Litvinoff was most kind and helped me to move my clay and stand from the
Kremlin to the Foreign Office. I would have liked a snapshot of our
procession--the moulder carrying the clay block, Litvinoff, in his
fur-lined coat and sealskin cap armed with the modelling stand, and I
following with the bucket of clay and cloths.
On arrival at the Foreign Office we were greeted by the Chinese General
in uniform and all his staff. Litvinoff, who is likely to be the Soviet
representative in China, was rather taken aback by this _rencontre_ but
the Chinese were enormously amused.
Later, at 9 p.m. I returned with Litvinoff to Tchicherin’s office to
begin work. While Litvinoff went inside I waited in the secretary’s
room, and while I was waiting a man hurried through the office. He was a
little man in brown trousers and a coat which did not match. With small
steps he shuffled hastily along. It might have been a night watchman; it
was Tchicherin.
Still I waited, and the length of my wait began to annoy me, and then I
began to feel that
[Illustration: SENTRY OUTSIDE THE GUEST-HOUSE.
_p. 161._]
something was wrong. Presently Litvinoff called me, but I got no further
than the doorway.
There Tchicherin confronted me, and in hurried and confused tones said:
“To-night it is impossible, quite, quite impossible,” and disappeared.
He had not even allowed me to cross his threshold.
Litvinoff and I looked at each other and walked out. We went upstairs to
Litvinoff’s office. He was obviously upset and at a perfect loss to
explain or excuse. I sat and talked until the car arrived to take me
home, and from what Litvinoff said and from what I had seen in that
flash, I have learned something of the personality of Tchicherin.
He is an abnormal man, living month after month in that Foreign Office
with closed windows and never going out. He insists on having a bedroom
there, as he says he has not time to go home to sleep. He works all
night, and if a telegram comes in the day he has to be awakened. His
nights are days and his days are not entirely nights. He has no idea of
time and does not realise that other people live differently. He will
ring up a Comrade on the telephone at 3 or 4 o’clock in the morning for
the most trivial information. He does all his own work, and will not
ring for a secretary or messenger, but runs himself with papers to
other departments. He lives on his nerves and the slightest thing throws
him off his pivot.
I had been told he was an angel and a saint. What I found was a
fluttering and agitated bird. The joke is that he is looked upon as the
“gentleman” of the party. He is by origin well-born and propertied. His
property he gave away to the people. To-day was a particularly
unfortunate one for me. It happened to be the first day for months that
Tchicherin had gone out. He went to the dentist. Someone watching him
from an office window described to me the phenomenon of Tchicherin in
the street. He did not go in a car, but on foot. He stood at the corner
of the kerb, looked at the street hesitatingly, much as one might look
into a river on a cold day before plunging in. When he did finally
decide to get across, he got half way and then ran back. What with the
traffic, the fresh air, and the dentist, it must have been a thoroughly
unnerving day for him, and no wonder he received me so ill!