Chapter XI: The Beginning of the Flight

Marian in her cell could hear the bells of the ships striking the hours; and she would count them and wait to see if the harbour clock answered to their signal. There was little else to do through the long days of darkness, save it were to listen to the cries of the seamen as they warped their ships to the buoys or exchanged a word with one of the sentries at the fort. Until this time her jailers permitted her no other occupations. Designedly, that she might become acquainted with the whole meaning of imprisonment in a fortress, they kept her hands idle and shut the daylight from her eyes. She thought sometimes that she would lose her reason for very dread of the silence and the darkness. Or she would succumb to the frenzy of the prisoner and be tempted to beat upon the door with her fist, or to dash herself against the granite walls, seeking thus an escape from the living death. But upon the day of Paul’s visit a new sense of resignation possessed her. The man’s great love, surpassing all she had imagined, spoke to her still when he had quitted her cell; she heard his voice again bidding her to be of good courage; she had kept the letter which little Dick had written, and tears of affection sealed the childish words. She asked herself what craven spirit had mastered her, that she should be the victim of this weakness and despair. They had accounted her a woman of unfailing nerve; no shackles of cowardice had hampered her will during those months of excitement when she had filched the secrets of Kronstadt one by one; had measured the forts, and counted the guns, and cried with delight at the successes she numbered. She determined to remember those days and to live them again.

“I will not show him that I suffer,” she said; “he shall find me laughing when he comes here to-morrow. And he shall write to Dick for me--a long letter about our home that is to be. After that he will speak to them. They will not keep me here always. It was such a little thing.”

This spirit of courage breathed upon all her actions of the day. She showed a smiling face to the Sergeant when he brought her dinner. Surrendering herself to childish anticipations, she began to think of a hundred things which Paul would do--how he would write to England, or see the Governor, or even go to the Czar for her. The hours hurried now, each bell telling her that her lover was up and working for her. To-morrow she would see him again. Perchance he would bring good news. At least she would touch his hand and hear his voice.

They were wont to bring her a little supper at sunset--the boiling tea and the black bread which was as earth in her mouth. But she ate it to-night with relish; and when her supper was done she let her head sink upon her arms and so was carried away to a dreamland of wood and meadow, to gardens warmed with everlasting sunshine, and woods alive with music of song-birds. Therein she walked awhile, holding her lover’s hand; she heard voices long forgotten, the voices of dead friends and the laughter of the child. The sleep was sweet, for it was a sleep of hope new born and of courage rekindled; but when it had endured a little while, the harsh skirl of the outer door turning upon its hinges awoke her rudely. She opened her eyes to see the Sergeant standing before her, and with him rough artillery men in their great grey cloaks, and others who were strangers to her. She thought for the moment that they had come to take her to Petersburg, or even to the nameless punishment beyond. She began to tremble, and stood back against the wall as though she would find protection there--the weak woman shrinking from the terrible hand which was about to touch her.

“What is it?” she cried, while she shielded her eyes, dewed with sleep, from the garish rays of the lanterns. “Why do you come here? what do you want with me?”

“To take you to Fort Katherine, mademoiselle, by order of the Governor.”

Marian clenched her hands; she scarce dared to believe what she heard. Paul had spoken, then; the night had passed; she would see the sun again.

“You wish to take me now?” she asked, vainly seeking to cloak the excitement which possessed her.

“Now,” said the Sergeant gruffly--“that is, if you have finished your supper.”

She laughed joyously, as though the suggestion were a folly.

“Oh!” she cried; “as if one would wait for that!”

Her hands were busy with the cape of fur while she spoke, and when she had buttoned it about her shoulders and had drawn the little fur cap over her untrammelled hair, she was ready for them. The men watched her with admiring eyes. The youngest among them was saying to himself, “What lips to kiss!”

“I am ready, quite ready,” she exclaimed, looking up with eyes awake and laughing. “You are sure it is to Fort Katherine, Sergeant?”

The Sergeant shrugged his shoulders.

“Sei tchas! are we here to play at being children, mademoiselle? Read that paper--it is the writing of the Governor.”

“I can read nothing to-night,” she said, pushing aside the lantern; “my eyes are blinded by the light. I cannot breathe in this place. It is good of you to come for me.”

“It is not good at all, mademoiselle. I am the servant, and it is my business to obey.”

He turned from the cell and the girl walked beside him still babbling like a child. No thought of prudence could have stilled her tongue in that hour. The burden of her punishment fell from her shoulders when she quitted the cell and ascended the short flight of steps leading to the quay above. The mighty granite walls terrified her no longer. She could see the heaven above her, gray-blue through the silver haze of night; the stars shone down upon her; they would be shining down upon England, she said; and she would watch them every night henceforth from her windows in Fort Katherine. The joy of liberty half possessed quickened her heart and released all her impulses and affection. She could have kissed the hand of the Sergeant who conducted her to the launch. She talked to him unceasingly while they traversed the corridor and the courtyard of the fortress; she was talking still when he threw open the iron-bound door and stepped out on to the quay which lies upon the north side of Alexander.

It was a glorious night, a night of soft winds and rippling sea. Though the sun had sunk, there was still a glow of crimson light in the West, a vast arc pointed with jagged spikes of orange and green and purple flame. Kronstadt herself stood silhouetted as an island of rock and pinnacles in an atmosphere of quivering haze. Great ships, belching clouds of smoke from mighty funnels, passed noiselessly behind the curtain of the eastern mists; lanterns flashed from all the forts, here white and far-reaching, there scarlet and dim; strange rays played upon the fretting waters; lakes of golden waves glistened where the warships spread the searching arcs of their lamps; the steam whistle moaned distantly or bellowed warningly from the nearer harbours. The West was a splendid canopy of flame hung in the heavens, as it were, above the throne of liberty and of freedom.

Marian stood upon the quay and the fresh wind scattered her curls and cast refreshing spray

upon her weary eyes. The scene around her was bewildering and not to be realised. She beheld a steam launch lying at the quay; she heard its timbers groaning as the swell lifted it against the granite wall and the fenders were flattened and twisted at the rush of the seas. But her eyes were rather for the West. There lay her own England. She could have stretched out her arms to the befriending light and have prayed that some messenger of God might come down to carry her from this tomb to which folly had brought her.

“Oh,” she said, “I am ready, quite ready, Sergeant. Is this the boat?”

The Sergeant ignored her question. He was bending down to speak to one who stood in the bows of the launch, a tall man wearing the rough overcoat of an officer of artillery. Notwithstanding the light in the West, it was very dark in the loom of the walls of Alexander. Marian could see little of the faces of those about her. The flickering rays of the lanterns danced upon the white deck of the yacht, but not upon the figure of the man who seemed to command it.

“I am to go on board?” she asked of one near her. “Why have you brought me here if you are not ready?”

The soldier laughed good-naturedly.

“We are quite ready, mademoiselle; it is the Captain for whom we wait.”

“The Captain!”

“Yes, for Captain Zassulic, who is to take you to Fort Katherine.”

She laughed in her turn, nervously and with the desire that surprise should not betray her. She did not dare, for some moments, to look again at the little ship or at the tall figure now standing by the engine-room. But when she was sure of herself, when she had driven from her mind the wild thoughts that occupied it, she saw that the figure was the figure of Paul, her lover; and at this the lights and the stars, the ships and the men, swam before her eyes, and she leaned heavily upon the arm of the trooper.

“Why do you keep me waiting? I am weak and cold,” she cried petulantly. “I cannot stand here.”

“Mademoiselle,” said the Sergeant, turning to her, “there is no need to keep you waiting any longer.”

Marian suffered herself almost to be lifted upon the launch. So soon as her feet had touched the deck a strong hand seized her own and drew her towards the companion. It was the hand of Paul, hot and burning as the hand of one in a fever.

“Let go!” he cried to the engineer, speaking in a voice which rang across the sea; and, almost with the words, the ropes were cast off and the launch stood away from the quay.

It was the work of a moment, so dexterously done, so unlooked for, that the Sergeant stood staring stupidly as one dazed with drink.

“Stoi, stoi!” he cried; “there are the others, my Captain.”

“I have no need of them. Do you think the girl is going to jump into the sea?”

“But the General’s order, my Captain.”

Paul laughed and took his place at the woman’s side.

“We shall know how to answer the General. Good-night to you, Sergeant.”

He cried again to the engineer and the little ship leaped into the waves. Foam flew from her bows and sparkled upon her decks. The whirr of her screw was as the whirr of a cascade thundering. The surrounding forts seemed to recede back to a more distant horizon. The lights of Kronstadt, the black shapes of barrack and church, were hidden in the deepening mists. Into the West, outward to the greater seas of the Baltic, the launch was bearing them. But the man continued to keep his eyes upon the great citadel he was leaving, to look upon it as one may look upon a home which shall be a home no more.

“My God!” he said, “it is for ever!”

And so he turned to the girl as though to shield her with his arm. The lights around him began to vanish one by one; the salt of the sea was on his face; he waited to hear the boom of the guns which should signal his flight and tell the city that he was a traitor--he who had served Kronstadt with an abiding love.