We fixed up our arrangements and bided our time. We stuffed our
pockets--"stuffed" is a good word--with twenty-one biscuits saved
from our parcels--twenty-one for three of us. We also had two tins of
sardines, and, better than all, a map and compass. One thing that we
determined to do was to get rid of a conspicuous stripe sewn down the
sleeves of our coats and the legs of our trousers. It was a bit of a
puzzle at first, but Walker got over the difficulty by cutting up his
waistcoat and inserting strips under the light stripes, which, when
we got clear, were torn away, leaving us to all intents and purposes
clothed like ordinary citizens and not like wicked "Engländers."
It was on September 27th--fateful, happy day!--that our opportunity
came. We were at work in a barn on a farm four or five miles from the
Laager, for which work I had volunteered with a view to escape, feeding
a threshing machine. It was a job that was supposed to last four days,
but while the guard was out of the way we quietly put the machine out
of action with a crowbar. Then we went off to dinner and ate as hearty
a meal as we could in case of emergencies. Two sentries stood guard
over about twenty of us, and one of them showed signs of sleepiness.
"Why, Colonel," said I to the other, "aren't you going to have a nap
with your friend?" He grinned and walked away to lie down at the far
end of the barn. Thereupon we three conspirators passed the tip to each
other, and off we went. There were some thick bushes growing outside
the barn, and we had placed our coats containing the food near the
door. I was wearing a cap, a cardigan jacket, a black scarf, and an old
coat. I won't deny that my heart beat pretty briskly as we made for the
bushes as quickly and as noiselessly as we could.
There was good cover of this sort for a mile or so, and it was pretty
certain we weren't missed, at any rate until we had got quite a
respectable start. We had some open country to negotiate before we
found the friendly shelter of a wood, and lay there until night closed
in.
As a ruse we first turned eastwards and then cautiously worked our way
round until we had our heads in the direction of liberty. During the
night we heard sounds which led us to believe we were being searched
for. We had resumed our flight from the wood about seven o'clock, and
we kept going until day broke. Another wood sheltered us during the
day, and for the time being we dared not leave it, for our furtive
observations showed us a considerable tract of open country which it
would have been madness to face in broad daylight. We were taking no
undue risks this time, and we husbanded our resources and our strength,
even as we husbanded our food supply, taking it turn and turn about to
watch and sleep.
Water in the ditches supplied us with drink, and the rain saw to it
that we had plenty of water both without and within! When darkness
returned we set off once again, often starting at our own shadows and
slinking back into the blackness whenever we heard a sound. There was
safety as well as weakness in numbers--safety in our lookout, and
weakness in the inability of three men to give a reasonable explanation
if we were tackled. Whenever we had to take to the road we carried our
boots and trod as warily as panthers. Three or four times we had to
pass through towns and villages, but our luck was in, and we were not
challenged. Our heads were turned aside and as much distance imposed as
possible whenever we heard anyone walking on the thoroughfares.
Bootless and footsore, we also traversed four miles of railway, and it
seems miraculous, looking back as I now do, that we were never seen or
stopped by sentries. Three times, too, we had, willy-nilly, to cross
rivers. We "did" our first river in boats which we found secured to
the bank of the stream. There were two boats, and in the darkness we
paddled them as silently as Red Indians to the other side, and then
turned them adrift. I suppose it was what you might have called a
theft, but stern necessity knows no law, and a German boat more or less
was neither here nor there.
Another river was spanned by a bridge, and you can imagine how we
slipped across, as noiselessly as ghosts. Neither bridge nor boat
offered itself as a solution of stream number three, but it did not
prove a particularly formidable obstacle, and we walked through it, the
water rising to our waists.
From dusk to the time the first streak of light began to gild the
eastern sky we "padded the hoof." On the fourth night we reckoned that
we must be nearing the frontier. Tired and weary, footsore and very
hungry, our vigilance was never relaxed. That last night we approached
a town of considerable size. We did not dare to walk through it, and
made a long detour in order to pass wide of the outskirts. Though we
knew it not, we were nearing the last lap of our journey.
It was dark, with a velvety blackness, and neither moon nor stars
were showing. Suddenly the stillness of the night was broken by the
challenge of a sentry. Evidently he had seen three silhouttes, or
imagined he had.
Were we to have had all our toil in vain? Were we to be shut out even
as the gates of Paradise seemed to be opening to us?
Without a sound we dropped prone upon the ground and waited, waited,
listening to the beating of our hearts.
For twenty minutes or more we lay there, each thinking his own
thoughts, and listening to the silence. At last, with a whispered word,
we rose and moved on, our boots in our hands, to the north-west. Soon
we saw the white stones which told us that the frontier was in sight,
and I rolled down a steep bank and walked right into a man. It was
a soldier. Hazy in mind, scarcely realizing that I had crossed the
Rubicon, I stood speechless. Then the sentry spoke.
_It was a Dutchman!_