We arrived at midnight. In the common room of the post-house, around which earth and snow had been banked to keep out the cold, was a high brick stove, and around the walls benches whereon a dozen wayfarers like ourselves were wrapped in their evil-smelling furs, and sleeping. The odour as I entered the place was foetid; the dirt indescribable. One shaggy peasant, in heavy top-boots and fur coat, had imbibed too much vodka, and had become hilarious, whereat one of the sleepers, suddenly awakened, threw a top-boot at him across the room, narrowly missing my head.
The post-house keeper, as soon as he saw my permit, sent a man to the local chief of police, a stout, middle-aged man, who appeared on the scene in his hastily-donned uniform and who invited me to his house close by. There I questioned him regarding the political prisoners, “Numbers 14956 and 14957.”
Having read my permits—at which he was visibly impressed when he saw the signature of the Emperor himself—he hastened to obtain his register. Presently he said:
“The two ladies you mention have passed through this prison, Excellency. I see a note that both are dangerous ‘politicals,’ and that the elder lady was rather weak. Judging from the time when they left, they are, I should say, already in Yakutsk—or even beyond.”
“From what is she suffering?” I asked eagerly.
“Ah! Excellency, I cannot tell that,” was his reply. “All I know is that the captain of Cossacks who came down from Yakutsk to meet the convoy considered that being a dangerous political, she was sufficiently well to walk with the others. So she has gone on foot the remainder of the journey. She arrived her in a sled.”
“On foot!” I echoed. “But she is ill—dying, I was told.”
The chief of police shrugged his shoulders and said with a sigh:
“I fear. Excellency, that the lady was somewhat unfortunate. That particular captain is not a very humane person—particularly where a dangerous prisoner is concerned.”
“Then to be marked as ‘dangerous’ means that the prisoner is to be treated with brutality—eh?” I cried. “Is that Russian justice?”