Page:Ossendowski - From President to Prison.djvu/176

164. In the meantime I had joined the chase, making these observations as I ran. When I reached the marketplace, I saw the Georgian running like a hunted animal and seeming hardly to touch the ground. Several times the soldier stopped, as though to shoot at him, but was evidently deterred by his fear of hitting someone in the crowd. Suddenly the chase took a different turn, when some soldiers at the corner of the street barred the way and the fugitive in a twinkling threw the bag over a hedge, flashed his knife and disappeared in a small Chinese shop. From this he made his way out into the labyrinth of low wooden buildings and alleyways behind the market and finally was lost by his pursuers.

In the meantime the soldier had been surrounded and interrogated about the hold-up. He explained that he had been escorting the cashier of the bank on his way to deliver to a steamer captain three hundred thousand roubles.

"I am just going after the bag of money!" exlaimed the soldier. "It was right here that he threw it over the hedge."

I surged in with the crowd through a small gateway in the hedge and then listened to a most characteristic conversation among Russians of this type. Not far from the entrance was a large laundry tub, in which two strong Russian women were washing linen.

"Good morning," said the soldier to the women.

"Good morning, soldier."

"Have you seen the bag?"

"We have seen many bags in our life," laughed one of the women.

"And the one which fell here?"

"This also!"

"Where is it?"