I sat next to him at dinner; I talked of Poland—and I knew my subject—I talked brilliantly; he listened, he hung on my words, and he, the Prime Minister of all Russia, the Tsar's right–hand man, asked me to drive with him next day in his sledge. I, an almost unknown Polish girl!
When I accepted, I was in the seventh heaven of delight.
Next day he called and we set forth; at a deserted spot in the woods near Warsaw he tried to kiss me—I struck him in the face with the butt of his own whip.
That was why he had hung on my words, that was why he had taken me for my drive; it was my Polish body that interested him—not Poland.
The Prime Minister of Russia was confined to his room for two days, "owing to an indisposition." How I laughed when I saw the bulletin in the paper, signed by two doctors, but it taught me a lesson; I never dreamt idle dreams again.
No, I am wrong, my beloved. I dreamt an idle dream, a lovely dream about you and I. An after–the–war dream, if this war should ever end, but like other dreams it has ended—in dreams.
But I must hurry, for my little watch tells me that one hour of my five has gone, and I have much to say.
I could have married, and married brilliantly, but Poland held me back. I did not know what I could do for my country, it all seemed so hopeless, and yet I felt that perhaps one day… and I felt I ought to be single when that day came.
It was not easy, my Karl, sometimes it was hard; one man there was, Sergius was his Christian name; he loved me madly, and sometimes I thought—but no matter, he is dead now, killed at Tannenberg, and I—well, I will tell you more of my story.
When the war broke out and clouded over that last beautiful summer in 1914 (I wonder will there ever be another like it in your lifetime, my Karl? No, I don't think it can ever be quite the same after all this!), we were all in the country. Alex was back from his school in Petrograd, and my father kept him at home for the autumn term.
How well I remember the excitement, the mobilization, the blessing of the colours, the wave of patriotism which swept over the country; even I, under the influence of the specious proclamations that were issued broadcast by the Government, with their promises of reform, and redress for Poland after the war was over, felt more Russian than Polish. Lies! Lies! Lies! that was what the Government promises were, my Karl.
Under the stress of war the rottenness of that great whited sepulchre, Russia, feared the revival of the Polish spirit; it might have been awkward, and so they lied with their tongues in their cheeks, and we simple Poles believed them; the peasantry flocked to their depots, little knowing whom they fought, but the proclamations which were read to them told them they fought for Poland, and we women worked and prayed for the success of Russian arms.
Then the tide of war swept westward, and all day long and every day the troops, and the guns and the motor–cars and the wagons rolled through the village to the west.
Guarded hints in the papers seemed to say that all was not well in France, but France was so far away, and all the time the Russians were going west through our village. Mighty Russia was putting forth her strength, and the Austrian debacle was in full swing; these were great days, my Karl, for a Russian!
Then one day the long columns of men and all the traffic seemed to hesitate in the sluggish westward flow, and then it stopped, and then it began to go east. The weeks went on, and one day, very, very faintly, there was a rumbling like a distant thunderstorm. It was the guns! The front was coming back.
Have you ever seen forest fires, my Karl? We had them every autumn in our woods. If you have, then you know how all the small animals and the birds, the rabbits and the foxes, and perhaps a wolf or two, and the deer, and the thrushes and the linnets come out from the shelter of the trees, fleeing blindly from the great peril, anxious only to save their lives. So it was when the front came back. Herds of moujiks, the old men, the women, the children, the poor little babies, struggled blindly eastwards through the village.
Pushing their miserable household gods on handcarts, or staggering along with loads on their backs, and weary children dragging at their arms, the human tide flowed eastwards, round our house, begged perhaps a drink of water, and then wandered feverishly onwards.
