Oddly, I did not hate Semyonov;
I saw quite clearly that I had never hated him--something too impersonal
about him, some sense, too, of an outside power driving him. No, I did
not hate him, but God! how I feared him--feared him not for my own sake,
but for the sake of those who had--was this too arrogant?--been given as
it seemed to me,--into my charge.
I remembered that Monday was the 30th of April, and that, on that
evening, there was to be a big Allied meeting at the Bourse, at which
our Ambassador, Sir George Buchanan, the Belgian Consul, and others,
were to speak. I had promised to take Vera to this. Tuesday the 1st of
May was to see a great demonstration by all the workmen's and soldiers'
committees. It was to correspond with the Labour demonstrations arranged
to take place on that day all over Europe, and the Russian date had been
altered to the new style in order to provide for this. Many people
considered that the day would be the cause of much rioting, of definite
hostility to the Provisional Government, of anti-foreign demonstrations,
and so on; others, idealistic Russians, believed that all the soldiers,
the world over, would on that day throw down their arms and proclaim a
universal peace.
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