第 11 页

'But good for what? A life here dragging wood. No, doctor, I intend to escape and get back to Poland,' said Wladek.

The doctor looked sharply at him. 'Keep your voice down, stupid boy. You must realise by now that escape is impossible. I have been in captivity fifteen years, and not a day has passed that I have not thought of escape. There is no way; no one has ever escaped and lived, and even to talk of it means ten days in the punishment cell, and there they feed you every third day and light the stove only to melt the ice off the walls. If you come out of that place alive, you can consider yourself lucky.'

'I will escape, I will, I will,' said Wladek, staring at the old man.

The doctor looked into Wladek's eyes and smiled. 'My friend, never mention escape again or they may kill you. Go back to work, keep your leg exercised and report to me first thing every morning.'

Wladek returned to the forest and to the chopping of wood, but found that he could not drag the logs-more than a few feet, and that the pain was so intense he believed his leg might fall off. When he returned the next morning, the doctor examined the leg more carefully.

'Worse, if anything,' he said. 'How old are you, boy?'

'I think I am thirteen,' said Wladek. 'What year is it?'

'Nineteen hundred and nineteen,' replied the doctor.

'Yes, thirteen. How old are you?'asked Wladek.

The old man looked down into the young boy's blue eyes, surprised by the question.

'Thirty-eight,' he said quietly.

'God help me,'said Wladek.

'You will look like this when you have been a prisoner for fifteen years, my boy,' said the doctor matter of factly.

'Why are you here at all?' said Wladek. 'Why haven't they let you go after all this time?'

'I was taken prisoner in Moscow in 1904, soon after I had qualified as a doctor and I was working in the French Embassy. They said I was a spy and put me in a Moscow jail. I thought that was bad until after the Revolution when they sent me to this hell-hole. Even the French have now forgotten that I exist. Few have been known to complete their sentence at camp Two-O-One so I must die here, like everyone else, and it can't be too soon.'

'No, you must not give up hope, doctor.'

'Hope? I gave up hope for myself a long time ago, perhaps I shall not give it up for you, but always remember never to mention that hope to anyone; there are prisoners here who trade in loose tongues, when their reward can be nothing more than an extra piece of bread or perhaps a blanket. Now Wladek, I am going to put you on kitchen duty for a month and you must continue to report to me every morning. It is the only chance that you have of not losing that leg, and I do not relish being the man who has to cut it off. We don't exactly have the latest surgical instruments here,' he added, staring at a large carving knife.

Wladek shuddered.

Doctor Dubien wrote out Wladek's name on a slip of paper. Next morning, Wladek reported to the kitchens, where he cleaned the plates in freezing water and helped to prepare food that required no refrigeration. After carrying logs all day, he found it a welcome change: extra fish soup, thick black bread with shredded nettles, and the chance to stay inside and keep warm. On one occasion he even shared half an egg with the cook, although neither of them could be sure what fowl had laid it. Wladek's leg mended slowly, leaving him with a pronounced limp. There was little Doctor Dubien could do in the absence of any real medical supplies except keep an eye on his progress. As the days went by, the doctor began to befriend Wladek and even to believe in his youthful hope for the future.

They would converse in a different language each morning, but the old man most enjoyed speaking in French, his native tongue.

'In seven days time, Wladek, you will have to return to forest duty; the guards will inspect your leg and I will not be able to keep you in the kitchens any longer. So listen carefully, for I have decided upon a plan for your escape.'

'Together, doctor,' said Wladek. 'Together.'

'No, only you. I am too old for such a long journey, and although I have dreamed about escape for over fifteen years, I would only hold you up. It will be enough for me to know someone else has achieved it, and you are the first person I've ever met who has convinced me that he might succeed!'

Wladek sat on the floor in silence listening to the doctoes plan.

'I have, over the last fifteen years, saved two hundred rubles - you don't exactly get overtime as a Russian prisoner!' Wladek tried to laugh at the camp's oldest joke. 'I keep the money hidden in a drug bottle, four fifty-ruble notes. When the time comes for you to leave, the money must be sewn into your clothes. I will have already done tins for you.'

'What clothes?' asked Wladek.

'I have a suit and a shirt I bribed from a guard twelve years ago when I still believed in escape. Not exactly the latest fashion, but they will serve your purpose!'

Fifteen years to scrape together two hundred rubles, a shirt and a suit, and the doctor was willing to sacrifice them to Wladek in a moment.

Wladek never again in his life experienced such an act of selflessness.

'Next Thursday will be your only chance,' the doctor continued. 'New prisoners arrive by train at Irkutsk, and the guards always take four people from the kitchen to organise the food truck for the new arrivals.

'I have already arranged with the senior cook' - he laughed at the word -'that in exchange for some drugs you will find yourself on the kitchen truck. It was not too hard. No one exactly wants to make the trip there and back - but you will only be making the journey there!'

Wladek was still listening intently.

'When you reach the station, wait until the prisoners' train arrives. Once they are all on the platform, cross the line and get yourself on to the train going to Moscow, which cannot leave until the prisoners' train comes in, as there is only one track outside the station. You must pray that with hundreds of new prisoners milling around the guards will not notice you disappear. From then on you're on your own. Remember if they do spot you, they will shoot you on sight without a second thought. There only one last thing I can do for you. Fifteen years ago when I was brought here, I drew a map from memory of the route from Moscow to Turkey. It may not be totally accurate any longer, but it should be adequate for your purpose. Be sure to check that the Russians haven't taken over Turkey as well. God knows what they have been up to recently. They may even control France for all I know.'

The doctor walked over to the drug cabinet and took out a large bottle which looked as if it was full of a brown substance. He unscrewed the top and took out an old piece of parchment. The black ink had faded over the years. It was marked October 1904. It showed a route from Moscow to Odessa, and from Odessa to Turkey, seventeen hundred miles to freedom.

'Come to me every morning this week, and we will go over the plan again and again. If you fail, it must not be from lack of preparation.'

Wladek stayed awake each night, gazing at the wolvee sun through the window, rehearsing what he would do in any given situation, preparing himself for every eventuality. In the morning he would go over the plan again and again with the doctor. On the Wednesday evening before Wladek was to try the escape, the doctor folded the map into eight, placed it with the four fifty-ruble notes in a small package and sewed the package into a sleeve of the suit. Wladek took off his clothes, put on the suit and then replaced the prison uniform on top of it. As he put on the uniform again, the doctor's eye caught the Baron's band of silver which Wladek, ever since he had been issued his prison uniform, had always kept above his elbow for fear the guards would spot his only treasure and steal it.

'What's that?' he asked. 'It's quite magnificent.'

'A gift from my father,' said Wladek. 'May I give it to you to show my thanks?' He slipped the band off his wrist and handed it to the doctor.

The doctor stared at the silver band for several moments and bowed his head. 'Never,' he said. 'This can only belong to one person.' He stared silently at the boy. 'Your father must have been a great man.'

The doctor placed the band back on Wladeks wrist and shook him warmly by the hand.

'Good luck, Wladek. I hope we never meet again. They embraced and Wladek parted for what he prayed was his last night in the prison hut. He was unable to sleep at all that night for fear one of the guards would discover the suit under his prison clothes. When the morning ben sounded, he was already dressed and he made sure that he was not late reporting to the kitchen. The senior prisoner in the kitchen pushed Wladek forward when the guards came for the truck detail. The team chosen were four in all and Wladek was by far the youngest.

'Why this one?' asked the guard, pointing to Wladek- 'He has been at the camp for less than a year.'

Madek's heart stopped and he went cold all over. The doctor's plan was going to fail; and there would not be another batch of prisoners coming to the camp for at least three months. By then he would no longer be in the kitchens.

'He's an excellent cook,' said the senior prisoner. 'Trained in the castle of a baron. Only the best for the guards.'

'Ah,' said the guard, greed overcoming suspicion. 'Hurry up, then.'

The four of them ran to the truck, and the convoy started.

The journey was again slow and arduous, but at least he was not walking this time, nor, being summer, was it unbearably cold. Wladek worked hard on preparing the food and, as he bad no desire to be noticed, hardly spoke to anyone for the entire journey other than Stanislaw, the chief cook.

When they eventually reached Irkutsk, the drive had taken nearly sixteen days. The train waiting to go to Moscow was already standing in the station. It had been there for several hours, but was unable to continue its journey until the train bringing the new prisoners had arrived.

Wladek sat on the side of the platform with the others from the field kitchen, three of them with no interest or purpose in anything around them, dulled by the experience, but one of them intent on every move, studying the train on the other side of the platform carefully. There were several open entrances and Wladek quickly selected the one he would use when his moment came.

'Are you going to try an escape?' asked Stanislaw suddenly.

Wladek began to sweat but did not answer.

Stanislaw stared at him. 'You are?'

Still Wladek said nothing.

The old cook stared at the thirteen-year-old boy. He nodded his head up and down in agreement. If he had had a tail, it would have wagged.

'Good luck. I'll make sure they don't realise you're missing for at least two days.'

Stanislaw touched his arm and Wadek caught sight of the prisoners' train in the distance, slowly inching its way towards them. He tensed in anticipation, his heart pounding, his eyes following the movement of every soldier. He waited for the incoming train to come to a halt and watched the tired prisoners pile out on to the platform, hundreds of them, anonymous men with only a past. When the station was a chaos of people and the guards were fully occupied, Wladek ran under the carriage and jumped on to the other train. No one showed any interest as he went into a lavatory at the end of the carriage. He locked himself in and waited and prayed, every moment expecting someone to knock on the door. It seemed a life time to Wladek before the train began to move out of the station. It was, in fact, seventeen minutes.

'At last, at last,' he said out loud. He looked through the little window and watched the station growing smaller and smaller in the distance, a mass of new prisoners being hitched up to the chains, ready for the journey to camp 201, the guards laughing, as they locked them in. How many would reach the camp alive? How many would be fed to the wolves? How long before they missed him?

Wladek sat in the lavatory for several more minutes, terrified to move, not sure what he ought to do next. Suddenly there was a banging on the door.

Wladek thought quickly - the guard, the ticket collector, a soldier - a succession of images flashed through his mind, each one more frightening than the last. He needed to use the lavatory for the first time. The banging persisted.

'Come on, come on,' said a man in coarse Russian.

Wladek had little choice. If it was a soldier, there was no way out, a dwarf could not have squeezed through the little window. If it wasn't a soldier, he would only draw attention to himself by staying there. He took off his prison clothes, made them into as small a bundle as possible, and threw them out of the window. Then he removed a soft hat from the pocket of his suit to cover his shaved head, and opened the door. An agitated man rushed in, pulling down his trousers even before Wladek had left.

Once in the corridor, Wladek felt isolated and terrifyingly conspicuous in his out-of-date suit, an apple placed on a pile of oranges. He immediately went in search of another lavatory. When he found one that was unoccupied, he locked himself in and quickly undid the stitches in his suite extracting one of the four fifty-ruble notes. He replaced the other three and returned to the corridor. He looked for the most crowded carriage he could find and hid himself in a corner. Some men were playing pitch-and-toss in the middle of the carriage for a few rubles to while away the time. Wladek had always beaten Leon when they had played in the castle, and he would have liked to have joined the contestants, but he feared winning and drawing attention to himself. The game went on for a long time and Wladek began to remember the stratagems. The temptation to risk his two hundred rubles was almost irresistible.

One of the gamblers, who had parted with a considerable amount of his money, retired in disgust and sat down by Wladek, swearing.

'The luck. wasn't with you,' said Wladek, wanting to hear the sound of his own voice.

'Ah, it's not luck,' the gambler replied. 'Most days I could beat that lot of peasants, but I have run out of rubles!

'Do you want to sell your coat?' asked Wladek.

The gambler was one of the few passengers in the carriage wearing a good, old, thick bearskin coat. He stared at the youth.