FINLAND
Stáraya Derévnya, which means “the Old Village,” is a remote suburb of
Petrograd, situated at the mouth of the most northerly branch of the
River Neva, overlooking the Gulf of Finland. It is a poor and shabby
locality, consisting of second-rate summer villas and a few small
timber-yards and logmen’s huts. In winter when the gulf is frozen it
is the bleakest of bleak places, swept by winds carrying the snow in
the blizzard-like clouds across the dreary desert of ice. You cannot
tell then where land ends and seas begins, for the flats, the shores,
the marshes, and the sea lie hidden under a common blanket of soft and
sand-like snowdrifts. In olden times I loved to don my skis and glide
gently from the world into that vast expanse of frozen water, and
there, miles out, lie down and listen to the silence.
A few days after I had parted from Stepanovna in the Kazan Cathedral,
I sat in one of the smallest and remotest huts of Stáraya Derévnya.
It was eleven o’clock of a dark and windless night. Except for the
champing of a horse outside, the silence was broken only by the
grunting and snoring of a Finnish contrabandist lying at full length on
the dirty couch. Once, when the horse neighed, the Finn rose hurriedly
with a curse. Lifting the latch cautiously, he stole out and led the
animal round to the seaward side of the cottage, where it would be
less audible from the road. Having recently smuggled a sleigh-load of
butter into the city, he was now returning to Finland--with me.
It was after midnight when we drove out, and, conditions being good,
the drive over the sea to a point well along the Finnish coast, a
distance of some forty-odd miles, was to take us between four and five
hours. The sledge was of the type known as _drovny_, a wooden one,
broad and low, filled with hay. The _drovny_, used mostly for farm
haulage, is my favourite kind of sledge, and nestling comfortably
at full length under the hay I thought of long night-drives in the
interior in days gone by, when someone used to ride ahead on horseback
with a torch to keep away the wolves.
In a moment we were out, flying at breakneck speed across the ice,
windswept after recent storms. The half-inch of frozen snow just gave
grip to the horse’s hoofs. Twice, suddenly bumping into snow ridges, we
capsized completely. When we got going again the runners sang just like
a saw-mill. The driver noticed this too, and was alive to the danger
of being heard from shore a couple of miles away; but his sturdy pony,
exhilarated by the keen frosty air, was hard to restrain.
Some miles out of Petrograd there lies on an island in the Finnish Gulf
the famous fortress of Cronstadt, one of the most impregnable in the
world. Search-lights from the fortress played from time to time across
the belt of ice, separating the fortress from the northern shore. The
passage through this narrow belt was the crucial point in our journey.
Once past Cronstadt we should be in Finnish waters and safe.
To avoid danger from the searchlights, the Finn drove within a mile
of the mainland, the runners hissing and singing like saws. As we
entered the narrows a dazzling beam of light swept the horizon from
the fortress, catching us momentarily in its track; but we were
sufficiently near the shore not to appear as a black speck adrift on
the ice.
_Too_ near, perhaps? The dark line of the woods seemed but a stone’s
throw away! You could almost see the individual trees. Hell! what a
noise our sledge-runners made!
“Can’t you keep the horse back a bit, man?”
“Yes, but this is the spot we’ve _got_ to drive past quickly!”
We were crossing the line of Lissy Nos, a jutting point on the coast
marking the narrowest part of the strait. Again a beam of light shot
out from the fortress, and the wooden pier and huts of Lissy Nos were
lit as by a flash of lightning. But we had passed the point already. It
was rapidly receding into the darkness as we regained the open sea.
Sitting upright on the heap of hay, I kept my eyes riveted on the
receding promontory. We were nearly a mile away now, and you could no
longer distinguish objects clearly. But my eyes were still riveted on
the rocky promontory.
Were those rocks--moving? I tried to pierce the darkness, my eyes
rooted to the black point!
Rocks? Trees? Or--or----
I sprang to my feet and shook the Finn by the shoulders with all my
force.
“Damn it, man! Drive like hell--we’re being pursued!”
Riding out from Lissy Nos was a group of horse-men, five or six in
number. My driver gave a moan, lashed his horse, the sleigh leapt
forward, and the chase began in earnest.
“Ten thousand marks if we escape!” I yelled in the Finn’s ear.
For a time we kept a good lead, but in the darkness it was impossible
to see whether we were gaining or losing. My driver was making low
moaning cries, he appeared to be pulling hard on the reins, and the
sleigh jerked so that I could scarcely stand.
Then I saw that the pursuers were gaining--and gaining rapidly! The
moving dots grew into figures galloping at full speed. Suddenly there
was a flash and a crack, then another, and another. They were firing
with carbines, against which a pistol was useless. I threatened the
driver with my revolver if he did not pull ahead, but dropped like a
stone into the hay as a bullet whizzed close to my ear.
At that moment the sledge suddenly swung round. The driver had clearly
had difficulty with his reins, which appeared to have got caught in the
shaft, and before I realized what was happening the horse fell, the
sledge whirled round and came to a sudden stop.
At such moments one has to think rapidly. What would the pursuing Red
guards go for first, a fugitive? Not if there was possible loot. And
what more likely than that the sledge contained loot?
Eel-like, I slithered over the side and made in the direction of the
shore. Progress was difficult, for there were big patches of ice,
coal-black in colour, which were completely windswept and as slippery
as glass. Stumbling along, I drew from my pocket a packet, wrapped in
dark brown paper, containing maps and documents which were sufficient,
if discovered, to assure my being shot without further ado, and held it
ready to hurl away across the ice.
If seized, I would plead smuggling. It seemed impossible that I should
escape! Looking backward I saw the group round the sledge. The Reds,
dismounted, were examining the driver; in a moment they would renew
the pursuit, and I should be spotted at once, running over the ice.
Then an idea occurred.
The ice, where completely windswept, formed great patches as black as
ink. My clothes were dark. I ran into the middle of a big black patch
and looked at my boots. I could not see them!
To get to the shore was impossible, anyway, so this was the only
chance. Jerking the packet a few yards from me where I might easily
find it, I dropped flat on the black ice and lay motionless, praying
that I should be invisible.
It was not long before I heard the sound of hoofs and voices
approaching. The search for me had begun. But the riders avoided the
slippery windswept places as studiously as I had done in running, and,
thank heaven! just there much of the ice was windswept. As they rode
round and about, I felt that someone was bound to ride just over me!
Yet they didn’t, after all.
It seemed hours and days of night and darkness before the riders
retreated to the sledge and rode off with it, returning whence they had
come. But time is measured not by degrees of hope or despair, but by
fleeting seconds and minutes, and by my luminous watch I detected that
it was only half-past one. Prosaic half-past one!
Was the sombre expanse of frozen sea really deserted? Cronstadt loomed
dimly on the horizon, the dark line of woods lay behind me, and all was
still as death--except for the sea below, groaning and gurgling as if
the great ice-burden were too heavy to bear.
Slowly and imperceptibly I rose, first on all fours, then kneeling, and
finally standing upright. The riders and the sledge were gone, and I
was alone. Only the stars twinkled, as much as to say: “It’s all over!
’Twas a narrow squeak, wasn’t it? but a miss is as good as a mile!”
It must have been a weird, bedraggled figure that stumbled, seven or
eight hours later, up the steep bank of the Finnish shore. That long
walk across the ice was one of the hardest I ever had to make, slipping
and falling at almost every step until I got used to the surface.
On reaching light, snow-covered regions, however, I walked rapidly
and made good progress. Once while I was resting I heard footsteps
approaching straight in my direction. Crawling into the middle of
another black patch, I repeated the manœuvre of an hour or two earlier,
and lay still. A man, walking hurriedly toward Cronstadt from the
direction of Finland, passed within half-a-dozen paces without seeing
me.
Shortly after daylight, utterly exhausted, I clambered up the steep
shore into the woods. Until I saw a Finnish sign-board I was still
uncertain as to whether I had passed the frontier in the night or
not. But, convincing myself that I had, though doubtful of my precise
whereabouts, I sought a quiet spot behind a shed, threw myself on to
the soft snow, and fell into a doze.
It was here that I was discovered by a couple of Finnish patrols, who
promptly arrested me and marched me off to the nearest coastguard
station. No amount of protestation availed to convince them I was not
a Bolshevist spy. The assertion that I was an Englishman only seemed
to intensify their suspicions, for my appearance completely belied the
statement. Seizing all my money and papers, they locked me up in a
cell, but removed me during the day to the office of the Commandant at
Terijoki, some miles distant.
The Commandant, whom I had seen on the occasion of my last visit
to Finland, would, I expected, release me at once. But I found a
condition of things totally different from that obtaining six weeks
earlier. A new commandant had been appointed, who was unpersuaded
even by a telephone conversation conducted in his presence with the
British representatives at the Finnish capital. The most he would do
was to give me a temporary pass saying I was a Russian travelling to
Helsingfors: with the result that I was re-arrested on the train and
again held in detention at the head police office in the capital until
energetic representations by the British Chargé d’Affaires secured my
release, with profuse apologies from the Finnish authorities for the
not unnatural misunderstanding.
The reader will, I hope, have become sufficiently interested in my
story to inquire what were the circumstances which led to my taking
this sudden journey to Finland. They were various. Were I writing a
tale of fiction, and could allow free rein to whatsoever imagination
I possess, I might be tempted at this point to draw my story to a
startling climax by revealing Zorinsky in the light of a grossly
misunderstood and unappreciated friend and saviour, while Stepanovna,
the Journalist, or the Doctor would unexpectedly turn out to be
treacherous wolves in sheep’s clothing, plotting diabolically to
ensnare me in the toils of the Extraordinary Commission. As it is,
however, fettered by the necessity of recording dull and often obvious
events as they occurred, it will be no surprise to the reader to learn
that the wolf, in a pretty bad imitation of sheep’s clothing (good
enough, however, to deceive me), turned out actually to be Zorinsky.
It was the day after I had parted from Stepanovna that the Doctor told
me that Melnikoff’s friend Shura, through sources at his disposal, had
been investigating the personality of this interesting character, and
had established it as an indisputable fact that Zorinsky was in close
touch with people known to be in the employ of _No. 2 Goróhovaya_. This
information, though unconfirmed and in itself proving nothing (was not
the Policeman also in close touch with people in the employ of _No.
2 Goróhovaya_?), yet following on the news of Melnikoff’s death and
Zorinsky’s general duplicity, resolved me to seek the first opportunity
to revisit Finland and consult Ivan Sergeievitch.
There were other motives, also. I had communicated across the frontier
by means of couriers, one of whom was found me by the Doctor, and
another by one of the persons who play no part in my story, but whom
I met at the Journalist’s. One of these couriers was an N.C.O. of the
old army, a student of law, and a personal friend of the Doctor: the
other a Russian officer whose known counter-revolutionary proclivities
precluded the possibility of his obtaining any post in Soviet Russia
at this time. Both crossed the frontier secretly and without mishap,
but only one returned, bearing a cipher message which was all but
indecipherable. Sending him off again, but getting no reply, I was
in ignorance as to whether he had arrived or not, and, left without
news, it was becoming imperative that I repeat my visit to the Finnish
capital.
Furthermore, with passage of time I felt my position, in spite of
friends, becoming not more secure, but rapidly less so. What might
suddenly arise out of my connections with Zorinsky, for instance, no
one could foresee, and I determined that the best thing would be to
disappear completely for a short period and, returning, to start all
over afresh.
I learned of the ice-route to Finland from my courier, who came back
that way, and who returned to Finland the following night on the same
sledge. Discreet inquiries at the logman’s hut produced the information
that the courier’s smuggler, granted that he had safely reached
Finland, was not due back for some time, but another one had arrived
and would take any one who was willing to pay. The sum demanded, two
thousand marks, when converted into foreign exchange, was about twenty
pounds. But the Finn thinks of a mark as a shilling.
As ill-luck would have it, I found on arrival in Finland that Ivan
Sergeievitch was in the Baltic States and no one knew when he would
return. But I saw his wife, who had sent the indiscreet message to
Petrograd leading to Varia’s arrest. She was mortified when I broke
this news to her, but was unable to throw any light on Zorinsky. I
also met several other Russian officers, none, however, who had known
Melnikoff, and I thus got no further information.
The Doctor, of course, had denounced Zorinsky as a _provocateur_,
but there was as yet little evidence for that charge. Zorinsky might
be an extortionist without being a _provocateur_. Wild charges are
brought against anybody and everybody connected with _Sovdepia_ on the
slightest suspicion, and I myself have been charged, on the one hand,
by the Bolsheviks with being a rabid monarchist, and, on the other, by
reactionaries with being a “subtle” Bolshevik. However, my aversion to
Zorinsky had become so intense that I resolved that under no pretext
or condition would I have anything more to do with him.
My time in Helsingfors was occupied mostly with endeavours to obtain
official assurances that any couriers I despatched from Russia would
not be seized or shot by the Finns, and that reasonable assistance
should be given them in crossing the frontier in either direction. The
Finnish Foreign and War Offices were willing enough to co-operate, but
appeared to have but little sway over their own frontier authorities.
The last word belonged to the new Commandant at Terijoki, a man of
German origin, who defied the Government whenever instructions ran
counter to his open German sympathies. Being in league with German
Intelligence organizations in Russia, he was naturally disinclined to
do anything that would assist the Allies, and it was only when his
insubordination passed all limits and he was at last dismissed by the
Finnish Government that facilities could be granted which made the
operation of a secret courier service across the frontier in any degree
feasible.
The story of intrigue and counter-intrigue amongst Finns, Germans,
Russians, Bolsheviks, and the Allies at this time, both in the Finnish
capital and along the Russian frontier, would be a fascinating one in
itself, but that is not my province. On the occasion of my brief visits
to Finland my prime object was not to become involved, and this was
the main reason why, depressing though the prospect of returning to
Petrograd was under existing circumstances, I nevertheless cut short my
stay in Finland and prepared to return the moment I learned positively
that the German frontier commandant was to be removed.
Earnestly as I had striven to remain _incognito_, my unavoidable
participation in the negotiations for arranging a courier-service had
drawn me into unfortunate prominence. The German Commandant, still
at his post, appeared to regard me as his very particular foe, and
learning of my intention to return to Russia by sea he issued orders
that the strictest watch should be kept on the coast and any sledge or
persons issuing on to the ice be fired upon. Thus, although I had a
Government permit to cross the frontier, the smuggler who was to carry
me positively refused to venture on the journey, while all patrols had
orders to afford me no facilities whatsoever.
But I evaded the Commandant very simply. At the other extremity of
the Russo-Finnish frontier, close to Lake Ladoga, there is a small
village named Rautta, lying four or five miles from the frontier line.
This place had formerly also been a rallying point for smugglers and
refugees, but in view of its remoteness and the difficulties of forest
travel it was very inaccessible in mid-winter from the Russian side.
At the Commandant’s headquarters it was never suspected that I would
attempt to start from this remote spot. But protesting, much to the
Commandant’s delight, that I would return and compel him to submit
to Government orders, I travelled by a very circuitous route to the
village of Rautta, where I was completely unknown, and where I relied
on finding some peasant or other who would conduct me to the border.
Once arrived at the frontier I was content to be left to my own
resources.
Luck was with me. It was in the later stages of the tedious journey
that I was accosted in the train by a young Finnish lieutenant bound
for the same place. Russians being in ill-favour in Finland, I always
travelled as an Englishman in that country, whatever I may have looked
like. At this time I did not look so bad, attired in an old green
overcoat I had bought at Helsingfors. Noticing that I was reading
an English paper, the lieutenant addressed me in English with some
trifling request, and we fell into conversation. I was able to do
him a slight service through a note I gave him to an acquaintance in
Helsingfors, and when I further presented him with all my newspapers
and a couple of English books for which I had no further use, he was
more than delighted. Finding him so well-disposed I asked him what he
was going to do at Rautta, to which he replied that he was about to
take up his duties as chief of the garrison of the village, numbering
some fifteen or twenty men. At this I whipped out my Finnish Government
permit without further ado and appealed to the lieutenant to afford
me, as the document said, “every assistance in crossing the Russian
frontier.”
He was not a little nonplussed at this unexpected request. But
realizing that a pass such as mine could only have been issued by the
Finnish Ministry of War on business of first-class importance he agreed
to do what he could. I soon saw that he was much concerned to do his
utmost. Within a couple of hours after our arrival at Rautta I was
assured not only of a safe conduct by night to the frontier, but also
of a guide, who was instructed to take me to a certain Russian village
about twenty miles beyond.
Nothing could be more truly proletarian than Finnish administration in
regions where neither German nor _ancien-régime_ Russian influence has
penetrated. It is the fundamentally democratic character of the Finnish
people that has enabled them since the time of which I speak to master
in a large measure their foreign would-be counsellors and controllers
and build up a model constitution. The elder of the village of Rautta,
who was directed by my friend the lieutenant to show me hospitality
and procure me a guide, was a rough peasant, literate and intelligent,
living with his wife in a single large room in which I was entertained.
His assistants were men of the same type, while the guide was a
young fellow of about twenty, a native of the village, who had had a
good elementary education at Viborg. In the hands of people of this
sort I always felt myself secure. Their shrewd common sense--the
strongest defence against nonsensical Red propaganda--made them as a
class trustier friends than a spoilt intelligentsia or the scheming
_intrigants_ of the militarist caste.
My guide produced half-a-dozen pairs of skis, all of which were too
short, as I require a nine- or ten-foot ski, but I took the longest
pair. About eleven o’clock our skis were strapped to a _drovny_ sledge,
and with a kindly send-off by the elder and his wife, we drove rapidly
to a lonely hut, the last habitation on the Finnish side of the
frontier. The proprietor was roused and regaled us with tea, while a
scout, who chanced to come in a few moments after our arrival, advised
my guide as to the latest known movements of Red patrols. Our peasant
host possessed no candles or oil in this solitary abode, and we sat in
the flickering light of long burning twigs, specially cut to preserve
their shaky flare as long as possible.
About midnight we mounted the skis and set out on our journey, striking
off the track straight into the forest. My companion was lightly clad,
but I retained my overcoat, which I should need badly later, while
round my waist I tied a little parcel containing a pair of shoes I had
bought in Helsingfors for Maria.
By the roundabout way we were going it would be some twenty-five miles
to the village that was our destination. For four years I had not run
on skis, and though ski-running is like swimming in that once you learn
you never forget, yet you can get out of practice. Moreover, the skis I
had were too short, and any ski-runner will tell you it is no joke to
run on short skis a zigzag route across uneven forest ground--and in
the dark!
We started in an easterly direction, moving parallel to the
border-line. I soon more or less adapted my stride to the narrow
seven-foot ski and managed to keep the guide’s moderate pace. We
stopped frequently to listen for suspicious sounds, but all that
greeted our ears was the mystic and beautiful winter silence of a
snow-laden northern forest. The temperature was twenty degrees below
zero, with not a breath of wind, and the pines and firs bearing their
luxuriant white burden looked as if a magic fairy wand had lulled them
into perpetual sleep. Some people might have “seen things” in this
dark forest domain, but peering into the dim recesses of the woods
I felt all sound and motion discordant, and loved our halts just to
listen, listen, listen. My guide was taciturn, if we spoke it was in
whispers, we moved noiselessly but for the gentle swish of our skis,
which scarcely broke the stillness, and the stars that danced above the
tree-tops smiled down upon us approvingly.
After travelling a little over an hour the Finn suddenly halted,
raising his hand. For some minutes we stood motionless. Then, leaving
his skis, he walked cautiously back to me and pointing at a group of
low bushes a hundred yards away, visible through a narrow aisle in
the forest, he whispered: “You see those farthest shrubs? They are in
Russia. We are about to cross the line, so follow me closely.”
Moving into the thickets, we advanced slowly under their cover until
we were within a few yards of the spot indicated. I then saw that
before us there lay, cutting through the forest, a narrow clearance
some ten yards wide, resembling a long avenue. This was the Russian
border-line, and we stood at the extreme edge of the Finnish forest. My
guide motioned to me to sidle up alongside him.
“It is to those bushes we must cross,” he whispered so low as to be
scarcely audible. “The undergrowth everywhere else is impassable. We
will watch the shrubbery a moment. The question is: Is there any one
behind it? Look hard.”
Weird phenomenon!--but a moment ago it seemed that motion in the forest
was inconceivable. Yet now, with nerves tense from anticipation, all
the trees and all the bushes seemed to stir and glide. But oh! so
slyly, so noiselessly, so imperceptibly! Every shrub knew just when
you were looking at it, and as long as you stared straight, it kept
still; but the instant you shifted your gaze, a bough swung--ever so
little!--a trunk swayed, a bush shrank, a thicket shivered, it was as
if behind everything there were something, agitating it, playing with
it, in order to taunt you with deceits!
But it was not really so. The forest was still with a death-like
stillness. The dark trees like sentinels stood marshalled in sombre
array on either side of the avenue. Around us, above, and below, all
was silence--the mystic, beautiful winter silence of the sleeping
northern forest.
Like a fish, my companion darted suddenly from our hiding-place,
bending low, and in two strides had crossed the open space and vanished
in the shrubbery. I followed, stealing one rapid glance up and down as
I crossed the line, to see nothing but two dark walls of trees on
either hand, separated by the grey carpet of snow. Another stride, and
I, too, was in Russia, buried in the thick shrubbery.
[Illustration: A RUSSIAN VILLAGE]
I found my guide sitting in the snow, adjusting his ski-straps.
“If we come upon nobody in the next quarter-mile,” he whispered, “we
are all right till daybreak.”
“But our ski-tracks?” I queried; “may they not be followed?”
“Nobody will follow the way we are going.”
The next quarter-mile lay along a rough track skirting the Russian side
of the frontier. Progress was difficult because the undergrowth was
thick and we had to stoop beneath overhanging branches. Every twenty
paces or so we stopped to listen--but only to the silence.
At last we came out on the borders of what seemed like a great lake.
My companion explained that it was a morass and that we should ski
straight across it, due south, making the best speed we might.
Travelling now was like finding a level path after hard rocky climbing.
My guide sailed away at so round a pace that although I used his tracks
I could not keep up. By the time I had crossed the open morass he had
already long disappeared in the woods. I noticed that although he had
said no one would follow us, he did not like the open places.
Again we plunged into the forest. The ground here began to undulate and
progress in and out amongst the short firs was wearisome. I began to
get so tired that I longed to stretch myself out at full length on the
snow. But we had to make our village by daybreak and my guide would not
rest.
It was after we had crossed another great morass and had been picking
our way through pathless forest for about four hours, that I saw by
the frequency with which my companion halted to consider the direction,
and the hesitation with which he chose our path, that he had lost his
way. When I asked him he frankly admitted it, making no effort to
conceal his anxiety. There was nothing to do, however, but to keep
straight ahead, due south by the pole star.
The first streaks of dawn stole gently over the sky. Coming out on to
an open track, my guide thought he recognized it, and we followed it in
spite of the danger of running into an early patrol. In a few moments
we struck off along a side track in an easterly direction. We should
soon reach our destination now, said the Finn--about a mile more.
I moved so slowly that my companion repeatedly got long distances
ahead. We travelled a mile, but still no sign of village or open
country. At length the Finn disappeared completely, and I struggled
forward along his tracks.
The grey dawn spread and brightened, and it was quite light, though the
sun had not yet risen, when at last I drew near the outskirts of the
forest. Sitting on the bank of a small running stream sat my guide,
reproaching me for my tardiness when I joined him. Across a large
meadow outside the forest he pointed to a group of cottages on the side
of a hill to the right.
“The Reds live there,” he said. “They will be out about eight o’clock.
We have come over a mile too far inland from Lake Ladoga: but follow my
tracks and we shall soon be there.”
He rose and mounted his skis. I wondered how he proposed to cross the
stream. Taking a short run, he prodded his sticks deftly into the near
bank as he quitted it, and lifting himself with all his force over the
brook, glided easily on to the snow on the far side. Moving rapidly
across the meadow, he disappeared in the distant bushes.
But in springing he dislodged a considerable portion of the bank of
snow, thus widening the intervening space. I was bigger and weightier
than he, and more heavily clad, and my endeavour to imitate his
performance on short skis met with a disastrous result. Failing to
clear the brook, my skis, instead of sliding on to the opposite snow,
plunged into the bank, and I found myself sprawling in the water! It
was a marvel that neither ski broke. I picked them up and throwing them
on to the level, prepared to scramble out of the stream.
The ten minutes that ensued were amongst the silliest in sensation and
most helpless I ever experienced. Nothing would seem easier than to
clamber up a bank not so high as one’s shoulder. But every grab did
nothing but bring down an avalanche of snow on top of me! There was no
foothold, and it was only when I had torn the deep snow right away that
I was able to drag myself out with the aid of neighbouring bushes.
Safely on shore I looked myself over despondently. From the waist
downward I was one solid mass of ice. The flags of ice on my old
green overcoat flapped heavily against the ice-pillars encasing my
top-boots. With considerable labour and difficulty I scraped soles and
skis sufficiently to make it possible to stand on them, and once again
crawled slowly forward.
I do not know how I managed to traverse the remaining three miles to
the village whither my guide had preceded me. It should have been
the hardest bit of all, for I was in the last stages of fatigue. Yet
it does not seem to have been so now. I think, to tell the truth, I
completely gave up the game, convinced my black figure creeping up the
white hillside must inevitably attract attention, and I mechanically
trudged forward till I should hear a shot or a cry to halt. Or,
perhaps, even in this plight, and careless of what befell me, I was
fascinated by the glory of a wondrous winter sunrise! I remember
how the sun peeped venturously over the horizon, throwing a magic
rose-coloured mantle upon the hills. First the summits were touched,
the pink flush crept gently down the slopes, turning the shadows palest
blue, and when at last the sun climbed triumphant into the heaven, the
whole world laughed. And with it, I!
The cottages of the Reds were left far behind. I had crossed more than
one hill and valley, and passed more than one peasant who eyed me
oddly, before I found myself at the bottom of the hill on whose crest
was perched the village I was seeking. I knew my journey was over at
last, because my guide’s tracks ceased at the top. He had dismounted to
walk along the rough roadway. But which cottage had he entered?
I resolved to beg admission to one of the huts on the outskirts of
the village. They were all alike, low wooden and mud buildings with
protruding porch, two tiny square windows in the half where the
family lived, but none in the other half, which formed the barn or
cattle-shed. The peasants are kindly folk, I mused, or used to be, and
there are few Bolsheviks amongst them. So I approached the nearest
cottage, propped up my skis against the wall, timidly knocked at the
door, and entered.
[Illustration: A RUSSIAN PEASANT ‘CAPITALIST’]