Escapes! Read Free Page B

the hems of their shirts and unraveled the threads, winding them into balls. Then they carefully braided the threads into a rope. As the rope grew longer, it began to eat up everything they could lay their hands on — shirts, underwear, stockings and breeches, napkins. As winter wore on, Latude and Allègre shivered half-dressed in their cell. They even unraveled the edges of their bed sheets, carefully stitching the hems back up and hoping the laundress wouldn’t notice that their linen was getting smaller!
    And before each dawn they hid it all under the floor, carefully laying the tile back in its place. The guards shrugged when the prisoners began napping during the day. It must help them pass the long hours, they thought.
    Next they needed steps for their ladder. Each day they saved a bit of the wood the guards brought for the fire, and stashed it in their hiding place. At night they filed the logs into rungs — as quietly as they could.
    Latude fitted the rungs one by one onto the rope, and laid out the 20-foot ladder for inspection. “Eighteen months’ work,” he said, stretching his back.
    â€œTime for the chimney,” said Allègre, nodding. Latude groaned — this would be the hard part!
    â€œYou first,” Allègre smiled. “You’re the nimble one.”
    Latude rolled up the ladder. Tucking it under one arm, he ducked through the fireplace and wedged himself inside the narrow chimney. He tossed the ladder up over one of the bars high above and climbed up to the first layer of gratings. Hanging in the gloom, he reached out to scrape at the cement around the grids, nearly losing his balance at first. His hands chafed on the rough stone and began to bleed.
    An hour later he couldn’t take it anymore, and scrambled down to give Allègre a turn.
    Slowly, painfully, they pried out the chimney gratings one by one, and climbed a little higher. Each time Latude pried a bar loose, he gently placed it back in its hole on the way back down. You never knew when guards would inspect the chimney. But it was ready to be plucked out when the moment came.
    And after hiding their tools each morning, Latude scanned the room for any sign of their work — the smallest chip of mortar could give them away.

    Latude wound a strip of cloth around yet another rung. It had taken them six months to clear the chimney and braid a safety rope, and now he was halfway through the second ladder. This one would need at least 150 rungs to reach down the outside tower wall. Wrapping it in cloth was Allègre’s idea — that way it wouldn’t scrape noisily against the stone.
    As he worked, Latude finally voiced the question that had been on his mind for months.
    â€œWhat about the outer wall beyond the moat?” he blurted out. It was the most dangerous part of their exit route. Sentries patrolled the top all night long.
    Allègre paused before ripping another strip of material. “There’s only one way. We’ll have to go through the wall — not over it.” He handed the cloth to Latude. “We’ll chip away the stones once we’re in the moat.”
    Latude lowered his eyes, saying nothing. The doubts that had haunted him now made him turn cold. Could they do it? With a sentry walking over their heads? Maybe this was turning out to be madness after all.

    Daylight was just piercing their small window as Latude slipped the last rung of the long ladder in place. He stared at it. He had thought it would go on forever! When he looked up at Allègre, he saw tears in his eyes. After seven years as a prisoner — eight for Allègre — Latude could scarcely believe this moment had come.
    It was February 25, 1756, the day before Mardi Gras. The winter nights were long and dark, the river around the Bastille was high, and fog made it hard to see very far. There would never be a better time to escape. They would go that night.
    The day seemed