by Lazlo Ferran
As I worked, I started calculating. Thirty feet to the grate would mean I would need at least at least sixty feet of ‘rope’ unless I could find some way to snag the grate. The iron hoop was a possibility: I would make forty feet and give it a try. I soon saw a major problem though: to be strong, I would braid three strips of cloth together, but this meant I would only get about eighteen feet from my clothes, using each sleeve of my shirt, twisted, on its own.
As I worked I remember that I had a wife called Rose and that I was a historian – a teacher. And then I remembered something else. An image came into my mind of a pastor – an old enemy of mine, stealing some documents from a museum – the British Museum. His name was Pastor ... Pastor Michel! Yes! It was a start.
I worked for hours, tearing and, then braiding, the rags together, to make my first length of rope. The activity calmed me and took the edge off a growing anger.
Whoever put me here is going to suffer if I get out!
The defiance gave me the strength to work towards a way out.
“Collect water.” That was the other thing I remembered our instructor telling us. “Any amount is worth collecting.”
As I completed lengths of my makeshift rope and spliced them into the main length, I laid them against the base of the wall where they could collect water as it ran down the walls.
Keeping the cloth wet should help to bind the braids and knots tighter too.
After a few hours of tying and twisting, my hands hurt. I needed a break and there was something else I had to do.
Going back to the three corpses, I stripped them of their rotting rags. The putrescence of the bodies had absorbed the cloth in places, and tugging it loose released the most awful smell I have ever experienced, with a sucking plop each time. I had to grit my teeth, and force myself to complete the task. The pitch darkness was a blessing.
I piled the rags and two pairs of boots up next to my rope and leaned against the wall to rest. Each time I put my hands near my face I had the impulse to gag.
How can I drink any moisture from the rope now?
Dysentery or worse would be the result. Nevertheless, I had to drink. I took off one of my shoes and tried to twist my home-made rope over the shoe in such a way that water might seep from the section not in contact with my hands. Not a drop could I hear. In desperation I lifted the shoe to my lips but no water touched my lips.
I threw down the rope in disgust.
In a few days I might have a cup full of water!
I was going to die of thirst if I didn’t get out. But then this was an oubliette. Nobody as far as I knew had ever escaped from one.
I swore at myself for thinking about defeat, and carried on, stubbornly braiding the rotted rags from the corpses.
As I twisted I heard myself humming the tune ‘The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde’. I laughed at myself.
Incredibly ironic! Here I am, in jail. Great!
Suddenly a clear image, connected with my memory of Pastor Michel, came into my mind, and I gratefully played it over and over, expanding it until I had the whole picture.
Rose and I were just going to bed in our Highgate flat, in North London. We bought the flat when I began teaching again, so that we could spend my summer holidays there.
It was a first floor apartment, and on this evening a gentle breeze was rustling the blue curtains through the open windows. The window-glass was leaded in a diamond pattern, and this was one of the features that attracted Rose to the flat; it reminded her of our house in France. I had just poured myself a glass of whiskey to enjoy with a new translation of the Vezelay Chronicle, excellent bedtime reading for a historian. The pubs were just emptying – I think it was a Friday night.
“Could you close the big window dear?” Rose asked from the bed.
As I put the glass down, the telephone rang and I picked up the black receiver.
“Hello?”
“Ah! Bonjour Monsieur.” I heard a lot of background noise, and the voice checked my name, speaking poor English with a very thick, French accent.
“Yes, that’s me. What can I do for you?”
“Ah. Sorry. My Engleeshe is not good. You remember Inspector Parcaud, no?”
“Yes. From years ago ...”
“Yes. He is retired now. My name is Inspector Clemenceaux and he has left a note for me to call you in certain circumstances ...”
“Yes ...?”
“And those circumstances has ‘appened. I am sorry to tell you that a prisoner has escaped – Michel Georges. You know ‘im?”
For a moment I was confused. “Georges? No I don’t think I know anybody with that name?”
“You may know him as something different: he was a Pasteur – Pasteur Michel?”
At the mention of that name a dread curled around and down my spine like a cold eel down one’s gut.
“Sorry, can you say that again. Did you say he has escaped? From prison?”
“Yes. Sorry.” The poor man seemed to be apologising for the whole French Gendarmes.
“Do you know any more: where he is or where he is likely to go?”
“I am sorry Monsieur. I don’t know these things. I will ‘ave to go. All I can advise is that you take extra precautions as you wish. He will probably hide. Anyway ... I will send details and a photograph to your local police station if you will tell me the address please?”
“Err. I don’t have it with me right now. It’s late.”
“Ah. Yes! You can call anybody here and leave the address any time tomorrow. The number is ...”
He gave me the number and hung up.
I put the phone down and rolled over to look at Rose. Her lips were pursed.
“It was a French policeman: he told me that Pastor Michel has escaped from prison.”
“Oh, not that awful man from Beauvais Cathedral? Do you think there is a danger ...”
“Not much I don’t think. He is ... was, inside for multiple murders. He has no chance for freedom if he’s caught. I think he’ll go into hiding. The Inspector thought so too.” I tried to sound hopeful.
“This doesn’t mean ...?”
“What? That I’m going to go chasing demons all over again?”
“It sounds like ...”
“Sounds like my past is catching up with me again. I know, but I made you a promise. I’m a teacher now and that’s the way it’s gonna stay.”
I put the book on the bedside-table and leaned over to kiss her bare shoulder. Her skin felt slightly cool to my lips. I could see the curve of her still-firm breast below the neckline of her night-dress, and I stiffened at the familiar, but still exciting, sight. She breathed more deeply, but didn’t look up. I wrapped my arms around her shoulder as she turned away from me, and held her close. I am not sure whether she was more angry or scared, of the news.
Two other things happened at about the same time: my son, Edward became engaged for the second time and I finally gained access to some manuscripts at the British Museum that I wanted to translate.
Edward’s first marriage had been a disaster, but thankfully there had been no kids. After only five years he had divorced Sheena. Rose and I thought he would never marry again but we were wrong. He met Diane, I beautiful, quiet girl, in the summer of 1990.
The manuscripts had first been discovered nearly forty years before, at the end of the Second World War, in damaged church in France. The owner claimed they had been penned by Bernard of Clairvaux. Not very likely, but possible. The British Museum had accordingly given them a low research-priority, but after persistent requests they finally gave me research-access. One document in particular interested me. Purporting to be a list of descendants of Dagobert II, famous King of Australasia in the 7th Century, it was a single sheet of parchment about six inches square.
What I didn’t know at the time was that the bottom half of the document was missing. It had been removed with a neat tear.
Several other, disparate images came into my head while I was remembering all this: a c
ar rolling over and over; a thunderstorm; but I didn’t understand their connection, either to the documents or Pastor Michel.
In the darkness of the oubliette, I didn’t know how long I had been braiding rags. Judging by my extreme thirst, it must have been something like forty-eight hours when I finally felt that I was ready.
That will have to do for now.
I had over sixty feet of main ‘rope’, and tied to that was another sixty feet of ‘leader’: a finer ‘string’ made by braiding very thin strips of cloth together. This formed a very light line that I could attach to the iron hoop, to try and snag the grate. The shoe-laces I had tied together with a wad of strong cloth at the end for a handle. I’d had plenty of time to plan my escape attempt and I had an idea where they might be useful.
Content with my work, but feeling exhausted, I needed a rest before I made my attempt.
I made one last effort to get something to drink. I tried to lick moisture directly off the wall with my swelling tongue but all I received was a tongue-full of grit.
I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes.
Sleep.
I jerked awake. I thought I heard something. I only half remembered where I was and for a moment I thought I was still asleep. But then I could see the faint light from the grate and remembered where I was. I started shaking with the cold.
“Help!” I shouted hoarsely. Silence.
“Help!” Nothing.
I had to run on the spot for twenty minutes or so to warm myself up. If I didn’t escape soon, I would die.
Standing as nearly underneath the grate as I could I swung the light cord with the hoop on the end. Swinging it round and round in vertical circles I released it at the right moment and waited. I heard it hit stone, and stepped out of the way as the hoop clattered onto the stone in front of me.
Again and again I tried for what seemed hours. I tried varying the position I launched from, but only rarely did the hoop hit the iron grate with a faint ‘ting’.
Despair again pulled at the edges of my mind as I imagined the hoop being too big to fit between the mesh of the grate. However, there was nothing else I could do.
The devil has really got me this time!
The thought made me angry and anger gave me the determination to keep trying.
One thing that surprised me was how fit I felt. For a sixty-five year old man I did not feel particularly out of breath. In France I often jogged through the forests around Nevers and I worked out with weights when I could. An agent always tries to stay prepared, even when retired. But now I felt like a man in his forties. Either I had been training hard since the last of my memories or I was going mad. Or else ... But no, I stifled the thought. It couldn’t be!
I kept on throwing.
Once, the iron hoop did not come back down. An animal, “Yes!” sounded in my parched throat. I tried letting out some cord but the slack wasn’t taken up.
Of all the luck! It must be balanced on a bar or strip, or where they cross. Damn!
There was nothing I could do except pull the cord. It snaked down around my hands and a moment later the hoop came tumbling down and clattered on the stone flags.
A thought penetrated my numbed and fuzzy thoughts. If it had balanced on one of the bars or strips then it could go over and come down, which was what I wanted.
This is possible!
The thought gave me renewed hope and I threw again and again eagerly. Still it failed to catch.
By now I was out of breath and decided to try ten more throws before taking a rest. The last throw was stronger than the rest. I put everything I had into it. There was anger too, in the throw and it caught.
My heart skipped a beat.
I stood in the dark, listening for a moment to the faint echo of the ‘ting’ and then my own hoarse breathing. Tentatively, I let out some of the cord in my hand and the slack was taken up by the weight of the hoop, as it came down through a hole other than the one it had gone up through. After a few feet it snagged, and I had to gently tug it to release it. I was expecting this, and it happened several time during the long descent of the hoop. But eventually I held it again in my hands. I kissed it.
Now, there is a chance!
Checking again that the thicker rope was looped neatly beside me, I started to haul gently on the leader, to pull the rope up, through the grate and back down again. Soon I held both ends of the rope in my hands.
Maybe I am going to get out!
I tried to control my emotions as the thought rushed around and around my head like the sound of a demented trumpet-player.
I took off my socks which would only get in the way. My shoes I tied to my waist with a piece of rag I had left over. The belt I looped over my shoulder and under one arm. The thin cord, I looped around my waist and tied to the hoop, still on the end, not knowing whether it would be useful or not.
Then I was ready for the long climb. It was too risky to pull the descending rope to haul myself up. The action of the rope running over the grate would almost certainly break it. I had tied knots, about three feet apart, for the last twenty feet of the rope and clasping the two lengths together, I climbed up the rope slowly. By grabbing both lengths at the same time my ascent was safer. I had made the knots thick. There was some small hope that if the last length broke somewhere, a knot would catch in the grate and check my fall as long as I was still holding the other length in my hands.
It wasn’t difficult to reach the grate. Adrenaline was pumping through me like rushing fire, and my hopes were raised further as I saw detail of the dungeon above me for the first time. As I had suspected, it was empty of everything except some iron hoops on the walls, benches and a large door. I wouldn’t normally have been able to see the hoops but my eyes had become super-sensitive to light in the absolute dark below.
Gripping a knot in the rope with my feet, I explored the grate with my hands and eyes.
It was roughly circular with the hinged section being square and consisting of five strips on each side, crossing each other to form the mesh. Each strip was about 1 1/2 inches wide and the gaps were about four inches wide. No wonder it had taken so many attempts to get the hook through it. The hoop was about three inches in diameter. The corners of the square hatch were about four inches from the edge of the circular opening. The whole iron assembly seemed to sit on top of a ledge cut into the great stone forming the floor of the cell above at this point. A large, sliding bolt-lock held the hatch securely closed. This was going to be a problem but I hadn’t completely overlooked this.
I took my time and carefully tied the two lengths of rope together, sometimes having to grip the grate with one hand to support my weight. Then, wrapping my legs firmly around the rope with my feet on a knot, I let go, and tied the length of shoe-lace rope around a strip of the grate outside the hatch. Then I tied the cloth end to the belt. I then let the belt down over my other shoulder until it formed a loop which I could sit in. Unfortunately the knot my feet were gripping, was too low, and I had to shin up the rope to be able to sit in the hoop. My heart was in my mouth as I let the assembly take my weight. It held. I could relax a little.
Now I just had to pick the lock. I was shaking with nerves, and couldn’t steady my hands. I forced myself to breath evenly and again found myself humming ‘The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde’. This time I had the accompanying thought of ‘good looking’ which seemed irrelevant. While I tried to calm down I studied the lock with my fingers. I was too low to see it from where I was swinging in space. There seemed only one possible way of getting the hatch open.
When I had almost stopped shaking I untied the iron hoop from my waist, and, keeping it attached to its thin cord, I passed it through the grate. On the end of the hoop were two small tongues which had been set into the two layers of the belt, with stitching to hold it in place. It had taken me a lot of effort to separate it from the belt. The tongues might now be my way out of here.
The iron lock was attached to the outer part of the
grate by three rivets, crudely fashioned from iron. The edge of the lock didn’t quite sit flush with the strip of iron it was riveted to and I slipped the tongue into the gap between them. I started wriggling it around to see if the rivets could be loosened.
The rivet at the right-hand end seemed looser than the others so I worked on that.
As I worked on the rivet it occurred to me that whoever had jailed me had probably not figured on the ingenuity of a 21st Century Special Agent. The thought was a strange one but one of only many in my head. There too was the burning question of how I had ended up in an oubliette? And why was I so groggy when I first woke up. Had I been drugged?
After a lot of effort and swearing, the rivet became looser, and I could start work on the one next to it. At first the work was slow but as each rivet became looser, I found I could get the tongue further into the join between the lock and the strip and get more leverage. I frequently had to stop for breaks as, working high overhead, my arms ached and I became very out of breath. In the end it was actually painful, and blood was streaming down my arms from cut fingers when finally there was a metallic bang as the lock came right away from the strip. I took a deep breath and took hold of the underside of the hatch. With my weight suspended from the grate around it I was free to open it and I pushed it up and over until it hit the top of stone floor with a clang.
My strength almost left me as I stood up in the hoop and put my arms over the edge of the open hatch. With a deep gulp of air and a grunt of determination I launched myself up and started to pull myself over the edge of the grate. I wriggled and struggled for about a minute before I finally laid on top of it, panting and exhausted.
I felt free, but of course I wasn’t.
When I had found my breath again. I hauled myself to my feet and stumbled over to the wooden door, banded with iron. The only light entering the room was from pale shafts through a grill in it.
I examined the door at length but could find no weakness. Constructed of an iron frame, with three horizontal strips and ten vertical strips, the gaps were filled with solid beams of oak. Even if I managed to dig through one of these beams, the gap would only be about four inches wide – too small for me to get through. The door-hinges were on the other side, as was the lock. There was no hatch for food. There was only the grill but this seemed rigidly fixed and was too small for me to get through.