If only his father had not died. Remembering his own harsh upbringing by Savva and also because, when Peter was only ten, he had lost his wife Ivan Suvorin had been a kindly father with the wisdom to let his two sons be themselves. Vladimir, five years the older, was a born businessman and Ivan had let him manage one of the Moscow plants when he was only seventeen. But Peter had intellectual leanings and to old Savva's disgust had even been allowed to go to university.

Then, six months ago, Ivan had suffered a massive stroke, and Peter's sunlit world had abruptly come to an end.

I'm completely in his power, he realized. For old Savva had asserted himself with extraordinary force. Within a week, he had taken personal control of everything. Peter's studies were cancelled at once; and while young Vladimir was left to manage the factories in Moscow, Savva had curtly ordered Peter to accompany him back to Russka. 'For it's time,' the old man told his wife, 'that we took this one in hand.'

To Peter, it had been a revelation. As a child in the comfortable Moscow house, his grandparents had been distant figures whose occasional visits were treated with a kind of religious respect. His grandfather was the tallest man he had ever seen: with his thick shock of hair, his huge grey beard and piercing black eyes he was as terrifying as he was silent. Ever since he had gained his freedom, Savva had dressed in a long black coat and an immensely tall top hat: so that once, as a little boy, Peter had dreamed that the great tower in the Moscow Kremlin had turned into his grandfather and gone stalking across the city like an avenging fury. Many times, with a wry smile, Ivan had told his sons how Savva had broken a violin over his head. Peter avoided the old man as much as possible.

But now that he had been forced to live in his grandparents' house, Peter's feelings had changed. The childhood fear still remained, but it was accompanied now by something else: and this was awe.

Savva Suvorin was something more than a mere mortal. He was a law unto himself and unto God: fixed, immutable, and merciless. He was eighty-two and stood as straight as he had at thirty. He strode everywhere, on foot. The Theodosian community to which he had belonged had been broken up by the authorities in the 1850s and, like many other merchants, he had found it necessary to subscribe, nominally, to the Orthodox Church. But he remained an Old Believer in private and still ate alone out of a wooden bowl, with a little cedarwood spoon with a cross on it. The break-up of the Theodosians also removed any last chains that community might have had upon the Suvorin enterprises. Now they belonged entirely to Savva and his family. And they were huge.

Peter knew the holdings at Moscow: the dye factory by the river; the plant for printing calico; the glue factory; the starch factory; and the little printing press his brother Vladimir had set up. But never, until now, had he really understood what had taken place at Russka.

Russka had never been beautiful, but now it was hideous. On the steep slope down to the river, the huddled huts, lean-tos and straggling fences seemed to topple into the water as though they had been tipped out of the town like so much refuse. Inside the walls, the huge brick cotton mill with its rows of blank windows dwarfed the church, and its belching octagonal chimney out-matched even the ancient watchtower by the town gate. The cloth mill was nearly as big; there were long, barn-like buildings containing the linen factory. People were drawn there from miles around and old Savva Suvorin ruled it all.

The force of will that had built this place up was frightening to contemplate. And it's all there, in his face, Peter thought. The great square head, the smouldering eyes, the heavy brows, and that mighty, shapeless promontory of a nose. Did they still make noses like that? His father's had been large, his own inclined to heaviness; but history itself might have paused, he thought, before Savva's features, like a sculptor before a stubborn granite rockface. My God, he realized, he's like one of those elders of ancient times, from beyond the Volga only turned into a merchant. Such was Savva Suvorin.

At first, life had not been too unpleasant. His grandparents lived in a simple stone house, not a tenth the size of the big Moscow house. It was furnished simply, with heavy, rather ugly furniture, which was impressive for being solid and highly polished. But what did the old people want with him? When he took Peter with him on his rounds, Savva gave no indication of what he expected; and after a few weeks Peter supposed the old man was bored with his company and would soon send him back to Moscow.

It was his grandmother, soon after Christmas, who had actually dealt the blow.

'We've decided you should start work in the linen factory,' she calmly announced. 'You'll get to know the village too, that way.'

Maria Suvorin's face was still, in old age, perfectly round; her nose, if anything, even more pointed; her compressed mouth, despite her huge riches, never smiled. And behind narrow slit lids resided the same pair of hard grey eyes. Like most simple Russian women, her white hair was parted in the middle, drawn tightly round her head and fixed at the back. The only luxuries she allowed herself were the rich silk brocade dresses which ballooned out to the ground like a bell. Over her head she liked to wear a big shawl that spread over her shoulders and upper arms and was pinned under her chin so that she exactly resembled one of those brightly painted little Russian dolls a comfortable image which was quite contradicted by her ruthless character.

'But I'm quite unsuited to this kind of work,' he protested.

'We think it's best,' she calmly replied.

'But what about my studies?'

'That's all over now,' she said placidly. And then, not unkindly: 'You surely can't expect your eighty-year-old grandfather to do all your work for you, can you?'

And now, on this cold, damp spring morning, as the starlings wheeled over the rooftops, it seemed to Peter that he could bear it no more.

He had tried to take an interest and find something to excite his imagination. When Savva told him, 'The American Civil War hit our cotton supplies for a while' or: 'We can get cotton from Asia now', Peter conjured up images of distant ships from the New World, or caravans across the desert, and told himself that the Suvorin enterprises were part of some larger, exciting adventure. But each day as he was faced with the same grim chimneys, the endless lines of spinning machines, and the monotonous, grinding work of the factories, he knew in his heart: Russka was a prison.

That morning they were doing what he hated most of all: they were inspecting the workers' living quarters.

Life was not so bad out in the villages, where the flax for the linen was grown and every peasant izba izba produced its own handicrafts. But the living quarters in Russka were completely different. There were three long rows of wooden houses for worker families, which might not have been so bad except that three to five families were crammed into each house. 'We are all one family,' Savva would remind these people as he moved amongst them like a grim Old Testament patriarch. 'We live together.' produced its own handicrafts. But the living quarters in Russka were completely different. There were three long rows of wooden houses for worker families, which might not have been so bad except that three to five families were crammed into each house. 'We are all one family,' Savva would remind these people as he moved amongst them like a grim Old Testament patriarch. 'We live together.'

And then there were the dormitories. Why was it that, as the two men entered one of these, Peter's heart sank?

It was not that the place was squalid. It was spotlessly clean, light, airy and well heated. The long room was painted white, with a line of wooden pillars running down its centre and beds on each side. The beds consisted of a wide, shallow wooden tray divided in two so that in each half there was room for a narrow mattress and a few other possessions. Two people therefore, separated by a low partition, slept on each bed, and there were thirty people on each side of the dormitory. Under the bed was a wooden box that could be locked; and above, hanging from the wooden ceiling, was a rack over which the rest of the worker's clothes could be hung. Men slept in one dormitory, women in another. It was all very orderly.

And yet depressing: and Peter knew exactly why. It was the people.

There was, as yet, no urban working class outside Moscow and St Petersburg and scarcely there. The people who lived in the dormitories mainly belonged to two types. There were the children of peasant families from distant villages, who returned periodically to their families to give them their modest wages; and there were the former household serfs who had been given their freedom at the Emancipation but who, having no land to claim in any village, were cast loose and were entirely homeless. These were the wretched creatures who now cringed as he and his grandfather passed. They are just peasants, he thought, who are lost. And the very tidiness of the place made it seem even more inhumane.

And I am supposed to live here, he considered, and continue this terrible system. These people and these hideous factories, will feed my family. It was all so terrible. He did not know quite what he wanted out of life, but with a kind of desperate urgency he muttered under his breath: 'Anything, anything I'd even haul barges up the Volga, but not this.'

It was just as they were leaving the dormitory that Peter Suvorin chanced to glance back, and caught sight of something he was not meant to see.

At the far end of the dormitory, with his back to Peter, a youth of about his own age was doing an imitation of Savva Suvorin for his friends. Considering that he was small and pinched in appearance, it wasn't bad. Seeing Peter watching, however, the others made warning signs, and the young fellow stopped and turned.

It was a shock to Peter. He had seen most kinds of expression on men's faces, but he had never seen naked hate before. The youth either did not know it showed, or didn't bother to conceal it: either way, it was unnerving.

My God, he thought, this fellow thinks I'm like Grandfather. If only he knew the truth! And then, even worse, he realized: But why would he even care that I sympathize with him, when I'm a Suvorin? And he fled.

He knew the young man slightly. He seemed harmless enough. His name was Grigory.

Natalia walked briskly along the path towards Russka. As soon as she had seen her father returning glumly from his interview with the village elder, she had slipped away. No doubt he would be looking for her by now.

She knew exactly what was in store for her. She would be sent to the Suvorin factory, and expected to stay there as long as the family needed her wages to make ends meet. She dreaded it. I'll be a spinster and a slave all my life, she calculated.

She was determined to do better than that. When she was a little girl, because Misha Bobrov had always been friendly towards her father, both she and Boris had been sent to the little school in Russka for three years, where they had learned to read. Poor though she was, this unusual accomplishment had given her a secret pride, a belief that somehow she had no idea how she would amount to something.

But although she had guessed what it would mean for her, she had encouraged Boris to go. She loved him. She knew it had to be. At least he may be happy, she thought. And her plan the plan of which she had spoken to Boris?

There was no plan. She had no idea what to do.

She pushed her scarf more tightly round her head as the damp air made her face smart. She could only think of one possible way out.

She was going to see Grigory.

Misha Bobrov and his wife Anna were beaming with pleasure.

It was just as dusk was falling that day that the little carriage arrived at the Bobrovo estate; and to their amazement, Nicolai jumped out, ran to embrace them, and announced: 'I got leave from the university to come home early so here I am.' And when he added that he had brought a friend, Misha happily replied: 'The more the merrier, my dear boy.' And, taking his son by the arm with that gentle Bobrov gesture, he led the way inside.

Misha Bobrov always counted himself a lucky man that he got on so well with his son. He still remembered the brooding atmosphere that surrounded his stern old father Alexis and had always resolved never to allow such bad feeling at Bobrovo again which came naturally to him anyway, for he was a kindly, easy-going man.

Above all, he was always delighted to let the boy argue with him. 'Just like dear Sergei and old Uncle Ilya,' he'd say. Indeed, he was rather proud of his own skills in debate; and even if as one expected with young people Nicolai sometimes became heated, Misha never minded. 'The boy's basically sound,' he'd tell his wife afterwards. And when she thought he'd let Nicolai go too far he would reply: 'No, we must listen to the young people, Anna, and try to understand them. For they are the future.' He congratulated himself that this strategy had clearly proved correct.

The two travellers were tired after their journey, and after eating they both expressed a desire to retire early. 'But I can see we shall have some splendid discussions with these young men,' Misha remarked to Anna, as they sat in the salon afterwards. 'One may not always like what goes on at universities, but our young people always come back full of ideas.' He smiled contentedly. 'I shall have to be on my mettle.'

Only one thing puzzled him. It was absurd, really, but he had a curious sense, the moment he had set eyes on him, that there was something vaguely familiar about Nicolai's friend. Yet what the devil was it?

Yevgeny Pavlovich Popov. That was how the ginger-haired fellow had been introduced: it was a common enough name. 'Have I seen you before?' Misha had asked.

'No.'

He had not pursued the subject. Yet he was sure of it there was something about the fellow ... And that night, as he lay for many hours, too excited to sleep, this little conundrum was one of many matters the landowner turned over in his mind.

The arrival of his son always made Misha Bobrov think about the future. What sort of estate would he be able to hand on to the boy? What sort of life would Nicolai have? Above all, what did the boy think about things. I must ask him about such-and-such, he'd think. Or, remembering some pet project of his own: I wonder if he'd approve of that? So it was that, in the darkness, a host of subjects crowded into his head.

And it was typical of Misha Bobrov that, although for him personally things had gone rather badly, he remained convinced that, in general, they were going well. 'I am optimistic about the future,' he would declare. It was one of the few matters upon which his wife could not agree with him.

In fact, on the Bobrov estate, things were going extremely badly. For if the Emancipation had disappointed the peasants, it had hardly been any better for the landowners either.

The first problem was old and familiar. By 1861 Misha Bobrov, like nearly every landowner he knew, had already pledged seventy per cent of his serfs against mortgages at the State bank. In the decade after Emancipation, half the money he received as compensation went straight to the bank to pay off these debts. Furthermore, the State bonds that he was given in part payment the bonds which the peasants were struggling so hard to pay off were slowly losing their value as Russia suffered a mild inflation. 'Those damned bonds are already worth two-thirds of what they were,' he had remarked to Anna just the week before.

Because he was in debt and short of cash, Bobrov found it hard to pay for labour from his former serfs to cultivate the land he had left. Some had been rented out to peasants; some leased to merchants; and some, he feared, would soon have to be sold. Most of his friends were selling land. Each year, therefore, he grew a little poorer.

Why then should he be optimistic?

There were several reasons. The Russian Empire was certainly more settled and stronger than when he was a young man. After centuries of conflict, the vast empire seemed to be reaching out, at last, to its natural frontiers. True, the huge territory of Alaska, in 1867, had been sold to the United States. 'But it was too far away,' Bobrov would say. And meanwhile, Russia was consolidating her hold on the distant Pacific rim of the Eurasian plain where the new port of Vladivostok, opposite Japan, gave promise of a vigorous Far Eastern trade. Down in the south, after the debacle of the Crimea, Russia had once again secured the right to sail her fleet in the warm Black Sea; and to the south-east, she was gradually absorbing the desert peoples beyond the Caspian Sea, with their fierce ruling princes and rich caravans. In the west, the last uprising of the Poles had been crushed and Russia closely allied now with Prussia was at peace with her western neighbours. And if, some said, the Prussian kingdom and its brilliant Chancellor Bismarck seemed a little too hungry for power, what was that to the empire of the Tsar, which covered a sixth of the land surface of the globe?

But the real reason why Bobrov was optimistic was because of what he saw inside Russia itself.

'We've seen more reform in the last fifteen years,' he would point out, 'than at any time since Peter the Great.'

It might be that, in private, Tsar Alexander II only wanted to maintain order in Russia; but having decided that reforms were needed to do so, he had made amazing progress. The creaking, ancient legal system had been totally reformed. Now, for the first time in eight hundred years of Russian history, there were independent courts, with independent judges, professional lawyers, open to all men and conducted, not in secret, but in the open. There was even trial by jury. The military had been reformed: all men, noble and peasant, were liable to be chosen by lots for service but six years only, not twenty-five. And in all but the elite regiments, a man of humble birth could even become an officer. 'God knows, we can only do better than we did in the Crimea,' Misha liked to say to fellow gentlemen who complained of this mixing of classes.

But the reforms which pleased Misha Bobrov the most were the new local assemblies.

For these were the bodies known to history as the zemstvos zemstvo zemstvos zemstvo meaning: 'of the land, the community' in the country; and the meaning: 'of the land, the community' in the country; and the dumas dumas the the duma duma being the ancient Tsar's council in the towns. And Russia had seen nothing like them before. In every district, town and province, these assemblies for local government were elected by all taxpayers, whether gentry, merchant or peasant. 'So now,' Misha cheerfully claimed, 'Russia has entered the modern world of democracy too.' being the ancient Tsar's council in the towns. And Russia had seen nothing like them before. In every district, town and province, these assemblies for local government were elected by all taxpayers, whether gentry, merchant or peasant. 'So now,' Misha cheerfully claimed, 'Russia has entered the modern world of democracy too.'

True, the zemstvos zemstvos and and dumas dumas had only modest powers; and key posts like that of governor and the police chiefs were all appointed by the Tsar's government. had only modest powers; and key posts like that of governor and the police chiefs were all appointed by the Tsar's government.

True, there were also some special features in the election. In the towns, for instance, the votes were weighted by how much in taxes was paid: the great majority of the people therefore, who only contributed a third of the taxes, could only elect a third of the council members. In the country, similar weighting, and a series of indirect election, ensured that in the provincial zemstvos zemstvos, over seventy per cent of the members belonged to the gentry. 'But it's the principle of the thing that matters,' Misha declared. 'And all the classes have a say.'

Besides and this was, perhaps, the thing Bobrov liked best of all these zemstvos zemstvos gave men like him a role in society. As a service class, the nobles might have been passed by; their serfs might have been taken from them; but in these local gave men like him a role in society. As a service class, the nobles might have been passed by; their serfs might have been taken from them; but in these local zemstvos zemstvos, however modest their power, a noble like himself might still preserve the illusion that he was important and useful to his country. 'We have always served Russia,' he could still say, with a trace of satisfaction.

It was just before he fell asleep that a possible solution to the puzzle concerning his familiar guest occurred to Misha Bobrov.

Devil take it, he thought. Didn't the young fellow say his patronymic was Pavlovich? And didn't that horrid old priest at Russka, with the red hair, have a son called Paul Popov a petty official of some kind in Moscow. Could this ginger-haired fellow be the priest's grandson, then?

It was an amusing thought. He decided to ask him in the morning.

Yet when morning came, and Misha descended to the dining room where he expected to find the two young men at breakfast, he was greeted by his manservant with a most curious bit of news.

'Mister Nicolai went out with his friend just before dawn, sir,' the fellow said.

'Before dawn? Where to?'

'Down to the village, Mikhail Alexeevich.' And then, with obvious disapproval: 'They were dressed as peasants, sir.'

Misha looked at the man. He was not usually given to inventing stories.

'Why the devil should they be doing that?' he demanded.

'I can't understand it, sir,' he replied. 'They said,' he hesitated for an instant, 'they said, sir, that they were going to look for work.'

And Misha Bobrov could only wonder what on earth this could mean.

Grigory was nineteen, with a pinched face and long, oily black hair which was parted, rather sadly, down the middle. He was not strong physically, and God had cursed him with teeth which gave him pain almost every day. But he was determined, in his quiet way. Determined to survive.

He was also frightened of Natalia Romanov, who loved him.

He had been one of a family of eight. His father had been a household serf who had drifted into casual labour in Vladimir and who, as soon as they were ten, had sent his children out to work. About once a month he had tied Grigory to a wooden bench and flogged him with birch twigs which he had thoughtfully wetted first. Yet, despite this, Grigory had been fond of him.

His father had not minded when, at the age of thirteen, Grigory had said he wanted to leave home. Indeed, Grigory had the impression that his parents were rather glad to get rid of him. But before he left, his father had given him one piece of advice to take with him on his road through life.

'Take what you can from women, Grigory. But watch out. Sometimes they seem kind, but deep down, they want to hurt you. Remember that.'

He always had.

And now this girl. What did she see in him? She was pretty, lively; her father had his own holding: by Grigory's standards, the Romanovs were rich. He could make her laugh: but then, with his sharp, rather cruel humour, he could make almost anyone laugh. He could make people laugh who hated him, and whom he hated.

So what could she want with him?

And why, in the name of the Lord, had she, that last night, asked him to marry her? He had looked at her with suspicious astonishment before gruffly replying: 'I'll have to think about that.'

When the two young men dressed as peasants appeared in the village that morning, nobody at first knew who they were until Arina, coming out of the house took one look and called out: 'Holy Master Nicolai, how you've grown!' And a moment later, at the old woman's insistence, they were inside the Romanov izba izba sitting by the big warm stove and eating sweetmeats. sitting by the big warm stove and eating sweetmeats.

When the family heard that Nicolai and his friend wanted to work in the village, they were mystified. Who could fathom the mind of a noble? But when Timofei cautiously enquired if they wanted to be paid, and was told they did not, his eyes opened wide at this stroke of good luck. 'Go no further, Nicolai Mikhailovich,' he said. 'I can give you just what you want.'

And so it was, two hours later, that a puzzled Misha Bobrov encountered his son and young Popov quietly helping the peasant at the edge of a large field and, wise enough not to interfere, shook his head in amusement at the strange eccentricities of young people and returned to his house. 'They'll be hungry tonight,' he remarked to his wife, and went to read a book.

Natalia watched the two visitors with curiosity too. She had been a little girl when Nicolai Bobrov went away to school and the landlord's son was hardly more than a name to her. He was handsome, she thought, with his neatly trimmed moustache and beard and his bright blue eyes. Very handsome. But his friend with the ginger hair was different: she did not know what to make of him. He didn't say much to Natalia and her family, leaving Nicolai to do the talking, and Natalia decided he must belong to some class of person that she had never seen before. Still, she considered, he's nothing to do with me. She had other things to think about.

Especially Grigory.

Natalia loved her family. She did not want to hurt them. But when Boris said he was moving out, something had snapped inside her. She felt suddenly very lonely. She knew her father and mother needed her; yet when the previous evening Timofei had told her, as she feared, that she might have to go to the factory, she couldn't help feeling resentful. If I do that for them, she decided, then I want something to make me happy too. Strangely, that meant Grigory.

Why him? The fact was, her prospects in the village were not good. The Romanovs were poor: with this new baby, her father certainly had nothing to give her as a dowry. And as she wasn't a particular beauty, she would be lucky to get one of the better village boys. But in any case, it was the little fellow in the factory, with his sly wit, who had captivated her. There was something about him, an inner drive, that fascinated her. None of the village boys had that. When they had first struck up an acquaintance, she had started to teach him to read, and been astonished by his quickness. He did not seem to study things like other people: he attacked each subject, devouring it ferociously until he had mastered it. He's like a tiger, she thought wonderingly. And yet, he was also vulnerable: he needed looking after. It was a combination she found attractive, compelling; and by the spring she had concluded: He may not be perfect, but there is no other man on earth like this.

Her plan was simple enough: Either he can come and live with us in the village, and then there'll be two wages to bring home. Or if they won't take him in, then I'll go and live with him in Russka and they'll get nothing. It was a way of asserting her independence, at least.

And so, all day, while Nicolai and Popov worked with her father, she thought about him.

She was quite surprised when, at dusk, Nicolai announced that he and his friend would be back again the following morning.

Nicolai was pleased. The first day had gone well. Yevgeny seemed to be satisfied too. We'll get their confidence,' he said. 'But remember,' he added sternly, 'we mustn't say anything for the time being. That's the plan.'

'Of course.' The plan was everything.

How lucky he was, Nicolai thought, to be with Popov. Admittedly, he could sometimes be rather mysterious, so that you felt he was withholding information; but he seemed so certain about things, so definite. And now they were partners in this all-important business. He supposed that, one day, their names might even be listed with the others in the history books.

Meanwhile, he was looking forward to this evening. He had seen Yevgeny in action many times, and he wondered with amusement what his friend would do to his parents.

As Misha Bobrov waited in the salon for the two young men to come down for supper, he tried to conceal his excitement.

Not only did he long to find out what they were up to, but, as he told his wife: 'You can be sure we have a great many things to discuss.' He believed that he would give a good account of himself. Indeed, he thought that the students might be rather impressed.

The salon was a long, pleasant room, simply furnished with chairs and sofas of French design, and was graced with heavy blue curtains, parted at the centre and tied at the sides with large tassels. A fine mahogany glass-fronted bookcase, its decorative panels carved in the shape of classical lyres, stood handsomely at the far end of the room; on the mantel over the fire, a black marble clock, shaped like a rather stolid little Greek temple front, stared out into the room with confident self-satisfaction. In one corner, a round table was covered with a bright Turkey rug. And everywhere a mass of family pictures, from large oils to tiny cameos, were hung around the walls in no particular order.

As well as these conventional furnishings, however, there were several indications that Misha Bobrov was a gentleman somewhat out of the ordinary.