of your time here. Alexis shall bring the carriage over every morning
for you, wherever you may be quartered."
The girls were as indignant and aggrieved as even the midshipmen could
wish to see them, but there was no help for it. A quarter of an hour
later a carriage was at the door, a portmanteau well filled with
clothes placed behind, and with the sergeant trotting alongside, the
boys left the chateau where they bad been so hospitably entertained,
promising to come over without fail the next morning.
They were conducted to the governor's house, and taken not to the
large room where he conducted his public business, and where they had
before seen him, but to a smaller room, fitted up as a private study
on the second floor. The governor, who looked, Jack thought, even more
savage and ill-tempered than usual, was seated at a writing-table. He
signed to the sergeant who accompanied them to retire, and pointed to
two chairs. "So," he said, "I am told that you are able to converse
fairly in Russian, although you have chosen to sit silent whenever I
have been present, as if you did not understand a word of what was
being said. This is a bad sign, and gives weight to the report which
has been brought to me, that you are meditating an escape."
"It is a lie, sir," Dick said firmly, "whoever told it you. As to our
learning Russian, we have, as you see, picked up a little of the
language, but I'm not aware of any rule or law by which gentlemen,
whether prisoners or otherwise, are obliged to converse, unless it
pleases them to do so. You never showed any signs of being even aware
of our presence in the room, and there was therefore no occasion for
us to address you."
"I do not intend to bandy words with you," the governor replied
savagely. "I repeat that I am informed you meditate attempting an
escape, and as this is a breach of honor, and a grave offence upon the
part of officers on parole, I shall at once revoke your privilege, and
you will be confined in the same prison with common soldiers."
"In the first place," Jack said, "as my friend has told you, the
report of our thinking of escaping is a lie. If we had wanted to
escape, at any rate from this place, we could have done it at any time
since we have been here. In the second place, I deny that we are
prisoners on parole. We did not give you our promise, because you did
not ask for it. You said to Dr. Bertmann, in our hearing, that our
parole was no matter, one way or the other, as it would be impossible
for us to escape. The doctor can of course be found, and will, I am
sure, bear out what I say."
"Silence, sir!" shouted the governor. "I say that you were prisoners
on parole, and that I have discovered you intended to break that
parole. You will be committed to prison, and treated as men who have
forfeited all right to be considered as officers and gentlemen."
The boys sat silent, looking with contempt at the angry Russian. The
latter believed that he had now cowed them. He sat for a few minutes
silent, in order to allow the prospect of imprisonment and disgrace to
produce its full effect. Then he continued in a milder voice, "I do
not wish to be severe upon such very young officers, and will
therefore point out a way by which you may avoid the imprisonment and
disgrace which your conduct has merited, and be enabled still to enjoy
your freedom as before."
"What is it?" Dick asked briefly.
"It is this," the governor said. "I have here before me," and he
touched some documents lying on the table, "a report which I am about
to forward to the Czar respecting Count Preskoff. The report is not
altogether favorable, for the count is a man of what are called
advanced opinions. He has curious ideas as to the treatment of serfs,
and has, no doubt, in your hearing expressed himself favorable to
their emancipation."
The boys were silent.
"He has, I doubt not, done so, for he is rash and open of speech. I
have here before me an information sworn to that effect, and if you
will place your names as witnesses to it, I will not only pardon the
indiscretion of which you have been guilty, but will do all in my
power to make your stay pleasant."
The boys were speechless with indignation at the infamy of the
proposal, and doubted not that the document contained far weightier
charges than those specified by the governor.
"Who has signed that document?" Jack asked.
"I do not know that the name can matter to you," the governor said,
"but it is one of the servants of the count, one Paul Petrofski."
"Then," Dick said, starting to his feet, "it is a forgery. Paul
Petrofski never signed that document."
"What do you mean?" the governor exclaimed, leaping to his feet also,
and laying his hand on his sword, while his face grew white with
passion. "Do you accuse me of forgery?"
"I repeat," Dick said, his indignation altogether mastering his
prudence, "that it is a forgery. You have never seen Paul Petrofski
since I heard you offer him one thousand roubles at the cross-roads
that night to betray his master."
With a short cry which reminded Jack of the sharp snarl of the wolves
in the night in the forest, the Russian drew his sword and rushed upon
Dick. The latter threw up his arm to defend himself, but the blow
fell, cutting his arm severely, and laying open a great gash on his
cheek.
The Russian raised his arm to repeat the blow, when Jack sprang upon
him from behind, seizing him round the waist, and pinning his arms to
his side.
The count struggled furiously, but Jack was a strongly built English
lad of nearly sixteen years old, and he not only retained his grasp,
but lifted his struggling captive from his feet. "Open the window,
Dick!" he shouted. "It's his life or ours now." Dick though nearly
blinded with blood, sprang to the window and threw it up.
There was a short, desperate struggle, as the Russian shouting
furiously for aid, strove with his feet to keep himself away from the
window, but Dick struck these aside. With a mighty effort Jack pushed
his captive forward, and in another moment he was thrown through the
open window. A rush of heavy steps was heard on the stairs. In an
instant Jack darted to the table, seized the documents upon it, and
cast them into the fire in the stove, slammed the door, and was
standing by the window with Dick, when an officer and several soldiers
burst into the room.
"What is the matter?" the former exclaimed; "and where is the
governor?"
"The matter is," Jack said, quietly turning round, "that the governor
has drawn his sword, and, as you see, tried to kill my friend. In
order to prevent his doing so, my friend and I have thrown the
governor out of the window."
"Thrown the governor out of the window!" gasped the astonished
officer.
"Yes," Jack said. "It was painful, but we had to do it. If you look
out, I fancy you'll see him."
The officer ran to the window.
"Good heavens!" he exclaimed; "it is true. They are lifting him up
already. He seems to me to be dead. You will have to answer for this,"
he said, turning to the lads.
"Of course we shall answer for it," Jack said. "He brought it on
himself. His temper, as no doubt you are aware, was not always under
strict control."
The officer could not help smiling. He had himself often experienced
the effects of that want of control of his temper on the part of his
superior, and was at heart by no means sorry at the prospect of a new
governor.
"His Excellency's temper was hasty," he said. "However, gentlemen,
that is no business of mine." Then, turning to the soldiers, he
continued, "You will take these officers into custody, and remain here
in charge of them until you have further orders." He then left them,
to inquire into the state of the governor. The soldiers muttered
remarks to each other, by no means indicative of sorrow, for the
tyranny of the governor had made him hated by all below him. One of
them at Jack's request at once went out and returned with a jug of
cold water and a towel, with which Jack bathed Dick's wounds, which
were bleeding severely, and the midshipman was scarcely able to stand
from loss of blood. Jack vainly attempted to stop the bleeding. "We
must have a surgeon," he said, turning to the soldiers, "or, as you
see, my friend will bleed to death. No doubt there are plenty of them
below. Will one of you go and ask one of them to come up here, telling
him how urgent is the need?"
After a consultation among themselves, one of the soldiers retired,
and in a minute or two returned with a surgeon, in whom, to his great
delight, Jack recognized Doctor Bertmann, who upon seeing Dick's state
at once proceeded to attend to him. Cutting off his coat and
shirt-sleeve, he examined his arm, from which the blood was flowing in
a stream.
"One of the small arteries is cut," he said. "It is lucky that aid was
at hand, or he would have assuredly bled to death." The severed artery
was speedily found and tied up, and then the wound on the face was
plastered and bandaged, and Dick, as he lay on the couch, for he was
far too weak to stand, felt comparatively comfortable.
CHAPTER XVI.
AN ESCAPE FROM PRISON
When he had dressed Dick's wounds, Doctor Bertmann said he would go
down and see the governor. He had already told the lads that he had
received fatal injuries, and was unconscious, and that he might, or
might not, recover his senses before he died. It was an hour before he
returned, accompanied by the other officer. Both looked grave.
"I'm sorry to say, my young friend," the doctor said to Jack, for Dick
had now gone off in a quiet doze, "that the affair has assumed a very
serious aspect. The count is dead. He recovered consciousness before
he died, and denounced you both as having made a sudden and altogether
unprovoked attack upon him. He had, he affirmed, discovered that you
were meditating a breach of your parole, and that he had informed you
that the privileges extended to you would, therefore, be withdrawn.
Then, he said, transported by rage, you sprang upon him. He drew his
sword and attempted to defend himself, but the two of you, closing
with him, hurled him through the window, in spite of his struggles."
The other officer had, while the doctor was speaking, been examining
the writing-table.
"I do not see the papers he spoke of," he said to the doctor.
Then, turning to the sergeants of the guard, he asked if any papers
upon the table had been touched. The sergeant replied that no one had
gone near the table since he had entered the room.
"In that case," the officer said, "his mind cannot have been quite
clear, although he seemed to speak sensibly enough. You heard him
order me, doctor, to fold up a report and attesting statement directed
to the Minister of the Interior, and to post them immediately? It is
clear that there are no such documents here. I entered the room with
the sergeant almost at the moment when the struggle ended, and as no
one has touched the table since, it is clear that they cannot have
been here. Perhaps I may find them on the table downstairs. It is
now," he said, turning to Jack, "my duty to inform you that you are in
custody for the deliberate murder of Count Smerskoff, as sworn to by
him in his last moments."
"He was a liar when he was alive," Jack said, "and he died with a
falsehood on his lips. However, sir, we are at your orders."
A stretcher was brought in, Dick was placed upon it, and under a guard
the midshipmen were marched to the prison, the soldiers with
difficulty keeping back the crowd who pressed forward to see the
English prisoners who had murdered the governor.
Doctor Bertmann walked with Jack to the prison door. Upon the way he
assured Jack that he entirely believed his version of the story, as he
knew the governor to be a thoroughly bad man.
"Singularly enough," he said, "I had intended to see you to-day. I
went back to Sebastopol on the very day after you arrived here, with a
regiment marching down, and left again with a convoy of wounded after
only two days' stay there. I got here last night, and I had intended
coming out to call upon you at Count Preskoff's to-day. You would, no
doubt, like me to see him at once, and inform him of what has taken
place."
Jack said that he would be very much obliged, if he would do so.
"I will return this afternoon to see my patient," Doctor Bertmann
said, as they parted, "and will then bring you news from the count,
who will, no doubt, come to see you himself."
The cell to which the boys were conducted was a small one, and
horribly dirty. Jack shrugged his shoulders, as he looked at it.
"It is not fit for a pig," he said to himself. "After all, Russia is
not such a pleasant place as I thought it yesterday."
When they were left alone, Jack set to work to cheer up his companion,
who was weak, and inclined to be despondent from the loss of blood
which he had suffered.
"At any rate, old boy," Jack said, in reply to Dick's assertion of his
conviction that they would be shot, "we shall have the satisfaction
that we have procured the safety of our friends at the chateau. Now
that their enemy is gone, the count will no doubt be let alone. It was
dreadful to think what would have become of the countess and the three
girls if their father had been sent to Siberia, and they turned out
penniless. Besides, old fellow, we are a long way from being dead yet.
After all, it is only the governor's word against ours, and you may be
sure that the count will move heaven and earth to bring matters
