Page:Ossendowski - From President to Prison.djvu/119

Rh little zest for fighting these courageous "devils of the mountains," and for this reason the Georgian fugitives from the prisons usually enjoyed long spells of liberty, that ended only when some specially unfavourable turn of fortune carried them back behind the bars or when the bullet of a pursuing guard broke the thread of their adventurous life.

I had no doubt that I had dislodged from the cavern some such dangerous individuals, full of knightly phantasy and old traditions so strangely blended with common banditry. My suspicions proved to be entirely well founded, for on my return to Harbin I learned that a gang of seven Georgians had attacked a field post, killed several men and taken a considerable sum of money. The Harbin police, who were traditionally slack during these years, stated that the gang was led by a Prince Eristoff, who had escaped from the prison at Vladivostok and for whom they had long been searching.