Come into my Parlour (46 page)

“Stefan!” Gregory cried in a low, urgent whisper.

There was no reply, so he ran back a few paces and looked up again. The bottom of Kuporovitch's window was a little open, just as his own had been. Through it he could see the back of the Russian's neck and the grizzled hair at the base of his skull. Apparently he had simply made a natural request, without the least thought of escape, and was just sitting there doing his business.

“Stefan!” called Gregory, slightly louder this time.

Kuporovitch did not even budge.

Gregory cast a frantic glance about him at the surrounding windows. The rooms on the ground floor appeared to be mainly store-rooms. The first and second floors were offices and through some of their windows he glimpsed vague signs of activity, but no one was actually looking down at him.

“Stefan!” he called again, raising his voice to a pitch which made
him fearful that half the people in the rooms overlooking the courtyard must hear it.

At last Kuporovitch responded. Screwing round his head he peered out over the sill and, on seeing Gregory, his heavy black eyebrows shot up with surprise.

Gregory ran back to the wall below the row of lavatories, then slid along it to a corner of the courtyard, so that he should be visible from only two of its sides while he waited. For the next few moments he stood there almost hopping from foot to foot with impatience while Kuporovitch did up his clothes. He did not hear the window raised because the Russian was clever enough to pull the plug in order to drown the sound, but next minute there was a heavy thump and he landed within a few yards of Gregory.

Near the far corner of the courtyard there was a door. As Kuporovitch scrambled to his feet Gregory ran towards it. To his immeasurable relief he found that it was not locked, but gave on his turning the handle. With Kuporovitch now close on his heels he slipped inside it. The door opened on to an empty side passage; closing it gently behind them they paused there a moment.

“D'you mean to hide?” whispered the Russian, still gasping for breath.

Gregory shook his head. “No. Once they have a chance to check up that we haven't left the building they'd start a systematic search, and they'd be bound to find us within a few hours. We haven't got an earthly unless we can get out of the building in the next five minutes.”

“We'd have to show passes to get out.'

“Not necessarily. The chap from the destroyer showed his both times when he came in, but they didn't bother him for it as he came out. That's the practice in lots of Government buildings. But it means our using the same entrance. D'you think you could find it?”

“First right, right again, left, then right,” Kuporovitch said after a moment. “That is, if the passages here are on the same as the first floor.”

“That's as I remember it,' agreed Gregory. “Come on, we haven't got a second to lose.”

As they started off, Gregory went on: “When we get to the hall we mustn't seem in a hurry and you must be talking to me loudly in Russian. Better choose a subject now. Something we might be arguing about that has nothing to do with the war. I know, you've read Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, haven't you?”

“Of course.”

“Then you can be laying down the law to me that Dostoevsky was
a far greater writer than the old Count. If we can raise the nerve for it the strongest card we could possibly play would be for you to grab my arm just as we got opposite the desk, and pull me up for a minute while you angrily hammer home some point or other. I only hope to God that these passages
do
run under those on the first floor.”

They passed a messenger, two girl clerks and an officer, none of whom took any notice of them. While they traversed the echoing stone corridors Gregory was desperately trying to calculate times. After Kuporovitch had pulled the plug the Ogpu man would have given him a couple of minutes, at least, to put himself to rights before becoming suspicious about his non-appearance. The fact that only one plug had been pulled would probably cause their captors to wait a moment or two more before doing anything about either of them. The odds were, therefore, that from the time Stefan had dropped out of the window they would not have less than three and not more than five minutes' clear start before the Mongolian began to bang on the doors. They had crossed the courtyard in something less than a minute, their swift conference had lasted about the same length of time, and, at a fast walk, one can cover a lot of ground in sixty seconds. It looked as if they should reach the hall with about a minute to spare before the
Ogpu
man had definitely made up his mind that they were staying in the lavatories too long.

What would happen then? Gregory wondered, his thoughts racing on. The Mongolian might think that they were still in there, having both taken poison, or hanged themselves, from fear that if they remained alive they might be tortured. Both he and Dakov were only visitors to the building. That might make all the difference to the escapers between getting away and immediate recapture. The two visitors would, perhaps, hesitate before destroying Admiralty property by breaking down or forcing the doors of the compartments. They would probably waste precious time in finding someone to summon the guard to do that.

It was possible, of course, that they might look out of one of the other windows and see the tracks of the fugitives in the snow that covered the courtyard, but even if they did, they would not be able to give a general alarm themselves. It was a safe bet that in the Soviet Admiralty some form of alarm system existed at the sounding of which all exits were closed and guards turned out, and it was probably operated from the command post. But the visitors would not know where to find that, so in any case they would have to go to the bald captain's office and explain matters to him before a general search could be ordered.

He had got so far in his agitated speculations when, to his immense
relief, they saw that the fourth passage into which they had turned was leading them out into the main hall.

Kuporovitch had realised that at the same instant and immediately began his literary dissertation in a loud voice. As they entered the hall he was declaiming heatedly that the
Brothers Karamazov
was a far greater work than
War and Peace
. Pulling up with a jerk in front of the desk, he suddenly looked straight at the man behind it and appealed to him for his support.

“Do you not agree with me, Comrade? This blockhead here contends that Tolstoy is our greatest Russian writer, while I say that there are many superior to him.”

Gregory halted too, and was on tenterhooks at this audacity. He thought it a splendid piece of bravado on Stefan's part but was terrified that they might become involved in a general argument, in which it must soon transpire that he could not understand what was being said.

The man looked a little surprised, but smiled and said: “Tolstoy was a fine writer in a dark age, Comrade, but I agree with you that there have been many better since. My own favourite is Maxim Gorky.”

“There!” cried Kuporovitch triumphantly. “You see!” And grabbing Gregory by the arm he turned him quickly towards the door.

Gregory smiled, shrugged as though he was still not convinced and allowed himself to be led away by his verbose companion. With every step he took he feared to hear the man call out after them to see their passes, but he was just smiling amusedly at their backs. He had recognised them as having entered the building with the
Ogpu
men and the destroyer officer a quarter of an hour before. There had been nothing to show that they were under arrest or that one of them was a foreigner. Strictly speaking, as they were civilians and had no passes of their own, they should have been seen out by the officers who had brought them in; but officers were sometimes slack about that sort of thing if they were pressed for time, and such minor breaches of the regulations were not infrequent.

When they had passed the sentry on the door their sense of relief was tremendous, but so fleeting as to be gone in a bare moment, since they knew that they had yet to get off the fortress island and that a hue-and-cry might start up after them at any second.

They turned right, as they had done before on leaving the building with Dakov, the same thought being in both their minds—that their one chance of getting clear was to catch the liberty boat before their descriptions had been circulated and the dock police warned to keep a look-out for them.

“D'you know where the main jetty is?” Gregory asked in a low voice.

Kuporovitch nodded. “I think so; and unless things have changed since I was last here they use as a liberty boat one of those old two-funnelled flat-bottomed ferries, so we ought to be able to spot her. It's five to twelve though, so we'll have to step out if we're to make it.”

Side by side they hurried down the quay. It was still thronged, but the twenty minutes that had elapsed since the mob had surged round them had greatly altered the composition of the crowd. The passing pedestrians who had witnessed the excitement had now left the spot to proceed upon their various activities, and many of the small boats that had then been loading up with stores or waiting for officers from the ships had now put off, others with different crews having taken their places. Nevertheless they dared not break into a run for fear of attracting attention, as some of the sailors who had seen them arrested when they passed that way before might recognise them, and tumble to it that, having eluded their guards, they were escaping.

They reached the jetty at one minute to twelve. There could be no mistaking it as, at its far end, lay the old-fashioned, two-funnelled ferry. Three sailors reached its entrance at the same moment, and began to run. Now that they had an obvious reason for hurrying, Gregory and Stefan followed their example.

As they pelted along just behind the sailors both of them were wondering desperately if they would get over the next hurdle that lay immediately ahead of them. Barely eight minutes had elapsed since Kuporovitch had dropped from the window, but by this time it was pretty certain that the
Ogpu
man would be giving excited explanations to the Naval Intelligence captain. Would they jump to it at once that the prisoners had lost not a second in getting out of the Admiralty building, and, having their liberty boat passes still on them, make a desperate effort to get away on her? If so they would telephone to the jetty and the fugitives would be stopped at the control post at its head before they could get aboard. Against that there was a fair chance that the speed and audacity with which they had acted might yet save them. Back at the Admiralty it might not occur to anyone that they could have got out so quickly. In that case the guards would be put on to searching the ground floor store-rooms for them and the doorkeeper might not even be questioned for a quarter of an hour or so yet.

Breathless they arrived at the end of the jetty. Two Marines were standing in front of a hut there examining all passes. The sailors showed theirs and ran down the gangway. The fugitives had already taken the flimsy papers from their pockets as they ran and pulled up panting to show them. One of the Marines just glanced at the papers and signed to their bearers to go on.

The twelve o'clock hooter blew; the ferry sounded her siren in
reply. As Gregory and Stefan charged down the gangplank two sailors were undoing the ropes; the moment the fugitives reached the deck the gangway was pulled in and the ferry put off.

Still panting, they looked at one another and grinned. They had performed the almost impossible feat of escaping not only from the Admiralty building but also from Kronstadt island in the brief space of nine minutes. Yet in a moment they were gravely sober again, as they knew that they had still to get through the third barrier which separated them from their liberty, and that their chances of doing so were even less than they had been at the other two.

It was the best part of five miles from Kronstadt to Oranienbaum, and it was unlikely that the old ferry would cover such a distance in less than twenty-five minutes. Before that time had elapsed it was as good as certain that the doorkeeper at the Admiralty would have been questioned and reported their audacious escape. It was possible that it still might not occur to anyone that they had gone straight to the liberty boat, or, since their escape had been made so close on twelve o'clock, that they would have had time to catch it. If so the Naval Police would be put on to comb the town and later the island for them. But if it was once suspected that they had made a dash for the liberty boat the Admiralty would telephone the port authorities at Oranienbaum, and the fugitives would be re-arrested on landing there.

Getting out of the crowd they stood nervously about on a quiet corner of the deck, cudgelling their brains in vain for a possible way to evade the strong possibility that they would be recaptured the moment they set foot on shore.

Kuporovitch suggested that they should hide somewhere in the terry, go back in her to Kronstadt, then attempt their landing after she had completed her next trip, which would probably start about three o'clock; his idea being that if the port police at Oranienbaum were on the look-out for them now and they did not appear it would be assumed that they had not taken the liberty boat after all, and that nobody would be expecting them when she came into Oranienbaum again about three-thirty.

But Gregory pointed out that the fact of their being in civilian clothes, among so many sailors, made them terribly conspicuous, and that it was even more likely that an order would have been given to the Oranienbaum police to keep a watch for them by three-thirty than it was at present. In fact, it was practically certain that precautions would be taken to prevent their getting away from the island in any later boat as a matter of routine; whereas there was still a chance that during the comparatively short space of half an hour nobody would have thought of doing so.