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Ogaret,,'s Arrest
'Taken? What do you mean?' I asked, jumping out of bed and feeling my head to make sure that I was awake.
'The politsmeyster came in the night with the district policeman and Cossacks, about two hours after you left, seized all the papers and took Nikolay Platonovich away.'
It was Ogarev's valet speaking. I could not imagine what pretext the police had invented : of late everything had been quiet. Ogarev had arrived only a day or two before . . . and why had they taken him and not me?
It was impossible to fold my arms and do nothing; I dressed and went out of the house with no definite purpose. This -.,vas the first misfortune that had befallen me. I felt dreadfuclass="underline" I was tortured by my impotence.
As I wandered about the streets I thought, at last, of one friend whose social position made it possible for him to find out what was the matter and, perhaps, to help. He l ived terribly far away, in a summer villa beyond the Vorontsov Field; I got into the first cab I came across and galloped off to him. It was before seven in the morning.
I had made the acquaintance of --1 about eighteen months before; in his way he was a lion in Moscow. He had been educated in Paris, was wealthy, intelligent, cultured, witty, freethinking, had been in the Peter-Paul fortress over the affair of the Fourteenth of December and was among those set free; he had had no experience of exile, but the glory of the affair clung to him. He was in the government service and had great influence with the Governor-General, Prince Golitsyn, who was fond of men of a liberal way of thinking, particularly if they expressed their views fluently in French. The prince was not strong in Russian.
V-- was ten years older than we "\Vere, and surprised us by his practical remarks, his knowledge of political affairs, his French eloquence and the ardour of his Liberalism. He knew so much and in such detail, talked so pleasantly and so easily; his opinions were so firmly traced ; he had answers, good advice, I V. P. Zubkov. (A.S.)
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solutions for everything. He read everything, new novds, treatises, magazines, and poetry, was moreover a devoted student of zoology, wrote out schemes of reform for Prince Golitsyn and drew up plans for children's books.
His Liberalism was of the purest, trebly-distilled essence, of the left wing.
His study \vas hung \vith portraits of all the revolutionary celebrities. A whole library of prohibited books was to be found under this revolutionary ikonostasis. A skeleton, a few stuffed birds, some dried amphibians and entrails preser-ved in spirit, gave a serious tone of study and reflection to the too inflammatory character of the room.
We used to regard with envy his experience and knowledge of men; his delicate, ironical manner of arguing had a great influence on us. We looked upon him as a capable revolutionary, as a statesman in spe.
I did not find V-- at home: he had gone to to\vn overnight for an interview with Prince Golitsyn. His valet told me he would certainly be home within an hour and a half. I waited.
V--'s summer villa was a splendid one. The study in \vhich I sat waiting was a lofty, spacious room on the ground floor, and an immense door led to the verandah and into the garden. It was a hot day; the fragrance of trees and flowers came in from the garden and children were playing in front of the house with ringing laughter. vVealth, abundance, space, sunshine and shadO\v, flowers and greenery . . . while in prison it is cramped, stifling, dark. I do not know how long I had been sitting there absorbed in bitter thoughts, when suddenly the valet called me from the verandah with a peculiar animation.
'What is it?' I inquired.
'Oh, please, come here and look.'
I went out to the verandah, not to wound him by a refusal, and stood petrified. A \vhole semi-circle of houses were blazing, as though they had caught fire at the same moment. The fire was spreading with incredible rapidity.
I remained on the verandah; the valet gazed with a sort of nervous pleasure at the fire, saying:
'It's going splendidly. Look, that house on the right will catch fire ' l t will certainly catch ! '
A fire has some-thing revolutionary about i t ; i t laughs at property and levels ranks. The valet understood that instinctively.
Half an hour later half the horizon was covered with smoke,
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red below and greyish-black above. That day Lefortovo vo:as burned down. This was the beginning of a series of cases of incendiarism, which went on for five months; we shall speak of them again.
At last V-- arrived. He was in high spirits, pleasant and cordial; he told me about the fire by which he had driven and about the general belief that it was a case of arson, and added, half in jest:
'It's Pugachevshchina. You look: you and I won't escape; they'll stick us on a stake.'
'Before they put us on a stake,' I answered, 'I am afraid they will put us on a chain. Do you know that last night the police arrested Ogarev?'
'The police-what are you saying?'
'That's what I have come to you about. Something must be done; go to Prince Golitsyn, find out what it's about and ask permission for me to see him.'
Receiving no answer, I glanced at V.--, but where he had been it seemed as though an elder brother of his were sitting with a yellowish face and sunken features; he was groaning and greatly alarmed.
'What's the matter?'
'There, I told you ; I always said what it would lead to . . . .
Yes, yes, we ought to have expected it. There it is. I am not to blame in thought or in act but very likely they will put me in prison too, and that is no joking rna tter; I know what a fortress is like.'
'Will you go to the prince?'
'Goodness gracious me, whatever for? I advise you as a friend, don't even speak of Ogarev; keep as quiet as you can, or it will be the worse for you. You don't know how dangerous these things are ; my sincere advice is, keep out of it; do your utmost and you won't help Ogarev, but you will ruin yourself. That's what autocracy means-no rights, no defence; are the lawyers and judges any use?'
On this occasion I was not disposed to listen to his bold opinions and cutting criticisms. I took my hat and went away.
At home I found everything in a turmoil. Already my father was angry with me on account of Ogarev's arrest. Already the Senator was on the spot, rummaging among my books, taking away what he thought dangerous, and in a very bad humour.
On the table I found a note from M. F. Orlov inviting me to dinner. Could he not do something ior us? I was beginning to be
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discouraged by experience: still, there was no harm in trying and the worst I could get was a refusal.
Mikhail Fedorovich Orlov \vas one of the founders of the celebrated League of Welfare,2 and that he had not found himself in Siberia was not his own fault, but was due to his brother, who enjoyed the special friendship of Nicholas and had been the first to gallop with his Horse Guards to the defence of the Winter Palace on December the Fourteenth. Orlov was sent to his estate in the country, and a few years later was allowed to live in Moscow. During his solitary life in the country he studied political economy and chemistry. The first time I met him he talked of his new system of nomenclature on chemistry. All energetic people who begin studying a science late in life show an inclination to move the furniture about and rearrange it to suit themselves. His nomenclature was more complicated than the generally accepted French system. I wanted to attract his attention, and by way of captatio bcncvolentiae began to try to prove to him that his system was good, but the old one was better.