George Henty - Condemned as a Nihilist - A Story of Escape from Siberia

"It is all over now," Mr. Robson shouted from the next tree. "If they have not done better elsewhere than we have here the bag is not a very large one."

"Did you shoot anything, Mr. Robson?"

"I knocked a hare over; that is the only thing I have seen. What have you done?"

"I think I succeeded in frightening a hare, but that was all," Godfrey laughed. "It ran almost between my legs before I saw it, and I think it startled me quite as much as my shot alarmed it."

The bugle sounded again, and the party were presently collected round the colonel. The result of the beat was five hares, and a small stag that had fallen to the gun of Mr. White.

"Much cry and little wool," Mr. Robson said. "A hundred beaters, twenty guns, and six head of game."

Another short beat was organized, resulting in two stags and three more hares. One of the stags and the three hares were placed on a sledge to be taken back to the farm-house, and the rest of the game was given to the soldiers. A glass of vodka was served out to each of them, and, highly pleased with their day's work, the men slung the deer to poles and set out on their march of eight miles back to the town.

"They will have done a tremendous day's work by the time they have finished," Godfrey said. "Eight miles out and eight miles back, and three beats, which must have cost them four or five miles' walking at least. They must have gone over thirty miles through the snow."

"It won't be as much as that, though it will be a long day's work," the colonel said. "They came out yesterday evening and slept in a barn. Another company come out to-night to take their place."

It was already dark by the time the party reached the farm-house, and after a cup of coffee all round they began to prepare the dinner. They were like a party of school-boys, laughing, joking, and playing tricks with each other. Two of them undertook the preparation of hare-soup. Two others were appointed to roast a quarter of venison, keeping it turning as it hung by a cord in front of the fire, and being told that should it burn from want of basting they would forfeit their share of it. The colonel undertook the mixing of punch, and the odour of lemons, rum, and other spirits soon mingled with that of the cooking. Godfrey was set to whip eggs for a gigantic omelette, and most of the others had some task or other assigned to them, the farmer's wife and her assistants not being allowed to have anything to do with the matter.

The dinner was a great success. After it was over a huge bowl of punch was placed on the table, and after the health of the Czar and that of the Queen of England had been drunk, speeches were made, songs were sung, and stories told. While this was going on, the farmer brought in a dozen trusses of straw. These his wife and the maids opened and distributed along both sides of the room, laying blankets over them. It was not long before Godfrey began to feel very drowsy, the result of the day's work in the cold, a good dinner, the heated air of the room and the din, and would have gladly lain down; but his movement to leave the table was at once frustrated, and he was condemned to drink an extra tumbler of punch as a penalty. After that he had but a confused idea of the rest of the evening. He knew that many songs were sung, and that everyone seemed talking together, and as at last he managed to get away and lie down on the straw he had a vague idea that the colonel was standing on a chair making a final oration, with the punch-bowl turned upside down and worn as a helmet.

Godfrey had not touched the wine at dinner, knowing that he would be expected to take punch afterwards, and he had only sipped this occasionally, except the glass he had been condemned to drink; and when he heard the colonel shout in a stentorian voice "To arms!" he got up and shook himself, and felt ready for another day's work, although many of the others were sitting up yawning or abusing the colonel for having called them so early. However, it was already light. Two great samovars were steaming, and the cups set in readiness on the table. Godfrey managed to get hold of a pail of water and indulged in a good wash, as after a few minutes did all the others; while a cup or two of tea and a few slices of fried bacon set up even those who were at first least inclined to rise.

A quarter of an hour later the sledges were at the door, and the party started. The hunt was even less successful than that of the previous day. No stag was seen, but some ten hares and five brace of grouse were shot. At three o'clock the party assembled again at the farm-house and had another hearty meal, terminating with one glass of punch round; then they took their places in their sledges and were driven back to the town; the party for St. Petersburg started by the six-o'clock train, the rest giving them a hearty cheer as the carriage moved off from the platform.

"Well, have you enjoyed it, Godfrey?" Mr. Robson asked.

"Immensely, sir. It has been grand fun. The colonel is a wonderful fellow."

"There are no more pleasant companions than the Russians," Mr. Robson said. "They more closely resemble the Irish than any people I know. They have a wonderful fund of spirits, enjoy a practical joke, are fond of sport, and have too a sympathetic, and one may almost say a melancholy vein in their disposition, just as the Irish have. They have their faults, of course – all of us have; and the virtue of temperance has not as yet made much way here. Society, in fact, is a good deal like that in England two or three generations back, when it was considered no disgrace for a man to sit after dinner at the table until he had to be helped up to bed by the servants. Now, White, you have got the cards, I think."

Godfrey watched the game for a short time, then his eyes closed, and he knew nothing more until Mr. Robson shook him and shouted, "Pull yourself together, Godfrey. Here we are at St. Petersburg."

Three days later, when Ivan Petrovytch came in to breakfast at eleven o'clock – for the inmates of the house had a cup of coffee or chocolate and a roll in their rooms at half-past seven, and office work commenced an hour later – Godfrey saw that he and his wife were both looking very grave. Nothing was said until the servant, having handed round the dishes, left the room.

"Has anything happened?" Godfrey asked.

"Yes, there is bad news. Another plot against the life of the Czar has been discovered. The Nihilists have mined under the road by which he was yesterday evening to have travelled to the railway-station. It seems that some suspicion was felt by the police. I do not know how it arose; at any rate at the last moment the route was changed. During the night all the houses in the suspected neighbourhood were searched, and in the cellar of one of them a passage was found leading under the road. A mine was heavily charged with powder, and was connected by wires to an electric battery; and there can be no doubt that had the Czar passed by as intended he would have been destroyed by the explosion. It is terrible, terrible!"

"Did they find any one in the cellar?" Godfrey asked.

"No one. The conspirators had no doubt taken the alarm when they heard that the route was changed, and the place was deserted. It seems that the shop above was taken four months ago as a store for the sale of coal and wood, and the cellar and an adjoining one were hired at the same time. There was also a room behind the shop, where the man and woman who kept it lived. They say that arrests have been made all over the city this morning, and we shall no doubt have a renewal of the wholesale trials that followed the assassination of General Mesentzeff, the head of the police, last autumn. It is terrible! These misguided men hope to conquer the empire by fear. Instead of that, they will in the end only strengthen the hands of despotism. I have always been inclined to liberalism, but I have wished for gradual changes only. For large changes we are not yet fit; but as education spreads and we approach the western standard, some power and voice ought to be given to all intelligent enough to use it; that is to say, to the educated classes. I would not – no one in his senses would – give the power of voting to illiterate and ignorant men, who would simply be tools in the hands of the designing and ambitious; but the peoples of the great towns, St. Petersburg, Moskow, Kieff, Odessa, and others should be permitted to send representatives – men of their own choice – to the provincial councils, which should be strengthened and given a real, instead of a nominal, voice in the control of affairs.