Her hair was piled up on top of her head in the
old way that she used to do when she was trying to imitate Vera, and I
don't know why but that seemed to me a good omen, as though she were
already on her way back to us. She was wearing a very simple white
frock.
In spite of her smile she looked unhappy, and I could see that during
this last week experience had not been kind to her, because there was an
air of shyness and uncertainty which had never been there before. I was
just going over to speak to her when two of the giggling girls
surrounded her and carried her off.
I carried the little picture of her in my mind all through the noisy,
strident meal that followed. I couldn't see her from where I sat, nor
did I once catch the tones of her voice, although I listened. Only a
month ago there would have been no party at which Nina was present where
her voice would not have risen above all others.
No one watching us would have believed any stories about food shortage
in Petrograd. I daresay at this very moment in Berlin they are having
just such meals. Until the last echo of the last Trump has died away in
the fastnesses of the advancing mountains the rich will be getting from
somewhere the things that they desire! I have no memory of what we had
to eat that night, but I know that it was all very magnificent and
noisy, kind-hearted and generous and vulgar.
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