VII

THE ROYAL BOLSHEVIK AND THE NURSE

20.  “My Charybdis conducted me to the barracks where a lot of undisciplined philosophers were discussing the parceling out of land....  The ringleader was a round-headed, long-nosed and bulky individual with a shaggy beard and dirty uniform....  I knew him in an instant, but he did not recognize me ... he was one of Von der Goltz’ men who aided in the defense at Gallipoli....  The night before the Allied fleet withdrew he was lying beside a short, thickset and dark-haired Associated Press reporter with a German name and tortoise-shell eyeglass and was telling that same reporter that unless REINFORCEMENTS arrived AT ONCE the defenses would collapse!...  The next day he was at Headquarters informing the General in command that BUT FOR HIM the Turkish forces would have surrendered!...  He is NOW wearing a number of decorations for his military skill and bravery....  Such are the fortunes of war!...  This is the man who one minute preaches communism and another minute gravely asserts that it will be a good thing for the Kaiser to get killed in the war so as to guarantee the SUCCESSION of the Empire....  Perhaps he is doing this for my benefit....  Anyway he occupies the center of the stage at present and GOVERNS this greedy and unruly mob by kicking discipline into a cocked hat and allowing every unshaved Bolshevik his own unrestricted way!...  Under other circumstances I should dearly like to meet this boasting Furioso in a ten-foot ring when a little exercise is needed to keep myself in trim....  But NOW I am accepted as a BOLSHEVIK,—­one of the elect, privileged to select my lady and rob and pillage when I please!... This suits me very well ... but on mature reflection it seems to me that a FEW in this literally UNGODLY gang are playing a very cunning part....  If that BE so I am not so sure how far my own assumed conversion to the doctrine of rapine will protect my skin....  So far, however, I have adopted the policy of vindictiveness, and, when asked a question, I merely growl and swear like a trooper.... I am making an impression....”

21.  “On the way here the HERO of Gallipoli took quite a fancy to me, because I could beat him swearing perhaps....  Growing confidential over his liquor and Turkish cigarettes he asked point-blank:  ’Didn’t I see you at the TWELFTH DAY CEREMONY at the Winter Palace the time the Archbishop lost the golden cross in the river, a few years ago?’...  I thought it better to deny the acquaintance and the incident....  I could have easily recalled the ceremony on the Neva, the decorated pavilion on the ice in front of the palace, the procession of church dignitaries in their stiff Byzantine robes and scintillating mitres moving slowly across the road followed by the Grand Dukes and the Emperor, the clear voices of the choir cutting through the frosty air, the ladies of