If I meant to escape I had no time to lose. At any moment I was liable
to be betrayed. My comrades among the colonists, as also the prisoners
we had left at Irkoutsk, all knew who I was. Any of these, by turning
traitor, could earn a considerable reward; even a slight indiscretion
might reveal the secret, and the disclosure of my identity to the
authorities would lead to my immediate arrest. It was therefore
necessary to go at once; yet I could not start on so long a journey
without money, and I did not possess a kopeck. So I sold my great coat,
my woollen trousers, and my gloves, for a rouble and a half. It was
not much. After this depletion of my wardrobe, my costume left a good
deal to be desired. A regulation pelisse, a fur cap, thin trousers,
and ordinary underclothing, did not afford much protection against
the intense cold of a Siberian winter. But I dared not hesitate. On
November 2d, at ten o'clock, before noon, I set out from the village.
The morning though cold was clear and quiet. I made no attempt to hide
my quality; it was evident to everybody. My yellow regulation pelisse
and closely cropped head showed clearly enough that I was a vagabond.
But this gave me little anxiety; I had observed that in Eastern Siberia
vagabonds were neither arrested nor questioned. It would be the same
with me, I thought, and in this expectation I was not disappointed.
My journey as a vagabond lasted about eight days, and I suffered much
both from hunger and cold. In the valleys—for the country was hilly—I
often experienced a cold so intense that I thought my limbs would
freeze as I walked. Sometimes the valley bottoms were filled with a
thick fog. Going through one of those fogs was like taking a bath of
pins and needles—so keen was the cold—and, though on these occasions I
always ran, one of my knees became frost-bitten—my pelisse not being
long enough to cover my legs, which were clothed only in light cotton
pantaloons.
I generally passed the night in the bath-room of some peasant after the
manner of vagabonds, for nobody in Siberia, however poor, is without a
vapor bath, the vapor being produced by pouring water on red-hot stones.
One afternoon, just as night was closing in, I reached a village
and sought a lodging. I had heard from the experienced vagabonds of
the gang that it was always better to ask charity or help from the
poor than from the well-to-do. Never, they said, when you are on the
tramp, knock at the door of a rich man's house. Go rather to the most
wretched cabin you can find.
This rule, based on a wide experience and a profound truth—for the
poor naturally receive more sympathy from the poor than from the
well-to-do—I deemed it expedient to follow. At the end of the village
in question I found a cabin of unprepossessing aspect, and, concluding
that it was exactly what I wanted, I went in, making, as I entered, the
sign of the cross before the picture of a saint, as is the custom in
Russia. Then I greeted my hosts.
“Good day, my boy,” answered the peasant, an old man with a long white
beard, in a kindly voice.
“Could you sell me a bit of bread?” I asked; for though I travelled as
a vagabond I did not like to beg after the manner of vagabonds, and
always tendered a piece of money for what I received.
“Yes, you can have bread,” said the old man, handing me a loaf.
“Thank you, father; and may I pass the night in your house?”
“I fear that is impossible, my boy. You are a vagabond, aren't you?
They are very severe just now about vagabonds, the police are. If you
take in a man without a passport you may get fined. Where do you come
from, my boy?”
“From the convoy.”
“I thought so. I was right then. You are a vagabond.”
I answered with a supplicatory gesture, and I dare say I looked cold
enough and wretched enough to move the compassion of a harder-hearted
man than this good old peasant.
“You fellows generally sleep in the baths, don't you?” he said, after a
pause. “Well, go into mine if you like; I can put you nowhere else. And
I have heated it to-day; you will be warm.”
So picking up my loaf, and laying on the table a few kopecks—nobody
ever thinks of bargaining with a wanderer—I leave the house. The bath
is hard by, and on going in I find that it is quite warm, as the old
man had said. The heat is so great, indeed, that I can dispense with my
pelisse.
These peasants' bath-rooms are seldom supplied with a chimney. The
stones are heated in the middle of the room, and the smoke, after
blackening the rafters, finds its way out as best it can. There were no
windows, and, in order to look round, I had to light one of the tallow
candles which I carried in my bag. They were very useful for rubbing my
feet with after a long march. I was in no hurry to sleep, and before
lying down on the wooden bench which was to be my couch I had a little
operation to perform. My yellow pelisse proclaimed my quality a long
way off. That was an inconvenience, and in certain easily conceivable
circumstances, might lead to awkward consequences. I meant to change
its color. This I did by smearing the garment with a mixture composed
of tallow from my candles and soot from the wall. It was not a very
fast black perhaps, but it answered the purpose. Henceforth, nobody,
without a pretty close inspection, would perceive that I was a vagabond
on the tramp.
This done, I lay down on the bench and was soon fast asleep. I must
have slept an hour or two when I was wakened by the creaking of the
door, and I heard the heavy steps of a man entering the room. As it
was pitch dark I could not see him, and I did not think it worth while
to strike a light. The newcomer seemed to be of the same opinion, for,
without speaking a word, he groped his way towards my bench and laid
down beside me. Though he touched my body he made no remark, and a
few moments later I could tell by his regular breathing that he was
fast asleep. Then I slept again, and did not open my eyes until I was
wakened by the cold—for the bath-room had lost all its warmth, and the
temperature was far below freezing-point. So I rose from my couch,
donned my pelisse, and, though the sun had not yet risen, I left my
snoring bed-fellow, whom I never saw, to his slumbers and resumed my
journey.
My plan was to reach the house of a friend about 150 miles from the
village where I had been interned. To traverse a region as large as
Europe without money was quite out of the question, and even if I had
succeeded in doing so it would have been impossible, without papers,
either to cross the frontier or leave the country. It is hardly
necessary to say that I took care never to ask my way. That would have
been a great imprudence. And there was little need, for the roads in
Siberia are so few that it is scarcely possible to go wrong. According
to my reckoning I was still about thirty miles from my destination.
Shortly after leaving the village I saw, near a little cabin by the
road-side, a man who eyed me keenly. From his short hair and stubby
beard I guessed that he was a recently arrived colonist who had come
into the country with a chain gang.
“Won't you come in, brother,” he said, “and rest yourself and take a
cup of tea?”
I accepted the invitation with pleasure, for I had not broken my fast.
We entered the cabin together. It was very small, and on a brick hearth
was sitting a woman, probably the exile's wife. My host asked me to
take a seat and began to prepare the samovar, an appliance which is
found in every Siberian cottage. As we drank we talked.
“Is it a long time since you left the gang?” asked my entertainer.
“Quite lately. I belonged to convoy number four.”
“You have turned vagabond then, brother?”
“Yes, what is the good of staying here?”
“You are quite right,” returned the exile bitterly. “The country is
abominable. I shall do the same thing myself in a month or two. Which
way do you go—by the Angara road?”