Page:Ossendowski - From President to Prison.djvu/232

220 "The prisoner Kostenko is nowhere to be found and must have escaped, sir!"

Minute search was immediately instituted but failed to disclose the missing boy.

"Where is your pass?" the Commandant demanded of the girl.

"It was in the pocket of my coat," the girl answered, and began weeping. "Please give me the value of my hat and coat, for I am a poor girl and work hard for my living. Your prisoner has robbed me, and I shall make a complaint about it."

But tears availed nothing. When the examining magistrate arrived and began looking into the matter, he ordered the girl to the little Cell No. 3 to be held during the search for Kostenko, because she was suspected, in spite of her tears, of being the accomplice of the fugitive. She remained in custody for two weeks, during which she complained bitterly about the losses caused by the "scoundrel of a prisoner," as she disdainfully labelled Kostenko. When the fugitive was not found after a fortnight, she was set free. As she was about to leave and was saying good-bye to a group of Kostenko's friends, she half closed her very active, sparkling eyes and whispered:

"He must be already in Shanghai. &hellip;"

She went merrily off without any hat and coat but with the pleasing thought that she had probably saved the life of a fellow-creature and one that was very dear to her. The prisoners left behind remembered her for a long time and very often referred to her as "the sly sheeagle."

However, some other attempts at escape were not so successful. I remember three labourers being brought in one evening. Shortly after the keepers put them in their