We are now nearing the frontier. The little country stations, decorated for the 7th with red bunting and pictures of Lenin, will soon be passed. Back we go to the old world of tips and restaurants and civilisation.
Good-bye, wonder world, good-bye—good-bye!
November 12th. Reval, Esthonia.
We arrived in Reval late on Tuesday night, the 9th. I was handed a package containing my two volumes of diary and all my kodak films, which thanks to Litvinoff had been sealed with Government seals and confided to a courier who kept them in his charge until we were over the frontier.
I have written my diary all these weeks as trustingly as though I were in my own home, never foreseeing any difficulties of departure. My trust in Providence is always justified.
The next day I went to the British Consulate. Mr. Leslie (no relation) made me extremely welcome. He said that he had heard of me from H. G. Wells, and that until then he had not known I was in Russia: I had (reproachfully) not addressed myself to the Consulate on my in-going journey. I found that he had a Henry James cult, and had read everything Henry James had written, including the two volumes of letters. He gave me his bathroom for an hour and a half, invited me to luncheon and then arranged for me to stay the remaining two days in Reval with a most hospitable English couple, Mr. and Mrs. Harwood, who lived in a beautiful villa on the seashore. There I was overwhelmed by kindness.
I also learned with some curiosity and interest the politics of Esthonia, the half-Bolshevik conditions of things, and the history of the Baltic Germans, their settlement in Reval and their forced departure. It is an amusing but complicated little side-show.
During my stay in Reval I had to go several times to the Soviet headquarters at the Hotel Petersburg. It amuses me to recall my bewildered impression of last September. This time when I went I felt thoroughly at home. Not only did Comrade Gai take a great deal of trouble for me, but Gukovski received me as a friend.
On Thursday morning the coffins arrived from Moscow by courier, as promised by Litvinoff, and I had a fine game of dodge. Gai sent them on a lorry to me at the British Consulate just when I had left, and they returned to the Hotel Petersbourg while I was chasing after them to the British Consulate. Finally I got them down to the quay, but they were not allowed on board because there was not the required official paper from Moscow. Had the ship left as she was supposed to leave at midday, they certainly would not have been on board, but there was a storm brewing so the ship delayed sailing a day. When Gai had finally sent me the necessary paper, I sought out the Captain and begged him to have my cases put somewhere especially safe. “They contain the heads of Lenin and Trotsky,” I exclaimed. The Captain looked awfully impressed and pleased, so pleased that I added “plaster heads—and breakable.”
“A plaster head of Trotsky—and breakable? Come on! let us break Trotsky’s head,” and he made towards it threateningly, much to the amusement of the onlookers.