I did so and he went over the two tunics, the trousers, and the cap carefully. He was looking for something. I asked what.
'Making sure there are no rank badges, no stripes, no braid.' he said. 'Here, they're all right. You can take them.' He directed me back to the Kavalersky Building, where I collected my own suitcase and was told I had been allocated a bed for the night in the guard barracks. At mess I was given borsht and a kind of solyanka, which should be made with fine beef steak but was not. It was also cooked without wine, but I have had worse in RN wardrooms often enough, so all I had to complain of was that my bed had neither sheets nor blankets and that because of the cold I must perforce sleep in my clothes. I fell asleep thinking of Vassily Yakovlev, the name that Sverdlov had told me to remember. Who, I wondered, could he be?
I woke uncomfortable. Sleeping in day clothes is a habit perforce to be acquired in service at sea in time of war; so too is the hasty eating of half-prepared food. There was no way to wash more than face and hands, and that only in bitterly cold water. Breakfast was rough bread and a sliver of cheese washed down by sadly weak tea without lemon. We in Britain had heard much of the discomforts of the new Russia and it occurred to me then that discomforts is what they were. Certainly not hardships. All the same, as I made my way to the Kavalersky and my morning appointment with the Head of the Soviet State, I felt far from fresh, less than clear-headed, and in truth somewhat dull of mind. I knew in general what might lie before me. The envelope containing Mr Basil Zaharoff s document lay safe in my travel case, and I had known from the beginning, of course, that it was Zaharoff's intention that I be sent to the Tsar. It seemed also, from the previous day's events, that I was indeed to be sent east. But that morning, with my creased clothes sticking to my unwashed body, it was difficult to care. I presented myself ten minutes early, was kept waiting for fifteen and then was shown in to Sverdlov, who was breakfasting at his desk.
'I have been here since six,' he told me. 'It is the best of disciplines to wait for food.' He was peeling a hard-boiled egg as he spoke, and when it was done, inserted it whole in to his mouth. Accordingly further conversation was postponed for several moments. Then he said, 'The name - you remember the name?'
'Yakovlev,' I said. 'Vassily Vassilievitch Yakovlev.'
'Good, good.' He opened a drawer in his desk and extracted a large envelope of yellowish-brown paper. This he placed at the edge of the desk, close to where I stood. 'Open it.'
I took it up, and lifted back the flap. Naturally enough, the envelope contained papers, the first of which bore a photograph and a seal. I took it out. It was a combined laissez-passer and identity document. The photograph was of my own face, and could only be the one taken on the previous day. The paper bore the name Yakovlev, Vassily.
I looked at Sverdlov. 'I am to be Russian, then?'
He was busy with another egg.
'It is safer. Read while I eat. A man works up an appetite at a desk.'
The laissez-passer held further and surprising news. I was, it seemed, to be no ordinary Yakovlev, but Commissar Yakovlev! My eye travelled down the lines, making further discoveries as it went. I was on a mission of great importance for the Soviet Central Executive Committee, whose seal, in black wax, decorated the bottom of the paper, and whose chairman, Sverdlov himself, had signed it. I held in my hand a paper issued by the most powerful men in Russia demanding that my every requirement be met by whomever I encountered.
But there was more even than that. There was the threat - no, it was more than a threat - it was a plain statement: that summary execution awaited those who defied the wishes of Commissar Yakovlev!
I must have looked as astonished as I felt, for when I raised my eyes, Sverdlov was regarding me sardonically. 'We must hope that it works,' he said.
'I beg your pardon?'
'You are going to Tyumen, to Tobolsk,' he said. 'And both are a long way from this desk and from the Kremlin.'
'But surely, with such orders -?'
He raised a hand, amused. 'You think that suddenly the word of Comrade Lenin is law from the Ukraine to the Pacific? My friend, it all takes time. The regional soviets are made up of men who have never governed, who have spent their lives in secret activity and in fear of their lives. They are in the open now, but the old instincts remain. They fear and distrust the ruler in the distance, even when it is Comrade Lenin himself. They will govern the Urals, Georgia, the Ukraine.' He gave a low, rumbling laugh. 'Oh, they will listen. Or anyway they will say they are listening. Oh yes, Comrade Sverdlov, well naturally. .
.oh yes, they say it all the time. When they are here. But let them get off the train and it's a different matter. In their own territories they are independent and mean to stay so. Word from Moscow will be considered, sometimes it will be accepted, but sometimes the order is destroyed and the messenger with it. You'll be in danger, Englishman, whatever papers you carry. Be in no doubt of it.'
I nodded. To be in danger would be no great novelty after three years of war.
'What am I to do?'
He considered me for a moment. 'What is your relationship to Zaharoff?'
'None, sir. I am a messenger only.'
He gave a little snort of disbelief. 'That fellow would not send anyone but his own man.'
I protested. 'I am a serving officer, sir. I have been three years with the Grand Fleet. A month ago I was patrolling the Heligoland Bight on coastal bombardment. I met Mr Zaharoff only on the night I left London!'
Sverdlov waved an arm dismissively. 'It doesn't even matter. You are Yakovlev now, and Zaharoff too is far away. The matter is simple. You must have understood at yesterday's meeting that you had brought with you his promise of arms. The price is Nicholas Romanov and his family.'
I nodded; it was likely enough.
'But-' Yankel Sverdlov wagged a finger. 'There is more. Nicholas Romanov himself will pay for the arms. He has a hidden fortune in London. He releases the money to Zaharoff, Zaharoff releases arms to us, we release Nicholas Romanov and his family to his cousin, the English King. The former Tsar must sign your paper, so you must reach him at Tobolsk. And there are people in that region, members of the Soviet at Ekaterinburg, for instance, who would want only to stop you. They want Romanov dead. They think it matters that an ex-Tsar lives on. It doesn't. Nicholas Romanov counts for nothing. Except -' and Sverdlov produced again that sardonic smile - 'in so far as he can be useful. That is why he lives.' He lit a cigarette and glared at me for a moment. 'He lives and you live. But it would take very little to change that. Be very careful.' Then he gave me a sudden grin full of genial cunning. 'And give an increase in pay to the guards at Tobolsk, eh!'
And then, abruptly, his attention had switched to other things upon his desk. The interview was clearly at an end, and I was left standing with my papers. I bowed and withdrew and in the outer office stood in a corner and gave my own attention to the other papers in the envelope. They gave specific instructions to certain officials of the Trans-Siberian Railway; they gave me my command; they conferred upon me all the power and authority necessary to this strange mission of mine. When I had read them, nothing remained to be done except to depart. There was no car, no arranged transport, not even, I was told, the possibility of summoning a taxi.