By Conduct and Courage: A Story of the Days of Nelson

“Take as little as you can,” Will said; “if you drink much it will do you harm. You can drink often if you like, provided that you only take a sip at a time.”

“It is easy to say, Mr. Gilmore, but it is not so easy to do. I feel as if I could drink till I burst.”

“I dare say you do; I feel the same myself; but I am sure that to take a lot of water just now would do us harm instead of good.”

Their abstinence so far benefited them that they felt their work in the afternoon less than they had done in the morning, though the heat was, if anything, greater.

That evening they examined their prison. It consisted of one great hall supported by rows of pillars. Here the whole of the prisoners were confined. It was lighted by windows five-and-twenty feet from the ground. There was no guard inside, but fifty men, some of whom were always on sentry, slept outside the hall. It was clear to them, therefore, that no escape could be made after they were once locked up, and that if they were to get away at all they must make the attempt when they were employed outside.

On the third day one of the sailors from the Tartar, who had disregarded Will’s advice to drink sparingly, fell down dead after drinking till he could drink no more. Scarcely a day passed without one or more of the captives succumbing; some of them went mad and were at once despatched by their guards.

After working for a fortnight in the streets the gang were marched in another direction, and were put to labour on the fortifications. This was a great relief. They were now free from the choking dust of the streets, and obtained a view of the surrounding country. The three, as usual, laboured together, and showed so much zeal and activity that they pleased the head of their guard. They had the great advantage that they were accustomed to work together, while the majority of the gang had no such experience. There were men of all nationalities – French, Spanish, Italians, Maltese, and Greeks, and though most of them were accustomed to a warm climate, they had nothing like the strength of the three Englishmen. In moving heavy stones, therefore, the three friends were able to perform as much work as any dozen other prisoners. They were the only Englishmen in the gang, for the other two sailors had been from the first placed with another party.

On the march to their work they passed by a palace of considerable extent, surrounded by grounds which were entered on that side by a small postern gate. “I would give a good deal to know if that gate is locked,” Will said.

“What good would that do, sir?”

“Well, if we could get in there we might hide in the shrubbery, and stop there till the first pursuit was over. No one would think of searching there. I should say we might, if we had luck, seize and bind three of the gardeners or attendants, and so issue from one of the gates dressed in their clothes without exciting suspicion.”

“What should we do for grub, sir?”

“Well, for that we must trust to chance. There are houses that might be robbed, and travellers who might be lightened of their belongings. I can’t think that three active men, though they might be unarmed, would allow themselves to starve. Of course we should want to get rid of these clothes, and find some weapons; but the great point of all is to discover whether that door is locked.”

“All right, sir! I am ready to try anything you may suggest, for I am sick to death of this work, and the heat, and the food, and the guard, and everything connected with it.”

They looked at the door with longing eyes each time they passed it. At last one day a man came out of the gateway just as they were passing, and, pulling the gate to behind him, walked away without apparently thinking of locking it.

“That settles that point,” Will said. “The next most important question is, Are there people moving about inside? Then how are we to slip away unseen? To begin with, we will manage always to walk in the rear of the gang. There are often rows; if some poor wretch goes mad and attacks the guard there is generally a rush of the others to his assistance. If such a thing were to happen near this gate we might manage to slip in unnoticed. Still, I admit the chances are against anything of the sort taking place just at that point, and I expect we must try and think of something better.”

A fortnight later, just as they were passing the door, a small party of cavalry, evidently the escort to some great chief, came dashing along at full speed. The road being somewhat narrow the slaves and guards scattered in all directions, several of them being knocked down.

“Now is our chance!” Will exclaimed; and the three ran to the gate and entered the garden. There was no one in sight; evening was coming on, and any men who might have been working in the garden had left. They closed the gate behind them and turned the key in the lock, then ran into a shrubbery and threw themselves down. They trusted that in the confusion their absence would not be noticed, and this seemed to be the case, for they heard loud orders given and then all was quiet.

“So far so good,” Will said. “The first step is taken, and the most difficult one. To-morrow, when the gardeners come, we will spring upon three of them and bind them. I should not think that there will be more than that.”

Fortune favoured them, however, for an hour later three servants came along, laughing and talking together. The sailors prepared to act, and as the men passed their hiding-place Will gave the word, and, leaping out upon them, they hurled them to the ground. Tom and Dimchurch both stunned their men, and then aided Will to secure the one he had knocked down. Without ceremony they stripped off the clothes of the fallen men, tore up their own rags, and bound the captives securely, shoving a ball of the material between the teeth of each, and then secured them to three trees a short distance apart.

“That is good,” said Will, as they put on the servants’ clothes; “they are safe till they are found in the morning. In these clothes we can boldly venture out from the town gate as soon as it is opened. There is always the risk that our colour may betray us, but we are all burnt nearly as dark as mahogany and may very well pass.”

“Shall we start now, sir?”

“No, they will find out when they get to the prison that we are missing, and there will be a keen hunt for us. And now I come to think of it, the guards at the gate will be warned of our escape, and will probably question us, particularly as these bright-coloured garments would attract their attention. I really think our best plan would be to go out into the town at once and try to get hold of other disguises.”

“It would be a good thing if we could do so, sir.”

“Dear me, how stupid I am!” exclaimed Will after a pause.“You know that wall we were repairing to-day? It was only about fourteen feet above the ground outside, so we should have no difficulty in dropping down.”

“That is so, sir. It is an easy drop, and by leaving in that way we’ll avoid being questioned, and get well away before the alarm is given.”

“Then we will lose no time,” said Will. “We have to pass through a busy quarter, but if we go separately we shall attract no notice, though no doubt by this time the search will have begun. They will be looking, however, for three men together. Of course they will not so much as cast an eye upon the servants of this palace, for they will know nothing of our doings here till to-morrow morning. I will go first when we get into the street. You, Dimchurch, follow me forty or fifty yards behind, and Tom the same distance behind you.”

“I hardly think they will be in search of us yet,”Dim church said. “It is little more than an hour since we escaped, and they won’t find out till they get to the prison and count the gang. When they have done that they would have to see who it was that was missing, and then they would take some time to organize the search.”

“That is so, Dimchurch; still, we will take every precaution.”

So saying they started. When they were half-way to the wall they saw a number of soldiers and convict guards come running along, questioning many people as they passed. They trembled lest they should be discovered, but fortunately no question was put to any of them, and they kept on their way. Presently Will emerged upon the open space of ground between the wall and the houses, and when Dimchurch and Tom had come up they went together along the foot of the wall until they came to the place where they had been working.

“Keep your eyes open,” Will said as they climbed up,“there are crowbars and hammers lying about, and, where the stone-cutters were working, chisels. A crowbar or a heavy hammer is a weapon not to be despised.”

In a few minutes each was armed with a chisel and a light crowbar. They then went to the edge of the wall, and, throwing these weapons down, lowered themselves as far as they could reach and dropped to the ground.

“Thank God we are out of that place!” Will said fervently;“we won’t enter it again alive. Now, the first thing is to get as far away as possible, keeping as nearly parallel to the line of the coast as we can, but four or five miles back, for we may be sure that when they cannot find us in the town they will suspect that we have made for the coast, and a dozen horsemen will be sent out to look for us along the shore. It is no use our thinking of trying to get to sea until the search has been given up. Our principal difficulty will be to live. From the walls the country looked well cultivated in parts, and even if we have to exist on raw grain we shall not be much worse off than when we were in prison.”

“I don’t care what it is,” Tom said, “so long as there is enough of it to keep us alive; but we must have water.”

“I don’t think there will be much difficulty about that, Tom, as every one of the houses scattered over the plain will have wells and fountains in their gardens. Thank goodness, they won’t miss any we take, and we could go every night and fetch water without exciting any suspicion that we had been there!”

“One of the first things we must do,” said Will, “is to dirty these white jackets and trousers so that we may look like field labourers, for then if anyone should catch sight of us in the distance we should attract no attention.”

They walked all night, and just as morning was breaking they saw a large country house with the usual garden. They climbed over the wall, which was not high, and drew some water in a bucket which they found standing at the mouth of the well.

“This bucket we will confiscate,” Will said; “we can hardly lie hidden all day without having a drink. Of course they will miss it; but when they cannot find it they will suppose that it has been mislaid or stolen. One of the gardeners will probably get the blame, but we can’t help that. Now we will go another mile and then look for a hiding-place. There are a lot of sand-hills scattered about, and if we can’t find a hole that will suit us we must scoop one out. I believe they are pretty hard inside, but our crowbars will soon make a place large enough.”

After an hour’s walk they fixed upon a spot on the shady side of a hill and began to make a cave that would allow the three to lie side by side. The work was completed in less than an hour, and they crawled in and scraped up some of the fallen sand so as partially to close the mouth behind them.

“Thank goodness, we have got shelter and water!” Will said. “As for food, we must forage for it to-night.”

“I am quite content to go without it for to-day,” Dimchurch said, “and to lie here and sleep and do nothing. I don’t think anything would tempt me to get up and walk a mile farther, not even the prospects of a good dinner.”

“Well, as we are all so tired we shall probably sleep till evening.”

In a few minutes all were asleep. Once or twice in the course of the day they woke up and took a drink from the bucket and then fell off again. At sunset all sat up quite refreshed.

“I begin to feel that I have an appetite,” Will said; “now I think, for to-night, we will content ourselves with going into one of the fields and plucking a lot of the ears of maize. Messages may have been sent out all over the country, and the people may be watchful. It will be wise to avoid all risk of discovery. We can gather a few sticks and make a fire in there to roast the maize; there are sand-hills all round, so what little flame we make would not be noticed.”

“But how about a light?” Dimchurch asked.

“I picked up a piece of flint as we came along this morn ing,” Will said, “and by means of one of these chisels we ought to be able to strike a light; a few dead leaves, finely crumbled up, should do instead of tinder.”

“It is a good thing to keep one’s eyes open,” Dimchurch remarked. “Now if I had seen that piece of stone I should not have given it a thought, and here it is going to give us a hot dinner!”

As there were numbers of fields in the neighbourhood they soon returned with an armful of maize each. Dried weeds and sticks were then collected, and after repeated failures a light was at last obtained, and soon the grain was roasted. A jacket was stretched across the entrance of their den so that, should anyone be passing near, they would not observe the light.

“Now,” Will said as they munched some maize the next evening, “we must start foraging. We will go in opposite directions, and each must take his bearing accurately or we’ll never come together again.”

They were out for some hours, and when they returned it was found that Will had come across four fowls, Tom had gathered a variety of fruit, consisting chiefly of melons and peaches, while Dimchurch, who was the last to come in, brought a small sheep.

“We only want one thing to make us perfect,” Will said,“and that is a pipe of ’bacca.”