CHAPTER XX

RUHLEBEN AGAIN

We arrived in Ruhleben shortly before noon, and were kept waiting for a long time just inside the gates, for the good of our souls. But then, the under dogs are always kept waiting somewhere for the good of their souls. So that was all right.

When our names had been called a number of times, and some supposedly witty remarks had been made by a sergeant, whose reputation in camp was no better than it should be, we were marched off to our barracks (No. 14), a wooden one, and the last one toward the eastern end of the camp, next to the “Tea House.”

Part of it was divided off by a solid partition and enclosed by a separate wire fence. This was the punishment place of the camp, called “the Bird Cage.”

The other and larger part was empty; had, in fact, been cleared that morning for our reception, much to the disgust of the former inhabitants, who had been very comfortable in their home-made cubicles and corners. Now the place was absolutely bare, except for the litter of broken shelves and partitions on the floor.

We were still contemplating it doubtfully when we received our orders: “Beds will arrive presently. They are to be placed in two rows in the center of the barracks. Nothing shall be hung on the walls, or the beams and supports. No partitions or corners will be allowed. The barracks is to be kept bare, so that the inmates can be seen at any hour of the night. The electric light is to be kept burning all night and must not be obscured in any way.” Thus ran the gist of them.

We were pretty wroth. “Call that a return to the privileges and liberties of an ordinary prisoner of war?” rang our complaint.

At night our indignation broke forth again. We had to be in bed by 10 P.M. At 10:45 a patrol of three privates and an N.C.O. came to count us, tramping noisily round and round in their ammunition boots, over the bare wooden floor. Not much to complain about in that. But they repeated it six times during the night, and that was distinctly “off.” For many of us, sleep, even during the intervals, was difficult on account of the glaring brightness of the electric light.

Our barracks captain protested strongly the captain of the camp. So did virtually every member of the barracks privately, and gradually this nuisance abated. The six times we were disturbed dwindled down to four, then to three; and sometimes we were inspected only twice, when the patrol considerately kept outside and counted us through the windows.

* * * * *

Our reception in Ruhleben was rather flattering. I do not know how many new acquaintances I made during the first fortnight; several hundred, I should think. Now and again, inevitably, I met a man who immediately told me what he would have done “if I had been in your shoes and got as far as you. They would never have brought _me_ back alive!”

I had only to look at my barracks companions to see that we bore the prison stamp, and the remarks of my friends did not give me a chance to forget my own appearance. Compared with the Ruhlebenites proper, we looked more like animated corpses than living beings. Our faces were ashen gray, even our lips had paled. The skin around our eyes remained drawn and puckered, until the eyes had accustomed themselves again to the strong light of the open sky.

Prison life had taken its toll of our vitality, particularly among the long-timers. For a few hours the fresh air acted upon us like heady wine, and during the following days it simply sapped our strength.

Kent and Tynsdale were in comparatively good condition. Wallace was bad, but had an appetite, and recovered quickly. I was the worst of the four. My physical condition did not make me a desirable companion for an arduous venture, and since we found it impossible to “make a move” at once, as we had intended, I deliberately set myself to repairing the damage as quickly as I could. I took plenty of rest, and, avoiding any but the gentlest exercise, grew gradually stronger. About the middle of the second week I started some very mild training.

Yet I still remained nervous and distraught; more so than my companions, who showed signs of the same trouble. It was, however, merely the nervousness of inaction, for I was eager to start. The camp was not even as desirable as we had pictured it. Barracks No. 14 was far less comfortable in every respect than the barracks we had called our own before we made our first attempt. Everything was dirty, and we missed our accustomed privacy. The two daily roll-calls, which took place on the playing-field at seven o’clock in the morning and again twelve hours later, were an unmitigated nuisance.

What, then, could be more tempting than to woo Fortune again? If she proved fickle, we would go back to the Stadtvogtei. Under the new arrangement the punishment for a “simple escape” by a military prisoner was to be a fortnight’s imprisonment. At first we interpreted the paragraph as applying to civilian prisoners also. Now we had become more doubtful about it. Our friends, who had been sent to prison after the 1st of August, had more than doubly exceeded the stipulated time before we left the camp. What more likely than that the Germans would treat the agreement as another “scrap of paper” and send us to comfortable winter quarters, if we were caught?

* * * * *

We had intended to start within a few days of our arrival in camp. This we found impossible, but for two reasons the delay was fortunate. It permitted us to recruit our health and get accustomed to the open air, and it brought us nearer to the time of the new moon in the middle of September.

About a week after our arrival, Wallace decided not to come with us. For months he had had a plan of his own, which recommended itself neither to Tynsdale, Kent, nor me. He rather liked the idea of playing a lone hand, and his strong desire to see a little more of his friends in Ruhleben finally decided him. Tynsdale, Kent, and I “carried on.”

Our plans were simple enough, once we had got out of camp. First of all we intended to make for Berlin. From the capital a railway journey of about twenty hours (including a break of seven) was to take us to a small town in the northwestern part of Germany, sixty kilometers from the Dutch frontier as the crow flies. From there we intended to walk, the distance by road being rather more than seventy miles. One considerable river would have to be crossed, we did not quite know how, but we were all fairly powerful swimmers.

Tynsdale’s knowledge of German was not good enough to make it possible for him to travel on the railway without a companion to do the talking. Kent, his particular chum, was more than willing to take the risk of being Tynsdale’s courier, and proposed that he and his friend should always travel in one compartment, while I traveled alone in another. This arrangement was obviously unfair. Granted the wisdom of traveling in two parties, Kent would be taking the greater risk all the time. We finally agreed that Tynsdale was to be alternately in Kent’s and my charge.

We had maps and compasses. I had a water-bottle and a knapsack, and Kent obtained another knapsack in camp. A third and two water-bottles would have to be bought en route.

Ordinary wearing apparel, dictated by the railway journey, we had; also sufficient underclothes for cold weather, and two thick overcoats between us. Two oilsilks of mine would protect my friends on rainy days. I insisted on carrying a heavy naval oilskin, sufficiently large to make a decent ground-cloth for the three of us. If possible, we intended carrying food for ten days; cabin-biscuits, dripping, compressed beef, chocolate, cocoa-and-milk powder, sugar, and raisins.

A friend of mine, whom I have mentioned several times in this narrative, spoke to me one morning. “Take,” he began oracularly and with a twinkle in his eye, “a pound of real Scotch oatmeal, a pound of dripping, and a pound of sugar. Mix well. Roll out the dough until it is about three quarters of an inch thick, and bake it in a hot oven for four hours. The result will resemble shortbread. It is immensely sustaining. That it will crumble easily into a coarse powder need concern you only in so far as you will have to carry it suitably wrapped. Handkerchiefs will do. At a pinch, a cake per day, smaller than your hand, will keep you going indefinitely. And,” he added readily, “if you’ll give me the material, I’ll do them for you. But mind you chew ’em well when you eat ’em. It’ll take some time to masticate them properly. You must do that, to get the full benefit of the oatmeal.”

The square cakes, a little smaller than the palm of a man’s hand, which he handed to us in a parcel a few days after, were rather heavy for their size. We thought of carrying ten per man, reduced the biscuits to two per day, and discarded meat and cocoa altogether.

To carry all this during the railway journey, we had a cheap German portmanteau, which I had bought for this purpose in prison, and two small leather hand-bags. As to money, I was fairly well supplied. My companions got hold of smaller sums, and between us we had enough even for an emergency.

* * * * *

In the meantime we managed to be seen together as little as possible. Escaping was in the air. Two attempts from other barracks failed during the first fortnight. What was worse for us, three men from our barracks took the bit in their teeth and went one night. They were in cells again before dawn.

The camp authorities were wide awake and slowly strengthened the guards. More police dogs were reported to be arriving almost daily. (I doubt whether these reports were correct.) N.C.O.’s patrolled the sentries incessantly, or concealed themselves and watched places for hours where they thought fugitives would pass. As long as we knew beforehand where these places were this did not matter much, but it certainly increased my nervousness and impatience. I believe I was a sore trial to my friends with my incessant, irrational pleading for “something to be done.”

Kent and Tynsdale had made their first escape from camp by simply bribing the sentry at the gate and one other, and walking out. We had hoped to repeat this performance. Both these sentries were still in camp on guard-duty. Immediately after our arrival we sounded them as to their willingness to earn a few hundred marks easily. We did not do this ourselves, but made use of the good offices of a friend of Tynsdale’s, who had extensive dealings of a different nature with the two German soldiers and who could bring a good deal of pressure to bear on them. To appreciate the importance of the help he rendered us, it must be remembered that no soldier was allowed to talk with a prisoner. It would have been difficult for us to establish direct communication with the two soldiers. Not only was the punishment barracks least suited for anything like secret meetings, but its inmates were kept under more continuous surveillance than the rest of the interned.

The two soldiers were quite willing to do business, but maintained that the most they could do was to take an entirely passive part. The old, easy way was out of the question. The camp authorities were too suspicious of the existence of irregularities among the guards and of the danger of fresh attempts now that the “gang” was back in camp. “If we get certain posts, we won’t challenge during a specified time,” was what the soldiers gave us to understand.

The situation became worse when one of these soldiers was suddenly sent to the front. His manifold activities for the benefit of the prisoners--payment being made with English food--had at last got him into trouble. The other man, his associate in most of the deals, went about expecting the same fate and became quite intractable for a few days. As nothing happened to him, he gradually assumed his normal state of mind.

We intended to leave camp at the western corner. This was farther removed from the escapers’ barracks and nearest to Spandau. Our route was to lead us through part of Spandau.

A box in Barracks No. 8 was our headquarters. There our equipment was kept, and there we intended to dress.

The windows in the loft of Barracks No. 4 gave upon the enclosure of the Visitors’ Barracks. They were about two feet square and covered with wire netting which could easily be removed. As the loft of this barracks was divided into a large number of small cubicles, only the inhabitants of one cubicle needed to be taken into our confidence to any extent. They undertook with alacrity to have everything ready at a few hour’s notice, including the rope we should have to descend by. Once in the enclosure of the Visitors’ Barracks we should have only one wire fence to climb to get into the space between this and the outer wooden fence. The wire fences consisted of strong chicken-wire with barbed-wire strands along the top. They were about eight feet high. The wooden fence extended only a little way. The rest had been destroyed by a fire which had occurred in camp in June of that year. Along part of the way we should be partially protected from the view of the sentries by the wooden fence and the structures about us.

There was a sunken path which was well lighted by electricity, and well guarded. The sentries walked on top of a bank and were able to see most of the space between the wire and the wooden fence. Post No. 2 was at the corner of the wooden fence, where the path met the road which ran along the front of the camp, and extended along the path for about seventy yards. Then came Post No. 3. The end of the wooden fence was nearer to the road than to the other end of Post No. 2.

The attempt was to be made when our man was on duty. He was to be deaf and blind. This would leave us free to concentrate our attention upon Post No. 3.

“Next Sunday!” Kent told me at length on a Friday. “Are you ready?”

“Good heavens, man, I’ve been ready these two weeks past!” Then I began to ruminate: “Sunday? That’s rather awkward!”

“It is, but do you think we ought to delay it on that account?”

“No, certainly not! Does Tynsdale realize the state of affairs?”

“Haven’t discussed them with him. If we two come to an agreement, he’ll be sure to take the same view.”

There were two objections to the day proposed--one because it was a Sunday, which made getting into Berlin rather risky, the other because it happened to be the 16th of September, which made getting away from the capital additionally difficult.

As to Sunday, food was scarce in Germany, especially in the capital, and illegal trading was rife. Every Sunday the inhabitants flocked into the country in multitudes to buy farm produce from the peasants direct, offering prices much higher than those fixed by law. To stop this, the police frequently detained passengers who were traveling into town on the trunk and local railways, in the Underground, and on trams, and inspected their baggage. A search of our bags and bundles would mean immediate arrest.

Secondly, at 2 A.M. on the 17th of September--the Monday after the day we had chosen--summer time was to change to astronomical time. Consequently, trains all over the country would leave independently of the printed timetables during several hours before and after the hands of the clocks were moved back. Thus we could not be sure whether or not we could catch the train we had selected.

We came to the conclusion that we should have to risk it. But could we not minimize the first, the greater of the two risks, by reducing the amount of our luggage? “We’ll take only one of the small hand-bags, discard these and these articles, and carry food for six days only,” we decided.

The amount of food which we finally took with us worked out per man per day as follows: a bar of chocolate, two small cabin-biscuits with dripping, one cake of the famous “escapers’ shortbread,” two or three pieces of sugar, and half a dozen raisins. A tin of Horlick’s malted milk tablets was carried in reserve, and also a small flask of brandy.