第22章 THE ESCAPE(4)

got myself alive out of that fortress; and now I had to try to get the others, my comrades.There was about a fathom of rope to spare; I got it by the end, and searched the whole ground thoroughly for anything to make it fast to.In vain: the ground was broken and stony, but there grew not there so much as a bush of furze.

'Now then,' thought I to myself, 'here begins a new lesson, and I believe it will prove richer than the first.I am not strong enough to keep this rope extended.If I do not keep it extended the next man will be dashed against the precipice.There is no reason why he should have my extravagant good luck.I see no reason why he should not fall - nor any place for him to fall on but my head.'

From where I was now standing there was occasionally visible, as the fog lightened, a lamp in one of the barrack windows, which gave me a measure of the height he had to fall and the horrid force that he must strike me with.What was yet worse, we had agreed to do without signals: every so many minutes by Laclas' watch another man was to be started from the battlements.Now, I had seemed to myself to be about half an hour in my descent, and it seemed near as long again that I waited, straining on the rope for my next comrade to begin.I began to be afraid that our conspiracy was out, that my friends were all secured, and that I should pass the remainder of the night, and be discovered in the morning, vainly clinging to the rope's end like a hooked fish upon an angle.I could not refrain, at this ridiculous image, from a chuckle of laughter.And the next moment I knew, by the jerking of the rope, that my friend had crawled out of the tunnel and was fairly launched on his descent.It appears it was the sailor who had insisted on succeeding me: as soon as my continued silence had assured him the rope was long enough, Gautier, for that was his name, had forgot his former arguments, and shown himself so extremely forward, that Laclas had given way.It was like the fellow, who had no harm in him beyond an instinctive selfishness.

But he was like to have paid pretty dearly for the privilege.Do as I would, I could not keep the rope as I could have wished it;

and he ended at last by falling on me from a height of several yards, so that we both rolled together on the ground.As soon as he could breathe he cursed me beyond belief, wept over his finger, which he had broken, and cursed me again.I bade him be still and think shame of himself to be so great a cry-baby.Did he not hear the round going by above? I asked; and who could tell but what the noise of his fall was already remarked, and the sentinels at the very moment leaning upon the battlements to listen?

The round, however, went by, and nothing was discovered; the third man came to the ground quite easily; the fourth was, of course, child's play; and before there were ten of us collected, it seemed to me that, without the least injustice to my comrades, I might proceed to take care of myself.

I knew their plan: they had a map and an almanack, and designed for Grangemouth, where they were to steal a ship.Suppose them to do so, I had no idea they were qualified to manage it after it was stolen.Their whole escape, indeed, was the most haphazard thing imaginable; only the impatience of captives and the ignorance of private soldiers would have entertained so misbegotten a device;

and though I played the good comrade and worked with them upon the tunnel, but for the lawyer's message I should have let them go without me.Well, now they were beyond my help, as they had always been beyond my counselling; and, without word said or leave taken, I stole out of the little crowd.It is true I would rather have waited to shake hands with Laclas, but in the last man who had descended I thought I recognised Clausel, and since the scene in the shed my distrust of Clausel was perfect.I believed the man to be capable of any infamy, and events have since shown that I was right.