Red Dusk and the Morrow · Chapter 7 (2/3)

The story of intrigue and counter-intrigue amongst Finns, Germans, Russians, Bolsheviks, and the Allies at this time, both in the Finnish capital and along the Russian frontier, would be a fascinating one in itself, but that is not my province. On the occasion of my brief visits to Finland my prime object was not to become involved, and this was the main reason why, depressing though the prospect of returning to Petrograd was under existing circumstances, I nevertheless cut short my stay in Finland and prepared to return the moment I learned positively that the German frontier commandant was to be removed.

Earnestly as I had striven to remain incognito, my unavoidable participation in the negotiations for arranging a courier-service had drawn me into unfortunate prominence. The German Commandant, still at his post, appeared to regard me as his very particular foe, and learning of my intention to return to Russia by sea he issued orders that the strictest watch should be kept on the coast and any sledge or persons issuing on to the ice be fired upon. Thus, although I had a Government permit to cross the frontier, the smuggler who was to carry me positively refused to venture on the journey, while all patrols had orders to afford me no facilities whatsoever.

But I evaded the Commandant very simply. At the other extremity of the Russo-Finnish frontier, close to Lake Ladoga, there is a small village named Rautta, lying four or five miles from the frontier line. This place had formerly also been a rallying point for smugglers and refugees, but in view of its remoteness and the difficulties of forest travel it was very inaccessible in midwinter from the Russian side. At the Commandant’s headquarters it was never suspected that I would attempt to start from this remote spot. But protesting, much to the Commandant’s delight, that I would return and compel him to submit to Government orders, I travelled by a very circuitous route to the village of Rautta, where I was completely unknown, and where I relied on finding some peasant or other who would conduct me to the border. Once arrived at the frontier I was content to be left to my own resources.

Luck was with me. It was in the later stages of the tedious journey that I was accosted in the train by a young Finnish lieutenant bound for the same place. Russians being in ill-favour in Finland, I always travelled as an Englishman in that country, whatever I may have looked like. At this time I did not look so bad, attired in an old green overcoat I had bought at Helsingfors. Noticing that I was reading an English paper, the lieutenant addressed me in English with some trifling request, and we fell into conversation. I was able to do him a slight service through a note I gave him to an acquaintance in Helsingfors, and when I further presented him with all my newspapers and a couple of English books for which I had no further use, he was more than delighted. Finding him so well-disposed I asked him what he was going to do at Rautta, to which he replied that he was about to take up his duties as chief of the garrison of the village, numbering some fifteen or twenty men. At this I whipped out my Finnish Government permit without further ado and appealed to the lieutenant to afford me, as the document said, “every assistance in crossing the Russian frontier.”

He was not a little nonplussed at this unexpected request. But realizing that a pass such as mine could only have been issued by the Finnish Ministry of War on business of first-class importance he agreed to do what he could. I soon saw that he was much concerned to do his utmost. Within a couple of hours after our arrival at Rautta I was assured not only of a safe conduct by night to the frontier, but also of a guide, who was instructed to take me to a certain Russian village about twenty miles beyond.

Nothing could be more truly proletarian than Finnish administration in regions where neither German nor ancien regime Russian influence has penetrated. It is the fundamentally democratic character of the Finnish people that has enabled them since the time of which I speak to master in a large measure their foreign would-be counsellors and controllers and build up a model constitution. The elder of the village of Rautta, who was directed by my friend the lieutenant to show me hospitality and procure me a guide, was a rough peasant, literate and intelligent, living with his wife in a single large room in which I was entertained. His assistants were men of the same type, while the guide was a young fellow of about twenty, a native of the village, who had had a good elementary education at Viborg. In the hands of people of this sort I always felt myself secure. Their shrewd common sense⁠—the strongest defence against nonsensical Red propaganda⁠—made them as a class trustier friends than a spoilt intelligentsia or the scheming intrigants of the militarist caste.

My guide produced half-a-dozen pairs of skis, all of which were too short, as I require a nine- or ten-foot ski, but I took the longest pair. About eleven o’clock our skis were strapped to a drovny sledge, and with a kindly send-off by the elder and his wife, we drove rapidly to a lonely hut, the last habitation on the Finnish side of the frontier. The proprietor was roused and regaled us with tea, while a scout, who chanced to come in a few moments after our arrival, advised my guide as to the latest known movements of Red patrols. Our peasant host possessed no candles or oil in this solitary abode, and we sat in the flickering light of long burning twigs, specially cut to preserve their shaky flare as long as possible.

About midnight we mounted the skis and set out on our journey, striking off the track straight into the forest. My companion was lightly clad, but I retained my overcoat, which I should need badly later, while round my waist I tied a little parcel containing a pair of shoes I had bought in Helsingfors for Maria.

By the roundabout way we were going it would be some twenty-five miles to the village that was our destination. For four years I had not run on skis, and though ski-running is like swimming in that once you learn you never forget, yet you can get out of practice. Moreover, the skis I had were too short, and any ski-runner will tell you it is no joke to run on short skis a zigzag route across uneven forest ground⁠—and in the dark!

We started in an easterly direction, moving parallel to the borderline. I soon more or less adapted my stride to the narrow seven-foot ski and managed to keep the guide’s moderate pace. We stopped frequently to listen for suspicious sounds, but all that greeted our ears was the mystic and beautiful winter silence of a snow-laden northern forest. The temperature was twenty degrees below zero, with not a breath of wind, and the pines and firs bearing their luxuriant white burden looked as if a magic fairy wand had lulled them into perpetual sleep. Some people might have “seen things” in this dark forest domain, but peering into the dim recesses of the woods I felt all sound and motion discordant, and loved our halts just to listen, listen, listen. My guide was taciturn, if we spoke it was in whispers, we moved noiselessly but for the gentle swish of our skis, which scarcely broke the stillness, and the stars that danced above the treetops smiled down upon us approvingly.

After travelling a little over an hour the Finn suddenly halted, raising his hand. For some minutes we stood motionless. Then, leaving his skis, he walked cautiously back to me and pointing at a group of low bushes a hundred yards away, visible through a narrow aisle in the forest, he whispered: “You see those farthest shrubs? They are in Russia. We are about to cross the line, so follow me closely.”

Moving into the thickets, we advanced slowly under their cover until we were within a few yards of the spot indicated. I then saw that before us there lay, cutting through the forest, a narrow clearance some ten yards wide, resembling a long avenue. This was the Russian borderline, and we stood at the extreme edge of the Finnish forest. My guide motioned to me to sidle up alongside him.

“It is to those bushes we must cross,” he whispered so low as to be scarcely audible. “The undergrowth everywhere else is impassable. We will watch the shrubbery a moment. The question is: Is there anyone behind it? Look hard.”

Weird phenomenon!⁠—but a moment ago it seemed that motion in the forest was inconceivable. Yet now, with nerves tense from anticipation, all the trees and all the bushes seemed to stir and glide. But oh! so slyly, so noiselessly, so imperceptibly! Every shrub knew just when you were looking at it, and as long as you stared straight, it kept still; but the instant you shifted your gaze, a bough swung⁠—ever so little!⁠—a trunk swayed, a bush shrank, a thicket shivered, it was as if behind everything there were something, agitating it, playing with it, in order to taunt you with deceits!

But it was not really so. The forest was still with a deathlike stillness. The dark trees like sentinels stood marshalled in sombre array on either side of the avenue. Around us, above, and below, all was silence⁠—the mystic, beautiful winter silence of the sleeping northern forest.

Like a fish, my companion darted suddenly from our hiding-place, bending low, and in two strides had crossed the open space and vanished in the shrubbery. I followed, stealing one rapid glance up and down as I crossed the line, to see nothing but two dark walls of trees on either hand, separated by the grey carpet of snow. Another stride, and I, too, was in Russia, buried in the thick shrubbery.

I found my guide sitting in the snow, adjusting his ski-straps.

“If we come upon nobody in the next quarter-mile,” he whispered, “we are all right till daybreak.”

“But our ski-tracks?” I queried; “may they not be followed?”

“Nobody will follow the way we are going.”

The next quarter-mile lay along a rough track skirting the Russian side of the frontier. Progress was difficult because the undergrowth was thick and we had to stoop beneath overhanging branches. Every twenty paces or so we stopped to listen⁠—but only to the silence.

At last we came out on the borders of what seemed like a great lake. My companion explained that it was a morass and that we should ski straight across it, due south, making the best speed we might. Travelling now was like finding a level path after hard rocky climbing. My guide sailed away at so round a pace that although I used his tracks I could not keep up. By the time I had crossed the open morass he had already long disappeared in the woods. I noticed that although he had said no one would follow us, he did not like the open places.

Again we plunged into the forest. The ground here began to undulate and progress in and out amongst the short firs was wearisome. I began to get so tired that I longed to stretch myself out at full length on the snow. But we had to make our village by daybreak and my guide would not rest.

It was after we had crossed another great morass and had been picking our way through pathless forest for about four hours, that I saw by the frequency with which my companion halted to consider the direction, and the hesitation with which he chose our path, that he had lost his way. When I asked him he frankly admitted it, making no effort to conceal his anxiety. There was nothing to do, however, but to keep straight ahead, due south by the pole star.

The first streaks of dawn stole gently over the sky. Coming out on to an open track, my guide thought he recognized it, and we followed it in spite of the danger of running into an early patrol. In a few moments we struck off along a side track in an easterly direction. We should soon reach our destination now, said the Finn⁠—about a mile more.

I moved so slowly that my companion repeatedly got long distances ahead. We travelled a mile, but still no sign of village or open country. At length the Finn disappeared completely, and I struggled forward along his tracks.

The grey dawn spread and brightened, and it was quite light, though the sun had not yet risen, when at last I drew near the outskirts of the forest. Sitting on the bank of a small running stream sat my guide, reproaching me for my tardiness when I joined him. Across a large meadow outside the forest he pointed to a group of cottages on the side of a hill to the right.

“The Reds live there,” he said. “They will be out about eight o’clock. We have come over a mile too far inland from Lake Ladoga: but follow my tracks and we shall soon be there.”

He rose and mounted his skis. I wondered how he proposed to cross the stream. Taking a short run, he prodded his sticks deftly into the near bank as he quitted it, and lifting himself with all his force over the brook, glided easily on to the snow on the far side. Moving rapidly across the meadow, he disappeared in the distant bushes.

But in springing he dislodged a considerable portion of the bank of snow, thus widening the intervening space. I was bigger and weightier than he, and more heavily clad, and my endeavour to imitate his performance on short skis met with a disastrous result. Failing to clear the brook, my skis, instead of sliding on to the opposite snow, plunged into the bank, and I found myself sprawling in the water! It was a marvel that neither ski broke. I picked them up and throwing them on to the level, prepared to scramble out of the stream.

The ten minutes that ensued were amongst the silliest in sensation and most helpless I ever experienced. Nothing would seem easier than to clamber up a bank not so high as one’s shoulder. But every grab did nothing but bring down an avalanche of snow on top of me! There was no foothold, and it was only when I had torn the deep snow right away that I was able to drag myself out with the aid of neighbouring bushes.

Safely on shore I looked myself over despondently. From the waist downward I was one solid mass of ice. The flags of ice on my old green overcoat flapped heavily against the ice-pillars encasing my top-boots. With considerable labour and difficulty I scraped soles and skis sufficiently to make it possible to stand on them, and once again crawled slowly forward.

I do not know how I managed to traverse the remaining three miles to the village whither my guide had preceded me. It should have been the hardest bit of all, for I was in the last stages of fatigue. Yet it does not seem to have been so now. I think, to tell the truth, I completely gave up the game, convinced my black figure creeping up the white hillside must inevitably attract attention, and I mechanically trudged forward till I should hear a shot or a cry to halt. Or, perhaps, even in this plight, and careless of what befell me, I was fascinated by the glory of a wondrous winter sunrise! I remember how the sun peeped venturously over the horizon, throwing a magic rose-coloured mantle upon the hills. First the summits were touched, the pink flush crept gently down the slopes, turning the shadows palest blue, and when at last the sun climbed triumphant into the heaven, the whole world laughed. And with it, I!

The cottages of the Reds were left far behind. I had crossed more than one hill and valley, and passed more than one peasant who eyed me oddly, before I found myself at the bottom of the hill on whose crest was perched the village I was seeking. I knew my journey was over at last, because my guide’s tracks ceased at the top. He had dismounted to walk along the rough roadway. But which cottage had he entered?