For now the door opened and a new figure appeared. It was Yevgeny Popov.
Young Alexander Bobrov had found himself standing beside Vladimir at the moment when Popov entered and, for once, he heard even the perfectly controlled industrialist gasp with surprise.
‘Well I’m damned!’ He glanced down at Alexander. ‘It’s the fellow we saw during the strike.’
It was indeed. The red-headed man they had called Ivanov. ‘Will you throw him out?’ Alexander whispered.
‘No.’ The industrialist smiled. ‘Don’t you remember, my friend, I wanted to talk to him then; and now here he is. Life is wonderful indeed.’ And with outstretched hand he strode across the room to where the revolutionary was standing, and smiled. ‘Welcome.’
But if this action took the youth by surprise, it was nothing to his horror when, a moment later, the red-head walked over to his father, embraced him warmly, and then, when Mrs Suvorin asked in confusion: ‘You two know each other?’ replied calmly, ‘Oh, yes. We go back together a long way.’
His father was a friend of this creature. It seemed to Alexander that there was no limit to Nicolai’s foolishness and disloyalty.
The little group which gathered around Popov eyed him with curiosity. Nicolai in particular, seeing his old acquaintance in this strange new setting, looked on with some amusement, while Mrs Suvorin, gazing at his calm, rather detached expression and comparing him with her Marxist brother-in-law, quickly came to the conclusion: This is a very different sort of man. He recognizes no barriers.
‘You wanted a Bolshevik,’ Peter said to her wryly. ‘Here he is.’
And Mrs Suvorin smiled.
‘You are welcome indeed,’ she said. Which was certainly true. For, excellent though the company always was at her house, Mrs Suvorin knew that recently she had been missing out on something: the true revolutionaries.
In a later age it would be called radical chic, this fashion amongst some of the privileged classes of inviting revolutionaries to their home, and even making contributions to their cause. A few industrialists, convinced that the Tsar was on a road to catastrophe, may have courted the revolutionaries as a kind of insurance policy against the future. But others of the rich and idle certainly did so only because they thought it amusing, or smart, or perhaps to receive a little frisson from the knowledge that they were playing with fire. Mrs Suvorin had always eschewed these activities before, but recently she had feared that, without an occasional revolutionary, her salons might begin to look a trifle dowdy. She needed Popov, therefore: he completed her arrangements.
And, it had to be said, he made himself rather agreeable. It was evident at once that he was well-informed. He had recently returned from the Socialists’ latest congress, held in Stockholm; and while he was obviously careful about what he said, he seemed quite willing to answer questions. To Mrs Suvorin’s enquiry about the Bolsheviks, he was very straightforward.
‘The difference between the Bolsheviks and the rest of the Social Democrats – the Mensheviks as we call them – is not that large. We all want a Socialist society; we all follow Marx; but there are disputes about tactics.’ He smiled at Peter Suvorin. ‘And sometimes personalities.’ He reeled off the names of some of the Menshevik leaders: young Trotsky, Rosa Luxemburg in Poland, various others. ‘But it’s the Bolshevik leader who really makes the split, though.’ He grinned. ‘That’s my friend Lenin. He never compromises about anything.’
‘And who is he, this Lenin?’ Nicolai Bobrov asked. ‘I don’t know a thing about him.’
‘Oh, but you do,’ Popov smiled. ‘For you’ve already met him – fifteen years ago, on a train. Remember?’
‘The lawyer? The Chuvash lawyer with an estate by the Volga?’
‘One and the same. He’s been living in exile most of the time. He’s in hiding now, because the authorities don’t seem to like him. But he’s the man behind the Bolsheviks.’
‘And what does he want? What makes him different?’
‘He writes carelessly,’ Popov replies, ‘but the key to Lenin lies in his book. That’s his manifesto.’ And he told them a little about it.
This all-important work had been written only four years before, and smuggled into Russia from Germany; but already, for most revolutionaries, it had become a bible. Choosing the same title as the little novel which had so inspired the previous generation of radicals, he had called it What Is To Be Done. It was not so much a political tract as an instruction manual – on how to make a revolution. ‘Marxism tells us the old order will collapse,’ Popov smiled. ‘Lenin tells us how to give it a push.’ And then carefully: ‘Roughly speaking, our Menshevik friends want to wait until the masses are ready to create the Socialist order of a new and just society. We Bolsheviks are sceptical. We think that a small and highly organized cadre is needed to push for the great change in society. It’s only tactics: but we believe the masses will need leading, that’s all.’
‘Some of us think,’ Peter Suvorin observed, ‘that Lenin regards the workers as nothing more than cannon fodder.’
To his surprise, however, Popov nodded. ‘It’s probably true,’ he replied. Then, smiling again: ‘That’s part of his greatness.’
For a moment or two the little group was silent, digesting what Popov had said. Then Nicolai Bobrov slowly spoke.
‘I can see your point about the masses needing leaders, and you may be right. But isn’t there a danger of such a group becoming too powerful – a sort of dictatorship?’
And to his surprise also, his Bolshevik friend was extremely frank. ‘Yes. It is a danger, in theory. But remember, Nicolai Mikhailovich, that the political objective we seek is not that far from yours. The only way forward for Russia, the only way to Socialism, is through the people – through democracy.’ He paused. ‘Whatever else, always remember this: all Socialists, including the Bolshevik faction, are trying to reach the same thing: a democratically elected body – one man, one vote – with sovereign power. We don’t want to overthrow the Tsar to put another tyrant in his place. We want a Constituent Assembly, just as you do. Democracy will lead to Socialism; but democracy is the all-important means.’
It was said with great seriousness and great conviction. And all who heard him believed.
Or so it seemed, until young Alexander Bobrov broke his silence.
He had been standing beside Vladimir Suvorin all this time, watching Popov carefully. True, he had been listening as well, but for Alexander it was not a question of argument. The red-headed Bolshevik was his enemy. He knew that in his bones. His enemy unto death. For the youth, therefore, it was only a question of observing the object of his hatred so that he might know him better.
And now the revolutionary’s words had infuriated him: not because of what had been said but because, Alexander could see, the hearers had been impressed. Are they all going to be as stupid as my father? he wondered. And he had a burning urge to expose Popov, to throw down the gauntlet, and to humiliate him.
‘I’ve heard that all the leading revolutionaries are yids,’ he said, softly but distinctly. ‘Is it true?’