After an hour’s walking, directed so far as possible towards the west, I had the impression of being followed by dogs, whose barking was certainly coming nearer. I crawled into a close thicket, and crouched down in the darkest part of it under the bracken. I heard a dog bark close to me, and I clenched my teeth at the thought that I was tracked. But it must have been simply the dog belonging to a ranger who lived a little way off, for I could soon distinguish the noise of the animal’s chain and the crowing of a cock in the poultry yard. I should have to wait now till nightfall, and I spent long hours there listening anxiously for the least sound. I was an escaped prisoner. I had succeeded in deceiving the vigilance of my keepers. That was a great deal, but I did not fail to realise that the most painful and difficult part was before me. For some weeks past I had managed to get our sentinels to talk, and even the non-commissioned officers who were guarding us. They had confided to me the following details: the frontier was a dozen kilometres away as the crow flies; news of a prisoner who had escaped would be transmitted all over the neighbourhood by one hundred and fifty telegrams and three battalions of Landsturm stationed at X----; and in another town a search-party would be organised, with police dogs to help. Civilians themselves, on the demand of the military authorities, would have to give up to them their own bloodhounds. A certain sum of money was promised to any one who should bring about the capture of the fugitive. More often than not it had been women or old men who had prevented our escaped comrades from getting successfully away. The punishment, always carefully announced in camp, was, in case of capture, forty-two days’ solitary confinement, during which the prisoner only received one platter of food (and that a prisoner’s portion) every two days. Often an “accident” happened and a man was killed. An adjutant who had escaped was one day fired at point-blank and killed as he was peacefully returning, surrounded by the sentinels who had caught him. I had neither map nor watch nor compass. Geographically my position was as follows: to the north-west a railroad, to the west a river to cross, then a railroad; X----, the last German town, was a little way this side of the frontier. The river Z---- was a little beyond the frontier. Once, then, I had crossed this river I should be safe. I had hoped to get over the ground straight away in twenty-four hours at most, taking advantage of the surprise of the Germans, and so I had not troubled to bring much in the way of food. My estimate was at fault, as I discovered later to my cost. As provisions for my journey, my pockets contained a pound of chocolate, a box of kola pastilles, some meat lozenges and some lumps of sugar.