After this there was a wholesale refusal to work and much bludgeoning, and general mutiny threatened. The Germans saw they had gone too far, and they capitulated. They told us that if we behaved fair to them they would be fair to us. All the time we were under martial law, and the orders that were read out to us were signed by Hindenburg.
Escape now seemed farther off then ever, so I played 'possum, pretended to have rheumatism and other ailments, and was sent back to Münster. I was still wearing the red and white signal of my attempts to escape, and one of the first things that I did on my return was to commandeer a fresh coat, otherwise I should have been a marked man.
What new plan of campaign could I evolve? Two had been tried and failed; yet I was just as keen and just as ready as ever to stake even life itself on a desperate throw. It was now that I met with a bit of luck, for I happened to fall in with Private Leonard Walker, of Oldham, and Private Fussell, of Taunton, one a Welsh Fusilier and the other a Somerset. They were bent on escape even as I was, and Walker had also tried the game before, having spent five days and five nights in the open with a chum, living on biscuits and a rabbit which they picked up and steering a course by map and compass. They, like me, had been caught, when crossing a railway line. A woman signalled to the sentry; they were captured, and had undergone solitary confinement. Walker, Fussell, and myself were a pretty good trio, with none of the turning-back spirit in our composition. Lot's wife turned back, you'll remember, but her fate was a shorter shrift than ours, and far less uncomfortable. A grand chap for the job was Walker, and his experience stood us in good stead. He studied the situation, weighed matters carefully, was resourceful and cute, but nevertheless had that touch of recklessness so necessary for such a venture.
We fixed up our arrangements and bided our time. We stuffed our pockets--"stuffed" is a good word--with twenty-one biscuits saved from our parcels--twenty-one for three of us. We also had two tins of sardines, and, better than all, a map and compass. One thing that we determined to do was to get rid of a conspicuous stripe sewn down the sleeves of our coats and the legs of our trousers. It was a bit of a puzzle at first, but Walker got over the difficulty by cutting up his waistcoat and inserting strips under the light stripes, which, when we got clear, were torn away, leaving us to all intents and purposes clothed like ordinary citizens and not like wicked "Engländers."