"I'm going to escape and come back"

    Yes No.6 seemed only too keen to escape during ‘The Chimes of Big Ben,’ only to hurry back, if only to wipe this place of the face of the earth, obliterate it and No.2 with it! True upon his Arrival in the village the Prisoner did demonstrate the accepted behaviour patterns, and tried to escape not once, but twice and then again during ‘The Chimes of Big Ben.’ Yet for a Prisoner who is as keen as mustard to escape the confines of the Village, No.6 had a limited amount of escape attempts. I haven't counted the episode of ‘Free For All’ because in truth this was not an escape attempt. No.6 had wanted to conduct a mass break-out once he had been successfully elected to the position of No.2. Yet they had been onto this as early as the time No.6 underwent the truth test in the Labour Exchange managers office.

   ‘The Schizoid Man’ was next, and something of an opportune escape attempt which failed because he had not known that Susan, Curtis's wife had actually died a year ago. Well there was no way No.6 could have known that, was there? But then two episodes on we come to ‘Many Happy Returns’ and a golden opportunity to escape, but not by road or track way. Nor by the mountains, too high and with no visible sign of a pass through them. No the only way is to escape by sea. The Village being apparently deserted gave No.6 the time he needed to construct his sea going raft, to take photographic evidence of the village before setting sail. He didn't seem to feel the inclination to just sit down and wait, he didn't think this could be anything other than the golden opportunity that he had been waiting for. Well No.6 hadn't banked on Mrs Butterworth had he? Nor upon his untimely return to the Village, such is the predictability of the Prisoner. They, the authorities of the Village knew that if No.6 ever escaped he would instantly go running back to his ex-colleagues, that he would want to find the location of the village for himself. After all he had sworn to escape and come back.......!

    Then came the episode of ‘Checkmate,’ only this time No.6 has chosen some reliable men to aid him in an attempted escape. But then could his reliable men actually trust No.6? It was a good plan and one which might have worked had it not been for No.58 who put No.6 to his own test, and got it utterly and completely wrong! And this was the last escape attempt to be made by No.6, until that of ‘Fall Out,’ but even then the Prisoner hadn't escaped. He is still as much a prisoner as ever he was.

    As for the remainder of No.6's time in the Village. Well that was spent mainly poking his nose into things and places it had no business. At one time he even saved the citizens from mass reprisals by his intervention of the assassination/execution plot. So No.6 did care, No.2 of ‘Once Upon a Time’ asked No.6 "Why do you care?" and No.6 replied "You'll never know!"

    Whether or not No. 6 ever carried out other escape attempts we shall never know. Well he was a citizen of the village for well in excess of 12 months, and what we see during the 17 episode period is but a fraction of that which we do not.

Be seeing you