The little man’s teeth were chattering, so that he could scarcely speak....
“I heard them in the other room. I knew that the cupboard would be the first place. I slipped into the kitchen and hid in the fireplace.”
“You’re not angry, Nicholas?” Vera asked. “We couldn’t send him out to be shot.”
“What does that matter?” he almost impatiently brushed it aside. “There are other things more important.” He looked at the trembling dirty figure. “Only you’d better go back and hide again until it’s dark. They might come back....”
He caught Vera by the arm. His eyes were flames. He drew her with him back into her little room. He closed the door.
“The Revolution has come—it has really come,” he cried.
“Yes,” she answered, “it has come into this very house. The world has changed.”
“The Czar has abdicated.... The old world has gone, the old wicked world! Russia is born again!”
His eyes were the eyes of a fanatic.
Her eyes, too, were alight. She gazed past him.