IV
Rounding the precipitous cape, the steamer entered the bay. The convicts gathered about the hatchways, and with feverish curiosity watched the high shores of the island, looming up before them through the evening twilight.
At nightfall they entered the port. The outlines of the island had the effect of drawing nearer as they approached, and stood out more clearly defined in their black grandeur. The boat stopped. The sailors formed in line, and the convicts were led out.
On shore, in the darkness, a few lights were visible; the water splashed against the beach, the sky was overcast, and a sympathetic cloud of sadness weighed on all hearts. “This is Fort Doué,” said Burán, in an undertone. “Here we shall have to live in barracks at first.”
After roll-call the party was conducted on shore, in the presence of the local officials. Having lived several months continuously on board ship, now the convicts once more walked on solid ground. The steamer on which they had spent so long a time rocked gently in the dusk, softly sighing amid clouds of white steam.
Lights were moving ahead, and voices were heard.
“Is this the party?”
“It is.”
“Show them the way to barrack No. 7.”
The convicts followed the light. They were walking in a disorderly line, and were surprised to have no one beside them, urging them on with musket-butts.
“Say, fellows, there is no escort with us!” several exclaimed in astonishment.
“Keep still!” angrily growled Burán. “What need is there for an escort! There is no danger that you will run away, even if you are not guarded. The island is large, and surrounded by water. You might die of hunger anywhere. Don’t you hear the moaning of the sea?”
A heavy wind was rising. The lanternlights flickered unsteadily under its gusts, and the roar of the sea as it beat on the shore sounded like the raging of an awakened wild beast.
“Don’t you hear it roar?” said Burán, addressing Vasíli. “Look at it,” he continued, “ ‘Water all around us, and trouble ahead.’ You will have to cross the water; and think of the distance before you come to the crossing! … a desert! … woods and military outposts! … I have a foreboding that this attempt will not end well;—the sea gives us warning. I fear that I shall not escape from Saghálin; indeed, I do! Twice already have I escaped. The first time, I was caught in Blagovéstchinsk, and the second time in Russia … and I was brought here again. It must be my fate to die on this island.”
“All may turn out well,” replied Vasíli, encouragingly.
“You are a young man, and I am worn out. How angrily and mournfully the sea roars!”
The convicts who had occupied barrack No. 7 were removed, and the newly arrived party, temporarily guarded, was installed in their place.
Accustomed to strong bolts and to the confinement of prison-life, they would have rambled over the island like sheep let loose from their enclosures, had they not been thus guarded at first. The old convicts, who had already been living there for some time, were not locked up; for, becoming gradually familiar with the conditions of their exile, they had reached the conclusion that an attempt to escape is a dangerous undertaking, and usually means certain death to those who attempt it; for only the most resolute and determined characters, after long and careful preparations, try this experiment—and such as they might be shut in by ten locks and yet would try to escape either from prison or from out-of-door labor.
“Now, Burán, you must advise us,” said Vasíli to him, on the third day after their arrival. “You are our leader, and you will have to go ahead; so give us our orders. I suppose we ought to be getting ready.”
“What can I advise!” replied the old man, reluctantly. “It is not an easy undertaking, and I am growing old. Well,” after a pause, “about three days hence, the sentries will be withdrawn, and we shall be sent out to work. Besides, we are free to come and go at any time; only, one is not allowed to carry any bag. That is all there is to it.”
“Do advise us, Burán, my good fellow; you know what is best.”
Burán looked gloomy and careworn. He rarely spoke to anyone, but muttered incessantly to himself. It seemed as if this old vagrant, who for the third time had been brought back to the same place, was now losing his energy.
However, Vasíli had in the meantime succeeded in securing ten more able-bodied men, and was teasing Burán, in the hope of rousing him and of awakening his ardor. In this he sometimes succeeded, but eventually the old man always reverted to the difficulties of the road and bad omens. “I shall never escape from this island,” he said, repeatedly, a sentence which expressed the depression of the unsuccessful vagrant. Nevertheless, in his brighter moods, the recollection of former attempts cheered him, and in the evening, when lying in his bunk beside Vasíli, he would talk to him about the island and the roads that they intended to follow.
Fort Doué lies on the western side of the island, facing the Asiatic shore. The Tartar Straits at this place are about three hundred versts in width; to attempt to cross in an open boat would be out of the question, and the vagrants naturally follow either this or the opposite shore of the island.
“If you are anxious to die, you can go anywhere you like,” Burán was in the habit of saying; “the island is large, a wilderness and a forest. Even the native Ghiláks, who are well used to it, find few places where they can settle. If you go east, you run the risk of losing your way among the rocks, or of being pecked to death by hungry birds, or, if you live, you will probably go back of your own accord, when winter comes. If you go south, you will reach the end of the island and come to the ocean, which can only be crossed in a ship. There is but one road for us to follow, and that is to the north, skirting the shore for the entire distance. The sea will be our guide. After travelling some three hundred versts, we shall come to narrow straits, and it is there that we must cross in boats to the Amúr shore. Only, let me tell you, my boy,” here Burán fell into his usual doleful strain, “we shall have trouble in passing the military outposts. The first one is called Várki, the second Pánghi, and the last one Póghib, called so because it is usually here that we perish. And dear me! how cunningly these outposts are placed! Wherever a hillock rises, behind it you find an outpost. You are marching along, and stumble upon it without warning. The Lord have mercy on us!”
“But you have already been twice over the ground!”
“That is true.” And the dull eyes of the old man kindled. “Listen to what I say, and do as I bid you. Shortly they will call on those who wish to volunteer as workmen in the mill. Have your names put down on the list; and when they are sending the provisions thither, put your rusks and biscuits in the cart. Peter, a former convict, has charge of the mill. Then will be the time for you to escape—I mean, when you get to the mill. You will not be missed for three days. That is the way things are managed here. You can miss the roll-call for three days before any notice is taken of it. The doctor objects to corporal punishment, because the hospital is in such a wretched condition. If anyone gets tired out and becomes ill from working, he goes into the woods instead of going to the hospital, and often recovers in the open air. But if he does not put in an appearance on the third day, he is considered missing; and were he to come back of his own accord, it would make no difference—he might as well make up his mind, at once, to be flogged.”
“At any rate, I hope we shall escape the flogging,” replied Vasíli; “if we succeed in getting away, we will not return of our own accord.”
“And if you don’t,” growled Burán, “it will be all the same; it will end in the crows devouring your carcass, as it lies not far from one of the outposts. The soldiers have no time to fool away for your sake; they won’t escort you back hundreds of versts. Wherever they see you, they will shoot you down, and there is the end of it.”
“Stop croaking, you old raven! Remember, we start tomorrow. Tell Bobróf what we need, and the artel will supply us.”
The old man mumbled some reply, and left him with downcast head, while Vasíli went to his comrades and bade them get ready. He had given up the duties of stárosta’s assistant some time before, and another man had been chosen in his place. The fugitives packed their bags, exchanged their clothes for the strongest that could be found, and the next day volunteered to work on the mill. That very day they all left work, and hid themselves in the woods. Burán alone was not among them.
It was a well selected party. Among Vasíli’s comrades were a personal friend of his, called Volóydka Makárof, a strong and agile man, who had already escaped twice from Kára; two Circassians, determined fellows, and invaluable as faithful comrades; and a Tartar, a great rogue, but skilful and ingenious. The rest were also vagrants, who had more than once wandered through Siberia.
Already the fugitives had been one day in the woods; … the night had passed, and the greater part of the following day; still no Burán. The Tartar was sent to the barracks to look him up. On arriving, he secretly called out an old convict, Bobróf, a friend of Vasíli’s, a man who had great influence among his comrades. The next morning, Bobróf came to the spot where the fugitives were concealed.
“Well, comrades, how can I help you?”
“Send Burán to us at once. We cannot start without him; and if he is waiting because he needs something, help him to get it. We are all waiting for him.”
When Bobróf returned to the barracks, he saw that Burán had made no preparations whatever for starting. He found him walking restlessly about the barracks, talking to himself, and gesticulating wildly.
“What are you about, Burán?” he called out to him.
“Why, what is that to you?”
“How, what is that to me? Why are you not getting ready?”
“I am getting ready for my grave; that is what I am getting ready for.”
This answer provoked Bobróf.
“What do you mean? Don’t you know that the boys have already been three days in the bushes? Do you want to get them whipped? And you call yourself an old vagrant!”
These reproaches touched the old man to the quick.
“My time has gone by. I shall never escape from this island. … I am worn out!”
“Whether you are worn out or not, that is your own affair. Supposing you do not reach the end of your journey in safety, supposing you die on the way, you will not be blamed for that; but what if through any fault of yours eleven men were to be whipped? You see, the responsibility resting on you obliges you to go. If I should report this to the artel, what do you think they would do to you?”
“I know it all,” replied Burán; “they would ‘cover’ me, and I should deserve it. It is not becoming for an old vagrant to die such a death. It seems as though it were my fate to go. Only, I have made no preparations.”
“We will get you ready at once. What do you want?”
“Well, in the first place, I want twelve good new coats.”
“But every man has a coat of his own!”
“You mind what I say!” replied Burán, with a show of temper. “I know that they have one apiece; but they need two. Each one will have to give the Ghiláks a coat for ferrying him across. Besides, I want twelve good knives, about three-quarters of an arshin long, two hatchets, and three kettles.”
Bobróf called a meeting of the artel, and stated the case. Whoever had a good coat gave it to the vagrants. Every convict has an instinctive sympathy with each daring attempt to escape from their four prison-walls. Knives and kettles were furnished, some being bought, and some given by the convict settlers. In two days everything was ready. Thirteen days had already passed since the arrival of the party on the island, and the following morning Bobróf accompanied Burán to the hiding-place of the convicts, assisting him to carry the provisions.
In accordance with an old convict regulation, the men “stood up for prayers,” something like a Te Deum was read for the occasion, and, bidding goodbye to Bobróf, they started on their journey.