THE DEAD EXILE.
On reaching the chief surgeon's quarters he found that irritable petty
tyrant possessed of much temper on account of his long absence.
"If you don't pay more attention to your duties, I will have you sent
into the mines."
"Pardon me, sir, but I found the old man very low, and, tried to comfort
him," said Barnwell, respectfully.
"Curse him, let him die. He only lingers from pure obstinacy to make
trouble here. The wolves are waiting for his carcass. Go and bring my
dinner!"
Barnwell hurried from the presence of the brute; but he could have
choked the life out of him for what he had said.
But, brute that he was, he fell upon the food that was soon placed
before him, and after gorging himself and washing it down with fiery
Russian brandy, he showed more of his brute instincts by becoming more
peaceable, and finally going to sleep in his chair.
Barnwell removed the wreck of the feast as noiselessly as possible, and
left him alone, not daring, however, to go far away, for fear of again
exciting his ire, knowing that he had the power to consign him to the
underground mines, or even to kill him like a dog. And so he sat and
waited his pleasure.
But his anxiety was hardly to be mastered, for he wanted a few more
words with Batavsky regarding the solution of the diagram he had given
him, not knowing whether he would be alive when he might see him next.
What new thoughts crowded themselves into his mind now!
And although his desire to escape was no greater than ever, yet the
possibilities that would now attend it were overwhelming, almost.
But how was he to give force to all this--how could he escape from that
closely-guarded colony, with armed sentinels at every turn, and trained
bloodhounds ready to follow any scents even if he escaped from the
guards. He would be sure to be missed, and the guards knowing nothing of
his whereabouts, let it be supposed, those savage brutes would be
started out in every direction until they found his scent, and then run
him down to death from their fangs or for an easy capture.
He had seen too much of it during the terrible year he had lived in
Siberia. Many a wretch, ambitious to be free, he had known to set his
life upon the hazard of a chance, and attempt to escape into the Ural
mountains, only to be run to bay by those terrible hounds, and either
killed by them or dragged back into the captivity sure to be made worse
than before.
And he had seen men have their flesh stripped from their naked backs
with the cruel knout, in the hands of unfeeling wretches.
And had he not been buoyed up by hope of one day escaping, he would
surely have taken his own life as he had actually seen others do when
hope failed them.
The situation was a dreadful one, even to a criminal; but what was it to
an innocent man like William Barnwell? But, after all, it gave nerve to
his heart.
While cogitating thus, Kanoffskie, the chief surgeon, awoke with a
snort.
He glared wildly around the room in a startled way.
Barnwell looked at him inquiringly.
"Did you see anything?" he finally asked.
"Nothing unusual, sir."
"Did you hear anything?"
"Nothing, sir."
"Did I cry out in my sleep?"
"No, sir, not that I heard."
"It must have been a nightmare, but it was dreadful," mused Kanoffskie.
"They are sometimes very horrid, sir."
"Very strange. How is old Batavsky?"
"I have not seen him since, sir."
"I thought in my dream that he had me by the throat, and was strangling
me with his bony fingers. And I thought he hissed in my ear that he was
going to take me with him. I was powerless in his dreadful grasp, and I
thought he dragged me down, down, through some huge volcano's crater,
sulphurous and suffocating, growing hotter and hotter all the while as
we plunged downward, until finally I saw the blue and yellow flames dart
up as though to meet and welcome us, and heard the agonized cries of
anguished beings far below! Anon I could see them writhing in their
fiery torment, and I recognized many faces there that I had seen on
earth. As I drew nearer they seemed to forget their agonies, and joined
in a glad, wild chorus of imprecating welcome to me. Fiends came at me
with blazing swords and fiery prongs, and in my extreme terror I awoke.
Oh, it was dreadful!" he added, hiding his face in his hands.
"It surely must have been, sir, and I have read of such sleeping
agonies. But, after all, it was but a dream," said Barnwell.
"Oh, but such a dream! Barnwell, I would not go through the agony of
such a dream again for Alexander's crown. You are an educated, well-read
man. Tell me, do you believe there is such an awful place?" he asked,
and he seemed to have forgotten all his old hauteur.
"Our common religion teaches us that there is."
"Oh, Heaven, forgive and keep me from it," said he, bowing his head
abjectly.
"My dear sir, you lay too much stress on an ugly dream. Remember that
you went to sleep after eating a hearty dinner and they often cause ugly
dreams," said Barnwell, for thought it would best serve his purpose to
attribute it to it might be, rather than to what it probably was--a
warning of the future.
"Oh, if I could only think so I would abandon the sin of gluttony at
once. But that terrible face, those bony fingers, which seemed to
penetrate my neck like eagle's claws!" and involuntarily he placed his
hand upon his neck, as if he really expected to find lacerations there,
showing that he was greatly frightened.
"Barnwell, go and see how Batavsky does," he added.
"I will, sir."
"And hurry to let me know."
Barnwell withdrew, and Kanoffskie bowed his head upon the table before
him, repeating a simple prayer of the Greek Church which he had not
quite forgotten.
The young man made haste to Batavsky's cell, but there the old exile,
dead, with his eyes staring wide and glassy.
He had died alone, without a friendly hand to close his eyes with a
prayer.
In truth, his death at any moment was not unexpected by Barnwell, but
coming as it did at the very moment of Kanoffskie's dream, made it seem
more strange and horrible.
Indeed, there seemed to be something horribly supernatural about it.
He stood for a moment gazing upon the rigid features of the poor old
man, hardly daring to return and tell Kanoffskie of his death.
"But it serves him right," he thought; and covering the dead man's face
with a blanket, he returned to the surgeon's office.
"Well?" he asked, with quick anxiety.
"The old man is dead, sir."
"Dead--dead, say you?" shrieked Kanoffskie, springing to his feet,
trembling and pale.
"Yes, sir, he is dead."
"How--how long since, do you think?" he asked, in a choked voice.
"Probably fifteen or twenty minutes; he is scarcely cold yet."
"Heavens!" he exclaimed, and sank back in his chair.
"It might have been expected, sir."
"Yes, but in connection with my dream! Barnwell, my dream! It must have
come simultaneously with it!" and the wretched man seemed scarcely able
to sit in his chair, so greatly did he tremble, while great beads of
perspiration stood out upon his forehead.
Barnwell hastened to set a glass of wine before him, which he
tremblingly bore to his mouth and swallowed at a gulp.
"More!" he gasped, and Barnwell poured him out another.
"That will revive you, sir, I hope."
But the surgeon made no reply. He sat there glaring at vacancy for fully
five minutes, and neither of them spoke a word.
Finally he pointed to the empty glass, and again Barnwell filled it with
brandy, which he drank.
He was evidently trying to nerve himself up.
"What a strange coincidence, Barnwell."
"Very strange, indeed, sir; but do not let it weigh too heavily on your
mind, I beg of you. Regard it as simply a strange coincidence, nothing
more."
"Oh, Barnwell, it must be something more! I have ill-treated that man,
and even his death may be laid to my door and I have abused others even
to death--those whose faces I saw in that deep-down, horrid hole--they
who welcomed me with such fiendish and exultant shouts," said he, with
his head bowed low.
There could be no doubt but that he spoke the truth, and this made it
seem all the more strange. He had always been a tyrant in his office,
and many a poor wretch had he sent to his long home after he became
useless to the government.
He had never been credited with possessing either fear or a heart, but
now he showed that he was a moral as well as a physical coward, and was
racked by most agonizing fears.
"Barnwell," he finally said, "see that the old man is decently buried,
and a prayer said over his grave. Yes, be sure and bury him decently in
a coffin, and a grave so deep that the worms may not reach it, and then
come to me again. But see that you bury him tenderly, and say nothing of
this to any person living."
"You shall be obeyed, sir," said Barnwell, hurrying from the room, glad
to carry out such an order in the dead old exile's behalf.