Russka - Edward Rutherfurd [457]
Why, she used to wonder – why would God give her this gift, only to blight it? This must be another of life’s inexplicable mysteries. The last three years had been a nightmare. Sometimes the sickness had been like a terrible weight on her chest and she would cough until it hurt; for days she would be prostrate, unable to summon up the energy to do anything. The tour had had to be cancelled. Even her musical studies were almost abandoned. ‘If I can’t play properly, I don’t want to play at all,’ she told her unhappy father. She had slowly sunk into a depression, while her family watched hopelessly.
‘If only she had friends to help her,’ her mother would lament. The trouble was that almost all her friends in Vilnius were musicians, and now she no longer wished to see them. Only one close friend remained: young Ivan Karpenko, down in the Ukraine. Even since that terrible day when he had saved the family from the pogrom, there had been a special bond between Rosa and the Cossack youth. It was to Ivan, therefore, that she wrote long letters during this period of pain, and from whom she received back letters of warm encouragement.
The sudden death of her father the previous year had forced Rosa to come out of her lethargy. The family’s main income had gone; her two brothers were having to support her mother. Rosa was forced to consider what to do with her life. A musical career was out of the question now so what were the alternatives. Teach the piano – for a pittance? Her mother suggested it, but Rosa dreaded the thought. There was the Teachers’ Institute in the city, where Jewish students could train to teach in the state schools. Her brothers thought this was better. What does it matter, if I can’t do what I want? she thought. But I must do something. I can’t just be a useless person. She had enrolled at the Institute. And now here she was, on a summer evening, at a Jewish workers’ meeting simply because she had nothing better to do.
There were so many meetings. Some were just study groups, teaching eager workers to read and write; others were more communal and met to discuss how they could improve working and living conditions. And a few were, more or less, political.
Today’s meeting, however, was rather special. A professor all the way from Moscow had come to address them on worker movements in and outside Russia. ‘But I dare say it’ll go further than that,’ one of her companions whispered. ‘The professor’s a Marxist.’ And when Rosa looked blank. ‘A revolutionary.’
A revolutionary. What did such a person look like? Would they all be arrested? It was with some interest that Rosa now looked up as the speaker entered the room.
Peter Suvorin spoke well. At first, his thin, abstracted face, small gold-rimmed spectacles and quiet, kindly eyes might have given him the appearance of a mild-mannered schoolmaster. But soon it was this very gentleness and simple sincerity – combined with a wonderful clarity in all his explanations – that made him impressive.
At thirty-seven, Peter Suvorin had not changed. He was one of those pure and fortunate souls who, having encountered a single and powerful idea, find their destiny. Peter’s idea, the theme of his life, was very simple: that mankind could – and must – reach a state where all men are free and none oppressed. He had believed it in 1874 and he believed it now.
He had had a strange life. Back in 1874, after his sudden departure from Russka, he had wandered in the Ukraine for months and the Suvorins had wondered if he had died. Then, however, needing money, he had contacted his brother Vladimir in Moscow; and Vladimir, feeling he must, had let old Savva know that his grandson was alive.
Was it, perhaps, Savva Suvorin who had sealed Peter