In August 1977, Dan Sprînceană crossed the Danube into Yugoslavia on his third try, after two earlier attempts failed. Romanian border guards opened fire and he came within a breath of dying. As he recalls, guards were promised a week of leave for every runaway caught, alive or dead, a detail that captures how the regime treated those who fled. Nearly fifty years on, the writer, now settled in France, told Adevărul about those hours on the river.