“My faith!” he exclaimed, “it is it to the life! I have observed him. But remember this, my friend; I speak no English and would be helpless; they would discover me at once.”
A day or so later the Frenchman and Conyngham met again in the jail-yard. The latter motioned his friend aside to where one of the stone buttresses hid them from the sight of the sentry who was watching the yard.
“Here,” said the captain; “with this wire I have made a pair of spectacles, and in the evening no one would notice that there is not glass inside the rims.”
As he spoke he placed the wire upon his nose, drew down his upper lip, and the Frenchman looked at him and laughed.
“My faith!” he said again, “it is the doctor to the life.” And then, as if an idea had suddenly dawned upon him, he touched Conyngham on the shoulder. “It is you who should try it,” he said. “You shall have my clothes. I can give them to you piece by piece, and as they have allowed me to keep some others I shall not miss them.”
At first Conyngham demurred, but the Frenchman was insistent, and so the next night and the next transfers were made unobserved in the jail-yard, and the captain secreted the clothing inside the mattress upon which he slept on the floor of his cell. From another prisoner a hat was obtained almost like the heavy three-cornered affair that the visiting doctor wore. A book was procured somewhat resembling the doctor’s.
Saturday evening was set for a trial of the plan. Conyngham was most anxious to get away. He had, by his trick of reading people’s lips, discovered that there was a plot on foot to convict him if possible of the charge that hung over his head. A man had been found who swore that he had known him in Ireland, and another who had positively identified him as his brother. If they could prove the contention that he was a British subject he would have short shrift of it, so it behooved him not to put off long the attempted escape.
Saturday afternoon at about five o’clock the prisoners were released in batches of ten or a dozen for exercise in the courtyard. When the door of Conyngham’s cell was opened he feigned indisposition, and asked only to be allowed to sit in the doorway where he could breathe the fresher air; but no sooner had the turnkey left than he quickly donned the Frenchman’s black small-clothes and the long coat, and putting on the spectacles and the big hat he stepped out into the corridor that opened into the yard. Imitating carefully the doctor’s step and holding the book under his arm, instead of turning to the left he went down the corridor to the right, at the end of which stood the first sentry at the entrance to the guard-room. It was dark in the corridor, and what light there was came from behind him. The sentry hardly looked at him; turning the key and pulling the bolt, he let him pass.
He was now in the room that was occupied by the soldiers whose special duty was to watch the prisoners and to patrol the outer walls, but the room, by luck, was empty except for a sergeant, who, with his coat off and his feet propped against the wall, sat snoring in a chair. At first Conyngham was uncertain which of the two doors, that led out of the apartment, to take. He chose the one to the right again, and opening it came into another room where at the farther end three soldiers were throwing dice. They paused in their game as he entered and looked up at him. At first it appeared as if the one who was holding the dice-box was about to address him, but one of his companions, with an oath, exclaimed, “It’s only the doctor; go on with the game, you blockhead!” and the men proceeded, rattling the dice and then tossing them on to the bench. Conyngham walked past them and opened the door that led out of the prison entrance, and here he had to go through a worse ordeal than ever, for he came into the daylight, and there within twenty feet of him stood the man on guard. He was in full regimentals, with his long red coat and white cross-belts, and propped against him at an attitude of attention was his loaded musket with the bayonet fixed. Conyngham pulled the hat a little farther over his eyes, and opening the imitation note-book he began muttering to himself the way he had seen the doctor do. Closer and closer he came to the sentry. In his imagination he could feel the man’s eyes looking through and through him, and he thought he could detect a shuffling of his feet as if he was stepping to intercept him.
He was past the sentry now, and thought he was over the worst of it when the latter spoke.