'My dear friend, you don't understand. The authorities have nothing. No one is being supplied.'

Misha frowned. 'Then this?'

The other grinned again. 'I bought it myself. My agents found it and shipped it all the way from the south. It's nothing to do with the authorities.'

For several seconds Misha was silent, unable to speak. Nicolai saw tears well up into the old man's eyes. He held on to Suvorin's sleeve, then muttered: 'How can I thank you, Vladimir Ivanovich?' And shaking his head: 'What can I say?'

But it was after a moment's thoughtful silence that Misha Bobrov suddenly made his extraordinary outburst. Throwing back his head, and gathering all his strength, he shouted out in a paroxysm of frustration, shame, and contempt: 'Damn those people! Damn that governor! Damn the government in St Petersburg. I tell you, these people are useless to us. Let them give power to the local zemstvos zemstvos since they are incompetent to govern themselves.' since they are incompetent to govern themselves.'

He shouted it in front of the servants, the drivers, and several villagers. He did not seem to care. It came straight from his heart. Misha Bobrov, landowner, noble, liberal but loyal monarchist, was done with his government. So, Nicolai knew, were other landowners and zemstvo zemstvo men all over the central provinces that winter of famine. men all over the central provinces that winter of famine.

And so it was on this day, in after years, that Nicolai Bobrov would look back and murmur: 'That was the start of the revolution.'

It was in early spring that the first outbreak began.

It started in the group of huts that straggled along the river bank below the little town of Russka. Why it should have started there no one knew. Perhaps because there was an old rubbish tip there perhaps not.

At first, when several people suffered from diarrhoea, no one took much notice. But then, after two days, one man suddenly experienced a violent discharge from his bowels of whitish and yellowish matter, like whey. Shortly after, he vomited more of the same, then cried out that the pit of his stomach was on fire, and screamed for water. The next day he suffered acute cramps in the legs and his body started to turn blue. His eyes became so sunken he resembled a skeleton and when he spoke, his voice was only a hoarse whisper. When his wife tried his pulse, she could feel nothing. Just before the following dawn he died.

After his death, his body remained strangely warm for some time. His wife said it had grown hotter. She also noticed that, well after death, the corpse suffered muscular twitches and spasms, which frightened her.

And within a few more hours, all Russka knew that cholera had arrived.

'If we can just keep it out of the village.' This was Misha Bobrov's litany each day. 'Of course,' he would say, 'if Russia was properly run, the whole area would be sealed off. There'd be a cordon sanitaire cordon sanitaire.' But neither local nor provincial administration could attempt such a thing: people came and went. Thanks, however, to the efforts of the two Bobrovs and of Suvorin, a sort of informal quarantine was in force that seemed to be limiting the terrible cholera's spread.

Indeed, their modest success was soon confirmed by a young doctor that the zemstvo zemstvo managed to employ to help deal with the outbreak. 'In other parts, it's raging almost out of control,' he said. 'The famine has weakened everyone and made them terribly prone to diseases.' managed to employ to help deal with the outbreak. 'In other parts, it's raging almost out of control,' he said. 'The famine has weakened everyone and made them terribly prone to diseases.'

It was not long before Nicolai had made himself extremely familiar with the disease. 'It especially attacks the young and old,' the doctor informed him. 'The most serious cases usually seem to go straight to the white vomit and diarrhoea stage. They usually die in a day or two. There is one small comfort though,' he added. 'Generally, the bulk of the fatalities occur at the very start of the outbreak. So the first week or so is the worst. After that, many of them pull through.'

There were several dozen cases in the town, a few in the monastery, and several in the villages in the area. Nicolai greatly admired the way the young doctor went about his work. 'Though the truth is, I can't do much,' he confessed. 'The early stages I dose with opium or nitrate of silver; mustard flannels and chloroform for when they get the cramps. If they're sinking and there's a chance they might pull through, brandy or ammonia to give them a jolt back to life. And that,' he said wryly, 'is about it.'

The unfortunate doctor was soon short of everything. Once more, the central government promised medical supplies, but this time the Bobrovs did not even expect them to arrive which they did not. 'All my best brandy went in the first week,' Misha said with a sad smile. Nicolai went to the provincial capital to get supplies but found none. In Moscow, however, Suvorin was able to obtain some nitrate. And the young doctor worked without ceasing.

'How do you avoid getting it yourself?' Nicolai had asked him when they first met.

'Some people believe it's carried in the air,' the doctor told him. 'But I believe the chief cause of infection is through the mouth. Never drink water or eat food touched by someone with cholera. If you get vomit or any bodily fluid from sick people on your clothes, change and wash yourself very thoroughly before you eat or drink anything. I don't say it's foolproof, but I haven't got cholera yet.'

And though Nicolai several times accompanied the young doctor to places where the disease was raging, he carefully followed this advice and came to no harm.

A week passed. A second. A third. And still the cholera did not spread to the village of Bobrovo. Strangely enough also, while the rest of the world was trembling before the sickness, Misha Bobrov was getting his strength again. He would often walk out now with his wife or young Arina and stroll in the woods above the house. It was pleasant, too, for the old man and his son to come to know each other better again. Indeed, it nowadays caused Nicolai some amusement to remark to his friend the doctor: 'Do you know, since he turned against the government, my old father's far more radical than I am. I thought it was supposed to be the other way round!'

Gradually the deaths from the disease grew less, the new cases fewer. After a month it seemed to have subsided. 'You've been lucky,' the doctor told them. 'And I've just been asked to go to another bad spot over by Murom. Goodbye.'

Soon afterwards, in mid-May, Nicolai decided it was time for him to return to St Petersburg. 'I'll be back in July,' he promised his parents. 'And if there's no more sign of cholera in the region, I'll bring all the family to see you.' It was with a considerable sense of relief, therefore, that he set out once more for the capital.

He did not go alone. To their surprise, the Bobrovs had discovered that young Arina had always wanted to see the capital. And since Misha was now recovered, and Nicolai's wife had written to say she had need of a temporary nanny for their children, it was agreed that young Arina should accompany Nicolai and remain with his family for the summer. The girl seemed delighted.

And if, just before leaving, she had had an unpleasant interview with her brother Boris, she kept it to herself.

It was three days after they had left that old Timofei Romanov showed signs one afternoon of being ill. Within an hour he was vomiting a whitish substance with little rice-like grains in it.

He had cholera. It had gone straight to the second, deadly stage.

By the time darkness fell, he was in agony. By morning he was transformed. The terrible discharges had left his body wracked and almost purple. His eyes were hollow caverns; the pallor of death was upon him. His wife and old Arina, who had changed his sodden clothes a dozen times already, stood in the pale light of dawn and gazed at him mournfully. The old fellow's eyes were staring, sometimes at them, sometimes at the little icon in the corner; but he could no longer utter. Once, with a huge effort, he managed to smile, as if to tell them that he was resigned.

Misha Bobrov was surprised early that morning to find Boris Romanov at his door. He could not remember when the surly and suspicious fellow had last been up to the house. But today he seemed polite, almost friendly.

'I'm afraid, sir,' he explained, 'it's bad news. My father.' And he told Misha the details.

'My God.' So, just when he thought they had been spared, the plague had come to Bobrovo after all. Thank God I'm fit enough to deal with the crisis, Misha thought, and immediately gave orders to send for a doctor and warn the people in Russka about the outbreak.

He was rather surprised, a few minutes later, to find young Boris still hanging around.

'The fact is, sir,' the younger man explained, 'he's asking for you. He wants to say goodbye.' And just for a moment, Misha saw tears form in Boris's pleading eyes. 'He won't last the day,' he said simply.

Misha hesitated. He could not help himself. The fact was, he had no desire to go into a house where there was cholera. I can't afford to get it myself, he thought. There's too much to do. But immediately he felt ashamed. God knows, I ask the doctor to do it. Besides, I've known old Timofei all my life.

'Of course,' he said. And put on his coat.

How confoundedly hot it was in the Romanov izba izba. There was a suffocating smell, despite the fact that a window had been opened.

There before him lay his childhood playmate Timofei or what was left of him. Poor devil. It seemed his mind might have wandered a bit, for he now gazed at Misha with a kind of astonishment; but it was hard to know what was in his mind since the old man could not speak. My God, but he's the same age as me, Misha remembered. He looked a hundred. Well, now I'm here, I must go through with it.

He glanced round the room. Despite everything, old Arina and her daughter had kept it spotlessly clean. The floor had been scrubbed recently, and the table. Timofei lay in clean bedclothes by the stove. The morning light was streaming in through the window. He glanced at the little icon in the corner, taking what comfort he could from it. Boris offered to take his coat: the heat felt a little less oppressive once it was off. But though they offered him a chair, he preferred to stand, some distance away from the patient, and was careful not to touch anything. And now dear old Timofei was trying to smile.

Misha spoke what words of comfort he could. To his surprise, he did not find it so difficult. He recalled times past, people they had known, and the gentle old peasant seemed to receive pleasure from it. Boris, with a grateful smile, slipped out of the room for a minute. It was strange how, in the presence of death, foolish antagonisms could disappear.

Boris moved swiftly and quietly. He could hardly believe how easy the whole thing had been. His father had looked so surprised to see the landowner that for a second Boris had feared Misha might guess that the old man had not sent for him at all, but he had not; all was well. Now he slipped across the passageway into the open storeroom opposite.

The bedclothes and three of his father's shirts were lying in a corner where they had been thrown a short time ago. Old Arina said they should burn them but no one had had time yet. Carefully he opened out Misha Bobrov's coat, and laid it on the pile. Then he turned it over and did it again, gently pressing the coat down. He repeated this, making sure that the coat was thoroughly impregnated. Then, with a look of polite respect on his face, he went back into the room, carrying the coat carefully.

'This,' he whispered to himself, 'is for Natalia.'

What a business that had been, Misha considered a short time later as he walked hurriedly back to the house. How horribly hot the room was. Thank God he had taken care not to touch anything. You couldn't be too careful.

But he was proud of himself. He had done the right thing, and the old peasant was happy: he could see that.

He must have been sweating himself in there, more than he had realized. As he strode back up the slope even his coat felt damp. He wiped his brow and his moustache with his coat sleeve. Yes, it had certainly been an unpleasant business and he was glad it was over.

A week later the news reached Nicolai in St Petersburg: his father had cholera.

1892, Summer There was a subdued buzz of conversation in the room. Soon the distinguished speaker would arrive and Rosa Abramovich felt a tingle of anticipation. She had never been to a meeting like this before. There were about thirty people there, almost all in their early twenties.

Outside the evening sun was bathing the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius and its old castle hill in a soft orange light.

Rosa Abramovich was twenty now and she had lived in Vilnius for a decade. She might, she knew, have been in America. Many Jews had started to go there after the pogroms in 1881; but at the family conference her father had called in the autumn of that terrible year, they had decided instead to cross the Jewish Pale, some five hundred miles to the north-west, into Lithuania. 'There's not much trouble in Vilnius,' her father had remarked. 'If pogroms come there, then we'll leave Russia.' He still had faith.

Rosa loved her new home. From the Lithuanian capital it was only a day's train journey to the Baltic Sea, or south-west to the ancient Polish capital of Warsaw. To the north lay the Baltic provinces where the Latvians and Estonians lived and where once, centuries ago, the Crusading Teutonic Knights had raided Russia. 'It's very much a border province, a crossroads,' her father had remarked.

And indeed, though all these lands nowadays formed part of the Tsar's sprawling empire, it could not be said that their character was in the least Russian. In the rolling, prosperous farmlands and woodlands of Lithuania, the people had not forgotten that once they and the Poles, in their joint kingdom, had been masters of all these western lands, and more besides. The Lithuanian farmers, with their large, handsome wooden houses, reminded Rosa of the independent Cossack farmers she had known in the Ukraine. As for the capital of Vilnius, it was a pleasant old European city, containing buildings in many styles Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque and Neoclassical. It contained a fine Catholic cathedral and numerous churches. Of Russian architecture there were hardly any examples at all. And this cosmopolitan city had also a thriving Jewish community.

In fact, Rosa's father had found only one thing wrong with the place: there were far too many of those secular-minded young Jews who were turning their back on their religion. Try as he might, it had been almost impossible to stop his two sons consorting with them; but little Rosa he had kept a strict watch over, until his sudden and unexpected death the previous year. And now, it was into precisely such dangerous company that she had fallen that evening. It was all rather exciting.

Friends of her brothers had brought her there. Half the people in the room were young men and women from the assimilated Jewish middle class students, a young doctor, a lawyer. The rest were Jewish workers, including three girls who were seamstresses. It was a pleasant, lively group, but to Rosa they were all strangers. And why had she come? She hardly knew: but mainly, she supposed, because she had nothing better to do.

For though she was only twenty, life had already dealt Rosa some bitter blows. At first, after arriving in Vilnius, it had seemed that everything was going so well. Her musical career had made huge strides: at the age of sixteen she had given several piano recitals and made a small tour; a year later she was promised a major tour with an important conductor. Her parents were delighted; her brothers proud, even a little envious. She had everything she could desire. And now she had nothing.

Why, she used to wonder why would God give her this gift, only to blight it? This must be another of life's inexplicable mysteries. The last three years had been a nightmare. Sometimes the sickness had been like a terrible weight on her chest and she would cough until it hurt; for days she would be prostrate, unable to summon up the energy to do anything. The tour had had to be cancelled. Even her musical studies were almost abandoned. 'If I can't play properly, I don't want to play at all,' she told her unhappy father. She had slowly sunk into a depression, while her family watched hopelessly.

'If only she had friends to help her,' her mother would lament. The trouble was that almost all her friends in Vilnius were musicians, and now she no longer wished to see them. Only one close friend remained: young Ivan Karpenko, down in the Ukraine. Even since that terrible day when he had saved the family from the pogrom, there had been a special bond between Rosa and the Cossack youth. It was to Ivan, therefore, that she wrote long letters during this period of pain, and from whom she received back letters of warm encouragement.

The sudden death of her father the previous year had forced Rosa to come out of her lethargy. The family's main income had gone; her two brothers were having to support her mother. Rosa was forced to consider what to do with her life. A musical career was out of the question now so what were the alternatives. Teach the piano for a pittance? Her mother suggested it, but Rosa dreaded the thought. There was the Teachers' Institute in the city, where Jewish students could train to teach in the state schools. Her brothers thought this was better. What does it matter, if I can't do what I want? she thought. But I must do something. I can't just be a useless person. She had enrolled at the Institute. And now here she was, on a summer evening, at a Jewish workers' meeting simply because she had nothing better to do.

There were so many meetings. Some were just study groups, teaching eager workers to read and write; others were more communal and met to discuss how they could improve working and living conditions. And a few were, more or less, political.

Today's meeting, however, was rather special. A professor all the way from Moscow had come to address them on worker movements in and outside Russia. 'But I dare say it'll go further than that,' one of her companions whispered. 'The professor's a Marxist.' And when Rosa looked blank. 'A revolutionary.'

A revolutionary. What did such a person look like? Would they all be arrested? It was with some interest that Rosa now looked up as the speaker entered the room.

Peter Suvorin spoke well. At first, his thin, abstracted face, small gold-rimmed spectacles and quiet, kindly eyes might have given him the appearance of a mild-mannered schoolmaster. But soon it was this very gentleness and simple sincerity combined with a wonderful clarity in all his explanations that made him impressive.

At thirty-seven, Peter Suvorin had not changed. He was one of those pure and fortunate souls who, having encountered a single and powerful idea, find their destiny. Peter's idea, the theme of his life, was very simple: that mankind could and must reach a state where all men are free and none oppressed. He had believed it in 1874 and he believed it now.

He had had a strange life. Back in 1874, after his sudden departure from Russka, he had wandered in the Ukraine for months and the Suvorins had wondered if he had died. Then, however, needing money, he had contacted his brother Vladimir in Moscow; and Vladimir, feeling he must, had let old Savva know that his grandson was alive.

Was it, perhaps, Savva Suvorin who had sealed Peter's fate? According to his lights, the old man had been forgiving. For the letter he had seen, supposedly written by Peter and confessing to laying the fire, had been a terrible blow. For months afterwards, in secret, he would mutter to himself: 'To attack his own family!' It would have been hard to say whether this treachery, or the accidental killing of the two young people, shocked him more; and he was so shaken that he never told anyone, including Vladimir, about it. Now, therefore, when news of Peter came, Savva sent him a strongly worded message: return at once to make amends for his terrible crimes or be cut off from the family for ever. It seemed to Savva that he was acting with forbearance. And he was shocked still further when, having received the message with a groan, Peter refused to return. 'His heart is hardened into sin,' old Suvorin declared, and never spoke of the young man again. Six months later he died.

The Will of Savva Suvorin was clear. The dangerous revolutionary Peter was cut out of all control of the Suvorin enterprises and left with only a modest allowance. 'You could contest it,' Vladimir told him frankly. 'Or I'll give you part of my fortune myself.' But Peter was young and proud. 'Besides, I want no part of it anyway,' he said. He returned to Moscow and his studies. He fell in love but was rejected. He discovered a talent for physics, studied the subject deeply, and even wrote a small textbook on the subject which was published successfully. He told himself that he was happy enough. And he continued, steadfastly, to look for a better world.

He came to Marxism in the 1880s. Ever since his first meeting with Popov, he had become a student of revolutionary thought. He had several times encountered Popov again, and that secretive fellow had put him in touch with certain radical groups; but by all these people he was seen as a kindly dreamer. In Marxism, however, he had found a system that gave him more stature. Here was his longed-for utopia, but scientifically arrived at not by some violent, conspiratorial overthrow, but by a gradual and natural historical process. 'You call my views utopian,' he would say to Vladimir, 'but I just call them human progress.' And in his heart he secretly believed that one day the Suvorin factories would pass into the hands of the workers with scarcely a shot fired.

Strangely, it was his early interest in Marxism that had convinced the tsarist authorities that the mild-mannered professor was harmless to the state. That very year a senior official had privately conveyed the government's attitude to Vladimir Suvorin himself.

'My dear fellow, as long as your brother sticks to studying Marx we're not very worried. We've looked at all these things, you know,' he added wisely. 'This Marx was an economist. We've even allowed some of his works to be translated and published because right or wrong, no one can understand a word of him anyway. It's revolutionaries we're worried about, not economists and I can't see your brother throwing any bombs, can you?'

It was a strange relationship between the brothers the rich industrialist and the poor professor, the family man and the lonely bachelor. They were fond of each other, but some strain was inevitable. Nor was it helped by the fact that Vladimir's handsome young second wife, who loved to entertain in the great Moscow house, could not help feeling rather sorry for this kindly man whom she regarded as a poor unfortunate. 'Peter should marry,' she would tell Vladimir. 'But I'm afraid he's too timid.' Peter sensed her feelings and it hurt his pride. He did not go to the Suvorin house often.

This evening's meeting was small, but Peter Suvorin believed it was important, and he was especially anxious it should go well. As he spoke, therefore, he tried to gauge the reaction of the audience carefully. With admirable precision, he outlined for these young people the developments in Europe. Only three years before, an important Socialist conference, the Second International, had been held for delegates from many countries. The last year had seen, for the first time, groups of workers in Russia celebrating May Day as a token of solidarity with the international workers' movement. 'And these things, in their infancy now, will shape the future of civilization in generations to come,' he assured them.

Only when he was sure he had them with him did Peter Suvorin broach the real subject that was on his mind, and the reason why he had been so anxious to address them that night. Which was that they were Jewish.

He began carefully, and subtly, by alluding to some of their grievances: for in recent years the tsarist government, for reasons never explained, had undoubtedly turned vigorously against the Jewish community and treated them shabbily. Jews had been forbidden to buy land and told they must only live in towns; education quotas were being applied against them so that only a miserably small percentage of students in higher education could be Jews, even in the big cities in the Pale. And the laws of the Pale were suddenly being enforced with such viciousness that the previous year some seventeen thousand Jews had been thrown out of Moscow. Worse yet were the repeated outbreaks of violence since the pogroms of 1881, which the government had done little to prevent.

It was hardly surprising therefore if in recent years the Jewish workers had begun to think of setting up their own workers' committees, quite independent of the others. Peter could hardly blame them. But this was exactly what he was anxious to combat.

'The workers of the world must unite,' he told them. 'All groups, all nations, shall be one.' He saw this vision so clearly. 'And besides,' he warned them, 'as part of a larger movement, your voice will be much stronger than it ever would be as a separate group.'

They listened to him politely, but he could see they were uncertain. And then a tousle-haired young man near the front quietly addressed him. 'You say we should remain part of a larger brotherhood. Well and good. But what are we to do if our non-Jewish brothers refuse to defend us? What then?'

It was the question Peter had been awaiting. For it was true, he knew, that Russian workers had mixed feelings about their Jewish brothers. In Russia proper, they were foreigners; in the Pale, they were competition; and there were even activists and Socialists who had failed to stand up against the pogroms for fear of alienating the workers they were trying to win over to their cause.

Peter was too honest to deny the problem, but it was a phase that would pass, he assured the young man. 'Remember, we are at the very first beginnings,' he said. 'Even many of the activist workers have to be educated; but as the great brotherhood develops in size and consciousness, this problem will fall away. And,' he added, 'you will speed that process by staying on the inside, not by splitting off.' There was a long pause. He was not sure if he had convinced the young man or not. Some other questions followed.

It was just as the meeting was about to end that the girl stood up. She had been sitting towards the back, just behind a large youth, and he had only been aware of her mass of black hair. Now, suddenly, she was staring at him, with huge, luminous eyes and a look of genuine puzzlement on her face. And indeed, Rosa Abramovich was was puzzled. She had listened intently to all that Peter Suvorin had said. She had caught his vision of the great sweep of human history and the better world to come, and it had touched her profoundly: she had never heard anyone speak like that before. Yet when she considered her own life, and her memories of what had passed in the Ukraine, there was something she found she could not understand. And so now, she faced him a little awkwardly and asked in a soft voice: 'But when the new world comes, when the Socialist state has been achieved, will that mean that the Jews are not persecuted any more that men will have changed?' puzzled. She had listened intently to all that Peter Suvorin had said. She had caught his vision of the great sweep of human history and the better world to come, and it had touched her profoundly: she had never heard anyone speak like that before. Yet when she considered her own life, and her memories of what had passed in the Ukraine, there was something she found she could not understand. And so now, she faced him a little awkwardly and asked in a soft voice: 'But when the new world comes, when the Socialist state has been achieved, will that mean that the Jews are not persecuted any more that men will have changed?'

Peter stared at her. It was a question of such dazzling stupidity that, for a moment, he had not known what to say. Was she trying to be funny? No. As he gazed at her large, serious eyes and pale face, it was obvious that she was entirely sincere. What a striking-looking girl she was. He smiled.

'I'm afraid you haven't understood,' he said kindly. 'In a Socialist worker state, all men will be equal. The persecution of minorities is inconceivable.' And seeing her looking doubtful: 'Come to me after the meeting. I'll recommend you some books to read.'

Rosa sat down. Someone was saying something, but she did not hear. Did she believe the professor? She had no idea. But one thing she did know. He was the most beautiful-looking man she had ever seen in her life.

The courtship of Peter Suvorin and Rosa Abramovich was not long, for from their first meeting it seemed as if they had known each other all their lives.

'He's almost twice your age,' her brothers warned her.

'He's a revolutionary, and he's not Jewish,' her mother protested. And then, more hurtfully: 'Remember your father, Rosa, before you do this thing.'

Rosa had loved three men in her life. One, she now understood, was the Cossack boy Ivan Karpenko. Of course, it was only a childhood affection, followed by a friendship conducted by letter. Yet as she grew older and wiser, this innocent childhood love came to seem more and not less important to her. The other man had been a conductor she had watched from afar when she was fifteen, and never spoken to. And now Peter Suvorin. None of them, as it happened, had been Jewish.

What was it that so moved her about Peter Suvorin? Was it his mind? His brilliant mastery of economic theory fascinated her, even if she could not always follow it. He seemed to possess a system that explained all the complex problems of the world. But there was also a purity about him, a passionate idealism that she loved. He was a pilgrim soul, an outsider, a sufferer. He was a bachelor who, in all these years, had never found a woman worthy to be his wife.

As for Peter, he was astounded to find himself with this magical, poetic creature who had somehow dropped from the sky into his life. True, she was Jewish; but she was one of a kind. And besides, he told himself, I really have no one in the world to please but myself.

If Peter felt he had begun his life again, to Rosa it seemed that her own existence had suddenly been resolved. She had a purpose now. Even her health started to improve dramatically. And though she loved her mother and revered the memory of her father, she found she could no longer think as they had. She had seen too much of the younger generation, her brother's friends. Many of them scarcely went to the synagogue at all. 'Why should I ruin my life, which has been unhappy, for the sake of religion, which has brought me no comfort?' she once burst out to her mother who was berating her. 'I won't do it. I don't care any more.' She was in love. Nothing else seemed to matter.

'You are leaving me,' her mother told her bitterly. 'I will have nothing to do with it.'

'She'll get over it,' her brothers counselled.

It was in September that Rosa left with Peter for Moscow. But it was a short while later, just before they married, that she took one further step. She accepted baptism into the Russian Orthodox Church. 'You know it means nothing,' she wrote to her brothers. 'But it makes things easier in Moscow, especially if there are children. I suppose we shall have to tell Mother,' she added, doubtfully.

A month later, when she finally heard of it, Rosa's mother quietly summoned her friends to sit Shivah with her. She herself had sat, only two weeks before, with an old couple whose son had become an atheist and a Socialist. 'She is dead to me now,' she announced sadly.

Her sons refused to take part, though they tried to comfort her. But her friends understood.

1905, July Young Ivan worshipped his Uncle Boris. Uncle Boris knew everything.

He was head of the family now. Timofei and his wife had died in the plague of '91; old Arina a year later. He had a large family, some of them already full grown; and to these he added his little sister Arina, whose husband had died young, and her six-year-old son, Ivan.

The news that his Uncle Boris had given the boy was certainly exciting. 'This year, little Ivan, is the most important year in the history of Russia. And do you know why? Because the revolution has begun.'

The revolution. It was certainly an exciting word, but the boy was not certain what it meant. 'It means,' his uncle explained, 'that we are going to kick the Bobrovs out and take all the land for ourselves. What do you think of that?' And little Ivan had to agree that this sounded wonderful indeed.

He knew that his mother Arina liked the Bobrovs, and not everyone in the village spoke badly of them. But Uncle Boris was always right. 'Long live the revolution!' he cried, to please his uncle.

The extraordinary events of 1905 had been brewing for a long time. If the reign of Alexander III had been one of reaction, the last eleven years under his unimaginative son Nicholas II and his German wife had been a sorry continuation of almost everything that was dull and oppressive in the former regime. Indeed, sometimes it almost seemed as if the unfortunate Tsar Nicholas was deliberately looking for people to oppress. For nearly a century, the people of Finland had been an autonomous duchy within the empire; now, suddenly, the government had decided to Russify them, as it had the Ukraine, with the result that the Finns were rioting. In the Ukraine, meanwhile, there had been a peasant rising, and in 1903 a terrible pogrom. Meanwhile the government, frightened and determined to control everything, had become almost irrational. For no reason, there was a sudden clampdown on the universities; and when students protested they were treated like political agitators and sent into the army. It had even alienated the last supporters who might have helped them, by curtailing the work of the liberal gentry in the zemstvos zemstvos.