I left the studio in a state of chaos, Smith being in the midst of
casting the busts of Kameneff and Krassin. I felt a wonderful sensation
of relief at these being finished, and the Victory also. Everything for
the moment is finished, until I begin something new. And who will that
be, I wonder?
Kameneff picked me up at 12.15 and we caught the 12.50 from Waterloo to
Portsmouth. Sydney met us at the harbour and escorted us to his house on
the Isle of Wight, near Newport. A very attractive journey across, as it
was warm and calm weather. A motor met us at Ryde and took us to his
house, seven miles. On arrival we flung ourselves down in the sun on the
grass of the tennis-court. And after tea, as we lay full length on rugs,
our heads leaning on the grassy bank behind us, and the sun gradually
sinking lower and lower, Kameneff for over an hour told us the history
of the Russian Revolution.
He told it to us haltingly, stumbling along in his bad French, wrestling
with words and phrases, but always conveying his meaning and above all
conjuring up the most graphic pictures, making us see with his eyes,
live over the days with him, and know all the people concerned. He is
amazingly forceful and eloquent.
We sat silent and spellbound. He began as far back as twenty years ago,
with the first efforts of himself and Lenin, Trotsky and Krassin. He
described their secret organisations, their discoveries, their secrets,
his months and years of prison, first in cells, then in Siberia--but
long before he had finished, our dinner was announced, and we went in
just as we were, to eat. The spell for the moment was broken, and though
Kameneff did not again that evening resume the tale of the Revolution,
he did most of the evening’s talking.
He described to us shortly, but vividly, the individuality and
psychology of Lenin. There were others also whose names I cannot recall.
One I remember was Dzhirjinsky, the President of the Extraordinary
Commission, a man turned to stone through years of _traveaux forcés_, an
ascetic and a fanatic, whom the Soviet selected as organiser and head of
“La Terreur.”
This is the man of whom Maxim Gorky wrote, that one could see martyrdom
crystallised in his eyes. He performs his arduous task, suffering over
it, but with the conviction that he is helping towards an ultimate reign
of peace and calm, towards which end every means is justified. This man
sleeps in a narrow bed behind a curtain in his “bureau,” has few
friends, and cares for no women, but he is kind to children, and
considerate towards his fellow-workers when they are overworked or ill.
It is useless to try to tell any of Kameneff’s stories, they require his
individuality, and would lose in repeating. I only felt that it was a
great waste that his audience should consist only of us two, when so
many might have been enthralled.