Sonia’s offences against the law did not, however, trouble me much. I only desired to ascertain from her the truth regarding my wife, the Grand Duchess, and in order to meet her was prepared for any risk.
Thus I placed myself in the hands of this villainous-looking rascal whose name I did not know, and who had come to me entirely without credentials. My natural caution warned me that from every point of view my midnight expedition was fraught with considerable danger, yet thoughts of my sad-eyed wife whom I so dearly loved aroused within me a determination to ascertain some key to the enigma, and I was therefore resolved to accompany the unkempt stranger in face of any peril.
Chapter Thirty Two
On the Frontier
The first hour of our walk in the bright balmy night proved fresh and pleasant after the stifling malodorous town. My unknown guide was, I soon discovered, a typical gaol-bird, the fact being made plain by the scanty growth of hair on one side of his head revealed when he inadvertently removed his cap to wipe his brow with his dirty hand. His strong knee-boots were well-patched, but he was out at elbow, and his moustache and matted beard sadly wanted trimming. He kept his appointment to the moment, and declining my invitation to drink, we set off together, ascending the low hill behind the town, and taking a circuitous route back to the river bank. By no means devoid of a sense of humour, he strode along jauntily, laughing, joking, and making light of any risk of capture, until I began to regard him with less suspicion. That he was no ordinary moujik was certain, for he spoke of life and people in Moscow, in Nijni, and even in Petersburg, his conversation showing a more intimate acquaintance than could be acquired by mere hearsay. Our way at first was through narrow lanes of dirty wooden houses, where the foetid odours of decaying refuse greeted our nostrils; then, leaving the town, we ascended through some cornfields until, suddenly descending again, we came to where the Niemen flowed onward between its sedgy banks, its placid bosom a sheet of silver beneath the light of the full moon.
Fully three miles we trudged along the post-road beside the river, passing a solitary little hamlet. Not a soul stirred, not a dog barked. The place seemed uninhabited. Now and then we passed a country cart driven by some sleepy peasant who had imbibed too freely of vodka, until we came to where a striped verst-post stood at the junction of another narrower highway.
“That’s the road to Jurburg, and to the frontier at Poswentg,” my companion remarked, in reply to my enquiry. “It’s too dangerous for us.”
“Why?”
“It swarms with frontier-guards,” he answered, with a low laugh. “We have no desire to encounter any of these gentlemen this evening, therefore we must presently take to the paths. See!” and he nodded upward to the sky, “The tail of the Great Bear points downwards. We shall have luck to-night.”
“Is this the route you take with the fugitives?” I asked, pausing to take breath, and gazing around upon the lovely scene, for here the moonlit river flowed among its osiers and rushes, across the great grass-covered steppe.
“Yes,” he answered. “This is the only portion of our journey where there are serious risks of detection, so let us hurry. On a bright night like this, a man can be seen a long way off. The guards are too fond of hiding along the banks, fearing that any German boats from Endruszen may creep up the river.”
I started forward again, and we both quickened our pace. I now saw from his demeanour that he feared an encounter, for at each unusual sound he paused, his hand uplifted in silence. At last, at a point where the stream made a sudden bend, we left the river road and plunged into a great marsh, where the reeds grew almost as high as ourselves, and where our feet ever and anon sank deep into chill, slimy mud. As soon as we had left the river, my strange guide became as jovial as before, and spoke entirely without restraint. Fear of detection no longer troubled him, for as we held on our way over the soft clay, the silence of the calm night was now and then broken by his coarse laughter. On that flat, marshy land, each step became hampered by huge cakes of yellow mud that clung to our boots, while often I sank with a splash ankle-deep in water, much to my companion’s amusement. Whistling softly to himself, he laughed at all misfortunes, assuring me that we should very soon find drier ground, and that before dawn I should meet Sonia Korolénko, who was awaiting me.
“She is your leader – eh?” I asked.
“Well, of course,” he answered, with a grim smile. In the moonlight he looked a shaggy, evil-faced ruffian, and more than once, when I remembered that I had upon me a good round sum in notes and gold, I regretted that I had trusted myself with him unarmed. “The police drove her from Vienna, from Paris, from London; so she has come to us.”
“And is yours a paying profession?” I asked interested.
“Generally,” he answered, with that frankness that characterised all his conversation. “You’d be surprised how many people seek our assistance. Some of our party are in St Petersburg, Moscow, and Warsaw, and make the contracts with the fugitives; then they hand them over to us, and we do the rest.”
“You guarantee to put them on German soil, or bring foreigners into Russia for a fixed sum?”
“Yes. You would open your eyes if you knew some of the people I’ve guided over this very path. Sometimes it is a Jew peasant who has no permit, and desires to emigrate to London, or to America; at others, an escaped prisoner, a murderer, or a revolutionist, who is being tracked down by the Security Section. We always know why they are leaving Russia, and make them pay accordingly. Not long ago I brought a young titled lady across here; accompanied her into Germany, and put her into the train for Berlin. We had a narrow shave of being captured, but she gave me a thousand roubles when we parted.”
“Why did she want to leave secretly?” I asked.
“She had poisoned her husband somewhere down in Minsk, and the police were in search of her,” he laughed. “Never a night passes, but one or other of us cross the frontier.”
“And you find it an adventurous game – eh?”
“Well, it is pleasant after ten years of Siberia,” he answered grimly. “I let loose the red rooster and burned down the barin’s house in a village in Tver. He well deserved it. I and two friends got away with his money and jewels to Moscow, but one night, a week later, I had an appointment to meet my companions opposite the fountain in the Lubyansky Square, and was arrested.”
“And you got ten years?”
“They made out that the barin got burned to death, so I was packed off for life to Kara. After ten years I managed to escape and become a ‘cuckoo.’ Then after a year’s wandering I succeeded in returning to Moscow, where I found one or two old friends, and we started together in this business. We don’t intend to fall into the drag-net of the police again,” he added with a sardonic grin, at the same moment drawing from his trousers pocket a big army revolver.
“Do the frontier-guards ever trouble you?”
“Sometimes,” he laughed. “When we meet we always show fight. Three were killed in a brush with some of our party not long ago. It will teach them not to interfere with us for a little time.”
Long ago I had heard of a gang of desperate characters who made the strip of zealously-guarded territory between Germany and Russia a terror to travellers, and the utter loneliness of the dismal place, and the swaggering demeanour of my evil-faced companion increased my mistrust.
We left the swamp shortly afterwards, and strode out again across the boundless undulating steppe that stretched away as far as the eye could reach. The moon had sunk lower in the sky, and a whitish cloud appeared in the zenith which seemed to shine with a phosphorescent light. Our trackless path wound between low shrubs, and then, after another hour’s weary, lonely plodding across the grass-covered plain, we came to a clump of trees where the underwood was thick and tangled.
I paused for a moment to gaze behind at the great expanse of flat, uncultivated, uninhabited country we had traversed. A mystery seemed to plane over the boundless steppe. The night wind played among the dry grasses, and sad thoughts awakened in my soul.
Hist!.. there was a slight rustling! A reddish fur gleamed in the moonlight so close to me that I could see the ears of a fox and its bushy tail sweeping the ground. It disappeared between the trees, and my heart beat faster as together we went forward, bursting through the underwood. The twigs struck me in the face; I stumbled, gasped for breath, and halted. The wail of a night bird broke the silence.
At that moment I saw my companion bending at the foot of a solitary tree that stood alone amid the tangled undergrowth. There was a hole in its trunk from which he drew forth something and placed it hastily in his pocket. Then, turning towards me, he took out a cigarette and calmly lit it, saying, —
“We have nothing now to fear.”
He allowed the match to burn much longer than was absolutely necessary. Instantly the thought flashed upon me that this light might be a signal to some of his nefarious companions.
But together we went forward again; he jovial and amusing, I moody and thoughtful. His actions had aroused my suspicions. I glanced at my watch, and in the dim light distinguished that it was just past two o’clock. We had already been walking four hours.
Presently, chattering and laughing as we proceeded, we left the wide rolling steppe and plunged into a great wood. The forest was still as death. The moss-grown fir trees stretched out their huge arms as they waved slowly to and fro like funeral plumes. Little light penetrated there, but now and then we could see the bright stars between the branches as we went along a narrow winding track, the intricacies of which were apparently well-known to my guide, for he went onward with the firm, confidential tread of one who know the path, while I followed him closely, the dead branches crackling beneath our feet.
Once or twice a noise fell upon his quick ear, and we halted, he standing revolver in hand in an attitude of defence. Each time, however, we ascertained that we had no occasion for alarm, the noise being made by some animal or bird startled by our sudden intrusion. Then we resumed our midnight journey in single file.
During half an hour we proceeded, he leading the way, directing his footsteps by marks upon the trunks of the trees, so near the ground that they would have escaped the notice of any but those who knew of their whereabouts.
Once I thought I detected a dark figure between the trees, and fearing that it might be one of the sentries, whispered a word of warning to my guide, but he reassured me by telling me that we were skirting the frontier outside guarded territory, therefore there could be no danger. Nevertheless, as he turned to me, I thought his furrowed face looked darker, and his teeth gleamed whiter than usual.
We walked on. The forest was silent, save for the soft whisper of the pines. Without uttering any word I was following closely the footsteps of my guide, when suddenly, how it occurred I know not, I was conscious of being stopped dead by my evil-faced companion, who, with a quick movement, brought up his ready revolver to a level with my head.
Fate had played me an ugly trick. One thought remained uppermost in the chaos of wild, feverish fancies that seized me – the thought of the woman who was my wife.
Chapter Thirty Three
Bad Company
“Well,” I managed to ejaculate, standing quite still, without moving a muscle. I saw that his attitude was one of determination, and that he had been joined by a ruffianly-looking companion who had emerged from the undergrowth as if by magic.
My only thought was of my past life. How had I been able to bear the suspicion and suspense so long? I had borne it because the star of hope had glimmered in the darkness. And now the star had vanished, and the hope was dead. Darkness had fallen upon my soul, and a storm arose within it like the chill whirling wind that swept across the steppe at dead of night. I could not think; I forgot where I was, forgot everything except my anger. My heart was full of blind despair.
I was conscious that the gaol-bird spoke. He was demanding my money, and threatening to put a bullet through my head if I refused.
“I promised you money on condition that you took me to Sonia Korolénko,” I answered. “I am ready to pay when you have fulfilled your part of the contract.”
Both men laughed heartily.
“We have no knowledge of her,” declared the man who had been my guide. “All we know is that you have money; if you don’t hand it to us quietly your grave will be in yonder heap of dead leaves.”
“He’ll be company for the others,” observed the man with a fox-like countenance, who had joined us, and was leaning upon an old Berdan rifle.
“Then I understand you have brought me here, to this spot, on a false pretence. You mean to rob me?” I said. “You assured me that you were Sonia’s messenger, and so implicitly did I trust you, that I left my revolver behind at the inn.”
“That is no affair of ours,” answered the old scoundrel, shrugging his shoulders unconcernedly. “Hand us over your money, and we are ready to guarantee you safe conduct, either on into Germany or back to Skerstymone.”
“I’ll pay you nothing, not even a rouble, na vódkou, until you take me to your leader,” I answered defiantly, for somehow I had from the first been convinced of the truth of the man’s assertion that Sonia was in that neighbourhood.
“As we are unable to conduct you to the lady, whoever she is, we shall therefore be compelled to use violence,” observed my guide, glancing at his companion, who nodded approvingly. Then, still holding the muzzle of his weapon to my face, he added with brutal frankness: “You’d better make the sign of the cross now, if you want to. It will be the last chance you’ll get. When a man’s dead and buried he can tell the police nothing.”
Well I knew the desperate character of these brigandish nomads, and fully recognised that they were not to be trifled with.
“The people who come to us for aid never get across the frontier unless they part with their money first,” he continued. “If they don’t – well, we put them to rest quietly and unceremoniously, and give them decent burial. A good many of all sorts, rich and poor, lie buried in these woods. You asked me whether it was a paying profession,” he laughed. “Judge for yourself.”
He still spoke with that unaffected carelessness that had impressed me when we had first met outside the dingy little “tractir” in Skerstymone.
“Come,” cried the ragged, fox-faced man, impatiently, with an accent of South Russia. “We have no time to waste; we have many versts before us ere dawn.”
“Then you’d better be off, and leave me to find my way back as best I can,” I said, endeavouring to preserve an outward show of calmness.
Some noise, so faint that I did not distinguish it, caused both outlaws to hold their breath and listen. They exchanged quick glances. They had wandered thousands of versts across the “taiga” and the steppe, and constantly on the alert to evade Cossack patrols and police, knew every sound of the forest. They had learnt to know the voice of the wood; the speech of every tree. The great firs rustle with their thick boughs, the dark, gloomy pines whisper to one another in mystery, the bright green leafy trees wave their dewy branches, and the mountain-ash trembles with a noise like a faintly rippling brook. They knew, to their disgust, too, how those spies of the frontier, the magpies, hover in crowds over the track of the man who tries in daylight to creep unseen across the bare open steppe.
It was evident that the noise had for an instant puzzled them; yet, after listening a moment, both became reassured, and re-demanded with many violent threats whatever money I had upon me.
“I tell you I refuse,” I answered. “If you take me to Sonia you shall have two hundred roubles each, with twenty more na vódkou.”
“Then you do not wish to live?” exclaimed the man who had so cunningly entrapped me.
“I will give you nothing,” I said resolutely.
“Then take that!” he cried, wildly, and at the same time his revolver flashed close to my face.
The shot echoed far away among the myriad tree trunks, but the bullet passed harmlessly by my ear.
Ere he could fire a second time I sprang upon him, and clutching him by the throat with one hand, with the other grasped the wrist of the sinewy hand that held the revolver. It was a struggle for life.
Again my antagonist drew the trigger, but the weapon was exploded in mid-air. Then his companion flung himself upon me in an endeavour to drag me off. This he was unable to do, and, apparently, fearing lest I should succeed in wresting the weapon from his accomplice’s grasp and use it against him, he sought to stun me by raining blows with his clenched fist upon my head.
A third time the ruffianly assassin’s revolver went off with loud report, but doing no harm. At that moment, however, I was conscious that my strength was failing me. I was muscular, but against this pair of hulking brutes I had no chance in a contest of mere physical power.
The repeated blows upon my skull dazed me, but hearing shouts resounding in the darkness, I held on with grim, dogged courage, with the faint hope that they might be Cossacks. In the dim light I could distinguish figures moving rapidly beneath the trees. The forest seemed suddenly alive with men, but at that instant the fox-faced ruffian, finding his efforts unavailing, stepped back a pace or two, and lowering his rifle, took deliberate aim at my breast.
I closed my eyes tightly and held my breath.
A shot rang out, followed by a burst of wild shouting, but finding myself unharmed, I opened my eyes again. In terror I glanced up, and saw my fox-faced assailant lying face downward. The cowardly villain had evidently been shot at the very instant he had covered me with his Berdan.
Half-a-dozen men sprang forward, and wrenching the revolver from the scoundrel who had attempted to take my life, seized him in their strong grasp, while I, breathless and exhausted, struggled up from my knees, amazed at my sudden and unexpected delivery.
Some twenty men, an ill-dressed, ruffianly crowd, in patched cloaks and dirty grey caps covering their long hair, surrounded me, talking excitedly, bestowing opprobrious epithets upon the man who lay wounded and groaning, and as I turned suddenly in wonder, I was confronted by a peasant woman in a short skirt of some dark stuff, an ill-fitting striped bodice, with a handkerchief tied about her head.
She uttered my name. In an instant I recognised her. It was Sonia.
“I arrived only just in time to save you,” she explained, half breathlessly, in English. “The shots attracted us. That villain, Stepanovitch, whom I sent into Skerstymone to bring you here, no doubt intended to take your money and decamp, but, fortunately, we caught him redhanded. He has long been suspected of doing away with people entrusted to his care for conduct across the frontier, but I never believed him capable of treating any of our friends as victims.”
“He fired at me point-blank,” I said, “although I was unarmed.”
“What shall we do with him, little mother?” cried the excited crowd of burly malefactors, dragging the man before the notorious woman, with pleasant countenance, sonorous voice, and lively manners, whom they acknowledged as leader.
“Tie him up to yonder tree and let him be shot,” answered Sonia, pointing out a lofty pine. “Pick a marksman from among yourselves, and do not shout so loudly. Only one shot must be fired, for I believe the guards are lurking about to-night, and more may attract them.”
With yells of execration the crowd hurried away the unfortunate wretch who had so treacherously treated the friend of their leader, and ere a couple of minutes had elapsed he had been secured to the tree. Then they commenced haggling among themselves as to who should fire the fatal shot. It was a weird scene, this summary justice directed by a woman. The choice fell at last upon a tall hulking fellow in ragged coat and a hat of dirty sheepskin, who, addressed by the nickname of “The Goat,” on account of the shape of his beard, lifted his gun with a jeering remark at the cowering wretch, and stepped back to take more deliberate aim.
“No,” I cried, “don’t let him be shot on my account, Sonia. Give him his life.”
She shook her head, saying simply: “He betrayed my trust.”
“I ask you to forgive him,” I urged. “At least grant me this favour.”
She was undecided, and the outlaws hearing us speak in English, called to their tall champion to stay his hand.
“Very well,” she said, at last. “I forgive him because you plead.”
Without a word I pushed past the men surrounding us, and, taking out my pocket-knife, severed the cord holding the terrified wretch. The old scoundrel, dropping upon his knee, kissed my hand amid the loud jeers of his rough, brutal companions, then regaining his feet, took off his cap, and looking towards heaven, made the sign of the cross.
“This, I hope, will be a lesson, Stepanovitch,” exclaimed Sonia, sternly, in Russian, advancing towards him. “I forgive you only because of the request of this Englishman. Remember in future that the person of any friend of mine, or any of our brothers, is sacred.”
“Yes, I will, matóushka,” answered the old villain, penitently. “That I will. I owe my life to his high nobility’s intercession. I will not again offend, little mother.”
“Very well,” she answered, abruptly; then, briefly explaining how they had just returned from a hazardous trip across the frontier, during which they were detected and followed by a Cossack picket, she gave the order to return home, and we moved forward in single file along the narrow secret paths which wound with so many intricacies through the dark, gloomy forest. As I walked behind her we chatted in English, she telling me how she had been compelled to leave London unexpectedly, and relating how she had fared since we had last met. She, however, made no mention of the nefarious trade she had adopted, and I hesitated to refer to it.
When at length we emerged from the forest, the wounded man being assisted along by his companions, it was near morning. The darkness had gradually become less intense, the stars shone more faintly, and a streak of dawn showed on the far-off horizon. The pale light revealed grassy plains as far as the eye could reach, and the fresh morning breeze swept softly over the thick, green grass that promised an abundant hay crop, such as the dwellers on the broad Kovno plains had longed for for many years. Soon after leaving the forest, however, the party separated, arranging as meeting-place, when the moon rose on the morrow, the third verst-post out of Wezajce, a small village five miles distant. All her associates, Sonia explained, lived in villages in the vicinity, scattering themselves in order to avoid detection by the authorities. The villagers themselves, although well aware of their doings, said nothing. To all inquiries by Cossack frontier-guards or police spies they remained dumb, for the simple reason that while contraband trade could be transacted the village thrived, each of these small, wretched little places receiving indirectly a portion of the outlaws’ profit. In summer there were no empty barns or thistle-grown threshing floors, and in winter the stoves in the huts were always burning, and the “borstch,” or soup, was never without its proper proportion of buck-wheat gruel.
Many were the rumours of missing travellers and violent deaths in that neighbourhood, but the villagers feared nothing from this adventurous gang, who had grown more bold now that they were led by their “little mother.” From what I gathered from my fair companion as we pushed forward together towards the dim line of trees that bounded the steppe in the direction of the sunrise, it appeared that the band had been in existence for several years, but that a few months before, the leader, a well-known escaped convict, was shot dead by a picket while creeping by day across the Zury steppe, and that a proposal had been sent to her at Skerstymone, where she was hiding, that she should become their head. She admitted, with a smile, that the men who had just left us to return to their various occupations were all of bad character, and that, almost without exception, all had served long terms of imprisonment for robbery or murder.
“But is not the assassination of those who have paid for guidance into Germany quite unjustifiable?” I exclaimed, reproachfully, as we walked side by side across the long, dewy grass.
“How can I prevent it!” she asked. “I do all I can to preserve the lives of our clients, but with men of their stamp it is impossible to stop it. Nearly every one of the brotherhood would slit a throat with as little compunction as lighting his cigarette: first, because it avoids the risk of crossing the boundary, and secondly, because of the money the victim has in his pockets. Again, persons who accept our escort are not those persons after whom any inquiry is made. When they are missed, their friends naturally conclude they’ve fallen into the hands of the police, or have escaped abroad and fear to write. Stepanovitch, for instance, does not obtain the rolls of notes he sometimes has by importing contraband goods, neither could he afford to keep a snug house down in Ludwinow, where he spends the winter, and is regarded as a highly respectable member of the Mir.”
“He is an assassin, then?”
Sonia smiled and shrugged her shoulders.
We were approaching a small village with a background of high pine trees, situated on the edge of the great treeless plain. Its name was Sokolini, she told me. Once, in the days of serfdom, it had been the property of a landowner, but now, enjoying liberty, its emancipation was attested by its half-ruined huts, whose bulging walls and smoke-blackened timbers were supported by wooden props. There were not more than thirty houses, all of a similarly squalid, miserable character, and as we entered the tiny place the cocks were crowing in the yards, for the sun had by this time fully risen.
“Five miles through yonder forest as the crow flies brings us into German territory,” she said, indicating the dense wood behind the houses, then pausing before the door of one of the tumble-down huts, pushed it open, and invited me to enter.
The interior was one square room, with huge brick stove, the flat top of which served as bed in winter, a low sloping ceiling and two small windows with uneven panes of greenish glass that imparted to the rays of light a melancholy greyish tint. The bare miserable place was poorly furnished with wooden chairs, a rickety table, and a very old moth-eaten sofa covered with velvet that was once red, but now of faded brown. Over the door was nailed a cheap, gaudy ikon, and on the opposite wall was pasted a crude woodcut of his Majesty the Tzar.
The room was, indeed, in strange contrast to the dainty little drawing-room in Pembroke Road.
While I threw myself into a chair worn-out by fatigue, she removed the ugly wrapper from her head, and disappearing into a little inner den, the only other room in the house, soon reappeared with a steaming samovar, afterwards handing me tea with lemon.
The pale yellow sun struggling in through the thick green panes, fell in slanting rays across the carpetless room, and as we sat opposite one another sipping our cups we exchanged curious glances. Ours had, indeed, been a strange meeting.
She burst out laughing at last.
“Well,” she said, “I see you are surprised.”
“I am. I did not expect you had exchanged your life in London for this,” I exclaimed.
“Ah! I was horribly tired of inactivity there. I had spent all my money, and could do nothing in your country. It is a drawback to be too well-known,” she laughed.
“But surely this life is attended by very serious risks,” I observed, noticing, as the sunlight fell across her hair, that she was still as handsome as ever, notwithstanding her ugly peasant costume and clumsy boots.
“Yes,” she answered reflectively. “Perhaps, in a little while, when I have made more money I shall leave here and return to London. One cannot live without money.”
“True,” I answered. “Yet life here must be terribly dull and monotonous after Vienna and Paris.”
“Ah!” she cried, with the slightest suspicion of a sigh. “All that I have forgotten long, long ago.”
Her eyes were downcast, and I thought I detected tears in them. I gazed at her, this woman who was known in nearly every capital in Europe as one of the most daring and enterprising adventuresses of the century, half-fearing that she might still refuse to disclose her secret.