Vera was beside herself.

“Quick!  Quick!  Some one must go after her.  She must be brought back at once.  Quick! Scora!  Scora!...  I must go.  No, she is angry with me.  She won’t listen to me.  Ivan Andreievitch, you must go.  At once!  You must bring her back with you.  Darling, darling Nina!...  Oh, my God, what shall I do if anything happens to her!”

She clutched my arm.  Even as she spoke, she had got my hat and stick.

“This is Alexei Petrovitch,” I said.

“Never mind who it is,” she answered.  “She must be brought back at once.  She is so young.  She doesn’t know....  Boris—­Oh! it’s impossible.  Don’t leave without bringing her back with you.”

Even old Uncle Ivan seemed distressed.

“Dear, dear...” he kept repeating, “dear, dear....  Poor little Nina.  Poor little Nina—­”

“Where does Grogoff live?” I asked.

“16 Gagarinskaya....  Flat 3.  Quick.  You must bring her back with you.  Promise me.”

“I will do my best,” I said.

I found by a miracle of good fortune an Isvostchick in the street outside.  We plunged along through the pools of water in the direction of the Gagarinskaya.  That was a horrible drive.  In the Sadovaya we met the slow, winding funeral procession.

On they went, arm in arm, the same little wailing tune, monotonously repeating, but sounding like nothing human, rather exuding from the very cobbles of the road and the waters of the stagnant canals.

The march of the peasants upon Petrograd!  I could see them from all the quarters of the town, converging upon the Marsovoie Pole, stubborn, silent, wraiths of earlier civilisation, omens of later dominations.  I thought of Boris Grogoff.  What did he, with all his vehemence and conceit, intend to do with these?  First he would flatter them—­I saw that clearly enough.  But then when his flatteries failed, what then?  Could he control them?  Would they obey him?  Would they obey anybody until education had shown them the necessities for co-ordination and self-discipline?  The river at last was overflowing its banks—­would not the savage force of its power be greater than any one could calculate?  The stream flowed on....  My Isvostchick took his cab down a side street, and then again met the strange sorrowful company.  From this point I could see several further bridges and streets, and over them all I saw the same stream flowing, the same banners blowing—­and all so still, so dumb, so patient.

The delay was maddening.  My thoughts were all now on Nina.  I saw her always before me as I had beheld her yesterday, walking slowly along, her eyes fixed on space, the tears trickling down her face.  “Life,” Nikitin once said to me, “I sometimes think is like a dark room, the door closed, the windows bolted and your enemy shut in with you.  Whether your enemy or yourself is the stronger who knows?...  Nor does it matter, as the issue is always decided outside....  Knowing that you can at least afford to despise him.”