Russka: The Novel of Russia

  At home everything that seemed familiar was being broken up. The land belonged to the people; the programme for nationalizing industry had begun; and the Orthodox Church had been told that all its property was confiscated and all its legal rights taken away. In effect, it was outlawed. ‘In six months,’ Lenin had declared, ‘we will build a Socialist state.’ It seemed he might succeed.

  For if the Bolsheviks were still a minority, they were a determined one. The opposition forces were in disarray; cleverly, Lenin had drawn some of the extremists of the peasants’ party – the terrorists – into his government so that they would not oppose him; Red Guards and other units were everywhere; Bolshevik cells were growing in the factories; and, most significant for the Bobrovs, a new organization, headed by a ruthless fellow named Dzerzhinski, had begun to operate in the last two months: the Cheka.

  The Extraordinary Commission to Combat Counterrevolution, Sabotage and Speculation was a very effective body. It was remarkable what it could come up with. It seemed that a number of political opponents of the Bolsheviks had been guilty of sedition, including many of the liberal Cadets. They were declared to be enemies of the people. Nicolai Bobrov had just learned that he was one of them.

  Alexander Bobrov was walking quite slowly, because he was lost in thought. He was wearing an old coat, a worker’s cap and a pair of heavy boots. The coat collar was turned up against the cold, and his face was hardly visible. He had taken to dressing like a worker a month ago. His father was in hiding.

  Their escape had been arranged by Vladimir Suvorin. Mrs Suvorin was to cross into Finland and go thence in stages to Paris where Vladimir’s son was awaiting her. The two Bobrovs, dressed as workers, were to accompany her. In the confusion which still existed everywhere, the journey itself should not be unduly difficult. ‘You just need to keep out of trouble until you leave,’ Vladimir had said.

  The industrialist’s own position was curious. Though the Bolsheviks wanted to nationalize all industry, they were still uncertain what to do with men like Suvorin. If he cooperated, with his wide knowledge and his many contacts he might be useful. ‘They know that industry and finance still have to run,’ Vladimir had explained to Alexander. ‘I’ve a friend in the Culture Minister, Lunarcharsky, too. All the same,’ he added, ‘I fear it may not be many months before I follow you.’ Nadezhda, despite much scolding, had insisted she stay with her father, and Alexander had just come, an hour before, from bidding her farewell.

  Since their time together in Russka while he recovered from his war wounds, they had grown very close. Twice he had proposed. But in the upheaval taking place all around them, she had simply begged: ‘Not now.’ Alexander had no doubt that she and Vladimir would be in Europe too, within the year. And then, he thought, will be the time. It was funny: they would both be nothing then – just a pair of emigrés. But he didn’t mind. ‘Take care of yourself, my Alyosha,’ she had said, and had given him a long kiss.

  And it was just these thoughts, as he went along the steet, that made him foolishly forget.

  ‘Got a cig?’ The soldier was standing in front of him, looking up. ‘Cigarette?’

  Alexander gazed down at him, hardly focussing. There were six or seven other soldiers, Red Guards, watching him. The one who had approached him was a disreputable little fellow. When he was serving, Alexander would have made him clean himself up.

  ‘You want a cigarette, do you?’ he said irritably. ‘Well, I don’t smoke.’ And he started to walk on.

  What the devil was the matter with the fellow? The soldier had suddenly caught his coat. His hopeful look had turned into a snarl. He was calling to the other guards, who were coming towards them, one of them unhoisting his rifle.

  And then he realized what he had done.

  He had spoken naturally, just as he would have done a year ago. He had forgotten to disguise his voice which had the faint but unmistakable burr of the aristocratic intonation. He had addressed him with a certain haughty disdain; and, worst of all, he had used the familiar ‘thou’ which officers always used when addressing their men.

  He was discovered.

  ‘Here’s an officer. What’s your name?’

  ‘Ivanov. I’m not an officer.’

  ‘You were though, weren’t you? I think we’ve got ourselves an enemy here, boys. Fine suit of clothes you’ve get there, my lord. Nice coat. Think you’re a muzhik, do you?’

  And suddenly Alexander doubled up with pain as a rifle butt was swung and hit him in the stomach. He went down.

  ‘What shall we do with him, lads?’

  ‘Take him to a tribunal.’

  ‘Search him first, maybe.’

  ‘I think you’d like to have a nice talk with the Cheka. That’s what I reckon,’ the first said with a laugh. ‘Up you get, baron. Come along, Excellency. What a fine officer you are, sir, to be sure.’

  He staggered up. Thank God he had no papers on him.

  ‘My name’s Ivanov,’ he said weakly.

  Then one of the soldiers cried out: ‘Here’s the man we need. He’s on the Committee. Let’s ask him.’

  And Alexander looked up to see Yevgeny Popov, who gazed at him with mild surprise, while the soldiers told him what they’d found. ‘Says his name’s Ivanov,’ the first one added. Then Popov smiled.

  For a few, long seconds he said nothing. His green eyes rested upon Alexander, yet it seemed he was thinking of something else. At last he spoke.

  ‘This man, comrades, is a good Bolshevik. He’s one of us.’

  The soldier who had discovered Alexander gazed in amazement.

  ‘But he talks like a noble,’ he protested. ‘I swear he was an officer.’

  Popov smiled. ‘Have you heard Vladimir Ilich speak?’ he asked. It was a subject of some amusement that Lenin pronounced his diatribes against the capitalist classes in an accent that was markedly upper-middle class. ‘Besides, comrade, there are officers who served in the imperial army who are loyal Bolsheviks now.’ It was true that, even in the higher command, there were men who had thought it their patriotic duty to obey the new government as thoroughly as they had the old. ‘We just shoot them if they don’t,’ Popov added pleasantly.

  The men looked at him doubtfully. ‘Are you sure, comrade?’

  Popov shrugged. ‘Ask him,’ he said. And he smiled again at Alexander.

  Afterwards, Alexander often wondered how he got through the next few minutes. Probably because his life was at stake. He had not prepared himself, and there was no time to think.

  ‘My name is Alexander Pavlovich Ivanov,’ he began slowly. It was not a long story. He was terrified that if he made it long, he might forget what he had said. He told them that he had been wounded in action, that on his return he had become disgusted with the old régime and that, immediately after the October coup, he had offered his services to the Bolsheviks. ‘I’ve got no money,’ he said. ‘And unfortunately I’m still sick.’ Then he offered to show them his wounds.

  ‘Long live the revolution,’ Popov said quietly.

  ‘Long live the revolution,’ Alexander repeated.

  The soldiers turned to Popov.

  ‘You heard him,’ he said. ‘I vouch for him.’

  ‘Oh, well, if you’re one of us,’ the first soldier said. And he clapped Alexander on the back. ‘Pity you’ve got no cigarettes,’ he added. Then the soldiers left.

  As he stood there, watched by Popov, Alexander felt physically sick. It was not only the blow from the rifle, nor the fear: it was the complete humiliation of having to swear to these pathetic lies in front of the man he hated and despised the most in the world. Unwillingly, he met Popov’s eye.

  ‘Why?’ he asked.

  For a moment Popov did not reply. It seemed that he, too, was contemplating. ‘Do you remember that you once called me a liar?’ he said. ‘I used a false name too. That disgusted you, didn’t it?’ He paused, still looking at Alexander coolly. ‘You called me a coward too, I recall.’ He nodded slowly. ‘And why did you
lie just now, so eagerly, Alexander Nicolaevich? I will tell you. You didn’t do it for a cause. You haven’t got a cause. You did it to save your skin.’

  Alexander couldn’t deny it.

  ‘I just wanted to see,’ Popov said calmly. ‘It was interesting to watch. Tomorrow, or the next day, or the next, you’ll be caught. And then I shan’t save you. You’ll be on your own. If they ask me, I shall tell them exactly what you are.’ He paused. ‘But in the meantime, you see,’ and now it seemed that Popov was speaking for a lifetime, ‘you will know that you are no better than me. In fact, you are worse. You’re nothing. Goodbye.’

  He walked away.

  And Alexander Bobrov, looking after him, wondered if he was right.

  The next day the Bobrovs left for Finland.

  1918, July

  In the months leading up to June 1918, a rather unexpected change began to take place in Vladimir Suvorin. Whether it was the effect of the events surrounding him, or whether it was one of those physical changes which sometimes occur rather suddenly with age, it was hard to say.

  The events of that spring might have shattered a lesser man.

  A week after his wife had left, the Cheka called him in to ask him where she was. He told them with perfect truth that she had gone to Finland. ‘We estimate your fortune at twenty-five million roubles,’ one of the men remarked. ‘What have you to say?’

  ‘I didn’t know I had so much,’ he answered blandly.

  ‘You won’t for long,’ they promised.

  In March Vladimir was informed that the Art Nouveau house belonged to the state; two days later, the great Suvorin mansion became a museum. In April, the factories at Russka were taken over. Late in May, after asking him to spend several days explaining various aspects of their workings, all the Moscow plants followed. By the month of June, Vladimir controlled nothing.

  It was strange. He had never taken a great interest in affairs outside Russia except in so far as art was concerned. He had no overseas investments. The only deposits in foreign countries that the great industrialist possessed were the accounts in London and Paris that his son and he used for purchasing works of art and enough for Mrs Suvorin to live on for a while, but no more. By June, therefore, Vladimir was poor.

  He was not personally harassed. When the house became a museum, he received a personal visit from the minister, Lunarcharsky, a kindly man, who with his bald pate and pince-nez perched on his nose looked more like a professor than a revolutionary. Lunarcharsky was straightforward: ‘My dear fellow, the museum needs a curator. Who better than you? Nadezhda can be your deputy.’ And they were permitted to inhabit a small apartment at the back of the house, which had once been used by the housekeeper.

  Each day, therefore, Vladimir would solemnly lead round the parties of workers whom Lunarcharsky would enthusiastically send along in lorries, while Nadezhda would try to explain a Picasso to puzzled peasant women, or quietly sweep the floor.

  The physical change in Vladimir was two-fold. In the first place, he lost weight, so that now his clothes hung somewhat loosely on his large frame. But secondly, whether it was his weight loss which showed the bone structure of his face, or whether some other process was also at work, his physiognomy began to change. His jaw seemed longer, his eyes more deepset, and his nose appeared to be longer and coarser. By the end of June, though not quite so tall, the resemblance had become extremely striking – he looked just like his grandfather, old Savva Suvorin.

  And perhaps hardship had given him something of Savva’s temperament, too. For now the man for whom all things were always possible had become rather silent and cautious. And determined.

  He watched events closely. Since the spring, two important developments had taken place. First, the capital was transferred from Petrograd to Moscow. Second, under Lenin’s direct instructions a peace had been signed with Germany at Brest Litovsk. It gave way to all Germany’s demands. Finland, Poland, Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia all became independent. So, under German control, did the Ukraine. The loss was devastating in terms of agriculture and mineral resources. But as Russia was then in no position to fight, it may have saved the Bolshevik régime. Since Russia was no longer their active ally, however, the peace also caused the western powers to look carefully at the new Socialist government whose leaders had long and actively espoused the cause of world revolution. By summer, a British force had already established a beachhead in the far north, officially to guard allied ammunition supplies; and soon a Japanese force, encouraged by the United States, had landed upon the Pacific shore in distant Vladivostok. Other forces were also at work. In the far south, the Don Cossacks were preparing to resist the Bolsheviks; other opposition was gathering in the east beyond the Volga. Lenin, clearly anxious, was busily recruiting a new Red Army. Trotsky was in personal charge. In Moscow, they had been offering steadily higher salaries all spring to get recruits. ‘There’s going to be a civil war,’ Vladimir told Nadezhda. ‘Though God knows who’ll win it.’

  Quietly, carefully, Vladimir watched. June passed, then July. And then, in the last part of July, the news came which decided him.

  They had shot the Tsar.

  Dimitri looked thoughtfully at his Uncle Vladimir and then his father. It was the first time he had seen a tension between them. Still stranger was it to hear his father, standing in the dining room, say in almost cutting tones to the great man: ‘I am surprised you should even ask me to desert my country.’

  They had been talking for half an hour and reached only an impasse. Patiently Vladimir had explained his reasoning. The increasing terror from the Cheka, the danger from outside. ‘Only one thing can result when a régime is in this kind of position,’ he argued. ‘Either it falls, or it imposes a tyranny. I’m sure now that the Bolsheviks will hold on to power. And the killing of the Tsar signals their intentions. They’ll stand and fight. And I for one will certainly be destroyed.’

  ‘The Tsar was killed by the local Siberian Soviet anyway,’ Peter objected.

  ‘I don’t believe it. And history will prove me right.’

  But Professor Peter Suvorin wasn’t very interested in the Tsar.

  There was no doubt, Vladimir considered, as he looked at his brother, that Peter could be irritating. He thought sadly of Rosa; then, with a grim smile, of his old grandfather. What, he wondered, had poor old Savva made of Peter? Not much, it seemed. To Vladimir’s deep and wide-ranging mind, accustomed to weigh causes and intentions as well as to appreciate the beautiful, his brother’s intelligence, however fine in its way, was superficial. Carefully he had questioned him about the events of recent months: the Bolshevik seizure of power, the ousting of moderate Socialists like the professor himself. All these things, Peter agreed, had disturbed him greatly. ‘But in the long run, don’t you see, Vladimir, it may have to be this way. We have the revolution. That’s the point, die revolution.’ And he had smiled with that sweet, clear look in his eyes which made Vladimir shake his head and remark grumpily: ‘I may be wrong, but I think you see what you want to.’

  Yet why, Dimitri wondered, despite my father’s refusal, should Uncle Vladimir still be putting such pressure upon me to go? For I haven’t the least desire to.

  Indeed, the last few months had been thrilling. In the ferment of the revolution, the artists of the avant-garde had been taking to the streets. Posters and proclamations were signed by artists like Mayakovsky. ‘Every artist is a revolutionary and every revolutionary is an artist,’ a young friend of his had declared. Huge murals were appearing. On top of a building near their apartment, a bristling sculpture made of metal girders towered up as if to proclaim the new, scientific age to the blue sky. There was a huge banner by Tolkin draped halfway down a theatre nearby. Each day, he and Karpenko had roamed the streets in wonder. Karpenko was painting busily and he, Dimitri, planned to astonish them all with his new symphony – a hymn to the revolution. How, therefore, could he possibly want to leave?

  It was only when Peter was out of the room
for a moment that Vladimir confessed to him: ‘I must beg you to come, Dimitri, because I promised your mother that I would.’ He paused. ‘It was really her last request, you know.’

  ‘But why?’ Dimitri asked. ‘Why should she be so anxious for me to leave?’

  Vladimir sighed. ‘She had dreams.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘That something would happen to you if you stayed.’ He paused. ‘The dreams became very terrible to her, very vivid, just before the end.’

  ‘Before the accident?’

  Vladimir looked at him sadly. ‘Quite.’

  But the boy was shaking his head. ‘I couldn’t leave my father – I don’t want to go anyway.’ He looked down. ‘My mother always told me I’d be safe as long as I was a musician, you know.’ Then he looked up again and grinned. ‘As you see, I am.’

  And so, reluctantly, Vladimir gave up. Only one person in the professor’s apartment agreed to go. And this was Karpenko who, after hearing the debate, said quietly: ‘I will come with you to Kiev. I want to get home.’

  It was the following day that Dimitri asked his father a favour. The Symphony to the Revolution was going well, but in the slow movement he wanted to incorporate some material he had written out, fully orchestrated, when he had been down in the country two years before.

  ‘And the devil of it is,’ he explained, ‘I must have left it down at Russka, in Uncle Vladimir’s house. As I hear the place was hardly touched, it’s probably still sitting there; but I haven’t really time to go down there.’

  And Peter had smiled. ‘I’ll gladly go for you,’ he promised.

  Nadezhda had got used to her new life. She liked the simple workers she took round the house. She was even used to having them watch her sweep the floor. For sheer convenience now, she often dressed like a simple peasant woman herself, with a scarf over her head. And above all, she was glad to feel that in this, the great crisis of his life, she was there beside her father. I at least, she thought bitterly of her mother, remain always at his side.