Of course there was a large Radical element, and so I got a good reception; they were sympathetic. I didn’t realize they were radicals and interpreted it as sympathy from the good New Yorkers. Whatever element it was they were tolerant and encouraging. When I began about Trotzky I forgot my audience, and got carried away, I seemed to have touched the magnetic cord to Moscow, straight to Trotzky! I described this man of wit, fire and genius—I talked of him as a Napoleon of peace! And then, suddenly remembering, I pulled myself together, hesitated and said I wouldn’t say any more about Trotzky! There were shouts of “go on!” This must have come from the radical element—but I was too wrought up and fevered to think politically.
When it was over, Dick joined me on the stage amid applause—people came to the footlights, and I went down on my knees to talk to my friends who came to the edge. Afterwards, on the way out, scores of people of all kinds surrounded me. One, a woman with a tragic and strong face, said, “Let me thank you for being so fair and unprejudiced. I am a Communist, I have not yet served my sentence ...” Her face was convulsed with emotion and traces of suffering ... there are martyr fanatics.
The more I look back on what I’ve done, the more it frightens me. I wonder how I ever skated on thin ice as I did.
February 5, 1921.
Moved into the flat. It is uncomfortable but I shall get it right. We are three people and two beds, Dick has to sleep on the sofa in my room. The telephone is cut off, and the heat does not seem to work, but for these two latter items one is thankful!
Griffin Barry, who used to be the Russian correspondent of the London Daily Herald, came to fetch me, and took me I don’t know where, to a studio belonging to Miss Bessie Beatty who has written a book on the Russian Revolution. There were a lot of people but I only knew Mr. and Mrs. Bullitt; he has been to Russia and she is very beautiful. I met Mr. Kenneth Durant, who is left in charge of the Soviet office in the absence of Martens. He has an extremely interesting, rather faun-like head. We all sat around the room with plates on our laps and were fed. It was primitive but an extremely good idea, and one I shall adopt if ever I want to give a bigger party in my studio than I have table space for.
A certain amount of politics was talked afterwards, in which I dared not join. In conservative circles I dare not talk politics for fear of being called Bolshevik. In Bolshevik circles I keep silent for fear they discover how ignorant I am! Durant left early, and I had no chance of talking with him. He has rather an enigmatic smile, and says very little.
Sunday, February 6, 1921.
Dick and I spent most of the day out at Yonkers with our cousin, Travers Jerome, Jr., and his wife, Joy, who is very good looking. The boy child is of the type that mine and Shane Leslie’s are, so I suppose it’s the Jerome blood! My American family seem to be very nice. Mama often wanted to talk about them, but we never would let her!
I dined with Maxine Elliot, and had on one side of me Mr. George Creel, and on the other Mr. Swope. The latter is the editor of The World, but I did not know it at first or I might not have said some of the things I did. There is a type of American! What force, what energy (“dynamic,” I said of him to someone. “No—cyclonic!” they corrected)! I asked him, when I was able to get a word in edgeways, how he manages to revitalize, he seemed to me to expend so much energy. He said he got it back from me, from everyone, that what he gives out he gets back, it is a sort of circle. He was so vibrant that I found my heart thumping with excitement as though I had drunk champagne, which I hadn’t! He talks a lot but talks well, is never dull....