Berezovo: A Revolutionary Russian Epic

What came next? Ah yes, he thought sourly: my marriage. What a mess I made of that! A complete catastrophe. Poppa was against it from the start, and no wonder. A wife condemned to ten years’ exile with two children, one still a babe in arms and no financial support – was this a son’s achievement he could be proud of? And now I’ve left Natalya with Baby Lev. First tragedy and then farce.

Again and again, he reflected, the cycle had repeated itself; the only difference was that as he had grown older, the damage he had inflicted had grown more grievous. The long climb to Iskra and international recognition. What had that led to but his part in the ruinous Second Congress, the whole Movement being riven from top to bottom into the “majority” and the “minority”? He felt sure that he could have stopped the split if he only had spoken up more effectively. Then Geneva, and after Geneva, the outbreak of the revolution in Petersburg, his taking over of the leadership of the Petersburg Soviet, leading inevitably to hundreds, possibly even thousands of arrests, and no one knew how many deaths and sentences of permanent exile? His final grandiloquent speech in court had nearly done for all of them. It was no wonder that some of the Deputies hated him.

He looked around the gloomy loft. From below he heard the sound of the soldiers’ voices rising in debate.

Are they talking about me? If the Faction took control of the escort guard, how many of the deputies would come to my assistance if I was attacked?

He thought of his baby son. Was it possible that Lev would inherit his own character flaws? What a dreadful patrimony to pass on!

At least the boy has been given his mother’s family name. What sort of rootless childhood could I offer young Lev Sedov? He is better off being cared for by Natalya’s father. What example could I possibly set? I, who have never listened to my own father but have wilfully pursued my own desires, regardless of my parents’ distress and the consequence to others? If Baby Lev followed my example he would neither prosper nor find contentment. My daughters, Zina and Nina – they have been lucky to have Alexandra for a mother. And they are girls; sooner or later they will become someone else’s responsibility. But a son – that is different. With a boy one has to take more care. The strain of unreliability and my propensity for over-reaching and for calamitous folly – that should not be passed down the generations. If… when… I return to the world I will have to take up the more settled occupation of journalism; a trade that I can teach the boy…

When he returned. If he returned… Another thought came to him. Now that the Reaction had begun, the Revolution had become both too dangerous and too ephemeral…

The sudden sound of rising voices below made him start. Downstairs, people were shouting in alarm. Without thinking, he began walking towards the top of the ladder but a child’s startled scream amid the shouting made him stop.

The Faction! he thought. The attack has begun.

A fight had broken out in the room below. He stood for a moment, listening as the noises grew uglier and more frightening; uncertain as to what his next action should be. Then, cautiously, he edged towards the opening in the floor and looked down.