Guilty Bonds

I was to undress a dead man!

“Why do you hesitate?” the jailer asked gruffly. “Know you not that you must obey?”

“This man is dead!” I said, in alarm.

“And the best thing that could happen to him,” was the stern reply. “Now, how long am I to wait for you?”

His companion grinned at my abhorrence of the task, and uttered some words in Russian, which the other answered.

It was plain I had to obey my heartless janitor, so, kneeling beside the corpse, I managed, by dint of some exertion, to divest it of its grey kaftan, strong knee boots, and sheepskin bonnet. In these I attired myself, afterwards dressing the corpse in my own clothes.

My new garments were such as I had never seen before, and upon my breast was a brass plate bearing a number.

“Now, take these,” commanded the turnkey, throwing his light upon some things in a corner.

I turned and picked them up.

There was a rug, a mess tin, and a wooden spoon.

“What am I to do with these?” I asked.

“You will want them upon your journey.”

“My journey! Where, then, am I going?”

“To the mines.”

“To Siberia?” I gasped.

“Yes,” he answered, adding, “Come, follow me.”

I left the side of the dead prisoner and accompanied him back to my own cell.

I would have preferred death ten thousand times, for I knew, too well, that for the Russian convict is reserved that punishment which is tantamount to death by slow torture – a living tomb in the quicksilver mines beyond Tomsk. When sent under the earth he never again sees the sunlight or breathes the fresh air, until a year or so afterwards when he is brought to the surface to die.

Racked by the frightful pain which quicksilver produces, gaunt as skeletons, and with hair and eyebrows dropping off, convicts are kept at labour under the lash by taskmasters who have orders not to spare them, working eighteen hours at a stretch, and sleeping the remaining six in holes in the rock – mere kennels, into which they must crawl.

A sentence of Siberian hard labour always means death, for the Government are well aware it is an absolute impossibility to live longer than five years in such horrible torture in the depths of the earth.

To this terrible existence was I consigned. Was it surprising, therefore, that I hoped – nay, longed – for death instead?

Chapter Thirteen

Graven on the Wall

I walked back to my cell as one in a dream.

Engrossed with my own reflections, I neither saw nor heard anything until I found myself seated alone in the dark, damp chamber, with the maddening thought of Vera’s treachery and triumph torturing and goading me to despair.

I covered my face with my hands, and strove to forget the present and to review the past.

As I pondered, the recollection of my childhood’s days came back to me. I saw the grey-haired stately lady, my mother, whom I loved, whose counsel I had ofttimes wisely taken, but who now, alas! was no more. I saw myself a laughing schoolboy, and later, a rollicking student, one of a crowd in the Latin Quarter; then a young man hard at work with my pen in a tall old house in one of the Inns of Court, burning the midnight oil and striving day and night towards the coveted Temple of Fame.

Later, a man of ample means, and afterwards – a convict.

Next morning, after the warder had paid his matutinal visit and I had appeased my hunger, I naturally turned to the inscriptions as my sole means of occupation; for besides being anxious for anything wherewith to occupy my mind, however trivial, I was also curious to ascertain whether the mysterious device upon the wall really bore a resemblance to the seal, or whether it was only in my distorted imagination that the similarity existed.

Without difficulty I succeeded in placing my hands upon the indentation, and after minute investigation satisfied myself I had not been mistaken. Though somewhat roughly executed, the symbols were exactly the same as those upon the fatal seal.

While carefully following the lines with my finger tips, I felt, suddenly, what appeared to be some letters, two above the circle and two below, about an inch from the outer ring. At first it did not cross my mind that they could have any connection with it, for I concluded they were but the initials of two prisoners who had occupied the cell.

However, when I had completed my investigation of the inexplicable emblem which had so long occupied my thoughts, I commenced trying to decipher the letters above.

At first I could make nothing out of them, but by passing my hand carelessly along I ascertained that they were in the Russian character.

Evidently they were initials.

Fortunately, while at college I had gained a knowledge of the Russian alphabet, and though it was rather imperfect, I was prompted to make an attempt to discover the equivalent of the two letters in English.

The task occupied me a very long time, and after considerable patience and perseverance I found I had translated the initials, although they told me nothing.

The two letters cut in the stone above were “N.S.”

I stood motionless for a few minutes, almost unable to give credence to the solution of the puzzle; then went carefully over the two signs again.

No; I was not mistaken.

“N.S.,” I repeated to myself aloud, almost breathless with amazement, my heart beating quickly, and sounding distinctly in the tomb-like silence of my dungeon. “The initials of some unfortunate man who perhaps, like myself, was confined here for some crime he did not commit.”

Whose was the hand that traced the deadly sign, and the initials? This was the question I vainly asked myself.

“Perhaps the letters below will throw some light upon this ghastly secret,” I said aloud, as I commenced to feel the two characters underneath the design. They were well-shaped and deeply cut, so I had not so much difficulty as with those above.

“I may be about to solve the enigma of the seal,” I reflected, as, in intense excitement, I took one letter after the other and thought of its corresponding letter in English.

I soon deciphered them, and found the initials were “S.O.”

The discovery caused me much disappointment, for beyond the assumption that a certain person whose initials were N.S. had been imprisoned in the cell, together, perhaps, with a comrade whose initials were S.O., who had possibly sketched the obscure hieroglyphics, I was no nearer the solution of the device than before.

It might have been inscribed a dozen, perhaps a hundred, years ago – before the seal had become synonymous of death – for aught I knew.

So intent was I in endeavouring to feel other names or devices near this particular one that I failed to notice the opening of my cell door, and when I became aware of the lantern-light behind me I turned and saw a Cossack officer standing upon the threshold.

He stepped forward and was about to enter, but suddenly, as if on second thought, he drew back and pulled up the broad collar of his riding-coat about his neck, so as to partially hide his face before entering.

Advancing, and turning the lamplight full upon my face, he gazed into it fixedly for several seconds, his own countenance being concealed by the shadow. Then, without speaking, he went across the cell and commenced examining the wall, apparently to ascertain in what pursuit I was engaged when he entered.

He cast his eyes along the wall, when he suddenly gave vent to a low exclamation of profound surprise, not unmingled with horror, and holding his lantern on a level with the inscription, scrutinised it minutely for some minutes, at the same time muttering to himself.