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ignorant Don Quixote invited the spies, the thieves, the murderers "to
make the New Russia."
I see foreign faces around me; I hear foreign accents in every line of
each new edict; I listen to the strange names of our new governors.
The Mob is in power; and the friendly faces of our Allies became dry
and cold....
Looking backward--I try to find out whether there was a mistake of my
own, or my own crime, for which some unknown and heartless Judge is
now so severely punishing me?
* * * * *
Here I am, a graduate of the two best institutions in Russia and
Germany, a man with five generations behind me,--all thoroughbred,
all civilized, all gentlemen. Here I am in disguise--as apparently
thousands and thousands of other Russians are, just as bearded as
they, just as dirty, just as hungry, just as alone in the world.
My name is now Alexei Petrovich Syvorotka, formerly non-commissioned
officer, 7th of Hussars, born in the province of Kursk. I dress in
an old military overcoat, have a badly broken shoulder blade (second
degree injury at Stanislau), and as my documents say--have been
evacuated to Tumen, where I am supposed to receive my soldier's
ration. Syvorotka! Would you talk to a man with such a name?
This Syvorotka, a humble creature--a shadow of yesterday--has only one
thing of which he cannot be robbed, his only consolation: the sorrow
which he wears deep under his uniform jealously concealed from the
rest of the world.
20
My baggage--the handbag--was found.
Those peculiar things can happen only in the present Russia. She is
like a good make of automobile after a wreck. Everything seems to
be crushed and broken--machinery, wheels, glass, body.... Still some
parts are strong enough to keep moving. So miraculously there moved a
part, which brought my handbag here from Moscow,--the very first ray
of sun in my existence for a long time.
I came to the depot this morning--I had been coming every day since
Schmelin gave me the baggage check--and saw a few men unloading a
baggage coach. I approached them.
"Hello," I said to a tartar whose abominable face was covered with
pock marks, (nowadays one must always address the most hostile looking
person in a crowd, never the most sympathetic, for one should not show
any weakness to the mob), "any work"?
"Hello,--yourself," the tartar answered grouchily and without
looking at me, "there is. Don't let them skin you.
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