If I fall as low as that, what will be left of me? It would be the end—I might as well hang myself.
I did try to be useful.
I worked three days under fire at Yaroslavl, as a Red-Cross nurse. At night I flung myself on my bed, my hands and my dress covered with blood. Once I was waked up by somebody pulling my skirt up.
I sat up and cried out.
It was a boy, an officer, I shall never forget his face!
He was just a wild beast, he pushed me down, squeezing my wrists, without a word. The swine!
Papa! I shot him with his own revolver—I don't know how it could happen....
I suppose he fell, I didn't see, I don't remember.... I ran out into the street. A glow in the sky, the town on fire, shells bursting.... I don't know why I didn't go mad that night.
It was then that I made up my mind to run away, to run, run.... I want you to understand me, to help me.... I must get out of Russia! I have an opportunity.... Only you must help me to get away from Kulichok.
He's always after me, I mean he drags me about everywhere with him, and every night there's the same talk.
But I'm not going to give in, not if he kills me...."
Ivan Ilyich stopped reading, drew a breath, and then slowly turned the page.
"Quite by chance I got hold of some very valuable things.... A man was run over by a tram at Nikitsky Gate in front of me.
He died because of me, I know that.... When I came to myself I had an alligator brief case in my hand: someone must have put it into my hands when I was picked up.... I only looked into it the next day: it was full of diamond and pearl jewellery.
These things were stolen by that man.... He was going to meet me.... They were stolen for me—see? Papa, I'm not going into the right or wrong of it—I kept the things.... My only salvation lies in them.... Even if you convince me that I'm a thief, I intend to keep them just the same.... Since I've seen such a lot of death, I want to go on living.... I no longer believe in the image of humanity.... Those fine people with, their grand words about the salvation of the native land are all beasts, swine.... The things I've seen!
Curses on them!
This is what has happened: Nikanor Yurevich Kulichok suddenly came to me late one night, he'd come straight from Petrograd, it seems. He insisted that I leave Moscow with him.
It appears their 'League for the Protection of the Native Land and Freedom' was discovered by the Cheka and wholesale arrests were going on in Moscow.
Savinkov and the whole staff had escaped to the Volga.
They were to have «got up risings in Rybinsk, Yaroslavl and Murom.
They were in a great hurry about it: the French ambassador wasn't giving them any more money and wanted practical proof of the strength of the organization.
They hoped to get the whole peasantry over to their side.
Nikanor Yurevich assured me the days of the Bolsheviks were numbered—the rising was to cover the whole of the north, all the northern Volga districts, and join up with the Czechs.
Kulichok told me my name had been found in the lists of the organization, and said it would be dangerous for me to stay in Moscow, and I went to Yaroslavl with him.
"There, everything was in readiness: the leading posts in the army, the militia, the arsenal were all in the hands of their people....
We arrived in the evening, and at dawn I was awakened by shots.... I rushed over to the window.... It looked out on a yard, opposite was the brick wall of a garage, a rubbish heap, and some dogs barking at the gate.... The shots were not repeated, all was quiet, except for distant reports and the ominous hooting-of motor bicycles.... Then bells began ringing all over the town, in all the churches.
The yard gates opened and a group of officers, already wearing shoulder straps, came in.
They all had excited faces and were waving their weapons.
They were leading a stout, cleanshaven man in a grey jacket.
He had no cap on, and no collar, his waistcoat was unbuttoned.
They were hitting him in the back.
His face was red and angry, his head foiling from side to side—you could see he was in a terrible rage.
Two of the officers stayed by the garage, holding on to him, the rest moved aside for a consultation.
Just then Colonel Perkhurov came out of the back porch. I had never seen him before—he's the chief of all the armed forces for the rising.... They all saluted him.
He's a man with a will of iron; he is very well set up, has sunken black eyes, a lean face, wears gloves, carries a cane.
I understood at once—it meant death for the man in the grey jacket.
Perkhurov stood looking at him from under his brows, and I saw how evilly he bared his teeth.
And the man went on swearing, threatening, demanding.
Then Perkhurov jerked up his head, gave a command, and went away immediately.... The two men who had been holding the fat man sprang away from him. He tore off his jacket, screwed it up and threw it at the officers standing in front of him—right in the face of one of them, and swore at them, getting redder and redder in the face.
He shook his fists and stood there in his unbuttoned waistcoat, huge and furious.
Then they shot him.
He shook all over, threw out his hands, took one step, and fell.
They went on shooting at him for some time as he lay on the ground.
It was Nakhimson, a Bolshevik commissar. Papa, I had seen an execution!
As long as I live, I shall never forget how he gasped for breath. Nikanor Yurevich assured me it was a good thing—if they hadn't shot him, he would have shot them....
"I can't remember what happened next: everything seemed to be a continuation of that execution, everything was saturated with the convulsions of that huge frame that did not want to die.... I was ordered to go to some long, yellow building with pillars in front, and there I sat and typed orders and appeals.
Motor bicycles kept dashing up, dust whirling.... People ran about, losing their tempers and giving orders; the merest trifle set them shouting and gesticulating.
There were alternate fits of panic and exaggerated hopes.
But whenever Perkhurov appeared, with his inexorable eyes, and threw out a word or two, the fuss all died down.
The next day the rumbling of cannon could be heard from outside the town.