In Search of the Miraculous

they charged me excess fare on my ticket because the reservation was issued for one

direction and the ticket for another. In other words everything was as it ought to be.

But the papers which I got on the way were full of news about shooting in the streets

of Petersburg. Moreover it was now the bolsheviks who were shooting into the crowd;

they were trying their strength.

The situation at this time was beginning to become defined. On the one side were

the bolsheviks, as yet not fully realizing the incredible success which was awaiting

them, but already beginning to feel the absence of resistance and to act more and more

insolently. On the other side was the "second provisional government" with many serious people who understood the situation in the minor posts and with altogether

insignificant babblers and theorists in the major posts; then there was the intelligentsia greatly decimated by the war; then the remains of former parties and the military

circles. All these taken together were divided in their turn into two groups, one who,

in the face of all the facts and common sense, accepted the possibility of peace parleys

with the bolsheviks who very cleverly made use of this while gradually occupying one

position after another; and the other who, while realizing the impossibility of any

negotiations whatever with the bolsheviks, were at the same time not united and did

not come out actively into the open.

The people were silent, although never perhaps in history has the will of the people

been so clearly expressed—and that will was to stop the war!

Who could stop the war? This was the chief question of the moment. The

provisional government did not dare. Naturally it could not come from the military

circles. And yet power was bound to pass to whoever

should be the first to pronounce the word: "Peace." And as often happens in such cases the right word came from the wrong side. The bolsheviks pronounced the word

"peace." First of all because it was a matter of complete indifference to them what they said. They had no intention of meeting their promissory notes, therefore they

could issue as many of them as they liked. This was their chief advantage and chief

strength.

There was something else here besides this. Destruction is always far easier than

construction. How much easier it is to bum a house than to build one.

The bolsheviks were the agents of destruction. Neither then nor since could they or

can they be anything else notwithstanding all their boasting and notwithstanding all

the support of their open and their hidden friends. But they could and they can destroy

very well, not so much by their own activity as by their very existence which corrupts

and disintegrates everything around them. This special property of theirs explained

their approaching victory and all that happened much later.

We who were looking at things from the point of view of the system could see not

only the fact that everything happens but even how it happens, that is, how easily everything goes downhill and breaks up once a single impulse is given to it.

I did not stay in Moscow but I managed to see a few people while waiting for the

evening train to Petersburg, and I passed on to them what G. had said. Then I went to

Petersburg and passed on the same message to the members of our groups.

In twelve days time I was again in the Caucasus. In Pyatigorsk I learned that G. was

not living at Kislovodsk but at Essentuki and in two hours time I was with him in a

small country villa in Panteleimon Street.

G. asked me in detail about everyone I had seen, what each had said, who was

going to come and who not, and so on. Next day three more people followed me from

Petersburg, then two more, and so on. In all, excluding G. and myself, there

forgathered twelve people.

Chapter Seventeen

I ALWAYS have a very strange feeling when I remember this period. On this

occasion we spent about six weeks in Essentuki. But this now seems to be altogether

incredible. Whenever I chance to speak with any one of those who were there they

can hardly believe that it lasted only six weeks. It would be difficult even in six years to find room for everything that was connected with this time, to such an extent was it

filled.

Half of our number, myself among them, lived throughout this period with G. in a

small house on the outskirts of the village; the others came in in the morning and

stayed late into the night. We went to bed very late and got up very early. We slept for

four hours, at the most, five. We did all the housework; and the rest of the time was

occupied with exercises of which I will speak later. G. several times arranged

excursions to Kislovodsk, Jeleznovodsk, Pyatigorsk, Beshtau, and so on.

G. superintended the kitchen, and often prepared dinner himself. He proved to be a

wonderful cook and knew hundreds of remarkable eastern dishes. Every day we had

dinner in the style of some eastern country; we ate Tibetan, Persian, and other dishes.