Through Russian Snows: A Story of Napoleon's Retreat from Moscow by G. A. Henty (reading women txt) 📕

but I don't think that he has ever had a pupil, and I believe he is nearly starving. His landlady told me that he has parted with all his clothes except those that he stands upright in. Of late he has been picking up a few pence by carrying luggage for people who land at the wharves. I have not spoken to him myself, but she tells me that he is a perfect gentleman, and though sometimes, as she believes, he has not so much as a crust of bread between his lips all day, he regularly pays his rent of a Saturday."

"I should think that he would be just the man for us. Would you see him when you go home this afternoon, and ask him to come to No. 44 Buckingham Street, either this evening at nine, or at the same hour to-morrow morning? I have written my address on this card."

At nine o'clock that evening the landlady came upstairs and said, rather doubtfully, that a young man had called to see Sir Robert, and that he had one of Sir Robert's cards.

"That is right, Mrs. Richards. I was expecting him."

The Pole was brought up. He was a pale young man, dressed in a thin suit of clothes that accorded but ill with the sharp frost outside. He bowed respectfully, and said in very fair English, "I am told, sir, that you wish to speak to me."

"Take a seat, sir. By the way, I do not know your name."

"Strelinski," the man said.

"I am told that you are desirous of giving lessons in languages."

"I am, sir, most desirous."

"Mr. Wyatt, this gentleman here, is anxious to learn Russian."

The man looked with some surprise at Frank. "I should be glad to teach it, sir," he said doubtfully, "but Russian is not like French or English. It is a very difficult language to learn, and one that would require a good deal of study. I should not like to take money without doing something in return, and I fear that this gentleman would be disappointed at the small progress he would make."

"Mr. Wyatt has just obtained a commission, and he thinks that as there are few, if any, officers in the army who speak it fluently, it might be of great advantage to him. He is, therefore, prepared to work hard at it. I myself," he went on in Russian, "speak it a little, as you see; I have already warned him of the difficulty of the language, and he is not dismayed. He is going down to Canterbury to join the depôt of his regiment in the course of a few days, and he proposes that you should accompany him and take a lodging there."

The young man's face had a look of surprise when he was addressed in the Russian language, and Frank saw a faint flush come across his face and tears flow to his eyes as he heard the offer.

"What terms would you ask? He might require your services for a year."

"Any terms that would keep me from starving," the man said.

"May I ask what you were in your own country, Mr. Strelinski?"

"I was educated for the law," the Pole said. "I took my degree at the University of Warsaw, but I was suspected of having a leaning towards the French—as who had not, when Napoleon had promised to deliver us from our slavery—and had to fly. I had intended at first to enter one of the Polish regiments in the French service, but I could not get across the frontier, and had to make north, getting here in an English ship. The war between you and France prevented my crossing the sea again, and then I resolved to earn my living here, but—" and he stopped.

"You have found it hard work. I can quite understand that, Mr. Strelinski. It is terribly hard for any foreigner, even with good introductions, to earn a living here, and to one unprovided with such recommendations well-nigh impossible. Please to sit here for a moment. Frank, come into the next room with me."

"Well, what do you think?" he asked when they were alone.

"I should think that he will do splendidly, sir, and his being a gentleman will make it very pleasant for me. But I should not like to offer him as little as thirty shillings a week."

"I have no doubt that he would be delighted with it, Frank, but as he will have to pay his lodgings out of it and furnish his wardrobe, we might say two pounds, if you can afford it."

"I can afford it very well, sir. My aunt gave me a hundred pounds when I came away from home, and that will pay for it for one year. I am sure I shall like him."

"He impresses me very favourably too," Sir Robert said, "and perhaps I may find a post for him here if we go out, though we need not think of that at present. Well, let us go in to him again. I have no doubt that the poor fellow is on thorns."

"I have talked it over with Mr. Wyatt," he went on when they had returned to the sitting-room; "he will probably require your services for a year, though possibly he may have to join his regiment sooner than that. He is willing to pay two pounds a week for your services as his instructor. Will that suit you?"

"It is more than sufficient," the Pole said in a broken voice. "For half of that I could keep myself."

"Yes, but there will be your lodgings to pay, and other matters; and if you are willing to accept two pounds, which appears to us a fair rate of remuneration, we will consider that as settled. It is a cold night, Mr. Strelinski. You had better take a glass of wine and a biscuit before you venture out."

He fetched a decanter of port and a tin of biscuits from the sideboard, and placed them in front of him; then he made a sign to Frank to leave the room. In a few minutes he called him back again. Frank found the Pole standing with his hat in his hand ready to leave. There was a look of brightness and hope in his face, which was a strong contrast to his expression on entering. He bowed deeply to Sir Robert, and took the hand that Frank held out to him.

"You have saved me," he said, and then, without another word, turned and left the room.

"I have insisted upon his taking ten pounds on account of his salary, as I told him that he must have warm clothes and make a decent figure in Canterbury. You are to deduct ten shillings a week from his pay till it is made up. The poor fellow fairly broke down when I offered it to him. There is no doubt that he is almost starved, and is as weak as a rat. He is to come to-morrow at twelve o'clock. I have business that will take me out all day, so you can have a quiet chat with him and break the ice."

CHAPTER VII

A FRENCH PRISON

Julian Wyatt had expected that there would be some formalities on his arrival at Nantes—that he should probably be taken before a court of some sort,—and he determined to make a protest, and to declare that he had been forcibly brought over from England. At the same time he felt that to do so would make little difference in his position. When Holland was overrun with the French, all English residents were thrown into prison, and the same thing had happened after the short peace; still he determined to make the effort, for he thought that as a civilian he might not be placed in a military prison, and might, therefore, have a better chance of making his escape. He had, however, no opportunity for protest or remonstrance. The captain of the lugger and two of his men went ashore as soon as the craft was moored alongside the quay.

A quarter of an hour later they returned with a sergeant and two soldiers. The captain pointed him out to the sergeant. The latter crossed the plank on to the deck, put his hand on Julian's shoulder, and motioned to him to follow him ashore.

"Good-bye, young fellow!" Markham said, as, feeling the uselessness of protest or resistance, Julian moved towards the plank. "I am very sorry for you, but there is nothing else to do, and you will be as well there as anywhere, for you couldn't show your face in Weymouth. I will keep my promise, never fear; and some day or other everyone shall know that you had nothing to do with giving that fellow the end he deserved."

Julian was marched along the quay for some distance, and then through the streets till they came to a large building. The sergeant rang the bell at the gate. When it was opened he entered with Julian, leaving the two soldiers without. A sub-officer of the prison came up, and the sergeant handed to him a paper, which was an order signed by the mayor for the governor of the prison to receive an English sailor, name unknown, age twenty-one, who had been picked up at sea by the master of the French lugger Lucille. The official gave a receipt to the sergeant for the prisoner, and a warder then led Julian away to a vaulted hall, where some forty or fifty men were either lying on some straw or were walking up and down in the endeavour to warm themselves. Julian saw at once that they were English sailors, although their clothes were for the most part ragged and torn.

"Hulloa, mate!" one of them said as the door closed behind him. "Have you come all alone? For the most part we arrive in batches. Where do you hail from, and what was your ship?"

"I hail from Weymouth," Julian replied cheerfully, his habit of making the best of things at once asserting itself. "I don't know that I can be said to belong to any ship, but I made the passage across in a French smuggling lugger, the Lucille. I suppose I ought to feel indebted to them, for they brought me across without asking for any passage-money; but they have played me a dirty trick here, for they have handed me over to the authorities, as far as I can understand the matter, as a man-of-war sailor they have picked up."

"What were you doing on board?" another sailor asked. "Did you have to leave England in a hurry?"

"I left in a hurry because I could not help it. Going across the hills I came quite accidentally upon one of the smugglers' hiding-places, and was seized before I had time to say a word. There was a little discussion among themselves as to what they would do with me, and I should have had my throat cut if an Englishman among them had not known that I was friends with most of the fishermen there, and had been present once or twice when a cargo was run. So they finally made up their minds to bring me over here, and as they feared I might, if I returned, peach as to their hiding-place, they trumped up this story about me, and handed me over to the French to take care of."

"Well, that story will do just as well as another," one of the sailors laughed. "As to their taking care of you, beyond looking sharp that you don't get away, the care they give you ain't worth speaking of. We are pretty nigh starved, and pretty nigh frozen. Well, there is one thing, we shall get out of it in two or three days, for we hear that we are all to be marched off somewhere. A batch generally goes off once a fortnight."

"Are you mostly men-of-war's men?"

"None of us, at least not when we were taken, though I reckon most of us have had a spell at it one time or other. No; we all belong to two ships that were captured by a couple of their confounded privateers. The one I belonged to was bound for Sicily with stores for some of the troops stationed there; the other lot were on their way to the Tagus. They caught us off Finisterre within a couple of days of each other. We both made a fight of it, and if we had been together when they came up, we might have beaten them off; but we had not any chance single-handed against two of them, for they both carried much heavier metal than we did. I don't think we should have resisted if we had not thought that the noise of the