"But I don"t know anything about the "committee.""
Zelig laughed familiarly. "Sender-the-Arbitrator"s son doesn"t know! If you only had the desire, you could belong to it yourself and introduce us fellows, too."
"Very well. I"ll consider it. And I should advise you men to do the same."
"Consider it! We are only plain uneducated people, but we aren"t going to do any considering. I have a sister, sir, and if a Gentile lays a finger on her he"ll be a dead man, I can tell you that. Jewish blood is being spilled by the bucket and here you are talking of "considering.""
He insisted that Vladimir should attend the meeting of his informal society, and Vladimir, completely in his power, promised to do so.
That evening, in a s.p.a.cious barn, half of which was crowded with barrels of herring, Vladimir found Zelig and some fifteen chums of his. Zelig was playing with a huge iron key. He was employed here and the meeting was held by his employer"s permission. For more than nine persons to a.s.semble without a police permit is a crime; so it gave Vigdoroff satisfaction to reflect that he was now incurring risks similar to those incurred by Clara and her friends. The gathering seemed to be made up of mechanics and labourers exclusively. One of the men present was the sneering fellow whom Vigdoroff had seen at the synagogue. Of the others Vladimir"s attention was attracted by two big burly young butchers with dried-up blood about their finger-nails, a chimney-sweep, who looked like a jet-black negro, with white teeth and red lips, and three men with medals from the late war which they apparently expected to act as an amulet against Gentile rowdies. The chimney-sweep sat apart, cracking sunflower seeds. Now and again he made as though to throw his sooty arms round somebody"s neck and then burst into laughter over his own joke.
All the others looked grave. They showed Vigdoroff much respect and attention. Even the sneering man made a favourable impression on him to-night. Only he himself was so ill at ease he could scarcely take part in the conversation. Other men came. When one of these proved to be Motl, the trunk-maker in his aunt"s employ, Vigdoroff felt somewhat more at home.
One of the retired soldiers took to bragging of the courage he and his two comrades had shown at the taking of Plevna, and when one of the other two signed to him to stop boasting, he said, with a blush:
"I am saying all this because--because--what good did it do us? Does the Czar pat us on the head for it? We risked our lives and many of our people died under Plevna, and yet if we tried to settle in Great-Russia we would be kicked out neck and crop, wouldn"t we?"
"Indeed we would, war record, medal and all," one of the other two chimed in.
"And why? Because we are Jews. We were not chased home from the firing line because we were Jews, were we?"
"Talk of Great-Russia," somebody put in. "As if in a place like Miroslav we were allowed to live in peace."
Another man a.s.sented with a sigh, adding: "If a thousandth part of the courage shown by the Jews in the war was shown in our self-defence against Gentiles, the Gentiles would have more respect for us."
The conversation turned on the subject of pistols, but the proposition was overruled.
"Before we get pistols and learn to use them we"ll be asleep under a quilt of earth," said Zelig. "Why, what ails my cooper"s hatchet, or a hammer, or a plain crowbar?"
Every time Vigdoroff opened his mouth the faces of the others would become tense with expectation. But he had nothing to say except to ask an occasional question, and every time Zelig, playing with his enormous iron key, pressed him for a speech, he would adjure him, in a flutter of embarra.s.sment, to let it go this time.
They talked of the prospective fight in phrases like "forwarding a remittance to one"s snout" or "pulling up sharp under a fellow"s peeper," which amused and jarred on him at once. For the rest, there was a remarkable flow of common sense, humour and feeling. The gathering cast a spell over him. He had come with the partial intention of speaking against their scheme, yet now he felt that he could much more readily face a gang of armed Gentiles than betray a faint heart to these Jewish artisans. Moreover--and this was the great point with him at the present moment--he felt that with these men by his side he could fling himself into the very thick of the hottest fight. A peculiar sense of solemnity and of gratification came over him. He followed their talk reverentially. He humbly offered to call on one of the leaders of the Defence Committee and to apply for the admission of this group with himself as one of its members.
His first dawn of consciousness as he opened his eyes next morning was of something exceedingly important and solemn which somehow had the flavour of herring. The active partic.i.p.ation of a man like Elkin in the work of the Defence Committee was a source of disappointment to him. He usually kept out of Elkin"s way, as much for his venomous pleasantry as for his revolutionary affiliations which he divined from his friendship with Clara. He wondered whether he meant to give the affair a revolutionary character. "He must have warned the other members against me as a silk stocking and a coward," Vigdoroff said to himself bitterly.
"That"s probably the way Clara describes me."
The next morning he was surprised by a visit from Elkin himself. The revolutionist frowned as he spoke, but this was clearly a disguise for his embarra.s.sment.
"Look here, Vigdoroff," he said. "There has not been much love lost between you and me, but that"s foolish--at a time like this anyhow. We must all work together. We are all Jews. I understand you have organised a number of good fellows. Let them join the others."
Vigdoroff"s heart beat fast, with emotion as well as with a sense of flattered pride. He would never have expected Elkin capable of such soulful talk. Moreover his speaking of himself as a Jew seemed to imply that he had abandoned Nihilism. "So we "cowards" were not so very wrong after all," he thought to himself triumphantly.
"In the first place," he answered, "it wasn"t I who organised them. It was just the other way, in fact."
"Well, anyhow, let them join the rest."
"Of course we will. Only look here, Elkin. You have been frank with me----"
"I know what you mean, but you need not worry. I won"t get you in trouble," Elkin replied with his usual venom in his lozenge-shaped sneer. And then, kindly: "It is not as a Russian revolutionist that I have gone into this thing. I am one, as much as ever; I have not changed my views a bit, in fact. But that"s another matter. All I want to say is that in this thing I am as a Jew, as a child of our unhappy, outraged, mud-bespattered people."
CHAPTER x.x.xVIII.
THE NIHILISTS" GUARD.
Pavel"s mother, the countess, had not been in Miroslav since March. She lived in retirement on one of her estates in another province, in a constant tremour of fear and compunction. The image of Alexander II.
bleeding in the snow literally haunted her. She took it for granted that Pavel had had a hand in the b.l.o.o.d.y plot, and she felt as though she, too, had been a party to it.
To ascertain the situation with regard to the riot rumours Pavel called on his uncle, the governor. He found him dozing on a bench in his orchard, a stout cane in one hand and a French newspaper in the other.
The old satrap was dressed in a fresh summer suit of Caucasian silk, which somehow emphasised the uncouth fleshiness of his broad nose. He was overjoyed to see his nephew, and he plunged into the subject of the riots at once and of his own accord. It was evidently one of those situations upon which he usually had to unburden his mind to somebody.
"Can you tell me what they are up to in that great city of yours?" he said, referring to St. Petersburg and the higher government circles and blinking as he spoke. "There is an administration for you! Perhaps you younger fellows are smarter than we oldsters. Perhaps, perhaps." He took out a golden cigarette case, lit a cigarette and went on blinking, sneeringly.
His words implied that Pavel, being one of the younger generation, was, morally at least, identified with the administration of the young Czar.
"What do you mean, uncle?" he inquired.
"What do I mean? Why, I mean that they don"t want those riots stopped.
That"s plain enough, isn"t it?"
This was a slap at the doctrine of Pavel"s party concerning the outrages, and he resented it as well as he could.
"But you have no evidence for such an accusation, uncle," he said.
"That"s a mere theory of yours."
"I knew you would stick up for your generation. Ha, ha, ha! Quite commendable in a young chap, too. Ha, ha, ha!"
"But where is your evidence?"
"You want to know too much, Pasha. Too young for that. If they wanted the riots stopped, it would be a case of one, two, three, and there she goes! That"s as much as I can tell you, and if you are really clever you can understand the rest yourself."
"He is in league with his fellow fleecers, the Jewish usurers," Pavel remarked inwardly. "He simply cannot afford an anti-Jewish demonstration, the old bribe-taker."
"Neither can you," a voice retorted from Pavel"s heart, "though for quite different reasons."
Prince Boulatoff called on Orlovsky, the government clerk in whose house the local revolutionists held their meetings. The first thing that struck him was Orlovsky"s loss of girth.
"h.e.l.lo, Aliosha," he said heartily, meeting him at the gate.
"Why, Pasha!" The clerk flung himself upon him, and they exchanged three prolonged kisses.
"By Jove," Pavel went on, "you are so changed I came near letting you pa.s.s. Why, what has become of your bulk, old boy? Have you been ill?"