November 1916 Read online

  CHAPTER 56

  Kotya’s departure—an inspection team on the way—everyday life in an artillery unit: how the batteries look—tidying up in a hurry—they’re here!—trick questions for the soldiers—Sanya and the professorial general—Chernega’s presence of mind

  DOCUMENT NO. 3

  A student handbill

  CHAPTER 57

  Yet another day at the guesthouse!—no, it was never going to be so easy—Alina interrogates—no way out—he should never have started it!—telegram to Svechin—numbness—I was almost the death of you!

  CHAPTER 58

  Alina reluctant to go home—the Smyslovsky family—feeling is running high at the university—Georgi and Alina guests of the Smyslovskys—Aleksei Smyslovsky’s eccentricities—music making—Alina brightens up

  CHAPTER 59

  On the way home with Alina—the moon in the side streets—did I play well?—what happened in Petersburg doesn’t come into it—let me look at you!—best to sleep on it—Alina’s note—Vorotyntsev’s telephone call to Susanna

  DOCUMENT NO. 4

  Prince Lvov to Rodzyanko

  CHAPTER 60

  Danger for Roman Tomchak—Irina envies those who can go to war—the 1914 Society—Irina finds a way out for her husband—Roman prepares his address—Zakhar Tomchak’s reverie—Roman dines and dreams—how he sees his wife—Irina’s household cares—Darya Mordorenko and the clerk—dirty ditties—evening on the Tomchaks’ grounds—bonfires out on the steppe

  CHAPTER 61

  The great reception room in the Tomchak house—the steppe farmers in congress—the correspondent—idle chatter—Roman’s speech—what is the procedure at conferences?—Zakhar takes a different view—the steppe farmers’ anger

  CHAPTER 62 (The Progressive Bloc)

  Only Russia had grain and cattle enough and to spare—the first untoward developments—society’s eagerness to regulate food supplies—the plenipotentiaries—everyone joins the fight against price inflation—curb the producers!—introduction of fixed prices in 1915—the debate on fixed prices in 1916—theories of Voronkov and Groman—the producers protest—why not fix prices of manufactured goods?— Alekseev’s plans for a dictatorship on the home front—effects of grain prices more and more widely felt—errors in price fixing, 1916—harvested grain not where it is needed—a noose around Russia’s neck

  The Tsar will pay for everything—meanwhile, the Progressive Bloc dithers—Milyukov’s prophetic vision: with the government in a dead end, the liberals will come to power—inconclusive debate of the Progressive Bloc, autumn 1915—how do we discover those whom the country trusts?—topple Goremykin!—Stürmer appointed Prime Minister—not a day longer under this government!—the Tsar at the opening of the Duma session in February 1916—what he failed to do there—Milyukov a moderating influence—let this regime drown—the Duma’s sleepy months—rabid congresses of the Unions of Zemstvos and Towns—ignore the government, put it out of business—but the government is now stronger!—restrictions on congresses—Duma delegation in Europe seeks to detach Allies from the Russian government—September 1916: the Bloc’s expectations disappointed—Protopopov’s frantic struggle for survival—responsibility for grain supplies divided between two ministries—the “Konovalov Conferences": time to launch an all-out assault on the regime!—Milyukov dissuades the Kadets from underground activity—break the government’s neck! Bring down the cabinet!—impossible to speak, impossible to remain silent—treachery in the Bureau: the Declaration leaks—will they dissolve the Duma?—cut out the word “treason” or keep it?—a rift: the Progressists leave the Progressive Bloc

  CHAPTER 63

  Skills of a Bolshevik activist underground—Shlyapnikov moves around Petersburg—the strike: a step too far?—laws of conspiracy not strictly observed—self-discipline a condition of liberty—why he decided on this strike—efflux of intellectuals from the Party—the “unattached” Social Democrats—worker support also ebbing—the proletarian intellectual—Sashenka Kollontai—Shlyapnikov represents the Party Center—his decisions and actions in July 1914—with Sashenka: “What the proletariat needs is peace”—Lenin corrects them: what is needed is civil war!—120,000 workers your responsibility—the serpent of suspicion glides among the workers—meeting with Lutovinov—breakdown of understanding between the émigrés and the underground—how Shlyapnikov contrived to cross the frontier—stinginess of the émigré leadership—Shlyapnikov’s nomadic life abroad—turner, first class—documents on persecution of the Jews—general strike imminent!—who should be in the Bureau of the Central Committee?—the quarrel with the Petersburg Committee—Shlyapnikov poses as a Frenchman in 1914—Sokolov tricked him over the affair of the sailors—the lockout and the conscription of young workers—you’ve let yourself be carried away!—proud to be a workman—with Kayurov in the café—will the general strike come off?—the old hands from Sormovo and Gorky—which are better, the English or the Germans?—the appetite of the German General Staff for socialists—Kesküla—don’t help us via Wilhelm!—Bukharin and Pyatakov on Kesküla’s trail—impotence of Bukharin’s group—their differences with Lenin—how émigré squabbles depress Shlyapnikov—the yoke—Shlyapnikov at his sister Manya’s home—Matvei Ryss—his leaflets—Shlyapnikov sees himself—his love affair with Sashenka—his dream—his dialogue with Lenin—Shlyapnikov wakes up—the bosses have given in!

  CHAPTER 64

  The Tsar’s daughters: what does the future hold for them?—their upbringing—the Empress’s schools, sanatoria, and hospitals—the Empress a trained nurse herself—the heir’s illness: the Man of God (Rasputin) is his salvation—Rasputin’s prayers for the Emperor and his armies—his words and his wisdom—his help in governing the state—meeting Rasputin in secret: sovereigns not free to live as they wish—calumnies against the Holy Man—the Friend’s help in selecting ministers—how to take the Synod in hand—Stürmer chosen—Khvostov (the nephew): a miscalculation—the quest for a War Minister—disappointments with other ministers—nomination of Protopopov—to whom should the food supply be entrusted?—all their enemies launch attacks simultaneously—transfer responsibility for the food supply to Protopopov, quickly—disagreements within the cabinet itself—the Empress’s ailments and her sleepless nights—don’t surrender the land to the wicked!—the Empress’s advice in letters to her husband—ambivalence of her feelings toward Germany—the Empress and the generals—Bonch-Bruyevich—save Sukhomlinov!—save Rubinstein!—Protopopov dreads an uproar in the Duma—he is in no hurry to take over the food supply—always come to the rescue of your friends

  CHAPTER 65 (The State Duma, 14 November)

  In the White Hall of the Tauride Palace—Rodzyanko’s calculations—his speech—a Polish orator—the Progressive Bloc’s declaration pruned—Chkheidze exceeds his time limit—Rodzyanko takes cover before the explosion—feeble responses from right-wingers—Kerensky’s fire and smoke—declaration of the Russian nationalists—the leader of the Bloc speaks at last—a bombshell in reserve—deploring the regime—how to read the foreign press, and traveler’s tales from Milyukov—he names the wrong lady—secrets more frightening when names are withheld—a bombshell, in German—Radek responsible for the story—"stupidity or treason?”—“storm signal for revolution”—the throne collapsing

  CHAPTER 66

  The officers at Mogilev—front-line friendliness—officers’ grumbles—rumors of Milyukov’s speech—Vorotyntsev visits Svechin—what is good about a coup d’état?—the Myasoedov affair—Guchkov no longer matters—how the war looks from GHQ—can it be Gurko?

  CHAPTER 67

  General Gurko’s past—Mogilev at dusk—a letter from Olda—spring in November—Vorotyntsev encounters General Nechvolodov

  CHAPTER 68

  Nechvolodov’s story—what freedom of the press means in Russia—revolution has already arrived—infestation—we have had centuries to prepare—helpless in the face of the plague of locusts—the Tsar’s
residence emerges from the darkness—the sword planted in the ground—rally, but round whom?—the Petersburg monarchists’ scheme—Stürmer is afraid

  CHAPTER 69

  The Emperor’s trip to Kiev—memories of Stolypin—doubts about Protopopov—Nikolai depressed by Alix’s invariable rightness—Rasputin’s presumptuousness—Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich visits the Emperor—and reproaches him—the right to personal attachments—shackled by routine—a day in the country: around the campfire—the Emperor’s relations with Alekseev—Alekseev’s illness—upset by the Duma—what will I do with these ministers?—the Emperor prays with his son—a night of foul weather

  CHAPTER 70

  Winter morning in Mogilev—sensation: Milyukov has proved that the Empress is a traitress—a buzz of officers’ voices—rumors passed on by Svechin—General Gurko and the plan to restructure divisions—Vorotyntsev gets down to work—practical analysis of the army’s needs—Vorotyntsev not invited to join GHQ—Gurko on Guchkov

  CHAPTER 71 (The State Duma, 16–17 November)

  Rodzyanko’s measures of self-preservation—Varun-Sekret resigns—the monarchist Shulgin declares war on the regime—the Progressist Efremov: the government’s behavior “borders on treason”—Cossack Captain Karaulov’s “six ways out”—Markov II replies—how the progressive camp gets rich and how it curbs the peasants—V. Maklakov: the government is paralyzing Russia—coexistence impossible—questions in the Duma about military censorship—Chkheidze glorifies revolution—Rodzyanko reelected—the blank spaces cry out—Kerensky: treason has built its nest in the heights—Markov II: your slanderous talk of treason will bring Russia down—conciliatory statements from the Ministers of War and of the Navy—Rodichev: Russia has one unshakable belief, belief in the Duma

  DOCUMENT NO. 5

  A circular telegram from Stürmer

  CHAPTER 72

  The Empress’s emotional ties with the wounded—mystical secrets—her wedding like a continuation of the late Emperor’s funeral rites—irreversibility of this war—the Emperor’s visits to his troops—partings that wear out the heart—the power of love—Anya Vyrubova’s love and how to contain it—how the Empress alienated high society— Anya, her intimate friend—ingratitude and jealousy—Anya’s grave accident—her new caprices—Anya a trusted devotee of their Friend, and his link with the Empress—first steps in aiding her imperial spouse—Nikolai’s defenseless kindness frightens his wife—preserve the empire for Baby!—the Empress now at ease with ministers—be another Peter the Great, another Ivan the Terrible!—why the Empress is so hated—her visits to GHQ—what answer should Stürmer give?—Shuvaev and Grigorovich sound a false note—we’ll show the left we’re not afraid—Protopopov on the right path—religious conversation with their Friend—release Rubinstein—let Stürmer feign illness—don’t abandon those who are loyal to us!—Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich’s letter—he has the Emperor’s mama and sisters behind him—a husband must stand up for his wife—miasma of calumnies—no one has ever defended the Empress

  CHAPTER 73

  Varsonofiev’s troubled dreams—difficult to rise in the morning—truth encountered in dreams—the cost of parting—not years but thoughts—the house on Mali Vlasievsky—the poisonous press—Milyukov’s pettiness—to think that he (Varsonofiev) was ever one of them!—the course of events defies understanding

  CHAPTER 74

  To the post office again—letter from Alina—am I free?—Alina’s character—all is lost—terror—past the monastery gate

  CHAPTER 75

  The accursed “what they’ll say”—with Fyodor—"a piece torn from my womb”—first equilibrium—disturbed again—why did you send for me?—through dark streets— the church at Utkino—the painting on the vaulted ceiling—before the icon of the Saviour—four sins—why is the way so confused?—the fifth sin—confession—"how can anyone forbid you to love?”

  Index of Names

  ACT ONE

  REVOLUTION

  Only the ax can deliver us, and nothing other than the ax … Russia summons us to the ax.

  From a letter to Aleksander Herzen’s newspaper, The Bell, 1860

  KNOT II

  NOVEMBER 1916

  (27 October–17 November)

  [1]

  Birds don’t like some forests. There were fewer birds in skimpy, stunted Dryagovets than in Golubovshchina, three versts* to the rear. Crows, ravens, kites flocked there to batten on the leavings of war (mice and rats poured in too), but song thrushes flew by and the white storks, guardians of happiness, had left their posts on the high roofs. The peasants, though, said that it was always the same even before the war: birds didn’t like Dryagovets, but did like Golubovshchina. An old coach road from Catherine’s time ran through the soggy patch between the two woods. There, war or no war, the lapwings kept up their plaintive cry, and no other sound was heard.

  Golubovshchina was parkland, not dense forest: thick-trunked trees stood as if on parade; there was clean, sweet grass over the whole expanse. Even now, after a year close to the front line, it was populated by throngs of birds. And in May there was such cuckooing and gurgling and chirring and twittering and hooting and trilling that Sanya, a native of the southern steppes, felt weak at the knees, longing to sink onto the silky grass, and his chest swelled to take in not just air but the singing of birds.

  The ammunition belts tugging at his shoulders, and his bulky revolver, seemed all the heavier.

  All these birds, you might think, could have easily flown away from the whine of shells, the smoke of explosions, the waves of gas, gone another ten versts or so to the rear. But no! Heedless of man’s black and noisy war, although they were sometimes among its victims, many birds went on living in the places that were theirs of old, obedient only to the imperative within them, their own strict meridian.

  Golubovshchina belonged to a Polish landowner, but had been leased to a simple villager, whereas Dryagovets was a peasant wood. What exactly its name meant Sanya never discovered, but the very sound of it told you that here was something inferior, contemptible. And so it was, a sickly, scrawny wood that gladdened no one’s heart and was now, through no wish of their own, peopled from end to end by grenadiers—the rear services and reserves of the infantry, in among the limbers, horses, and dugouts of the artillery. Just behind Dryagovets stood the guns of the 1st Division, Grenadier Brigade.

  No dugout could have been roofed with the thin trunks of Dryagovets, and there would have been no wood left long ago but for a timely order to fell no more trees either there or in delectable Golubovshchina. Stout beams were brought on flatcars from the Russian heartland to serve as fortification, and put on wheels so that peasants, for three rubles a load, could haul them a few steps at a time in the dead of night, with German rockets overhead, right up to the front line. (The peasants had left villages farther forward, but were still living and seeding their fields at Staiki and Yushkevichi. The Germans shelled the open fields, but did not aim at the peasants working them.)

  Sanya had spent the past year, almost the whole of his war, in these surroundings, the few square versts within his field of vision. His battery had been standing to the rear of Dryagovets since the previous September, and Sanya had always taken the same path to what used to be their observation post: first through Dryagovets, which was teeming with soldiers, then, in full view of the enemy, along the old highroad, where troops broke formation and vehicles passed one at a time; from the still undamaged wooden cross with a wire mesh shielding the figure of the Saviour, he bore left and walked a verst and a half, humiliatingly doubled up, along a communication trench, bumping into people coming the other way, and stumbling over earthfalls until he came to the infantry trenches, narrow slits in the marshy ground. Taking this path from day to day, squelching through the mud in spring and autumn, sometimes over your boots in trench water, you might wonder, if you did not already know, how anyone could have let it come to this: retreat to the worst possible positions
and allow the Germans to cross the Szara, occupy the Torczyc Heights, and convert the manor house on the hill at Michalowo into a fortress.

  But Sanya had seen something of last August in the Grenadier Brigade and remembered the last stage of that terrible retreat: flattened by raking artillery fire, or sometimes by poison gas, they had huddled all day in sketchy trenches, under pounding bombardments, with no shells of their own, and retreated by night, never catching sight of the enemy infantry, which had no need to do anything. With no shells, and having to count every rifle bullet, they had rolled and staggered back beyond Baranowicze to Stolpce and might have gone on to Minsk, when suddenly they discovered that the Germans were no longer pinching their behinds. They turned and stood, stood fast. Then, from month to month, watched and fired upon by the enemy, the whole Grenadier Corps laboriously and with great losses, crawled back, again “advanced to the closest proximity,” tediously digging their way forward to occupy two and a half versts of wilderness abandoned by the Germans as useless.

  It is hard to see how anyone could come to love these versts of humiliation, sweat, and death. But strangely, during the year he had spent there, the place had become as poignantly dear to Sasha as his homeland and he had come to know every bush, every hummock, every field path there as well as those around his native Sablya. Nearby, Sasha discovered, was Mickiewicz’s true homeland—to the right, toward Lake Koldyczew—and it would have been strange if the poet had not loved the scene of his childhood games and youthful dreams. But are not the places where you spend your turbulent years closest of all to your heart? They stand out against the whole world’s expanses as though caught by lightning; they witness not your unthinking and unheeding birth, but the deeds you do surprised by manhood, and, perhaps—today? tomorrow?—your death. As you tramp about your business through the rustling grass, you may be walking past the cross that will say you are dead, past your future grave.