn’t get by a copper together, so he struck out alone after making me promise to hunt him up at his company’s headquarters. I crawled into an empty car to wait for daylight, when it would be safer to go through the streets.
It was Sunday morning. I heard a church bell ring and knew it was somewhere around six o’clock. When I looked out of the car I saw that a heavy fog had settled over the city like a blessed benediction. I melted into it, making my way out of the freight yards and into the streets. The fog was so dense that I couldn’t have found my way if I had known the town. After walking blocks along a street I saw that the stores were getting smaller and farther apart. Vacant lots became more numerous and everything indicated that I was going in the wrong direction. A few doors ahead of me an old, rheumatic, mongrel dog appeared out of a hallway. He was the only living thing in sight, and when I got abreast of him I stopped and looked at him idly. He came over to me, gave me a rather doubtful look, and sat back on his haunches. After balancing himself carefully, he lifted a stiff hind leg and made a futile effort to dislodge the hungry fleas from under his collar. Failing at this, he got up slowly, gave me another looking-over, and limped back to his doorway. As he went in he glanced at me out of the tail of his eye.
It sounds strange to say that I was suspicious of a mangy, old cur dog; but it’s true. There was something so human in his glance that I followed him into the doorway to see what he was up to.
In the entrance behind the door, with his head on the lower step, a man was sprawled. A second look convinced me that he was a Saturday night drunk who had got that far and no farther. He was lying on his back, open-mouthed, and breathing heavily. The old dog stood beside him watching me.
I could see he was a workingman and ordinarily wouldn’t have given him a look, but I was now broke, hungry, wolfish. The dog growled a feeble protest as I began exploring his master’s clothes. He had money in every pocket. I left some silver in his vest for him to get a drink with when he woke up. The devoted old mongrel stood in the door as if to bar me from going out, and eyed me reproachfully when I gently pushed him aside.
Out in the street I cleansed my conscience by repeating the Sanctimonious Kid’s favorite parody: “Oh, room rent, what crimes are committed in thy name!”