She whispered, looking down at him in the darkness: “You are very,
very kind.”
“It will be safer not to talk just yet—your voice, you know.
And when you do talk, you must call me
’Tovarish’—it’s the word the soldiers use. We must be
very careful, even in details.”
“Yes, of course. I understand. Now I’m ready.”
“Good. We must try to get a long way into the forests by
daylight.”
“Still
en route
for Moscow, I suppose?”
He answered, shouldering his bundle and helping her quickly over the
uneven ground: “No. I have decided to accept your suggestion and will
try to get you to the coast, where you can take ship for abroad. Now
don’t answer me—don’t talk at all just save all your
strength for the long journey.”
He stood on the summit of the first low ridge that lifted
out of the long level of the plains. Dawn was creeping over the horizon;
distant and below lay the clustered roofs of the town. He and his companion
had stopped for but a moment, to share bread and water together; she was so
tired that she was already half asleep on the springy turf.
He stared strangely upon that refreshing August dawn, yet in his own mind,
for some reason, he saw another picture—a frozen Arctic river under
sunshine, all still and stiff, and then suddenly the splitting shiver of the
ice-crust and the surge of water over the quickening land. He felt as if
something like that were happening within himself. “Come now,” he
said, picking up the bundles. She was asleep and he had to waken her. She
smiled without a word and stumbled forward.
He dared not have allowed more than that moment’s halt, for though
they had had good fortune so far, there was still danger, and perhaps the
greatest of all now that daylight had come. They plunged on and on as the
glow in the eastern sky deepened and became glorified by sunrise; over
pine-covered ridges and down into little lonely valleys, through swishing
gullies of dead leaves and round curving slopes whence Saratursk, glimpsed
between tree-trunks, seemed ever further away yet ever dangerously near. By
ten o’clock they had covered seven or eight miles, and were already
deep in the foothill forests; but she was so tired that she could not take
another step. There was nothing for it but to rest for at least a few
moments. They sat on a fallen tree-trunk and she was asleep again instantly,
with her head leaning forward into her hands.
He was tired himself and after a short time, being afraid of falling
asleep also, he got up and moved about. Ten minutes—a quarter of an
hour—might be enough to give her just the needful strength to scramble
a few miles further. Even during those few minutes, he guessed, pursuers
would be gaining on them. He had no illusions or false optimism; he knew that
the escape must have been discovered within a few hours, at most, of its
taking place, and that immense efforts would certainly be made to recapture
such a fugitive. He had seen the whole routine carried through so often
before—a price upon some prisoner, dead or alive—a whole army
setting out on perhaps the cruellest and therefore the most intoxicatingly
thrilling game in the world—a man-hunt. And a woman-hunt would be even
a degree better than that. Then suddenly, even while he was pondering over
it, he heard, very faintly in the distance, a shrill whistle, and, a few
seconds later, a still fainter whistle answering it. The hunt had begun
already.
He touched the woman on the shoulder, but it was no use—he had to
shake her thoroughly to get her awake. He said quietly: “We must hide
for a time—I think searchers are somewhere in the woods.” She
answered in a dazed way: “All right. I’m ready.” He helped
her to her feet and they moved away, he with eyes alert for a good hiding-
place.
He was fortunate in finding one quite soon. A steep valley ended in a lame
and desolate tract of undergrowth amidst whose tangle there seemed a good
chance of escaping notice. Even if pursuers ever reached it, they would not
be likely to give every thicket the attention it deserved. He plunged eagerly
into the bushes and for ten minutes, out of sight of the world around them,
they both wriggled further and deeper into the dense undergrowth. At last the
seemingly perfect spot revealed itself—a little hollow hidden behind
thick brambles and knee-deep in litter of twigs and leaves.
“Here,” he cried, with sudden satisfaction. He stared thankfully
about him at the protecting foliage, and then upwards at the blue sky just
visible through the lacery of branches. Then he heard once again, but a
little nearer, that shrill whistle and its answer.
He laid her gently on the ground and yet again she fell asleep
instantly—so instantly that he smiled a rather rueful smile, for he had
intended to give her some cautionary advice. No matter; it could probably
wait. He would not think of wakening her. And then as the moments passed and
he watched her sleeping, a feeling of tenderness came over him, like a slow
warmth from another world, and he did something he had never done before in
all his life—he put his arm round a woman and drew her gently towards
him. She would sleep more comfortably so. He gazed on her with quiet, almost
proprietary triumph; all the way from Khalinsk he had not ceased to guard
her, through all manner of difficulty and peril, and here she was still, by
miracle, under his protection. He was hungry and thirsty and tired and
anxious, yet also, in a way he had never known before, he was satisfied.
The thicket was noisy with buzzing insects, but every few moments over the
distant air came the whistling—now quite distinctly nearer. His heart
beat no faster for it; he felt: We are here, and here is our only chance; we
must wait and take whatever comes…The nearest of the pursuers, he judged,
must be perhaps half a mile away; there were others, too, not far behind, and
probably hundreds already combing the forests on the way from Saratursk. Soon
the whistling became less intermittent and seemed to come from north and
south as well as west; once, too, he thought he heard voices a long way off.
Hunger and thirst were now beginning to be importunate, but he dared not
satisfy them, since it might be night before he could risk leaving the
thicket in quest of any fresh supplies.
Then he saw that her eyes were wide open—dark, sleepy eyes staring
up at him. She whispered, half smiling: “How uncomfortable you must
be—with me leaning on you like this!”
“All the better,” he answered, with a wry smile. “It
helps me to keep awake.”
“I think it is your turn to sleep now.”
“No, no—you go on sleeping.”
“But I
can’t
.” Her voice dropped agonisingly.
“I’ve kept my nerve pretty well up to now, but I’m
afraid—I’m beginning to be just—terrified.”
“Terrified? Oh, no need for that.”
“Those whistles that keep on sounding—we’re being
hunted—that’s what they mean, don’t they?”
“They’re looking for us, of course. That was to be expected.
But it doesn’t follow that they’re going to find us.”
“Promise me—promise me one thing—that you’ll kill
me rather than let them get me again!”
“Yes, I promise.”
“You mean it?”
“Absolutely.”
A whistle suddenly shrilled quite close to them—perhaps two or three
hundred yards away, on the edge of the undergrowth. Even he was startled, and
he felt her trembling silently against him. He whispered: “Keep
calm—they’re a long way off yet—they might easily come
within ten yards and not see us in a place like this. Don’t
worry.”
All she could muster, amidst her fear was: “You have your revolver?
You remember?”
“Yes, of course.”
His arm tightened upon leer; he whispered: “Poor child, don’t
give up hope.” Then they both waited in silence. It seemed an age until
the next whistle—an answering one that appeared to come from about the
same distance on the other side. What was happening was not very clear;
perhaps the two searchers were passing along the edges of the undergrowth and
did not intend to make any detailed search amongst it. He could imagine their
condition—tired, hot, thirsty, and probably bad-tempered after the so
far fruitless search. The prickly brambles would hardly tempt them. On the
other hand, there was the big reward that had most likely been
offered—men would do most things for a few hundred roubles.
After a short time it was evident that the searchers numbered far more
than two; whistling proceeded from every direction, and sounded rather as if
fresh searchers were coming up at every moment. Then came echoes of shouting
and talking, but voices did not carry very well and he could not catch any
words. He judged, however, that some sort of a consultation was in progress.
Next followed a chorus of whistling and counter-whistling from both sides,
the meaning of which was only too easy to guess.
“They’re coming through!” she gasped.
He whispered: “I daresay they’ve got the sense to realise that
this is a good place to hide. And so it is, too. There are so many of them
there’s bound to be over-lapping and confusion. Keep calm. We’ve
still a good chance.” The approach of almighty danger gave him a
feeling of exaltation as difficult to understand as to control. He went on, a
moment later: “Leaves—these leaves. A childish trick, but it
might work. I want you to lie down in this hollow and let me cover you
up.”
“Yes, if you wish.”
He placed her so that, with the leaves over her, there seemed no break in
the level ground. The whistling by this time was very much nearer, and there
could be heard also the tearing and breaking of twigs as some of the
searchers broke through. He whispered: “Keep still—don’t
move or say a word. And whatever happens, trust me and don’t be
surprised. Whatever happens, mind.” A moment afterwards the tousled
head of a Red soldier, streaked with dirt and perspiration, pushed itself
through the undergrowth a few yards away. A.J. did not wait to be accosted.
Wiping his forehead with his sleeve and kicking up some of the litter of
twigs, he shouted: “Hallo? Found anything yet? There’s nothing
here.”
The man answered: “Nor here either, Tovarish. It’s my belief
she didn’t go into the forest at all. And if she did, she
wouldn’t have got so far as this. It’s a terrible job, searching
through this sort of country on a hot day.”
A J. agreed sympathetically. “You’re right, my
friend—its the devil’s own job. And I’ve lost my whistle
too, confound it.”
The other laughed. “Never mind, I’ll whistle for you.”
He gave two mighty blasts. “That’ll show we’ve done
our
duty, anyway. Have a drink with me, Tovarish, and It’s get
out of this muddle.”
A.J. accepted the offer by no means ungratefully, for he wanted the drink
badly enough. The soldier seemed a simple, good-natured fellow, with a
childishness, however, that was quite capable of being dangerous. “You
were with the other lot, I suppose?” he queried, and A.J. nodded. They
struggled through the thickets and reached at last the open ground. There a
few other soldiers were already gathered together, evidently satisfied that
they had performed their share of the search. They were all rather
disgruntled. It was a ticklish moment when A.J. joined them, but his highest
hopes were realised; there had been a tremendous amount of confusion and no
man expected to know his neighbour. The chief concern of all was the food and
drink due to arrive from the forests below.
A.J. found them a friendly lot of men, behind their temporary ill-humour;
he soon learned that they had been promised a large reward for the discovery
of the escaped Countess, and that the latter, if captured alive, was to be
accorded a solemn full-dress execution in the market-place at Saratursk.
“She will be hanged, not shot,” said one of the men, rolling a
cigarette between grimy fingers. And he added contemplatively: “It is a
pity, in some ways, to hang a woman, because their necks are made
differently. I am a hangman by profession, and I can speak from
knowledge.”
Soon a few men came toiling up the valley with sacks of bread and buckets
of thin potato-soup. The searchers greeted them boisterously, relieved them
of their burdens, and began to eat and drink ravenously. A.J. and his tousled
companion, whose name was Stephanov, managed to secure a loaf of black bread
between them, as well as a large can of soup. Stephanov was not astonished
that A.J. knew none of the men. “That is the worst of the army
nowadays,” he said. “They shift you about so quickly that you
never get to know anybody. It was different in the old days when there were
proper regiments.” He went on chatting away in a manner most helpful to
A.J. “I suppose all the others have got lost—that’s what
usually happens. I only know one of the fellows here by name. That’s
little Nikolai Roussilov over there. Do you see him? That man snoring against
that tree-trunk.” A.J. looked and observed. “I can tell you a
secret, Tovarish, about that man—and though you’ll hardly believe
it, I assure you it’s the heavenly truth and nothing less.” He
dropped his voice to a hoarse whisper. “That man was once kissed by the
Emperor.”
A.J. made some surprised and enquiring remark and Stephanov went on,
pleased with his little sensation: “Ah, I guessed that would startle
you! Well, you see, it all happened like this. Nikolai was doing sentry duty
one night outside a railway train in which the Emperor was sleeping. The
train was drawn up in a siding, and it was Easter Sunday morning—in the
old clays, of course. You know the custom—you kiss the first person you
meet and give the Easter greeting. Well, Nikolai was the first person the
Emperor met that morning when he stepped out of the train, so the Emperor
kissed him. Isn’t that remarkable? And you would hardly think it to
look at him, would you?”
Many of the men had already fallen to dozing in the shade, but
Stephanov’s conversation showed no signs of early abatement. A.J. was
not wholly sorry, for the man’s garrulous chatter gave him much
information that he guessed might be of value in the immediate future. At
last, towards the late afternoon, an officer appeared on the edge of the
scene and gave leisurely instruction to the half-sleeping men. They were to
form themselves into detachments and march back to Saratursk. Evidently the
search, for that day, at any rate, was being abandoned.