Russka - Edward Rutherfurd [519]
Alexander gazed down at him, hardly focussing. There were six or seven other soldiers, Red Guards, watching him. The one who had approached him was a disreputable little fellow. When he was serving, Alexander would have made him clean himself up.
‘You want a cigarette, do you?’ he said irritably. ‘Well, I don’t smoke.’ And he started to walk on.
What the devil was the matter with the fellow? The soldier had suddenly caught his coat. His hopeful look had turned into a snarl. He was calling to the other guards, who were coming towards them, one of them unhoisting his rifle.
And then he realized what he had done.
He had spoken naturally, just as he would have done a year ago. He had forgotten to disguise his voice which had the faint but unmistakable burr of the aristocratic intonation. He had addressed him with a certain haughty disdain; and, worst of all, he had used the familiar ‘thou’ which officers always used when addressing their men.
He was discovered.
‘Here’s an officer. What’s your name?’
‘Ivanov. I’m not an officer.’
‘You were though, weren’t you? I think we’ve got ourselves an enemy here, boys. Fine suit of clothes you’ve get there, my lord. Nice coat. Think you’re a muzhik, do you?’
And suddenly Alexander doubled up with pain as a rifle butt was swung and hit him in the stomach. He went down.
‘What shall we do with him, lads?’
‘Take him to a tribunal.’
‘Search him first, maybe.’
‘I think you’d like to have a nice talk with the Cheka. That’s what I reckon,’ the first said with a laugh. ‘Up you get, baron. Come along, Excellency. What a fine officer you are, sir, to be sure.’
He staggered up. Thank God he had no papers on him.
‘My name’s Ivanov,’ he said weakly.
Then one of the soldiers cried out: ‘Here’s the man we need. He’s on the Committee. Let’s ask him.’
And Alexander looked up to see Yevgeny Popov, who gazed at him with mild surprise, while the soldiers told him what they’d found. ‘Says his name’s Ivanov,’ the first one added. Then Popov smiled.
For a few, long seconds he said nothing. His green eyes rested upon Alexander, yet it seemed he was thinking of something else. At last he spoke.
‘This man, comrades, is a good Bolshevik. He’s one of us.’
The soldier who had discovered Alexander gazed in amazement.
‘But he talks like a noble,’ he protested. ‘I swear he was an officer.’
Popov smiled. ‘Have you heard Vladimir Ilich speak?’ he asked. It was a subject of some amusement that Lenin pronounced his diatribes against the capitalist classes in an accent that was markedly upper-middle class. ‘Besides, comrade, there are officers who served in the imperial army who are loyal Bolsheviks now.’ It was true that, even in the higher command, there were men who had thought it their patriotic duty to obey the new government as thoroughly as they had the old. ‘We just shoot them if they don’t,’ Popov added pleasantly.
The men looked at him doubtfully. ‘Are you sure, comrade?’
Popov shrugged. ‘Ask him,’ he said. And he smiled again at Alexander.
Afterwards, Alexander often wondered how he got through the next few minutes. Probably because his life was at stake. He had not prepared himself, and there was no time to think.
‘My name is Alexander Pavlovich Ivanov,’ he began slowly. It was not a long story. He was terrified that if he made it long, he might forget what he had said. He told them that he had been wounded in action, that on his return he had become disgusted with the old régime and that, immediately after the October coup, he had offered his services to the Bolsheviks. ‘I’ve got no money,’ he said. ‘And unfortunately I’m still sick.’ Then he offered to show them his wounds.
‘Long live the revolution,’ Popov said quietly.
‘Long live the revolution,’ Alexander repeated.
The soldiers turned to Popov.
‘You heard him,’ he said. ‘I vouch for him.’
‘Oh, well, if you’re one of us,’ the first soldier said. And he clapped Alexander on the back. ‘Pity you’ve got no cigarettes,’ he added. Then the soldiers left.
As he stood there,