The Czar's Spy: The Mystery of a Silent Love
shutters turned to us with blanched face, whispering breathlessly--
"The police! What can they want of me?"
"Open!" shouted the horsemen outside. "Open in the name of his Majesty!"
Felix and I sprang up facing each other.
"We are entrapped!"
In an instant our guide Felix made a dash for the door of the inner room
where Elma had retired, but next second he reappeared, gasping in
Russian--
"Excellency! Why, the door is open! The lady has gone!"
"Gone!" I cried, dismayed, rushing into the little room, where I found
the truckle couch empty, and the door leading outside wide open. She had
actually disappeared!
The police again battered at the opposite door, threatening loudly to
break it in if it were not opened at once, whereupon the old wood-cutter
drew the bolt and admitted them. Two big, hulking fellows in heavy
riding-coats and swords strode in, while two others remained mounted
outside, holding the horses.
"Your names?" demanded one of the fellows, glancing at us as we stood
together in expectation.
Our host told them his name, and asked why they wished to enter.
"We are searching for a woman who has escaped from Kajana," was the
reply. "Have you seen any woman here?"
"No," responded the wood-cutter. "We never see any woman out in these
woods."
The police-officer strode into the inner room, glanced around to make
certain that no one was concealed there, and then returning to me asked,
"Who are you?"
"That is my own affair," I answered.
The mystery of Elma's disappearance while we had slept annoyed me. She
seemed to have fled from me in secret. Yet could she have received some
warning that the police were in search of her? She was deaf, therefore
she could not have been alarmed by the banging on the door.
"Your identity is my affair," declared the man with the fair, bristly
beard, an average type of the uncouth officer of police.
"Who is your chief?" I inquired, as a sudden thought occurred to me.
"Melnikoff, at Helsingfors."
"Then this is not in the district of Abo?"
"No. But what difference does it make? Who are you?"
"Gordon Gregg, British subject," I replied.
"And you are the drosky-driver from Abo," remarked the fellow, turning
to Felix. "Exactly as I thought. You are the pair who bribed the nun at
Kajana, and succeeded in releasing the Englishwoman. In the name of the
Czar, I arrest you!"
The old wood-cutter turned pale as death. We certainly were in grave
peril, for I foresaw the danger of falling into the hands of Baron
Oberg, the Strangler of Finland. Yet we had a satisfaction in knowing
that, be the mystery what it might, Elma had escaped.
"And on what charge, pray, do you presume to arrest me?" I inquired as
coolly as I could.
"For aiding a prisoner to escape."
"Then I wish to say, first, that you have no power to arrest me; and,
secondly, that if you wish me to give you satisfaction, I am perfectly
willing to do so, providing you first accompany me down to Abo."
"It is outside my district," growled the fellow, but I saw that his
hesitancy was due to his uncertainty as to whom I really might be.
"I desire you to take me to the Chief of Police Boranski, who will make
all the explanation necessary. Until we have an interview with him, I
refuse to give any information concerning myself," I said.
"But you have a passport?"
I drew it from my pocket, saying--
"It proves, I think, that my name is what I have told you."
The fellow, standing astride, read it, and handed it back to me.
"Where is the woman?" he demanded. "Tell me."
"I don't know," was my reply.
"Perhaps you will tell me," he said, turning to the old wood-cutter with
a sinister expression upon his face. "Remember, these fugitives are
found in your house, and you are liable to arrest."
"I don't know--indeed I don't!" protested the old fellow, trembling
beneath the officer's threat. Like all his class, he feared the police,
and held them in dread.
"Ah, you don't remember, I suppose!" he smiled. "Well, perhaps your
memory will be refreshed by a month or two in prison. You are also
arrested."
"But, your Excellency, I--"
"Enough!" blared the bristly officer. "You have given shelter to
conspirators. You know the penalty in Finland for that, surely?"
"But these gentlemen are surely not conspirators!" the poor old man
protested. "His Excellency is English, and the English do not plot."
"We shall see afterwards," he laughed. And then, turning to the agent of
police at his side, he gave him orders to search the log-hut carefully,
an investigation in which one of the men from the outside joined. They
upset everything and pried everywhere.
"You may find papers or letters," said the officer. "Search thoroughly."
And in every corner they rummaged, even to taking up a number of boards
in the inner room which Elma had occupied. But they found nothing.
A dozen times was the old wood-cutter questioned, but he stubbornly
refused to admit that he had ever set eyes upon Elma, while I insisted
on my right to return to Abo and see Boranski. I knew, of course, by
what we had overheard said by the prison-guards, that the
Governor-General was extremely anxious to recapture the girl with whom,
I frankly admit, I had now so utterly fallen in love. And it appeared
that no effort was being spared to search for us. Indeed, the whole of
the police in the provinces of Abo and of Helsingfors seemed to be
actively making a house-to-house search.
But what could be the truth of Elma's disappearance? Had she fled of her
own accord, or had she once more fallen a victim to some ingenious and
dastardly plot. That gray dress of hers might, I recollected, betray her
if she dared to venture near any town, while her affliction would, of
itself, be plain evidence of identification. All I hoped was that she
had gone and hidden herself in the forest somewhere in the vicinity to
wait until the danger of recapture had passed.
For nearly half an hour I argued with the police officer whose intention
it was to take me under arrest to Helsingfors. Once there, however, I
knew too well that my liberty would be probably gone for ever. Whatever
was the Baron's motive in holding the poor girl a prisoner, it would
also be his motive to silence me. I knew too much for his liking.
"I refuse to go to Helsingfors," I said defiantly. "I am a British
subject, and demand to be taken back to the port where my passport was
viséd." This argument I repeated time after time, until at length I
succeeded in convincing him that I really had a right to be taken to
Abo, and to seek the aid of the British Vice-Consul if necessary.
For as long as possible I succeeded in delaying our departure, but at
length, just as the yellow sun began to struggle through the gray
clouds, we were all three compelled to depart in sorrowful procession.
What, we wondered, had really happened to Elma? It was evident that she
had not fallen into the hands of the police; nevertheless, the fact that
the door of the inner room was open caused them to look upon the
statement of the wood-cutter with distinct suspicion and disbelief.
Our captors seemed quite well aware of all the circumstances of our
escape from Kajana, and were consequently filled with chagrin that Elma,
the person they so much desired to recapture, had slipped through their
fingers. While the police rode, we were compelled to walk before them,
and after trudging ten miles or so through the forest we came across
another small posse of police, who were apparently in search of us, for
they expressed delight when they saw us under arrest.
"Where is the woman?" inquired one officer of the other.
"Still at liberty," replied the man who held us as prisoners. "In hiding
twenty versts back, I think."
"Ah, we shall find her before long," he said confidently. "Within twelve
hours we shall have searched the whole forest. She cannot escape us."
Our captors explained who we were, and then we were pushed forward
again, skirting a great wide lake called the Nasjarvi, along the wooded
shore of which we walked the whole day long until, at sundown, we came
to a picturesque little log-built town facing the water, called
Filppula. Here we obtained a hasty meal, and afterwards took the train
down to Abo, where we arrived next morning, after a very uncomfortable
and sleepless journey.
At nine o'clock I stood in the big bare office of Michael Boranski,
where only a few days before we had had such a heated argument. As soon
as the Chief of Police entered, he recognized me under arrest, and
dismissed my guards with a wave of the hand--all save the officer who
had brought me there. The Finnish driver and the old wood-cutter were in
another room, therefore I stood alone with the police-officer of
Helsingfors and the Chief of Police at Abo. The latter listened to the
officer's story of my arrest without saying a word.
"The prisoner, your Excellency, desired to be brought here to you before
being taken to Helsingfors. He said you would be aware of the facts."
"And so I am," remarked Boranski, with a smile. "There is no conspiracy.
You must at once release this gentleman and the other two prisoners."
"But, Excellency, the Governor-General has issued orders for the
prisoner's arrest and deportation to Helsingfors."
"That may be. But I am Chief of Police in Abo, and I release him."
The officer looked at me in such blank astonishment that I could not
resist smiling.
"I am well aware of the reason of this Englishman's visit to the north,"
added Boranski. "More need not be said. Has the lady been arrested?"
"No, your Excellency. Every effort is being made to find her. Colonel
Smirnoff has already been relieved of his post as Governor of Kajana,
and many of the guards are under arrest for complicity in the plot to
allow the woman to escape."
"Ah, yes. I see from the despatches that a reward is offered for her
recapture."
"The Governor-General is determined that she shall not escape," remarked
the other.
"She is probably hidden in the forest, somewhere or other."
"Of course. They are making a thorough search over every verst of it. If
she is there, she will most certainly be found."
"No doubt," remarked Boranski, leaning back in his padded chair and
looking at me meaningly across the littered table. "And now I wish to
speak to this Englishman privately, so please leave us. Also inform the
other two prisoners that they are at liberty."
"But your Excellency does this upon his own responsibility," he said
anxiously. "Remember that I brought them to you under arrest."
"And I release them entirely at my own discretion," he said. "As Chief
of Police of this province, I am permitted to use my jurisdiction, and I
exercise it in this matter. You are liberty to report that at
Helsingfors, if you so desire, but I should suggest that you say nothing
unless absolutely obliged--you understand?"
The manner in which Boranski spoke apparently decided my captor, for
after a moment's hesitation he said, saluting:
"If that is really your wish, then I will obey." And he left.
"Excellency!" exclaimed the Chief of Police, rising quickly and walking
towards me as soon as the door was closed, and we were alone, "you have
had a very narrow escape--very. I did my best to assist you. I succeeded
in bribing the water-guards at Kajana in order that you might secure the
lady's release. But it seems that just at the very moment when you were
about to get away one of the guards turned informer and roused the
governor of the castle, with the result that you all three nearly lost
your lives. The whole matter has been reported to me officially, and,"
he added with a grim smile, "my men are now searching everywhere for
you."